Richard J. Christiansen

Richard J. Christiansen (July 5, 1965) is a serial entrepreneur, best-selling author, and philanthropist.

Early life

Richard was born in Beaver, Utah to John and Laurel Christiansen. He graduated from Beaver High School. He attended Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah, earning a B.S. in electronic engineering technology in 1989. In 1991, he earned a master's degree in business from BYU's Marriott School of Business.

Career

Richard worked as General Manager of the PC Division at Mitsubishi Electric, Product Line Manager at Novell, and General Manager of About.com. He left the corporate world in 2003. He is a serial entrepreneur and a parallel entrepreneur.

Some of Richard’s businesses include: Tornado Solutions, Know More Media, Cyclone Trading Company, MortgageSaver101, Mountain Grabbers LLC, Castlewave, and Custom Dreams LLC.

Author

Richard co-authored his first book Bootstrap Business: A Step-By-Step Business Survival Guide. It was published in 2009 by Wizard Academy Press. Richard's second book, The Zigzag Principle was published in 2011 by McGraw-Hill. The Zigzag Principle is a USA Today, Amazon.com, and Inc. Magazine bestseller.

Richard was the featured author, in May 2012, of the 12 Books Group leading the discussion of his second book, The Zigzag Principle.

Philanthropy

Richard is involved in philanthropic efforts around the world. He is particularly interested in helping the people of Nepal. After a family trip to the Himalayas in 2001, Richard and his family decided to help the Nepalese people starting by educating a Sherpa family.