mentor, mentoring, passions, reflection, whyamihere

A segue, why am I here?

markdavidboyd September 10, 2019

What are your career steps? Contact us at advice@everysaturday.com.au

I’m falling in love with this industry all over again.

So, two articles in and I’ve introduced myself to the big bad world, to start lending credibility to the personal mentoring programs I run. During this time, I also started my Master of IT Leadership, a reflective Professional Practice Degree curated by Deakin University.

I strongly recommend any young leaders looking to further their education, start here. I’m happy to hop on a call to discuss the program or catch up over a coffee to discuss course content. The course has been an excellent way for me to check back in on my career and help young folk in ICT not make the same career mistakes (missteps?) I made.

It was through reflective practice, and starting this blog I realised I’m falling in love with the ICT industry all over again. I’m back to where I started, full of energy, passion, and a love for learning.

So why do I have a passion for this industry?

Good question. As you’ll see in my first blog post, I’ve been privileged to hold many roles, from Desktop Support to General Management/Director roles. The ICT industry is fast-paced. At it’s best, you’ll meet amazing, culturally and professionally diverse people from all over the world, and if you’re lucky, you’ll get to travel yourself. At it’s worst, you can get burnt out very easily, and you can feel like people are leapfrogging you if you don’t take care to nurture your professional self.

I’ve certainly felt both the best and worst of these experiences in this industry. But it has grown me as a person. It’s instilled in me the idea that we should do nothing if not working towards helping each other out.

We should extend a handshake and discuss problems over coffee (many, many coffees). We should ask each other how we are doing, are we really ok, to our colleagues and our peers. We should set expectations on what we want from each other as colleagues and professionals.

I believe the ICT industry is unique in this way, people will genuinely care about you if you extend the hand of friendship and collaboration.

That, and more pragmatically, it’s exciting to know that no one is an expert in every technology type/platform/configuration/setup. You’ll truly learn something new every day.

The only way to survive in this industry is to observe (what is happening around you), understand (not just your area of expertise, but the motivations of those around you), internalise (reflect on your own behaviours, and those around you) and exude your passion (express your professional self, whatever that may be).

So, What gets me out of bed every morning?

The challenge. There’s always another problem to solve. Always another person to mentor. Always another customer to transform. When you master one technology in this industry, another pops up. And when you master a few technologies, your role changes and you start again.

I get out of bed knowing that there are brilliant technology and strategic influencers all around me. I get out of bed knowing I’m inspired to learn from everyone around me. I get out of bed knowing I’m going to learn as valuable a lesson from my mentees and interns, as I will my CEO and my organisation’s owner.

It takes work and discipline, but I get out of bed knowing I’m solely responsible for my attitude, and that passion may exist today, but also be gone tomorrow, so I may as well embrace this industry, with open arms.

I knew coming into this industry I would never be bored but I never quite understood the scale of the industry.

I’ve fixed printers, replaced hard drives, configured virtual servers in complex clusters distributed globally, configured and maintained complex networks. I’ve fixed destroyed databases and recovered critical customer data. I’ve prevented security issues for customers. I’ve guided, mentored, advised, grown (and sometimes shrunk) customer environments.

I’ve grown to understand the difference between strategic value and tactical value. All in 12 short years. Knowledge feeds my “soul”. This is why I’m pursuing this career with open arms and enthusiasm.

So why did I aspire to this field?

Truth be told, I didn’t. In grade 2, I wrote a diary entry to my teacher as a wide eye 8-year-old. I wanted to be a policeman. I wanted to follow my father into law enforcement. I was lucky enough to become a police officer for a very short stint, but it wasn’t after first venturing into IT. My career went ICT -> Police Officer -> ICT -> Consulting -> ICT.

So when did I first want to become an ICT Professional, if it wasn’t my original passion?

I was 10 (I think). We had our first computer. It was an old 486DX. The internet was becoming this thing that would eventually have a minor influence on all our lives, It was on this computer I learnt what RAM, Modems, VGA and Hard Drives were.

My father loved this computer. It was his hobby too. One holiday period, he was at work. One day, I decided to hop onto the computer and play solitaire, or chess, or whatever I could get my hands on while he wasn’t there.

In my infinite wisdom, I also decided to see what would happen if I deleted the C:\Windows directory. Windows 95 didn’t like that very much. I may as well have formatted the entire thing. Turns out, this was my first tech job – working to a deadline to fix dads PC before he got home, discover the issue, and be totally ok with my mistake*.

*flip out and get angry at the fact I destroyed his computer.

I literally had no idea what I was doing but figured the box of 15 floppy disks labelled “Windows 95 disk 1 through 15, would be a good place to start.

I managed to reinstall a fresh copy of Windows, reinstall his favourite game (Civilization 2), and show dad how much of the map I had explored, playing as the Aztecs, within the confines of his 8-hour shift. I’ve never actually admitted to him that I nearly cost him a few hundred dollars if he had needed to send the PC to the local repair shop. Maybe I’ll tell him the story next time I see him.

It was here, at an early age I realised I could do something with this talent for incident response, before I even knew what the term meant. I had my first committment to a “Service Level Agreement” here. It was equal parts terrifying and exhilarating. From that moment on, I started to pull apart and put technology back together (albeit in less risky environments, and fashions).

Early on, I feel like I only forayed into this industry because I was good at it. On a personal level, it’s why I left the industry a few times to pursue other things. Because I didn’t understand WHY I was passionate, I was distracted by the other shiny opportunity to do something else.

With time, I’ve come to understand that we should do what we love, and often, we are good at what we love. I see these factors as two contributors to developing a passion for something.

Sometimes, we need to remember why we started in the first place. Solving other people’s problems is joyful. I may no longer be “on the tools” so to speak, but I do enjoy giving young people in the industry the same exposure I had. To this end, teaching and growing others is a joy. And heck, if I get to learn some cool tech along the way, all the better, for all of us.

Which takes me to the next question – what are my ambitions, goals, and philosophies?

Interesting question.

My ambitions? Be better every day. Be better for me, for my colleagues, for my business, for my customers. I’m nothing without the brilliant people around me. Sincerely.

My philosophy? I believe in altruism. I believe we need to be remembered for the impression we gave people, of ourselves. I’ve been the arrogant, pigheaded young tech that got results and thought that was all that mattered. I’m actively trying to teach that out of young folk in the ICT sector now.

Being brilliant technically is one piece of the puzzle. Being liked and being an effective communicator is another piece. There are many more pieces for many more blog posts to come.

My goal? This is a difficult one. It changes every day.

Personally, I’d like to turn this blog into a philanthropic exercise where a big business pays me to bring them amazing graduates. But at the same time, I don’t want to be a recruiter. For now, I’m focusing on my “9-5” where I get to run their graduate program and still bring customers world-class, complex ICT and Unified Communications Solutions.

What do I attribute to my “success”? What major milestones got me here?

When I was 10 years old I fixed my first computer – that sweat-inducing “fix it before dad realises” problem discussed above. When I was 16 years old, I was told by someone who should know better that I’d never amount to anything, and that computers were a fad. Yes, this is a true story. This developed my youthful arrogance and fueled a desire to prove this person wrong.

When I was 17 I completed a TAFE course in Network Management, then onto Network Engineering, then General Computing, Business Systems, then full-time work at the age of 20.

My first big project was a complex, large 2000 seat LAN refresh I was dramatically underqualified to take on, but succeed by sheer will and effort.

My first major outage was fixing the mistake of another engineer who deleted 3% of a production database without a recovery option (many 10’s of thousands of dollars later, we got ourselves and the customer out of the situation). Be careful with your customer’s data.

The first major project I lead for a Managed Services Provider, I started with a single IP address and remote access to a server, thousands of Km’s away and built an entire, redundant cluster of servers hosting critical line of business applications for a leading college.

The first management position I took on, I had to learn how to be a manager and take on a small team of three people, and seemingly overnight, grow it to a team of 40.

The first consulting gig I took on, I learnt to present as a truly polished, suit-wearing professional where there was no hiding – organisations were now truly hanging on every word. Humbling. And terrifying. This was my first time in a General Management position with Profit & Loss management responsibility.

My recent foray back into the Managed Services space as a Project and Services Director now sees every project I deliver as major organisational transformational work. With great title, comes great responsibility.

Concluding.

The truth is, there is no one key to success and no one project that’s grown me. I am not the sole author of my successes or defeats. Through sheer will, reflective practice, and learning humility, I’ve gotten to where I want to be.

Where I go next, I suspect, is as much on you, as it is me. Your success is my success. Feel like chatting? Email me, mark@everysaturday.com.au or reach out on my LinkedIn page.

desktop, ICT, mentor, mentoring, tech, tools, troubleshooting, Uncategorized

My first ICT role

markdavidboyd August 1, 2019

Sometimes, reflecting on my career drives me nuts.

In my last article, I spoke about the roles I’ve held over my career. I figured it’s not a bad place to start, reflecting on what worked, what didn’t, what I thought my employers did well, what they could have done better. This will be the first of many posts going over my experiences.

In this post, I’ll talk about my first role, the role of the Desktop Support Technician. The desktop technician roles are low salary and fast-paced. It was here I learnt how to troubleshoot. It was here I discovered that people don’t know a thing about ICT, and that’s ok, people have other jobs to do, it’s your job to make sure they can do their job.

In this role, you will learn to listen, be empathetic, think on your feet. You may find yourself eating too many potato chips and crying into your pillow at the silliness of the questions you get asked on a day to day basis. Look at any post on www.reddit.com/r/sysadmin and you will find friends in need, are genuine friends indeed.

The first thing I’ll note is that I’m a firm believer of being critical, but fair. In the interest of being critical, I’ll be forthcoming with my opinions. In the interest of fairness. I will not be listing the names of the companies I worked for, or the people I worked with. This isn’t a blog to criticise former colleagues or workplaces. It is a place for reflection, and advice for those looking to succeed in roles similar to those I’ve performed.

Recapping my last post, the roles I’ve held.

I’ve been in the industry for over a decade now. I’ve been a Desktop Support Technician, a Network Engineer, a Systems Engineer (Wintel), a Police Officer (long story), Managed Services Engineer, a Service Desk Manager, a Service Delivery Manager, a General Manager in a consultancy firm and now, a Project & Services Director at a Melbourne based Managed Services Provider.

So, start with the Desktop Support Technician role.

This was my first real full-time position. I thought I had hit the big time when I got this job offer. I was 20. I had finished my Diploma and attempted my first six months of my undergraduate degree. I put the university degree on hold to go to work full time. I needed that cold hard cash and how else could I afford that $20,000 loan for a car I had taken out? (Word of advice, don’t take out a car loan).

I postponed university because I had a chip on my shoulder, and I already knew it all, and I couldn’t be taught anything at university that my Diploma didn’t already teach me. Was I wrong about that? Yes.

By this stage, I already had a great mentor. A gentleman I still to this day look up to, a great business person who I’ll interview on this blog shortly to share the benefit of his wisdom. It was in this job I met my next two mentors: the company’s IT Manager, and the company’s Systems Administrator. They helped me grow up quickly; they also taught me some bad habits, but ones I’m grateful for having the ability to reflect on.

I came into this first full-time role, cocky and with gumption. The staff loved me. I had my “trademark” (as others have called it) energy, passion, and nerdiness with a stroke of the ability to relate to people.

My advice if you’re going into this role? Enjoy learning about people – your colleagues and your customers. You’ll learn small talk here when someone is breathing over your shoulder wondering why it’s taking so long to fix the mess they call their computer. No one likes an awkward silence or mouth breathers. So get talking.

My second piece of advice? Learn to troubleshoot. No university course I’ve participated in, and no technical certification course (bar a few) have taught proper troubleshooting.

Mark Boyd, 2019, defines troubleshooting as learning to Google, intelligently.

You’ll come up against technology problems that if you can Google the problem correctly, and think like a tech, you’ll get the answer you want nine times out of ten.

If all else fails, here are a few tools I’ve learnt to trust along the way.

The SysInternals Suite – learn FileMon, ProcessMon and Autoruns inside out. I’ll do an article about these tools one of these days. ProcessMon is like Task Manager on steroids.

One example I give to mentees is that using this tool will help you understand what a dodgy application is trying to do, or why that pesky application you’re trying to install, is failing.

Pro Tip – Teachers in particular love asking you to install that crappy “educational application” that their kids “must use to succeed in life” – bought from some dodgy website, with no support from the vendor – learn to troubleshoot, learn ProcessMon. Exploring annoying applications behaviours in real-time with this tool is a Thanos-sent.

TCPView – gets a special mention. Knowing whether the traffic you’re expecting onto your WebServer is hitting the server or not, is a great way to see if you’ve configured it correctly. There are many more uses for this tool, do your research, and I’ll write an article about this one day. Look up NetStat too, understanding these tools and what they do, is invaluable.

WireShark – learn to do packet captures. If you have a passion for networking, you’ll learn to use this tool. To this day, I’ve seen CCIE’s that do not know how to use this tool. It will bother you that these people probably get paid more than you, and don’t know the first thing about using the tool, but it will get you promoted quicker for having quicker resolution times than the guy next to you. Your managers (primarily technical ones) will always throw you the curly jobs, and you’ll become the company’s “go-to person” for those tricky issues that no one else wants to take on.

CCleaner. The original and the best desktop clean up tool. The portable edition (if nothing else) will get you out of trouble. This tool will clean your registry (though the jury’s out on how much of a performance impact it has, in my opinion). It will also clean all that wasted hard drive space for those Exec types that store all 150,000 “critically important” files on their desktop and have consequently, run out of space.

The Command Prompt and PowerShell – some can code, some can’t. I’m no good at it, but basic understanding of commands, or at least how to use them to pull information from them has been my saviour. For heaven’s sake, know what ipconfig /all does. You’ll be asked this in interviews. This has been one of my staple questions when interviewing technical people, even in senior roles, and they have had no idea. Not knowing the answer to this question will make me pass over you in an interview for a technical position almost immediately.

Extending on Command Prompt, learn commands like Ping, Tracert, and learn how WMIC works. Learn what Taskkill is and when to use it/how to use it. Some applications don’t like being stopped. Taskkill will get you out of trouble.

Learn what “.Ini” files are and what they can do. When the crappy Dentist software you are supporting pops up and says “Can’t find the Server”, there is a probably an INI file telling you the name of the server it is trying to reach. And if that INI file is empty on the computer with the issue? Find the right INI file from another computer and copy it over, what’s the worst that can happen. (Be careful here for obvious reasons).

Learn SQL. Learn how to write database queries. Learn how to interpret data. If you can understand how you are performing by analysing your ticketing tools data, and help your boss analyse the data, you’ll be a service desk hero. You can smell that promotion now, can’t you?

TeamViewer, Kaseya, NAble, Labtech, Ninja RMM, Solarwinds – learn these tools. You’ll come across them. Follow the companies on Twitter and Linkedin. While you’re at it, get a professional headshot for these professional profiles. I digress. Sorry.

Enough technobabble, back to the role, what did I learn?

The technical work aside, I learnt that technical teams all value a fantastic desktop technician. I discovered here to never say no to an opportunity. I was replacing printer cartridges and hard drives one day, and building ESXi Clusters connected to Fibre Channel SANS the next.

My advice?

Involve yourself in everything. Stay back with your boss when those upgrades are happening, look, listen, learn, and teach the boss a thing or two.

The bad, bordering ugly?

I discovered that these jobs are low paying, unfortunately. I don’t think they should be. I think people should be able to forge good careers taking these roles on. I’ve met many “lifers” doing these roles, and I’d hire them again in a heartbeat.

Anecdotally, at the company I worked for, I was pushing for a pay rise. I wasn’t eloquent in my reasons, but in Australia, we are paid on an award system (Check out Fair Work Australia). An award system classifies your role and outlines a salary guide for your performance and responsibilities under that role. The role I was performing at the company I worked for should have seen me on a higher level of the award. I was doing work far beyond what I was hired to do.

When I took this up with the Human Resources Officer, I was told (almost verbatim) – “it’s not our responsibility to pay you more if we paid you to be a janitor and you are a qualified doctor, that’s your problem”. I was doing the work of a ‘doctor’ for the salary of a ‘janitor’.

When I recounted this story to my boss and mentor, he wasn’t all that pleased. I’m not sure what came of it, but I know he had my back. It was here I learnt to have my employees’ backs.

Upon reflection, at various stages of career, I’ve taken it too far. It is about balance. If you’re going to step into management roles, you need to learn how to speak truth to power, but you need to do it calmly, and pick the right battles at the right time. Your staff will respect you fighting for them. If you do nothing for your team, you’ll lose the floor. If you fight management too hard, you’ll lose management confidence in your ability.

Pick the right battle for the right time.

I wish this workplace had respected the hours we worked to keep the place running. I wish the elitism of the hierarchy (very wealthy, well to do part of town I worked in) was more inclusive.

So what am I looking for when I hire for these roles?

Communication – can you talk about your passions in or out of ICT with energy? Are you articulate? In interviews, I will ask you to explain how you’d describe a complex server problem, to a non-IT person – in simple terms. Your answer determines your employability.

Troubleshooting Prowess – I’ll ask you to explain how you’d troubleshoot a few simple, and a few complicated issues. I don’t care about the technical result; I care about your thought process.

I’m looking for someone that our customers would want to know beyond the 5-minute interaction you’ll have them. Your customers should be delighted when they get you answering the phone. They should always want to speak to you directly. Never let them, you’re always busy, they are lucky if they get you on the phone, but they should always want to.

A quick story.

I once had a conversation while troubleshooting someone’s computer problems about “how good looking Vladimir Putin was”. I didn’t share this customer’s view, but it kept the conversation going for 20 minutes, with much laughter, while I was clicking away. The person emailed the bosses of the company I worked for and sung my praises for my “winning personality”.

I was promoted shortly after this, not just because of this, but the ability to make someone laugh while they are having a crappy day, is critically essential in roles like this. Find common ground with those you’re supporting over the phone. Nothing is worse than staying silent on the phone for 20 minutes, keeping someone waiting.

Don’t have what it takes to conduct a lengthy conversation about a topless dictator on a horse? Ask if you can take over the user’s PC and you’ll call them back the moment you’re finished. Explain to them that a broken computer is just another excuse to have another coffee or to read the newspaper. Do anything other than keeping them hanging on the phone with your heavy breathing into the handset.

I’m going to wrap it up here.

The roles that followed this were all follow-ons from this role, an evolution of this role if you like. The next significant role I took on was the Managed Services Engineer, which became my first management role.

I’ll be discussing my first managerial role in my next post, but for now, I’m off to watch the Bachelor, or some such reality TV show.* Trust me, after a long day of toiling away at technical and managerial problems, switching your brain off by not touching a keyboard is an excellent way to unwind.

*I wouldn’t watch that tripe in a month of Sundays. It was a metaphor for “do something with my night that has nothing to do with a computer”. I appreciate the irony of sitting here typing this while expressing that sentiment. Is that actual irony? Alanis Morissette confused irony for everyone.

Mark, Out!

consulting, ICT, introductions, mentoring, passions, tech, techpost

Hello EverySaturday

markdavidboyd July 21, 2019

What is EverySaturday?

Mark Boyd here, an ICT Professional based in Melbourne, Australia. This blog is a personal reflection on the happenings of the ICT industry, with the sole purpose of connecting ICT Professionals to their peers, and giving youth a go.

I’ve been lucky enough to recieve mentorship from some amazing people in my career, so it is time to give back. My career ethos has been “say yes to everything”. This ethos got me to where I am today.

I’m a believer in the quote – “Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid”. This quote is the very foundation of this website and the ideas I’ll share through this, and other blog posts. We must all learn to teach. We must all learn an empathetic, compassionate, and respectful lens.

We can only judge someone’s actions in business based on whether they’ve fully understood the directive they’ve been given, and the consequences of the choices they will make. We owe it to young professionals to guide them through their career and pay back the privilege we have all had in our careers so far.

Why did I start this blog?

I started this blog to repay the favour my mentors gave me, to train and mentor.

I’ve recently undertaken my Masters of IT Leadership at Deakin University, a professional practice/credential-based degree that is heavy on reflection and developing a sense of self-awareness to carry my career forward. It became clear in the first few weeks of taking on the Masters that I’d need to maintain an active connection with the industry beyond my LinkedIn profile.

This blog, and the EverySaturday business is an attempt to give young ICT professionals the advice I both received and wished I received as I was growing up in this industry. The mission is to connect young ICT professionals to the industry and provide independent advice to them through their careers.

Let’s start with a reflection on the my career

I have been lucky to hold these positions and honoured to have met amazing people that have shaped my career along the way. I’ll talk at length about these roles in coming blog posts.

So what do I specialise in?

My core strength and specialty is ICT Managed Services. You’ll see me talk about this a lot on this blog. The ICT Managed Services sector in Australia is fast paced, diverse, and full of amazing people. I also believe the Managed Services sector is the fastest way to build a career in technology if you’re starting out as a technician or support engineer.

So we want to connect people, and mentor youth. What is my first piece of advice to those starting in the industry?

Find a mentor. The lessons a good mentor will teach you, directly, or indirectly, will carry with you for the rest of your career.

Some things my mentors have taught me.

Don’t be afraid to show your passion. You’re a human, not a robot. Do and pursue, only what you love. Pursue your passions relentlessly, unapologetically.

Understand what you do and don’t stand for. As a conscientious worker, your output will often outpace your peers. Don’t let this get you down. You aren’t there to “clip the ticket” – you are there to change the world.

Learn conviction. If your gut tells you something is bad, it probably is. You don’t owe your employer your mental health. Take care of your mental health.

Seek to change the world. Leave the industry in a better place than it was when you started in it.

Try to understand your industry’s pressures, try to understand your employer’s pressures. This will give you objectivity.

You will rightly want to be critical about issues your business faces. Learn empathy, learn to articulate problems coherently, succinctly so you can help your business overcome these issues.

When you do raise any issues, do it with conviction, and harness your emotional energy. Be positive. Your negative energy will rub off on your peers. Your managers are watching.

You will want to scream some days. Temper this propensity to the right place, right time. It takes 10 years to build a reputation, 10 minutes to destroy one.

Again, you are being watched. Your manager is noticing your turns of phrase, the way you dress, the way you speak, your positive or negative attitudes, your ability to self manage, your digital literacy, your communication skills, how you act under pressure, and how you work as a team player.

Your manager does not want to micromanage.

Your manager wants you to ask “What’s next?” when you run out of things to do – there is always more to do.

Learn to say no – this is hard, this will take time, and you will fail at this before you get good at it. Talk to your mentor about how to do this, they’ve likely spent years perfecting the art of saying no.

Don’t be afraid to make mistakes, and when you look back on them, don’t regret them. Share your mistakes with your peers. You will make a change on a customer’s environment and bring something down. We all do it. It is a rite of passage in this industry.

So what can you expect from this blog?

Most of this blog will be technology focused. Some of this blog will be your traditional “propeller-head” stuff, you can take the tech out of the ICT professional (when you get into management roles), but you should never take the ICT professional out of the tech.

And there will be business technology articles. I’ll post about technology risk, governance, finance, budgeting. I’ll be drawing from many sources of information. Sometimes, posts will be a regurgitation of a position taken in an article that I’ve read and adopted in my own practice. I will frequently link to my mentors, and those in the industry I follow.

People have asked, where did the “EverySaturday” name come from? The name came about because my aim was simple – post a new blog every Saturday. The domain was registered in 2015; my first blog post is in July 2019. Here’s to hoping new material is published each week from here on in.

So what’s next?

In the coming weeks, I’m hoping to get a few dozen articles up. I’m looking at posting a few reflection pieces first up. What roles I’ve taken on, what I learnt from them, the challenges, the good, the bad, and the sometimes downright ugly.

There will be a few “businesses I support” series of posts.

I’ll get technical at times. I’m looking forward to writing articles on technical troubleshooting. I’ve noticed a lack of troubleshooting ability as a failure of universities around the country – we aren’t teaching young technical people to troubleshoot. We teach them to build systems, not administer them.

I plan on hosting question and answer sessions on Saturday mornings around Melbourne as this blog matures and bringing guest speakers in to talk to young folk about navigating this broad church of an industry we all operate in.

Lastly, because this has come up already, any business or industry professional I write about I have both permission to do so, and I have not been paid to write the content (except where explicitly stated)

So, here’s a question to my exactly zero follows (right now, let’s grow this!) What do you want to see out of this blog? Is there a technology or topic you’d like me to explore? Is there any advice you’re seeking in the industry? Reach out at advice@everysaturday.com.au. Questions asked will be responded to individually and disseminated as a blog post for the benefit of the followers of this blog.

Happy reading, I hope we all learn something along the way.

Regards, Mark.

Mark@everysaturday.com.au

https://www.linkedin.com/in/markdavidboyd/