Hey all, hope you are all doing great!

So another pause for me, mainly because I find myself like busy……. no wait, super busy! Still striving forwards on my Cloud Journey but acutely aware that I really am on the home straight. This is both exciting to be nearing the end of a goal, one that when I started I really didn’t know what to expect the journey to bring.

I find myself busy with good things, work is full on, loads of opportunities and projects to be working on, I sometimes wish I had a second pair of hands as there are so many interesting projects on the go. I’ve just completed day 2 of a discovery and design workshop for a Teams Voice project which are always fun to work on, a smidge of AWS in this one but hey, I’m not complaining 😉

Something really cool happened today as well, I was called out for my achievements with my 100 Days of Cloud challenge on a senior manager all hands call…… I was said I couldn’t attend but my boss dropped me a message to let me know with a neat screenshot. Its things like this that really do remind me that what I am doing is a little bit different to the norm. I really appreciated that tip of the hat by such a great part of BT Enterprise, and this obviously adds to my motivation to get to the end of the challenge.

I suppose this challenge doesn’t really feel like a challenge as such, I think its really important for everyone to push themselves outside of their comfort zone a bit from time to time, and I guess one of the things I am realising so far as I write this =, is that I guess its starting to feel a bit more natural to push outside a comfort zone. I will be the first to say change albeit inevitable is still not exactly the most thrilling experience to push yourself through. I hear the bravado of IT Pro’s say that we ‘live for change’ and ‘its part of the job’, which yes absolutely I agree, but in todays climate I really am starting to see the difference in my role forming and the value that someone in my position can bring to aid customers and create desirable solutions.

I have sat and thought to myself about the ‘impostor syndrome’ that feeling that you don’t know it all, and you feel out of place which Im sure many more people suffer with but may not feel they can admit to it. I think that anyone who doesn’t suffer with that is simply non human! I really am realising that its fine not to know everything, and the more I push through my journey, the more I realise I don’t know. So… what does this mean for my job? Well, I think that like everyone, we all have our strengths technically, and as an IT Pro we all know how to learn fast and apply our learnings to a given opportunity, but I rally feel that gone are the days that a Consultant or an Architect are to font of all knowledge and I can slowly see the ushering in or that acceptance that people in my position are seen more for their ability to Solutionize with the broad spectrum of tools and technology at our disposal. The experiences of differing requirements, changes in customers and their staff, differing opinions, ideas, drivers, justifications and views on how a solution should look all add to a ridiculously interesting, challenging and satisfying position of employment to be in.

So I just wrote a long convoluted description of my work that I could summarise as being two words, challenging but exciting!

The learnings that I have put myself through have drastically changed the way I see things for the better, but there are still so many things I want to get done. I see some people on a 2nd or 3rd round of 100DaysOfCloud, now the jury is still out on that for me. But I need to think about how I progress my blog, You Tube and streaming. Post challenge!

Community……. wow, wow, wow what Can I say? Welsh Azure User Group….. LinkedIn….. Twitter…… Reddit…….. Twitch……… YouTube………. Streams, chats, Among Us, IoT, ELectronics, 3D printing Raspberry Pi on and on…… Wow!

I can honestly say, the community side of this challenge has genuinely helped me make connections with some truly awesome and inspirational people……… I used to have a cynical side to me that would say ‘yeah yeah John’ whatever!!! But I can’t say this clear enough…….. I never really used Twitter as a communications platform, instead it was a bit like my bookmark of things to read. Since posting and dabbling with video etc. over the last few months I have virtually met, chatted with, been invited onto talks, made other videos, streams over and above the brilliant reception the Welsh Azure User Group has received. The people I am with for WAUG are simply fantastic, I really cant wait until we can get to arranging a face to face and having a beer or two with a fantastic bunch of people.

The groups seems to be going from strength to strength, it really is a pleasure and an honour to be working with such a dedicated group of techies all willing to do their bit to help make the meetups run smoothly.

The learnings……. Im still dipping in and out of Azure DevOps and Terraform, with some work for projects and other for learning, i’m still dabbling with Python, but recently am considering the switch (or co learning) of .Net and C#, i’m still studying towards the AZ204 exam. I am still playing with the raspberry Pi!!

Basically Im busy…… and thats before I factor in the most important part of my life….. my family! The last week we have had some of the kids activities start back up which have taken me back to being Dad Taxi, as well as the trials and tribulations of self isolation with the kids being sent home from school and the general stresses and worries caused by my kids moving into the teenage years!

Well, ok I never expected this to become a ramble, but basically I wanted to give a glimpse into my life as I sit and type hear at 11pm. I have just stepped foot back in from a drive to Swindon to enable my son to train with his Ice Hockey team, something he has been waiting to do since the lockdown began in March. I drop him off as I had to take my two daughters with me, I sit in the car and catch a glimpse of him on the ice as the heaters demist the windscreen and the wipers periodically freshen the view from a rainswept windscreen. I’m chatting with my daughters, catching up on some of the awesome #festivetechcalendar content……. managed to watch a lot of the Scott Hanselman AMA……. brilliant live stream I must add!

I return home to the house, my better half is on a night shift, so I sit here to type this up. I really hope sharing the every day mundane activity puts things into perspective for people. Im not super human, Im just trying to reach a goal and progress my learnings, my attitude towards the growth mindset concept and doing this around a busy and active family life.

It’s not easy, but I’m really enjoying it!

Thanks all for reading, please drop me a line if anything resonates or if anyone has anything to add!

Until tomorrow!

100DaysOfCloud Overview

My Main ReadMe Page is all set up with a bit about me!

The guys at 100DaysofCloud have set up the GitHub repo to be cloned and also have a great repo containing ideas and areas to collaborate on: https://github.com/100DaysOfCloud/100DaysOfCloudIdeas

My Github Journey tracker can be found here: https://github.com/jonnychipz/100DaysOfCloud

Please Watch/Star my repo and feel free to comment of contribute to anything I push! I really look forward to hearing from anyone who is going to jump on the journey around the same time as me! Lets see where I get to in 100 days!

I would encourage others to jump on this journey, I’m not sure that I will be able to commit every day for 100 days, but as long as I can complete 100 days that will be great!