This has been an exciting year so far and an even more exciting week! I want to share that I am humbly honored to be featured twice this week. Once as an IT Community Champ by the highly respected Mary Jo Foley on www.petri.com and added to this years 25 ITSM Experts to watch list by Cherwell. 🙂 Again all of this was an unexpected surprise and I am honored to be included. For information on both of these check out the links below:
Minnesota has been a hotbed of tech for a long time. In 2015 Minnesota was named one of The Fastest-Growing States For Tech Jobs In 2015 by Forbes. Link here:
Most recently within the past few Months Amazon has opened an office in Downtown Minneapolis with 100 full time tech positions giving the local tech community another boost on the national scale. Here is an article that covers the topic of companies such as Amazon expanding into this market to tap into the rich technical talent pool. Article: High-tech talent grab Link: http://www.bizjournals.com/twincities/news/2016/09/30/high-tech-talent-grab.html
Back in the 1960’s Control Data Corporation one of the nine original major computer companies in the US was headquartered in Minnesota and later in the 1970’s Cray super computer also came out of Minnesota. In recent years it’s been heating up even more and the word has been getting out. Minnesota’s tech scene is stronger than ever with a number of high profile startups as well as many well established tech based organizations. Some of the hot tech startups include:
Code42
JAMF Software
The Nerdery
Leadpages
Upsie
Vidku
Field Nation
And other notable tech organizations are:
SPS Commerce
Stratasys
Optum
Lawson Software
Compellent (Acquired by Dell some years back)
Digital River
The list of startups and other large tech organizations could fill up an entire blog post itself so I had to limit the list.
I am from Minnesota and proud to be a part of this thriving tech community. Recently a documentary about the tech scene in Minnesota was released named DocuMNtary.
This film was produced by a techie named Nick Roseth, music done by the MN super hip hop collective Doomtree, and narrated by legendary MN hip hop emcee Dessa also of Doomtree. I was impressed that Nick pulled in Doomtree and Dessa to help with the film. A great move in my opinion. They help bring an artistic and authentic MN feel to the film’s creative side.
They kick off the film by getting the obvious out of the way….Minnesota’s cold weather. Once we break out from the cold it is time to focus on the culture and tech. Next they examine what makes Minnesota great, why people stay when they come to MN and the great things about the culture. They also touch on why MN tends to be a collaborative culture. The film then moves into the history of tech in MN and establishes the roots.
They continue through the film showcasing several startups, how the tech ecosystem is supportive, tech training, associations/government agencies that help facilitate tech in MN, events such as MN Cup, Startup week, and more. The film calls out a Minnesota focused website named Tech{dot}MN http://tech.mn. Tech{dot}MN is the go to for all things MN tech such as events, user groups, startup and other tech news. They even address the issue of diversity in tech and what is happening in MN to help bridge this gap.
In the film they interviewed 50 players in the tech scene from a variety of companies and organizations. Here is a screenshot of all the featured people.
Towards the end of the film it was admitted that Minnesotans are not the best at telling our story due to our Midwestern and humble nature. There was a call to action for viewers that are in tech and from Minnesota to do some bragging and get the word out about the magic happening in tech. This prompted me to write this blog post! I hope you enjoyed this breakdown about the DocuMNtary film. The film website is: http://www.documntary.com
You can watch it here:
I also want to call out some things that were not covered in this film that are happening in Minnesota tech. We have a thriving community in the Microsoft space. In fact Minnesota is 1 of 20 locations in North America that Microsoft has chosen to place one of their Microsoft Technology Centers (MTC). You can learn more about the MTC here: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/mtc/locations/minneapolis.aspx
Minnesota is home to 24 Microsoft MVP’s including myself. Here are some of the names of our local Microsoft MVP’s.
Each of these Microsoft MVP’s are highly talented in their respective areas of technological expertise and Microsoft has selected them for this. I am proud to have such a high concentration of MVP’s in Minnesota. Learn more about the MVP program here: https://mvp.microsoft.com/en-us/overview
Minnesota can boasts about some of the highest turnouts for our user groups and events.
SharePoint Saturday Twin Cities is the biggest one in the US with attendance often reaching 800+. More about this event here: www.spstc.com
MN SQL Saturday is an annual event that has been around for some time. This event typically attracts 450+ attendee’s with many MVP’s coming out to present. http://www.sqlsaturday.com/557/EventHome.aspx
Midwest Management Summit (MMS) has been around for 4 years. It is held at the Radisson Blue Mall of America and has sold out every year. Experts and attendee’s come from all of the US and the world to be a part of this magical event around Microsoft management technologies on premises and cloud. MMS has experts come in from Ireland, Denmark, Sweden, United Kingdom, Canada and more. Here is an old Microsoft blog post from Microsoft on MMS https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/mvpawardprogram/2015/11/16/mvps-from-around-the-world-come-together-again-for-mms-2015-in-minnesota and the offical website here: https://mmsmoa.com.
Some of the MMS folks also are involved in the MN System Center User Group (MNSCUG) https://mnscug.org and Minnesota Azure User Group http://www.mnazureusergroup.com. It is not uncommon for MNSCUG to host full day events with 100+ attendee’s and the MN Azure UG to get 50+ attendee’s.
On top of that Minnesota has SQL Pass, IoT UG’s, Twin Cities MAC Admins Meetup, Amazon AWS UG’s and more. A full list of user groups and events can be found on Tech{dot}MN.
Beyond the just the tech community eco-system If you want to launch a startup, work in corporate tech, work for a partner company to one of the big tech companies (Microsoft, Google, Amazon, IBM), work in open source, work as a developer, or even freelance Minnesota has a place for you.
So to wrap up this post the next time you think of MN go beyond the perception of the cold, our numerous sports teams, and the 10k lakes remember this is a tech hot bed and its only getting hotter all the time!
Today was a special day as I received an email from Microsoft stating I was awarded as an MVP for the 5th year! Here is the email:
This marks a special year. Microsoft awards you the special 5 year chip to add to your award. Here is a picture of the chip:
I am humbled to make it this long in the MVP program. A huge thanks goes out to everyone in the community and Microsoft. And as always I am honored to still be a part of such a great group of people. I have made many friends all over the world with other MVP’s, community, and Microsoft. I am looking forward to another exciting year of contributing to the community.
I will continue to do all that I can in the System Center community this year. Something new you will see from me this year is I will be contributing as much as I can also in the OMS and Azure Stack space. I am very excited about the new opportunities that are coming out of the growth of cloud.
A couple of years ago Microsoft ended TechNet. A lot of IT Pro’s were unhappy with that decision. IT Pro’s used TechNet to practice in their own labs and get up to speed on new technologies. Well on April 20th, 2016 Microsoft has an answer for this (NOTE:this is my opinion not any official statement from Microsoft).
Microsoft has launched the “Microsoft IT Pro Career Center” and the the free “Microsoft IT Pro Cloud Essentials“.
The Microsoft IT Pro Career Center is a free online resource to help map your cloud career path. Learn what industry experts suggest for your cloud role and the skills to get you there. Follow a learning curriculum at your own pace to build the skills you need most to stay relevant. Microsoft IT Pro Cloud Essentials is a free annual subscription for IT Pro’s that basically gives you Azure, EMS, O365 resources to practice and learn with. It even comes with a Pluralsight account. It includes:
Free Azure credits to try cloud scenarios like backup, disaster recovery, security & dev/test.
Free Pluralsight subscription for on-line training.
Free Priority support in the TechNet forums.
A free phone support incident for Azure or on-premises products.
A free certification exam voucher. [2]
Extended trials of Enterprise Mobility Suite and Office 365.
This is huge. Many of my IT buddies have said they want to jump in on cloud but could not afford to pay for the accounts out of pocket. Well this is no longer an excuse.
Recently Dice published a report that Azure was #2 on the list of the fastest-growing tech skills. Here is the link:
At MMS 2015 we had some interesting discussions in the Ask the Data center experts session. One of the discussions was centered around how IT is changing and how to adapt. For a while there has been a paradigm shift happening in IT. It is hard hitting for those on the front line especially IT Pro’s.
With the advent of many technologies moving to XaaS (x as a Service) based and the challenges for IT pro’s to move from strictly the ops side of IT to more of a DevOps model as well as becoming an internal technology consultant to the business IT Pros can feel lost in the paradigm shift.
The goal of this blog post is twofold. 1. I want to expand on this discussion with my opinion of how an IT Pro can remain relevant in the future of IT. 2. My friends over at Savision asked me to write a blog post and I thought this would be a great topic for it because they have some tools that can help with this transition.
Here are key points and additionally skills/mindset needed as an IT Pro moving into the future of IT:
Accepting Shadow IT….. Ability to manage anyway.
Shadow IT is the practice of business units spinning up their own IT solutions without organizational approval. With the expansion of cloud Shadow IT is becoming easier for business units to undertake.
Technology Budgets are no longer 100% controlled within IT anymore. Many departments own their own technology budget.
For so long IT has had the reputation of being “No People” and a dinosaur that takes forever to get things done. Embracing Shadow IT is about enabling the business, moving faster from conception to solution. Embracing Shadow IT will also change the reputation IT to “Yes People”.
This will cause the business to come back to IT first as internal SME’s to help them select the right outside solutions bringing internal IT Pros back into the loop.
Instead of focusing on how to stop business units for spinning up the technology solutions they need, help them. At the same time look for solutions that can help put governance and management around Shadow IT. A good example of this are three solutions from Microsoft such as Cloud App discovery (Discovery of cloud applications used in an organization), Azure Active Directory (Single Sign On, Centralized log on to cloud based applications and much more), and OMS (Management of cross platform clouds i.e. Amazon, Azure, Rackspace etc.).
The past two weeks have been full of tech awesomeness. The first week was the 2015 MVP Summit and the second week was MMS 2015. I will recap both of these in this post. Well for the MVP Summit I can’t actually say anything about it but I can post a couple of cool pictures from it. 🙂 Here are some pics from the Summit.
With PowerShell MVP Trevor Sullivan and my roommate/friend CDM MVP Jakob Svendsen during breakfast.
With the man! Mr. OMS/System Center Jeremy Winter.
Good discussion with a bunch of smart guys. CDM MVP Stanislav Zhelyazkov (Stan the man), CDM MVP legend Cameron Fuller, and CDM MVP Jedi Dieter Wijckmans.
This morning I received an email from Microsoft that I am awarded System Center Cloud and Datacenter Management MVP for the 4th year. Here is the email I received: The System Center Cloud and Datacenter Management MVP’s are a great lively bunch of folks. It is an honor to still be a part of this … Read more
Today Michael Seidl published an interview he did with me on his blog! Check it out: German: http://www.techguy.at/interview-mit-steve-buchanan/ English: http://bit.ly/1xcM9bg Follow Michael on Twitter @TechGuyAT for System Center related content. Thanks Michael!
Today I received an email from Microsoft that I was awarded System Center Cloud and Datacenter Management MVP for the 3rd year. Here is the email I received: Another huge thanks to everyone in the community and Microsoft. It is an honor to continue to be a part of System Center MVP’s! I look forward … Read more
