I received Microsoft's MVP Award yesterday. I tried blogging about the experience at the end of the day but I didn't feel that I was ready to do it. The MVP Award is an unusual and very different kind of designation in the professional world. Many professional awards are about recognizing accomplishment. But the Microsoft MVP Award is about recognizing service. When you are singled out in this way, it's the community's method of saying, "Keep up the good work."
I've achieved many certifications in my career. I've held certifications from Sun, Oracle, IBM, Microsoft, HP, Siemens, Cisco and a few others. But I've never advertised them publicly because they were all my doing. I studied. I worked hard. I passed the certification exams. And I was a better developer and software architect for doing it. But, as a professional, I think those things are expected of me. So there was really no sense in wearing those certifications on my sleeve, in my opinion. To paraphrase the old adage, the proof is IN the pudding, not ON it, if you know what I mean.
The MVP Award, based on community and industry service, is not something you apply for. You get nominated by other MVPs and you go through a process of demonstrating what you've been up to for the past year. A review board checks you out (you can't hide from the search engines) and determines which MVP area of expertise you would fit into. Then, they determine among the other candidates in your group if your contributions to the community are exemplary. My MVP area of expertise is Visual C#, by the way. I think they picked the correct area for me because I know, love and promote the dickens out of C#. It's my favorite programming language in my career of 25 years so far.
It's a bit overwhelming to get the kind of support you need to win the MVP Award. When you receive "the magical e-mail" as some have called it, there's a stark moment of realization that you're standing on the shoulders of so many others who contributed to it. No MVP has ever achieved the title on his own. And I'm certainly no different. That's the way communities work. We lift each other up. I want to recognize a few folks who have lifted me up and encouraged me along the way to serve better within the Microsoft developer community:
These folks are my role models. In particular, I want to recognize Andy Leonard. If we weren't about the same age, I'd call Andy my techno-Dad. He's a father figure to all of us in the mid-Atlantic user group community, I believe. Andy is humble and brilliant, a rare combination. He's also the hardest working person I know. If I could follow Andy's lead to 50% efficiency, I know I would be successful, too. We are sorry to be losing him to Atlanta soon but he's leaving us in great shape. Thank you, Andy.
I send out a heartfelt thanks to these folks and the cast of hundreds who pour their time and energy into making the user groups, Code Camps and DevCamps throughout the mid-Atlantic region great successes. My profession would be just a job if it weren't for all of you. I look forward to serving you all in the year to come.