Friday’s vExpert announcement madness has faded, so has the weekend, and it’s time to share some thoughts on the matter. I’d like to congratulate all the new and returning vExperts. For the seasoned ones it’s yet another accolade in an impressive list of acknowledgements. For others, it’s the result of the perseverance of a few years of involvement in the community. For others, it has the shining polish of novelty. Personally, I think I was lucky this year. 2015 was an extremely busy one for me: new work, management responsibilities, overall a year of maturation both personally and professionally.
Thankfully, my activities were not as dormant as I thought they were. I was privileged to take part in the London Tech.Unplugged & VMUG as well as the VMUG Italy UserCon. Also, I motivated myself to pass the Nutanix NPP certification, I got to write a few interesting (hopefully) articles, and last but not least I took my courage in my hands an decided to organize a VMUG event in Prague. As we speak, the event will be happening in 3 days so it’s kind of interesting, retrospectively, to revisit the year backwards. But let’s see how things will go.
My thoughts have been with what the vExpert program has brought to me, how it has helped me improved. vExperts tend to be generally very involved people in whatever they do: work, blogging, communication, interaction with the community and self-investment (VMUGs, conferences), they are also very much driven by their passion in technology and the unending will to learn. I’ve come to gradually appreciate this and I’ve tried, with unequal results, to excel in these.
The interaction with many experts in the community has been stimulating and has helped me cultivate an inner need for well done work. And seeing online acquaintances learn, improve, succeed and rise is certainly motivational and helps one believe that with the proper investment, nearly everything is possible.
I would thus like to thank firsthand VMware for putting the vExpert program altogether, as well as the many companies who offer incentives to vExperts. The incentives offered to vExperts have a cost and hopefully these provide a decent ROI.
As the number of vExperts keeps growing year after year, there is some legitimate concern from the most hardened veterans & VMware pundits that the value of the program has been diluted. Maybe VMware should come with another program more centered on the most seasoned experts. It would allow them to maintain the base of vExpert enthusiasts, while allowing the disenchanted elite to recognize itself into a premium accolade program that acknowledges their exceptional contributions to the community. And use the vExperts as a pool to draft from, selectively. Acceptance into this program could be done either by nomination or cooptation, i.e. one couldn’t enroll into it just like the vExpert program.
Now back on Earth and once again Thank You, VMware!