Reflections of an MVP
The last four weeks has been interesting for me. Besides living out of suitcases, I've met dozens of interesting individuals at PDC and even more talented and diverse people at the MVP summit. All unique in their own right and with their varied perspectives, opinions, and thoughts on technology, architecture, and software design. With the general community at large, more often than not, most people don't know what this whole MVP thing is all about. Sure, there are a few paragraphs and the elevator speech dotted around on various websites but what do Most Valuable Professionals mean to you and why should you care? I mean, what's it all about?
Call us commnity leaders, technical champions, or simply ubergeeks. We, like yourself, have a strong passion for technology and a deep desire to share our knowledge with you. We get excited when we see a problem as we look at it as a challenge to solve. We are the builders, the dreamers, the listeners of change. Like the Microsoft campus itself, the technical community at a vast sea of knowledge and full of diversity. Like each building on the campus, the community itself is unique with each of its problems, ideas, and solutions. This is the very fabric that makes this multiverse an interesting place to work and breathe within. The attributes that make us stand apart in this world are those that eventually bring us all together.
In an effort to build on what Microsoft strives for (and to resonate with what Steve Ballmer said) we are people in the community and here, both as individuals and members are representatives and communicators of this balance between innovation and customer collaboration. We're not magicians and we're not soothsayers but we do position ourselves as a bridge between you and Microsoft. Most of us are employees or consultants who have to work with Microsoft technology each and every day. We have to live in the same world that you do so there is no Us vs. Them here. We're just human but that passion we share around technology is something we have in common and we want to strive towards making a better world where things just work.
It is this self-sustaining action itself that feeds and grows so not only do we, the MVPs, need these retreats with the Microsofties, but also to be messengers of your experiences and concerns. We emphasize with your pain when a technology doesn't work as advertised because we've gone through it too. We want to help drive the cahnges necessary to see the things we hold true and watch them evolve and grow over time. Without you and without Microsoft we cannot instigate this change. The three of us form a techno-eco-system, each depending on each other and feeding each other through experience to change. One voice yelling is strong but a whole chorus is much better so we are here to help form that chorus.
The information absorbed this past week during the summit isn't just another stack of white papers to add to. It is a powerful ball of knowledge that we are here to share with, grow around, and explore together which will come out in time as Microsoft reveals the bits and pieces of the pie. The Office 12 and vNext version of SharePoint release is almost a year off now and there is going to be thousands of blogs, screenshots, videos, articles, and books as the next evolution in collaboration forms. So leverage us. Remember us. Use us. We go off on our tangents and rants but in the end we're here to provide an outlet for you to share and for us to grow with it. Its going to be a long ride and I'm sure there will be bumps (there always are) but looking to the road ahead, it's going to be a great trip.
The best is yet to come.