In my last post, I talked about how failure had given me motivation to buckle down and get to work. I happened to fail my VCP6-DCV right before the end of the year. After some reflection, I decided that I needed to develop some goals for the coming New Year and work to develop myself to achieve them.
I woke up this morning and it was February already! Where has time gone!? At the very least, I’ve been able to accomplish some of my going-to-be-shared-right-now goals.
Goal #1: Achieve VCP6-DCV – Complete!
I successfully passed my VCP exam on January 4, 2017 to start the year off! The sidebar looks nice with a little certification in it, I think. I still BARELY passed, but… pass is a pass.
Goal #2: Obtain a more technically-focused job. – Complete!
I took my last job working for a laboratory of scientists a little more than a year ago. My primary goal was to focus on sharing a vision and to enable the group to better consume technology. As I made my exit, I felt as though I accomplished these goals.
I started my new job as a Virtualization Operations Engineer at the tail end of January. I’ve joined a team of people who will easily be able to teach me something new every day. There’s a LOT more technology and I can’t wait to get down and dirty with it.
Goal #3: Achieve vExpert status – Complete!
My understanding of the VMware vExpert program is that you’re evangelizing the technology VMware offers. I’ll be honest, I don’t think I’m there yet. A lot of the things I offer the virtualization community are in terms of Boston VMUG items (I’m a member of the Steering Team). I want to add more tech-related posts to this blog (I should make that a goal!). Goal #2 should help with that! vExpert for the first half of 2017 is being announced on 2/8/17.
Edit: March 3, 2017 –
I found out on 2/8/17 that I had been accepted to the vExpert program! My new job has been taking priority over most things and it’s taken me almost a month to update this post.
Thus far, the vExpert program has been nothing short of amazing and I haven’t even done much yet. There are some incredibly talented people that hold the vExpert title. I’ve spent quite a bit of time lurking in the vExpert Slack channel and learning. I can only imagine that things will get better moving forward. Stay tuned for future blog posts…?
Goal #4: Blog a little more regularly – Defined moments ago!
I started this blog in October 2016. I haven’t given it a lot of thought, really. I’ve learned that blogging well takes a bit more training and perseverance than I previously gave it credit for. I want to hit 2017 with more technology-related posts. A quick-fix here or a use-case there.
Goal #5: Identify and earn another certification
I’m not positive what my next certification will be, but I imagine it will be VMware-focused. If I had to guess, it will be either VCP-DTM or VCP-NV. VCP-NV appears to be a valuable commodity as NSX becomes more commonplace in the market.
Goal #6: Get better at identifying long-term goals.
All of these goals are relatively short-term. That’s an issue I have with identifying personal goals. I like to focus on right now so that I can get to work RIGHT NOW. I need to focus on my personal goals over the next three to five years. Turns out that takes a lot more thought than I anticipated.
If you’re reading this, feel free to hold me accountable for the yet-to-be-met goals. Thanks for following along this far.