Community

Just a real short (but deeply meaningful to me) post today. Yesterday I was thrilled and humbled to be invited back into the Veeam Vanguard program, for the second year in a row. I have written about the program in the past, as have many others. Thus far, I think Dmitry has one of the most comprehensive pairs of posts that I have seen on the program. This year, we are up to 62 folks. Of the new folks, a large number of them are names that I immediately recognized due to their influence in the ‘vCommunity’. Going back to one of the key values of the program (your peers), I am truly looking forward to meeting these fellow Vanguards, as well as what the 2017 program has to offer. ...

Anyone who knows me knows that I am a huge proponent of the ‘vCommunity’. Since I upped my game at VMWorld 2015, I have been addicted to not just consuming community resources, but also giving back. I decided that I wanted to get involved and help out. Towards the end of 2015, my local VMUG group was not looking for any sort of additional leadership help, so I did the next best thing - I started my own user group. ...

Me on a panel discussion at the Veeam User Group held in Las Vegas at VMWorld 2016 About a year ago, I wrote a self-reflective post about what stood out to me in 2015, and what I had hoped to accomplish in 2016. Reading through it, I have to say, that I did not accomplish two out of the three goals I had listed. With regards to the ’networking’ goal, that just didn’t happen, although it is still something that I might try and pursue in 2017. ...

VDM 30 in 30 Wow - November 30th has arrived, which marks the last day of the Virtual Design Master 30 in 30 challenge. So, how did I do? Well, I managed to get a post out each and every day. I did try to keep them mainly on topic, and I aimed to hit at least 500 words per post, but I also made sure I was not just adding words to the post in order to make the sentences, and thus the word count for the post longer (see what I did there?). ...

Earlier this week I held the Q4 meeting for the SouthWest Ontario Veeam User Group (SWOVUG) in Mississauga, and thus far the feedback has been great. This time around, we had Mid-Range and Hewlett-Packard Enterprise sponsor the event, as well as some great giveaways (iPad Minis and a speaker). We kicked things off with a great high-level overview from Garth Reid of where Hewlett-Packard Enterprise is heading. One point that was made clear is that they are striving to work with organizations to not only make sure they can find storage solutions that fit but that those data sets are properly protected. ...

A bit of a personal reflection post today, but this is also a topic I see that comes and goes in ‘waves’ amongst my peers and a lot of in the ‘vCommunity’. Imposter Syndrome is something that affects a lot of us, and it isn’t always easy to work through it. Timing on this is also impeccable, given that I just wrapped up my first Tech Field Day event. I’m not ready to start re-capping the event yet, but in the spirit of the vDM 30 in 30, I wanted to get something posted today. ...

In a previous post, I covered off some of the podcasts that I listen to on a regular basis. I tend to consume a lot of audio content, so that list was far from done. I still have a fairly long list of podcasts, but I am going to cut the remainder down to ones that I think are worth recommending to most folks. So, once again, in no particular order, here are some more podcasts you should check out if you have already. ...

Today I was fortunate enough to present at the Toronto VMUG. That’s two talks that I’ve given at the TO VMUG this year - not bad considering I only started ‘participating’ in the vCommunity earlier this year! As always, I see these opportunities not only as a way to give back to the community but also as a way to practice and develop my own skills. I am constantly trying to improve my public speaking - I have found that the key for me is to be able to turn my presentations into a conversation (admittedly it is a one-sided conversation). It still takes me a bit of time to ‘slip into’ that mode, but I’m definitely getting better at it. ...

Since I was first alerted to the fact that you didn’t need an iPod to listen to a podcast (that probably dates me), I have been consuming podcasts whenever I get a chance. I am usually able to squeeze in a couple of hours of listening a day. This comes from listening to them at 2x (this may require some ‘practice’), but also finding the opportunities, such as when driving, walking the dog, cleaning the house, barbecuing, etc.. ...

I was fortunate enough to be selected into the Veeam Vanguard program earlier this year, and it is still something that holds a lot of meaning to me personally. I’ve touched on it very briefly in the past, but I wanted to share some insight into what makes this program so valuable. First off, the Veeam Vanguard program is aimed at advocates for their products, which is fair enough. Veeam employees cannot be part of the program, and in at least two cases now, Vanguards have made the transition to Veeam employees, and thus have had to relinquish their Vanguard status. There are currently about 50 of us, which creates a nice team-like environment where we almost all know each other by sight. ...