Goodbye VMware PSO...
Sam McGeown
Autumn seems to be a time for the winds of change to blow through our industry, and this year that’s true for me.
TL;DR - I’m leaving VMware PSO to join the Cloud Management Business Unit as a Technical Marketing Manager for Cloud Automation!
It’s been a little over two years since I joined VMware as a Senior Conusltant in the EMEA NSX Practice, and in that time I’ve enjoyed some great opportunities, worked with some great people and technologies. And I’ve learned a lot since taking on my first NSX-T design just days after joining. But, as I mentioned when I joined a couple of years ago, I’ve always said NSX comes alive when it’s automated by vRA. In fact, almost every engagement I’ve done over the past two years has had a strong vein of automation running through it.
A friend asked me what it was I wanted from my next role - after some thought, and not really knowing if the role would exist, I listed the following:
- a technical role
- content creation (blogs, presentations etc)
- presenting (VMUGs, VMworld etc)
- working with product management/engineering teams
- staying close enough to real world customers to be relevant
A little while ago Cody De Arkland and Grant Orchard encouraged me to apply for a Technical Marketing role that had opened up in Cody’s team - they were looking for someone to join on this side of the pond, and on paper it ticked a lot of boxes for me. In all honesty, I didn’t expect to get the role - I could think off hundreds of reasons why I wouldn’t, but after meeting with managers all the way up to VPs, I was really excited by the prospect. It’s been a really long process, from initial conversation through to getting the offer - having a role moved to the UK in an organisation the size of VMware is a complicated task!
So, next Monday (7th Oct) I’ll be moving into a new role as a Technical Marketing* Manager (TMM) for Cloud Automation. I’ll be back focussing on products like vRealize Automation, Cloud Assembly, Code Stream and Lifecycle Manager, but you can expect to see me incorporating NSX and cloud-native into the mix too.
And of course I’ll continue to blog here.
The last thing I want to say is thank you - Cody and Grant have really been great friends supporting me through this process (despite Cody’s treachary) and I do not doubt their support has opened doors that would otherwise not been! And also my wife, who has been very patient with me while all of this has been in process!
*P.S. Don’t get too hung up on the “marketing” part of the title, the emphasis will always be on the “technical” part of the role - I think of it as looking at the cool new stuff being released and generating content and enablement.