Time to say thanks to some of my mentors ...

After a little more than 20 years of what I could call a career... I thought it time to reflect on some of the people who have helped shape me and my career thus far.

Needless to say there have been numerous people that have helped me grow over the years, both personally and professionaly, ...the friends, family, my beautiful spouse, wonderful children, etc...

But some have really inspired, guided and taught me things that, to be honest, I could have never achieved on my own. 

These are the people I would like to call out as having been my mentors.

Now, you can probably tell by my clumsy writing style, that I am not your typical blogger, seasoned article writer or digital media publishin genius.  Nevertheless I felt it time to make an effort to write something publicly and express my sincerest thanks to some of these exceptional individuals.

So without further a due, and not at all in any order of importance or sequence...

Tony Won, who taught me very early on in my days working as an IT systems manager at a sugar producing company, Candico:  understanding the core business  of your company is essential in understanding how IT can help support the business .  How -as an IT guy- I hated walking around with a gas mask taking sugar stock inventory in the factory every month. But boy did I learn the in's and out's of a global industry from production to mass retail selling.  Something that still helps me in understanding industry processes today.

Gabriele Gundelbacher, who gave me a chance to be part of the leading EMEA Corporate Storage tiger team at Compaq/HP in the early 2000's and pushed me to trust my personal positives,  along with the safety of my technical expertise, to be able to stand in front of large technical and C level audiences and conduct a compelling presentation.  The 1000's of presentations done since then that went well -yes some sucked-, I owe to you.

Christophe Dubois, the person who I am proud to have called a colleague and still a dear friend today.  This is that one person that not only awed me with his technical breadth of knowledge, excellent presentation skills, but also truly learned me how to listen, develop myself more transversally and trust my own abilities to be a technical leader within the IT industry.

Walter De Neve, sometimes when you think you know it all and have a potential tendency of thinking you are bigger than the rest...this is the person that taught me by true example, that even when you are more knowledgeable than others, to remain humble, patient, take the occasional blow to the !@%#$% whilst choosing the right timing to just deliver great results... no one can argue with great delivery. 

Abdallah Bakkoury, one of my first managers when I transitioned from the IT supplier side to the customer consumer side, an important change period in my career.  He gave me real guidance in dealing with the internals of a single large non IT enterprise, rather than the tactical engagement experience I gained with the 100's of large enterprises I had worked and consulted to in the past.

There are many many more people that I have worked with -and continue to- that have inspired me in one way or another, whether it is/was through the sheer awesomeness of their IT industry innovation and contribution, their amazing personalities, or both...these are the  more than 1000 people that I am proud to be connected with via linkedin today. 

Sometimes you just need to call out those few that really come to mind when you take a minute to reflect back.

Sincerest thanks to my mentors thus far,

Yours truly,

Yves.