Short note to help promote and congratulate the latest vExpert 2015 awardees announcement, and a special welcome to new folk on the list. I am typing this on an iPad so grammar isn’t going to be a strong point especially because of IOS semi-intuitive autocorrect feature, I’ll try clean it up later.

The list has grown – tremendously and as I and other people have questioned the exponential growth of the list, I truly believe and trust the team at VMware is doing a fantastic job of making sure the people in the list belong in the list. I have been out of a “technologist” focused role for almost a year now so it has proven hard to find the time to return to creating fruitful and meaningful technical white papers, blog posts and posters. (Something I do miss)

But then that is what the good thing about the programme, and perhaps I needed to be reminded about. It is about contribution to the community and not the level you are technically contributing at – filling knowledge gaps where you can and putting your hand up and identifying when there is a gap in your own knowledge.

This is what makes the global VMware community special, and whilst I do think there are a lot of ego’s in this world – the one thing I have observed is for this community’s passion for helping others along their journeys.

It creates a virtual sense of family and whilst I and other long time vExperts compete through our chosen companies – I would never be led to believe this causes any friction or animosity towards each other when one is seeking help with a particular problem. That’s what makes this programme beneficial, not the free stuff you get with it, not the label or sense of title it gives you. It’s the people it connects you with- globally.

Check out http://blogs.vmware.com/vmtn/2015/02/vexpert-2014-announcement-2.html to see the full list.