 Everybody, this is Christian Buckley, doing another MVP buzz chat and I'm talking today with Ola. Hello. Hello, Christian. So, for folks that don't know you, who are you, where are you and what do you do? Well, I'm a Norwegian MVP in the Cloud and Data Center Management Group. And I've been an MVP for 15 years since 2008, so I like to say that I got my MVP award when I was about 10 or 12 years or something like that. Of course. That's right. And I got married when I was 12 as well, so, yeah. It's always easier to lie to yourself than other, right? Of course. Yeah. So, I always like to ask too, so for being a seasoned MVP, been in it for a while to go back down memory lane, but what was that process like, like, what were you doing prior to becoming an MVP and what was the process of becoming an MVP for you? Yeah. For me, it was, I was actually the first non-developer MVP in Norway that got the title. So they had only had a couple before me, but they were all developers. But I was so lucky that I had my MCT certified trainer and I did a lot of training and Microsoft asked me one time when they was out of a speaker in my hometown, Bergen, in Norway. If I could just do a session on, I think it was server 2003 or something like that. So I just jumped on it and did a presentation. It was maybe the hardest thing I have done up till then because it was a new forum. It was a lot of people, but still it was a fun topic to talk about. So I did the first session of Microsoft conference and I was happy. The next time they asked me to come back and after that one, they asked me to be on the, it was a Norwegian tour with four cities. So I attended all the four cities and started to do this every year and do speeches and suddenly Microsoft just decided that maybe we should nominate Olaf and at that time I was working on the fabulous operating system Windows Vista. Oh, yes. Yeah. So we were early in the deployment phase actually and I did some speak, I had a session at TechEd in the States about upgrading Norway to Windows Vista and then I was nominated in the setup and deployment team at that time and got successfully in hopefully and have been an MVP since but in different categories. But my main thing to stay an MVP have been basically doing speeches at conferences and some other kind of activities. But lately I've gone down the road. You are on the podcast track. So I have my Blue Screen Brothers podcast. That's a Norwegian sound podcast, but it's an English YouTube channel doing demonstration, more technical demonstration because that's easier with the picture than just the sound. Well, it's interesting too. I mean, where you started out by saying, you know, a non developer, that's like you know, folks that aren't as familiar with the program, you know, that your first instinct is, is like, well, if you're a Microsoft MVP, therefore you must code. You must be very technical. And certainly we're all focused on technology. I'm also a business focused MVP. You know, my degrees are in marketing, but I've been in tech for 32 years. And so it's, you know, the topics that I focus on are more, you know, user centric, user experience, you know, that side of things, business topics and dabbled in the IT pro, the admin topics as well. But can't can't write a line of code. Sorry. Yeah, I started that mostly that way myself. And when they changed the setup and deployment program to another job, to I think it was to be a part of the Windows Update group. It suddenly didn't fit me as well. And then I was over to the Windows MVP part instead. And one year I actually had two MEPs and then it was Windows and Office MEPs. So what I like to think about it as I grown up and started to do something else. So then I went over to the data center and Azure mainly. But I'm always loving Microsoft 365. That was my main cloud technology chaser. And after a while, I was starting to do more Azure work. And suddenly I was hired in a bank as an operation manager for Azure. And now I see myself as an Azure janitor doing maintenance and security. So that sounds really glitzy and Azure janitor. Yeah, yeah, because I don't think we have any good name because it's it's a kind of operation manager role. But I do more jobs. I find stuff that shouldn't be there. I deleted. I I do a lot of what I call janitoring. Right. It's it's a kind of governance and everything in governance is the main main part you have to do to stay secure. So you have the security side as an effect that you actually are a janitor and clean up stuff and find all these loopholes with networks that shouldn't be there or gateways that should be closed and so on. I've spent a good portion of my career, certainly when I was back in the project management world as doing janitorial services and operations. Same thing where it's you know, unappealingly referred to as like special projects. I was the one that would come in and I usually was like I had teams that would get merged into by my team. I was a task with managing people out. So to to taking teams, taking peers that got moved under me so that I could then cut across and clean up that. So not always the fun job doing the clean up stuff. But I prefer more of the governance as well, which is the oversight. Put the process in place to to have transparency on the work that's being done and yeah, policies, procedures for provisioning new systems and sites and teams and and putting the life cycle management in place and make sure that it's all running. Yeah, so and then you also get the place to be with the regarding of news because when you are doing the maintenance or the governance, you actually are in place of discovering new technologies, new way of doing stuff. So so you are allowed to stay ahead and actually do do exploring of everything you think could be a greater solution or better way of doing stuff for a new security system and stuff like that. So it's quite fun. I agree because it's also it's perfect for people that have adult ADHD. And yeah, but it's but having that variety, there's something to be said about having a variety in work. And I've never been that operations that ongoing, you know, basically it's it's packaged or set up. It's established and now it's just running it ongoing. Like drives me crazy. I got to be in new challenges and new challenges always. That's the thing. And that's why I call it a janitor because I feel like you do a lot of different stuff. You need to know a lot of stuff and you do a lot of different stuff. And because we are a bank, my work are really techno intensive and we have high priority on the technology and the security side and cost, of course, because every bank need to have they don't need to have a low cost, but they have to justify the cost. So so when I can discover that somebody set up an SQL server and forgot to delete the disks and we suddenly have 20,000 a year in disk space, not being used for something. So then you save money and you secure the system because in the same feature we actually discovered that we had firewall ports open to Avina that wasn't connected to anything, but it could easily be connected. So so you have different challenges all the time. And you you you can being a bank with quite a few developers. We have a lot of fun technology technology. So and that's going back to the MVP year. The way of being able to connect to different kind of product groups when I need to learn something new, if I need to learn something I didn't know anything about or I have a silly question. I can actually ask it and people will understand. OK, this is a new BN. We try to help him. So both in communities and internalists, of course. Well, that's why I mean, even before becoming an MVP, I mean, one of the things that I love about it is with the MVP calls, which are on a weekly basis now, the NDI calls. And for those that are familiar, it's the so it's it's there. We're all under NDA. We get advanced views of things that product teams, some of them are more forthcoming than others were sharing with roadmap. And hey, here's what we're thinking about, but we've not made decisions on what are your thoughts about this. Other things that we see that are, you know, before or during a private preview and we provide feedback on. But one of the things that I love about that is being able to see things. And sometimes I'll be honest, I'll join a call about something new and be like, all right, this has like I see no value in this for me, for the stuff that I'm doing, I'll drop out of the call. I'll I'll go and and you know, and sit in on things like that. Sounds like it might be interesting or apply or drop back out of that. I was doing that kind of activity. Maybe that's just the personality of a of an MVP to go and experiment to to take in all this new. But I I'm part of local communities here and I was in California, where I was born and raised, but was part of different technical communities and would often sign up for, you know, hey, new product or new. Hey, this is a new advance in this area. Come check it out. What we're doing, I would constantly participate in those community based activities. I'm doing less of that now, more MVP stuff. But again, it's just a great way to expose yourself to new ideas that could possibly impact your company or the very least something a blogger or a podcast about. Yeah. And the same thing if I'm attending a conference. Usually I'm doing some speeches at conference when when I am attending. But I always try to go to session. I don't know anything about because going to something you already know. Well, it's not so rewarding as going to something you should have an insight to and learn something just to see how stuff works. It's like when you were a kid and you got a present in took every parts from it to see how it works. It just for finding the screwdriver and see if you can dissimulate and then you could put it right back. Right. So so just exploring new stuff all the time is better than you should always go to track and know what you are doing when you are doing your main job. But knowing side stuff is also really fun and important. Well, that's why I also love to take the occasional class. I mean, stretch yourself, which is another I mean, it's always being learning. I think that's something I think humans need to always be learning something in general. I think it helps us to stay grounded and well rounded into the things that we're doing. Like I just I just finished a week long class and I it was around power platform and there are pieces of what I learned, which I'll never use again unless I take another class. But I wanted just to be able to speak to it to be aware of the various components. Now I have better understanding how they come together. And I can recommend it for other people. Right. Exactly. And that's why I actually love the Microsoft Learn platform because it's so easy to go in, especially when they have challenges where you can attend a challenge, cloud challenge and be a part of a rewarding system and stuff like that. But but I like to do the Microsoft Learn courses. I don't do the certification anymore because I have done enough of them and I know I don't need need them in my my work anymore, but I still like to take the different courses like the Azure developer course. I'm not a developer, but I read it to see how would the developer affect my daily work? What kind of system should I know about that they might be using? Yeah, that that's great advice in general. Anything else that you give I'm sure as an MVP for 15 years, you've had plenty of people come up to you and say, what is this process to become an MVP? What kind of guidance do you give a perspective MVP? I think it's the the main part is the same that I will give to everybody that will have a good career. It's to be visible and you can be visible by having a Twitter account, Twittering stuff, a blog and and people think that if you blog, you need to write 14 pages of something. But basically, the most read blogs are just half a page because they are directly to the point. So I think that you should try to be visible and on the online world, on the different medias, you should attend community classes, community groups, if you have some in your neighborhood and try to do speeches or at least attend and talk to them. So you are visible and people know you, but you need to have a footprint in the digital world before you can be an MVP today. It was easier when I was an empty and it was not easier that way. But but that way you got notice for what you did from your local Microsoft office, but now you can just have something online and people will start to see that you are often in in this community pages and answer question or stuff like that. You are you are doing something on Microsoft Docs to build up the learning curve and stuff like that. So you need to be visible and that's the main thing. And people think that MVPs are the best in class that everybody are the best engineer they can get. But but in basically, it's actually about sharing your knowledge with other people. So you don't need to be the top guy, but you need to be the guy that actually are willing to learn and share what you are learning with others. Yeah, that's really the key. That that's the point. I think when I became an MVP, it was kind of a big deal that there was just a handful of us that were business focused MVPs that were non technical and that's and I use that phrase too. It's like it's not exactly fair. Like again, my entire career has been in it. I'm technical in a number of areas, but not being a developer and not being an engineer by trade. I was there for a non technical MVP. And again, there was just a handful of us. And now you have a good portion of it where I think it was a shift even for Microsoft to recognize exactly what you said that these are individuals who are doing more to share what they're doing. You do need to be involved in the technology. That's kind of the point. But it's you're right. You're surfacing the work that you're doing, highlighting the work of others, recognizing that being in the conversation. Those are ways that you can become visible. Yeah, build up a network around you. So that's always a good thing. But I think always the local Azure groups, Office 365 groups or whatever group you have in your neighborhood, try to find one that you are involved in that kind of work. And if you get involved there, you have a good starting ground to become an MVP, I would say. Exactly. Yeah, there's there's always there's there's not a single user group out there that doesn't look at somebody who is willing to volunteer to get involved to they'll they'll not say no to that. You welcome the bigger issue is that you have a lot of people that just don't be one of them where they come and say, hey, I want to get involved and then you ghost them. You that you never respond, never follow up with the user group leadership. I'm on the user group board for my local community here in Utah. And we have plenty of people that get excited, go to an event that we put on or show up at a user group meeting and say, hey, I really want to get involved. I'd love to do more. I'd love to be in charge of a committee within the user group or something. And then we never see them again. Yeah, and then you get more work because if you think they are going to do something and you set it up and they don't follow up, you have to do it yourself. And it's twice as hard as just trying to do somebody else's job. So it's it's better to say it's too much for me, but I can help in another way. So yeah, so easy and then do what you promise. That's maybe the best thing. And just always showing up, being an attendee and participating, engaging in the conversation. That's fantastic right there. So yeah. Yeah. And share, share if there are good events because some of the community events are not that well visited and it should be more people there. So you should just start to share it, write it on LinkedIn or Twitter or whatever you have as social media. And then then you will start to create your own footprint so people can see that you actually have a digital footprint in technology. Exactly. Well, I'll really appreciate your time and your insights. And hopefully we'll we'll get to meet in person one of these days, maybe at another MVP summit in person. If they start, yeah, yeah, thanks for inviting me.