Along with 1300 or so of my peers, I waited around for the 2018 vExpert announcement.
I started to see the posts on Twitter and the vExpert Slack of people who go the “You’re In” email.
I checked my email. Nothing.
So did that mean I’m out? Or did the email not arrive.
I found the vExpert Directory fully populated, and there between Brad Christian and Ismael Cifuentes there was no one.
Am I surprised? No. Honestly last year wasn’t my banner year in the community. I only blogged a few times, I didn’t participate as much on twitter and VMTN. Even on Slack I was more of a lurker then in year’s past.
Am I sad about it? Yes. I’ve had an interesting transition at work that overlaid with some tough personal stuff that’s kind of left me in a rut. My focus at work has switched from VMware to Azure, which is still good but I don’t have the same connection with a community that I had in the past. It also just left me kind of in a weird state.
I’m arguably the VMware expert in my corporation, with all of the certifications and SME recognition to back it up. But what am I now that I’m transitioning over to Azure? Definitely I’m growing a new skill set, but it’s a very different skill set. At the moment it’s kind of a middle administration layer. Not architecting but also not deploying. I think the change from being an expert (with a lot of influence and control) to being whatever I am now is just a long drawn out confusing part of my career.
I’ll end it here. I vented. It’s over. We’ll see what the future holds.