this is the art of network engineering podcast in this podcast we'll explore tools technologies and talented people we aim to bring new information that will expand your skill sets and toolbox and share the stories of fellow network engineers welcome back friends it's so good to see you again for another episode of the joy of networking i don't know about you but it's that time of year and i'm certainly feeling a little spooky right about now let's just run with that feeling and see where it takes us today okay let's start out with a nice wooded area for a backdrop gotta set that scene you hear maybe let's do a little log cabin off to the side here i know a lot of network engineers that would love to go off the grid in this cabin speaking of which let's draw in a little howdy packet right in front now that's the happiest little beard i ever did see now i did say i was feeling spooky so let's work on a little graveyard over here what should we put on those gravestones hmm here lies token ring i got the tinglies just thinking about that maybe next to him we'll put a stone for the old t1 circuit he's not quite dead yet but maybe he just wanted to get his affairs in order that sounds responsible i wonder if dan still wants to hang out here now i'm not gonna judge we'll change his ear to ear grin to a half concerned smile there i think we need one more piece here oh i know it'll be winter before you know it let's give our old friend the spanning tree bear a nice little cave home to hibernate there i think that looks just wonderfully terrifying thanks for stopping by friends and stick around for the art of network engineering thank you tim ross i am uh i am master chief no blinky blinky happy halloween from your friends at the art of network engineering he is simba simba how are you doing this week ah kuna matata holy crap happy halloween you're probably gonna listen to this in february this is our hollywood valentine's special nothing to get you in the mood then a little spookiness right right oh god andy how you doing he is at andy laptop at uh permit ipandyandy.com also simba or mufasa no that looks like simba that's simba yeah yeah i feel like andy i think i look like a haseed uh good man thank you i'm uh things are good i'm tired from some crazy maintenance windows but there's an end in sight we're having my son's birthday party this weekend at the house i'm pretty psyched for that um good things are ahead yeah nice nice tim ross tim i'm so sad you're back home you were here and now you're gone we had so much fun we did i i really uh need to thank you guys i i got to spend some time up in the vermont mountains and i really did like like people always say they come back from stuff like that and they all they feel so refreshed and and life is good you know zandy if you will but you know i i didn't believe it you know and then i got home and it's like wow i i actually feel kind of better now got some of that mountain air and the streams and and uh this may have to go offline but there were some some weird dudes jumping in a creek i don't know what was going on there but we we don't have to get into that right now but other than that yeah it was now that was spooky there's a story um there's a story there's a story there but no i had a great time i i feel great it is it is good to be home but i do miss my new vermont family and uh your son your aj son timothy uh also tom drew me a picture and it's actually up on hanging up on the wall here so it's uh awesome all as well tim here had a petrified look on his face most of the time because whenever me and my wife would yell at my son tim we thought he thought that they were yelling at him yeah wronged him yeah i was in the dog house or thought i was most of the time uh dan how are you dan at howdy packet howdy howdy i'm doing good i uh i've been doing some work on this house i uh replaced a toilet tonight um an empty toilet yeah i got a little bit of dust on me but that happens i'm good was the shitter full is that why it was it was just a really old one so yeah yeah swapped it out with a nice nice white one wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait what color was the other one it was a it was a good old oatmeal color yeah straight from me dude that was that was classy back then man it was not no more though nice nice all right well we do have a guest this week but before we introduce the guests we're going to cut to some wins and now it's time for the wins for this week winning in our discord channel is chris morrison they passed the ccnp encore exam congratulations chris that's a big one hoobastank pilgrim that sounds really familiar i think they just got their aws cloud practitioner last week and this week they got the az900 the azure front of mendel's congratulations i can relate so much to this next win smiling chris from the discord made it through a trip to the hardware store and the projects that followed with his wife and he's still married sometimes those trips and projects can be tough and james glenos passed his aws solutions architect associate exam congratulations james that's all the wins for this week if you want your win to be read in the podcast you can go to artofneting.com forward slash iaatj for it's all about the journey and join our discord and whenever you have a win whether it's personal or professional you can drop it in the winning channel and we'll read it here right on the podcast welcome to new patreon craig johnson we thank you so much for your support as a patreon member of the art of network engineering if you're interested in becoming a patreon you can go to patreon.com forward slash art of neteng we thank all of our patreons and all of our listeners for your support of what we do here on the podcast now back to the show those are the wins for this week uh our we have a very exciting guest i am super happy to finally finally get him on the show uh you've seen him on the the twitter sphere you probably follow his blog and if you don't you should uh he's a cisco champion i'm given to understand we're going to hear him on cisco champions ready radio real soon uh it is gerard gerard thanks for joining us man gerard what's going on everyone i am listen first of all thank you all for having me being here has been something that's like i gotta get i gotta do this right but i also think it's kind of like a full circle thing because i remember when i was talking to aj about maybe about a year ago or so and we were just back and forth for hours he's like dude i'm starting this podcast and i followed it right like like all the content like we make individually collectively and i followed it like since i haven't missed one episode so it's awesome to be here to watch you grow to see where from the beginning like meet the team and you know just all these things so it's awesome to finally be here yeah i appreciate it guys yeah awesome man i think you're better at this than i am i've definitely missed a few of the shows it's become it's become part of my morning ritual right like you know get the kids to the bus stop go to work start it then i get into work and i finish it you know so awesome awesome well thanks for being here so uh why don't you uh introduce yourself who are you what do you do so my name everyone for those who know me those who don't i'm gerard cavalinas uh you can find me on the interwebs at g cavalinas i'm the founder of tech house 570 which is my blog and brand who you know i specialize in helping people from all over you know and i i'm part of this amazing community the art of network engineering it's all about the journey discord you'll find me in there um i started it as initially just kind of as an outlet to relax right like just something i love writing i love technology and i married those two passions and then almost two years later it's become something so much bigger i've helped so many people i'm still helping a bunch of people you know just whether you're looking to get into the industry you know your seasoned vet you're not sure where to go uh definitely pivot so i'm always available to help i'm currently an i.t specialist for a huge healthcare organization but tomorrow will be my last day in that role and on the first i will be transitioning over to halian systems which is a managed service provider based out in philly i'm going to be a managed services system analyst but my role will be varying right so i'll be doing maintenance windows patching servers networks doing the build outs working with some awesome gear so new role new challenges and i'm ready to go oh congratulations congratulations thanks it is and like i said there's just so much growth so much forward path so it's just it aligned perfectly with what i'm doing right now in life awesome it was a no-brainer philly meet up now be before we get too much further into your story i i gotta ask where do you get your energy from because you have more of it than my kids it's funny right so my son benjamin he's my youngest so we have a six-year-old seven-year-old five kids for pretty much everyone knows i'm big in my family my family's the most important right like without my wife without them i couldn't even do this so like huge shout out to my wife because i love her and without her i couldn't even be sitting up here with you guys so my son benjamin he's two i have a one-year-old and a three-month-old and i think he has way more energy than me but i think it's just they you know they keep me going right like i always and i keep myself busy i learned when i early especially on like my teenagers like just be busy i like doing something i don't like sitting still i don't i got to keep moving right my mind's got to keep going or because that's when you know the boredom kicks in that's when you're like holy shit what am i doing you know like i just i'm always moving i'm always active when i sleep i don't sleep you know like the brain's always going which that would be a good and bad thing but never stops man yeah every time i turn around i see gerard it's true it's like that rockwell song somebody's watching me i'm just what's the significance of the 570 tech house 570. so techhouse57057 knows the area code right because i'm based out of northeastern pa okay scranton's where uh my home is so you know home of the office everybody knows screen in the office it's kind of like synonymous at this point and five seven oh i just felt when i was you know creating the brand and i had the name i was like i think that'd be cool that's a nice ring to a 570 like you know you're representing the area yeah i remember what i saw that inspired me but yeah that's that's how the name came to be nice so what happens if you move i was just gonna snap you gonna change that brand ah no we're just gonna do a subdivision of the brand and it'll just be something else no numbers in it no no dan there's the number portability act he can take it with him wherever he goes it's fine hey i was just curious you know awesome uh well gerard i am aware that you have kind of like a a storied past man you've done a lot throughout your career and and so i want to dig right into that so uh let's hop in the old time machine and and go back to you know what got you into tech so it's funny right and i've written about this it was kind of part of my the very first blog piece that i've i've ever written so techhouse570 check it out shameless plug no shame i i you know technology i always love tinkering right i always love things but the one that did it for me the story was i got grounded right because my stupid i yell at my kids now because they'll do something and then i think back like man i did that same stuff right and then i remember i got grounded my ass is something stupid i was like you know what it's like i said something my mom goes go clean the basement i was like all right so there's three computers down there and i'm trying it was a it's a dell inspiron actually there's two inspirons and i think uh compact rosario i'm trying to remember the third one but she goes down there i go mom do any of these work she goes nope i was like well what's wrong with them she said i don't know figure it out and that was really like believe it or not that's what kind of kick started my lover technology like i was in my basement just with a screwdriver just messing around right tearing it apart tearing everything apart and then eventually i did fix one and when i fixed one right like the rest is history because like i loved how it worked like the troubleshooting the thought process like how does this work how do you you know figure out like like what do these components do and then when i was old enough i started really kind of looking more you know like as much as you could because back then you know there wasn't a whole lot of online resources but when i could i had registered for the career technology center in my area and that was our location that is our locational vocational educational school i signed up there and then i went there for three years for computer maintenance after i did that i started really you know working in retail right because retail for me back then you know the store once you got into retail you were like it right like you know there wasn't a community like this there wasn't twitter linkedin i don't even think there was myspace it was just you know who you know and i knew somebody and i got in and i just kind of kept going and climbing that ladder and i really wanted to master like computer repair and pc repair because the way i've always viewed it which sure times have changed drastically the way i always viewed it was like pc repair is kind of like your building foundation right like you built upon there and then you could go into networking or you could do programming and this was before automation for sd-wan for all that so i said okay so then my last time i used to bounce between like geek squad circuit city i thought i was like cool shit like oh they're gonna pay me 50 cents more yeah you know like i was they're like oh you'll give me more money like i was always looking to like better myself even when i was like 16 17 18 19 and uh i went ahead and when i landed at geek squad my last time i really got into networking like my last time before i moved up and that's where i fell in love with networking because i had to redo the cable drops and there was a switch rack to the side so i started configuring that and that's how my love of networking came in and then i just kept going up from there right like i got hired at uh bank i worked for bank of america for seven years as a network technician network admin doing cable runs they had old uh what do they have the old pbx system it was an old nortel system so like everything was cross connect based so i used to have to like trace out the cross connect find the cross connect to which rack panel port it was and then go back to the switch see what rack panel port like the old school way and uh gerard quick question just quick question yeah you got a job at bank of america as a network technician did you have any certifications any formal education well i had my high school diploma and then i had my career technology center degrees but i didn't have any certifications whatsoever right that's amazing was that career certification was it like a certificate a diploma it's a certificate right from the career technology center yeah it was a vote certificate said you got into this program i got it like a week or so before i uh before i graduated high school but your passion for technology and what you were learning and your knowledge i guess just kept getting you the next better job right yeah and it's one of those things like like so so the job that i'm i'm moving into i'm very blessed and fortunate humbled i this it landed in my lap right like i wasn't looking i wasn't those other ones i felt like i put a little more in just because i had to prove it i've always felt like no matter what you do or accomplish just keep going right like i have to prove that because i need to know like i didn't have any certifications i didn't have i just had hey i worked here in retail i'm looking for that next step in my career and i feel like you know he gave me that because he's like he saw i was hungry but the cool part was and i'll never forget this when so our our district manager regional managers all that stuff they were based all over like one was in delaware one was in philly one was somewhere else and we took us out to ruby tuesday he's like you're the youngest network technician i've ever hired i thought that was so cool yeah i was only i was like i was 21 at the time 21 and i'm working with guys that are older than me that are like not just in title but like way senior than me like these guys have been doing infrastructure for like 15 years yeah 20 years they've got like i'm just i'm literally coming in as green as you can how did you find that job because you kind of worked your way through best buy in the local places in retail like how did you i would believe it or not i believe it or not craigslist okay like all the places because there wasn't linked there wasn't linkedin yeah you know what i mean like so i was just like i was looking i was just looking for jobs like google and search and i found it on craigslist and i'll never forget it because i'm like oh shit this is a scam i don't know if i should i don't know if i should quit here i don't know like but i did i applied and i'll never forget the recruiter it's crazy talking you guys you know those every like the spark his name was ec and he was out in dallas texas and he was just like hey gerard what's going on man i was like what's going on and you know we did what i had to do gave me the formal offer and got in wow so i want to back up a little bit because i don't want to gloss over the fact that you worked in geek squad because we've had a number of guests on the show that have started their tech careers in geek squad retail and so i kind of want to pick that apart a little bit because i think that you know a lot of people in our audience are looking for a way to break in and that's a very viable option so how how do you go from you know not having a job or working like you know whatever you do when you're 15 16 17 and get into geek squad and start getting that tech experience so i think the cool part is well i know on my life i know today to get your first it job and we've seen it in like twitter post linkedin posts it's changed so drastically so what i mean by that is now you have like we have outlets and these communities like the discord server right like there's just like hey you know everybody just comes together back then as i said it was like who you knew or maybe you know i always heard this trick and i i don't know if this was ever true they're like if you apply really fast online when you do the application uh you know they'll get you to the to the thing to like the head of the line faster i was like i don't know about that but but of course i did it and i mean it worked but i can't confirm nor deny if that's the truth but you know geek squad and and fire dog and cersei those are such reputable brands and like they're still you know they know even three years later you know people know them and i think like well i know that presented so many opportunities and still does right because it gives you not just a technical opportunity okay like you know to learn the fundamentals and then really from there you know through studying day-to-day you know all that stuff then you look at the customer facing piece like the non-technical role how to not just troubleshoot issues or solve issues but deal with hostile customers and deal with people oh the soft skills for sure yeah right like so i just for me and i and this is how i view every job i always look if you could take one thing away from it what is it like what can you take away and that's you know for geek squad i took away you know it added to my resume my arsenal skills same with retail network technician gave me my first infrastructure job this was my first time touching i think i i remember cisco it was catalyst 6 500 series switches like all of these experiences have just kind of layered upon one another and that's what you know has led me to hear and then my other love so it's definitely it's definitely not just technical but non-technical too like what are your takeaways going to be do you think that you're a curious guy oh yeah yeah i feel like there's a there's a thread with a lot of like you're in the basement right trying to figure out how the computer works and then like you know that people like us seem driven by like we got to know how it works and and what it works the only people in the family that knows how this stuff works like nobody else was fixing computers in your family right right no i always hope maybe my son will catch the technology bug fingers crossed i got two boys and three girls so somebody's gotta catch it and you said you just applied to like best buy right or geek squat whatever yeah yeah went online and went online and applied because again it was like yeah i knew like some friends but it wasn't more like oh hey you know you could put a good word it was literally the time just apply there wasn't linkedin there was none of that it's pretty amazing and then you run into a switch and you're like wait what is this and now you're configuring a switch well the inter interesting parts of that too the switch so none of our drops were working when i was like re-imaging the computers and uh that's what again you know the passion and the love well they had my one friend i love her she's awesome uh she they had her doing and she's like i'm color blind they wanted her to rewire all the ethernet cables she's like i can't oh man when they're like why that'll be tough she's like a color blind so i literally can't do the pin out so then they're like oh so i started helping her and then that's where i started you know resetting up the switch and i was like again it was maybe 20 like 1920 and that was my first time ever touching a switch not in a production environment but you know in a retail one where i can't really mess anything up too bad son of mean to stop you in your story you were a bank of america you said right yep and what were you doing there uh network i was a network technician network administrator so you were configuring routers and switches yep and it's and that now the crazy part was is i love the begin for seven years so we got laid off like i think they did a massive layoff it was like oh 250 000 people they were laying off engineers project managers because towards the end what started happening those last like two and a half years or so they started tying our hands right so i wanted to get way better at the configuring you know like what what engineers do and it didn't happen because they they would have like a senior engineer hop on the bridge to do all the configuration like apply the new config and i was like well can i do that they're like no because there's contractual issues and i'm like ah and that was bankruptcy right yeah so it's kind of like a double it's kind of like a double win how the hell did you pivot from i configured one switch at best buy to bank of america hire me to manage their network that's a big jump again no certifications no formal training how did you get them to like you configured a switch and that's all they needed i mean i'm being facetious but no yeah i mean i wish i could go back and tell you i think it was just more so because of the and this this too and i'm you know i'm sure we'll touch base upon the majority of my career like i'd probably say eight tenths of my career i've been a generalist i've held centralized roles but i've been a generalist so what i mean by generalists is yeah i could rack and stack the gear i could you know we could set up the access points go meraki figure them but i'm also doing hey could you re-image the machine hey i have a printer problem fires and tickets and helping the tier one so i've always been that so i felt like again it was just that was early on in my career right so they saw wow this guy's well-rounded and i use the term i i'm not gonna say i coined it but i use it on my mop right so wherever you need me i'm gonna go so i felt like that's where and i was like first year and i was really learning like okay we're gonna turn up the ports there's just basic data jack activations phone moves we put in an entirely new voip system my first time touching voip was avaya and after that i remember i started helping like the guys like reimage and and build machines just because they would get slammed so it's like a double-edged sword right you know i get the learning experience to sponge all that knowledge up but then i'm also going to help the other guys you know where where i spent a majority of my time in the arenas and like you know the support aspect do you remember the interview from bank of america the reason i'm stuck on bank of america is that was your first network job and a lot of people want to know how do i get that first network job no sir no certifications no formal training and you had i guess it sounds like those retail established establishments give you great general like you said you're technical you're touching this you're touching that soft skills but that's kind of in front of the customer yeah yeah but yeah that seems like a jump to go from that to like a dedicated network management function do you think that you just do you remember the interview was it technical yeah so i had i want to say two interviews and like the second interview they did ask me some technical questions i don't remember what yeah i apologize i think and it goes down to it's how do you how you present yourself right and i've again i've listened to every single episode i've listened there's been so many great guests you've had and you're going to have it's how you how do you present yourself right like what is it that you bring to the table like the old question and i haven't heard this interview in a while and like i said i'm not that old but it's like an old school like why should we hire you what like what puts you above everybody else yeah and it's at that moment like it's the opportunity and i i just said this recently and i'll say it again you know when if you get one opportunity in life be it personally professionally whatever you gotta seize that like you gotta run take the ball run with it that's just always been my mentality because if you don't someone else will and that's you know that you're going to miss out on those opportunities or opportunities and just take it give everything you have and if you do that i mean you know i feel like a recruiter it's genuinely too right like they're going to see okay well i think this guy's yeah he knows and you've mentioned this in past episodes like don't lie right like don't bullshit if you don't know something just say that but if you're genuine and the authentic like the authenticness they see that and they're gonna be like okay that like that's the guy i want because at the end of the day we could teach skills technical skills like we could teach them how to even if i didn't know you know my head from you know what like they'll teach you okay you could configure a switch you could do this but you know what can't teach them soft skills i can't teach them how to be personable yeah we could teach all that other stuff being a being a genuine human being that's that's you either have it or you don't and i think that's kind of what helped me that's who i've always been in life so i think that gave me an edge i think there's something i want to jump on that too because that's that's something the initiative right being willing you you mentioned a little bit ago even if it wasn't something that was right up your alley if somebody needed help you were going to jump in and and showing that initiative people see that and uh i i want to compare it to uh eugene's episode a while back rise to grind because he did very similar things he was on the on the service center on the help desk but he would constantly kind of go out of his way to see what other people were doing and they eventually saw hey this guy doesn't have the experience yet but he's all over the place wanting to learn so when an opening does come up they're going to look at you right away yeah so i think that initiative speaks volumes and like i said in in any organization i t or otherwise but when you're that well-rounded and the more people you talk to hey can i shadow you on some engineering projects right if you're in a position where you have the opportunity to take them because some places you may not get to just because of you know lack of work or you know just engineers are really like they're just hammered i mean you guys know you know between the change windows and you get hammered then personal life and everything it just kind of comes at one and it's just when it comes it comes fast so if you get them just just take it like hey yeah i've got 10 15 minutes yeah come on sit i'll show you that's just how i've always believed and i think it's funny too because and i mean some of you talked about this before this like a long time ago and it i don't really see it as much now i don't see it at all there's always that old school mentality like i'm not gonna share what i know right because this guy's gonna come take my job and today and again i'm not that old i'm only 33 but today i'm like i didn't look i didn't know about the it community two years ago i didn't know about vlogging like i had the llc for tech outside so no i never knew what i wanted that to be i was like i'll hold that until i know what's right i found this community i found it was two people i found youtube videos i found one and the guy to my right aj his blood that's that right there because i didn't know what i wanted out of this and like i took that and i'm serious you know he's become one of my closest friends tim as well oh you guys but i i didn't know what i wanted and once you take that i'm like okay this is what i could this is how i can give back to the community that i didn't even know existed but now that i do i'm like well what do i do like how do i and i and and the piece that did it and i do want to call this back was the one aj did when he was traveling with uh his your son you had the i think it was what was it the the salesforce the little stuffed animal oh astro yeah astro yeah and i read that piece i read that like three times i read all this stuff but i read that piece three times and i go okay this guy is i too fresh still he's got a family because how do you balance it all and like that like that's where the spark that's where all this came from i married that too and i'm like yeah i'm serious i've been then i've been waiting i wanted when i got on here i was like that's literally dejuan's videos cause like i was you i was on youtube and i was like oh who's this guy all right cool he's got some good contact again i'm just oh there's a community and then it led me to blogs and like the second one was aj's and then the rest and i was like this is okay now i know now i know what what tech house is now i know what i could be doing all right gerard i just want to reiterate a couple things that you said because as you were talking i'm thinking that just about every tech job i've had i don't know if i was necessarily qualified for but in the interviews i presented well i could communicate i had good soft skills i had customer service experience like you said with irate customers and i showed hustle determination and then it would do anything that mop mentality that you said and i think that goes a really long way because you need people especially in the beginning to give you a shot you're not going to give the you know the person who can't communicate maybe a shot if he's not you know like to me this is the i'm not a computer science major you know that knows everything so how do i get into the industry and i i think you just kind of basically told that story which is exactly what i did you know like if people like you they're going to give you a shot and if you work oh yeah you know what i mean like you have all those intangible things that i remember in other shows there's like six things right that everybody seems to have i forget what the list is that you can succeed in spite of your education in spite of your lack of experience you know yeah absolutely it's it's it's how bad do you want it right and it sounds like it's gonna sound corny but like it's that jordan meant out like how bad do you want it if you want it bad enough you can get it it's just you know it takes that little it's it's that little extra that that you know like the the you know the tireless night same thing with going for a certification exam my ccna has been authored i don't even say a thorn in my side right excite because so i have my exam i push it back until end of november because i know like i'm not ready yet but it's been something like i've been on and off with just because of like i had you know stuff way back before i met my wife and even had one child much less five you know it's just been an ongoing thing but like that's my next like your mind right like the ccna and then from there i already got everything else mapped out but that has been a thorn in my side for at least the last like six seven years and it's just through with you it's just like you know it's just been a thorn in my sight and i'm like you know what i had goal all right champion okay do this now i've achieved them and more and i've continued to do other stuff but like ccna's next like that's next on the list to go so keep that drive you know i think like putting your intentions out there into the world right like making it known what you want right like when you when when we go back to rise to grind story like he's working there he's showing interest and he's telling them like hey i'm interested in networking i want to get into a networking job you know let me shadow you you know teach me a thing or two and then you know that way it's known that when a position opens up they're like oh well we got eugene over here that's really interested in networking let's let's pull him into this you know like if people don't know what you're interested in or that you're willing to learn they're not going to teach you now if you parade around shout at the top of your lungs this is what i want to do and people still don't take you and we'll shame on them you know like yeah i i think a lot of us in this industry are looking for people to share our knowledge with and when we know what people want we're more than willing to pull them into our circles and share our knowledge but there's there's definitely some bad apples out there that you know like like you said gerard that hold that knowledge in you know the little knowledge mongers uh so this year and i haven't seen any as much these days you know like even coming up it's it's become so different now because all the platforms we have hundreds of them i i want to point out to you what jordan just said because this is 100 true he said if you want to get on the network engineers good side this is for anybody wanting to break into the network engineering field uh offered to update their documentation and diagrams for that and that's a great way that is 100 that's a great way to preach i love that that's awesome that i would definitely be on that guy's side if they updated my documents i have to tell you everywhere i've worked updating documentation was the uh the job for the fng so oh yeah yeah so gerard since you touched on it how do you prepare for certifications studying learning what's your approach so for me what it's always been is i love and you know there's again tons of pieces out there by written by so many people me included y'all have written some great ones what's you know like first of all so i'm always labbing through cbt nuggets i love cbt nuggets company pays for my subscription but i've already paid for my new one so it's like because i like i love them i'm in there every day because there's always something not just through ccna but like other exams where i'm looking at some vmware stuff and i'll sit there and just injure like i'll just ingrain it and burn it into my memory like i'll just hammer over you know like bgp ospf like right now my biggest thing to subnetting has always been an issue and then when i review over those things but then i also take what i'm learning that's applicable whether it be a certain topic or section then i'll go and lab that on my physical physical gear at home now everybody's different right like some do a virtual some do physical whole other discussion whole other day but for me i love physical because there's just so many things you can't mimic in a virtual and we've talked about oh my god you're making me happy sorry keep calm i can't i can't mimic a power outage hang on i thought we were gonna get the lion roar there for a minute you get the winning goal for that one i'll get my god i love it yeah i just that's just me tall everybody has their own preference all their own that's fine i love my physical gear i've been a bum the last two months haven't labbed on it but that's okay because next week i'll be right back at it so i have i've just been like i'm going to sit down and do this tonight and then i sit down and fall asleep on my couch so don't do that if you're if you're listening at home and you have a plan yeah i'm like i'm gonna do this i'm gonna i'm gonna do this and then like my wife has to throw something at me to wake me up because i will i'm like like you know though so but yeah so gonna start labbing again that's imperative but because again there's just things like the you know power outages bad ports you know port security it's just all these different things that you can't get in a virtual environment that you're not gonna have opportunities for so you know if you ever can even if it's one switch start with that and then get some hands-on experience but i like to bring those two together late i'll focus on a topic and then i'll lab it over the weekend normally gotcha nice so bank of america where where to next so bank of america and then let's see after bank of america i worked actually with two jobs i worked in manufacturing doing i was a 19 administrator there and that's actually around the time too i so i had always had a little side business before so okay so circle back for a second so i had a little small business i started before i even got into retail and when i was in retail i still did this but over the course of all these jobs actually grew it and it was called dynamic pc repair remember i was so cool i was like i had the flyers i put them on all the telephone poles again no social media just just like the you know i have one of the flyers i have to share with you guys on these days but and it's just like call this number and i'll fix your computer right and over time that became dynamic i.t solutions llc like that was my first like business right and i was i always wanted to own my own business just to say i could and like i did it and i got the llc i learned how to do that and has my skills grew the business group right so when i learned networking i learned how to do like home network setups i got to a couple hundred people at one point towards like towards the end i had three subcontractors working for me like i did a bunch of stuff wow with that yeah it was cool like i didn't have like 20 employees but i still had like three people like subcontract work for me and i thought it was cool but what started happening towards the end was i wasn't doing like hands-on stuff right like i wasn't actually configuring the gear i wasn't talking to people i would schedule appointments like the managerial stuff so a friend of mine i found a solution out there was called connectwise uh they have so they help iit businesses grow and expand whether you're a one-man operation multi-million dollar corporation they help everybody they have solutions they've been around for a few years they're based out in tampa i connected with someone and i i kind of gave him you know we talked about it and he he was going to keep that on or absolve my aspect of the business right after that happened i went right back to a company called technet and that was a local like msp very small and my title there was i.t administrator so again jack of all trades master of nothing i did i was like i think it was about 55 53 people something like that they had one server room with three or four switches and like i think maybe 30 or 40 workstations 50 workstations so it maintained that then they did a layoff and then that's what landed me in this role which i've been at for about three years and now i'm going to my next role which is more infrastructure based because where i was at in my life like i said being a generalist has always been fine with me but i guess what i wanted to do more was a lot more of the networking build-outs right like i'm a great i.t professional but i'm not a great engineer and there's that's a whole other animal and i know it that's why i love being in this community because i'm with some of the best in the world and now i'm gonna go okay now i'm gonna apply those skills now i'm gonna go now okay we're gonna you know this is how we do things here and that's that's what has me even more excited the culture and just getting those opportunities to kind of go to that next level and do a lot more infrastructure work hey a1 fans aj here to remind you about nordvpn.com nordvpn will help secure you wherever you go i use nordvpn on all my personal devices whenever i'm out about i just go into the nordvpn app hit quick connect and away i go nice and secure don't have to worry about prying eyes anybody looking at my connection if i choose to go work from a coffee shop locally or you know even while i'm traveling if i bring my personal device devices i will use new vpn to help keep things safe and secure i'm using nordvpn right now and there's no degradation in my signal everything looks good when you guys watch us on the live streams so i i can't say enough good things about nordvpn they have some great additional services included with their vpn product they'll scour the dark web for your credentials and see if they've been involved in any sort of hacks or anything and then if they have they'll let you know and you can go change your passwords and do whatever you need to do to help keep yourself safe and secure they also have a mode that will block any websites or ads known to possess malware and they just have general ad blocking anyway because you know who wants ads as i record an ad anyway if you want nordvpn and you do go to nordvpn.com forward slash t-a-o-n-e for the art of network engineering and you can get a really great deal uh 73 off two years plus four months free so again that's 73 off two years plus four months free of nordvpn if you forget that url just go to nordvpn.com at checkout you can use the promo code t-a-o-n-e for the art of network engineering and we appreciate your support as well as nordvpn's support of the art of network engineering podcast now back to the show so i'm going to give you props for that for two reasons first off you recognize that you needed to make a change and you you went through with it you could have sat i mean you've got a decent job you could have kept doing the generalist thing and you said no i i have goals it's time for a change appreciate it number two you decided to take a new opportunity with five kids i mean that's that's nothing to shake a stick at man i'm sure you had to wrestle with that a little bit hands are sweating i i i i did knees weak are your palms ready yeah yeah that's right or something mom spaghetti it is ready um yeah trust me it wasn't an overnight thing brother it wasn't i wasn't like oh yeah i'm gonna do this uh just you know there's a situation arose you're right her job and well i was home and i've said this for a while if you don't like where you're at in life and i tell everybody this if if ever ask for advice right i feel like a pretty sound advice change your narrative i say that a lot and that's the three words just change your narrative you don't like it change your narrative it's all right it's you get one life it's not like it's overnight it's not going to be like that but if you're not happy you're not content to change your narrative do something about it that's the only way you're ever going to fix that problem not just technical one life you know i'm not here like i'm some spiritual life coach it's just these are things i've learned over the course of my journey and i continue to do it again i want to instill in my kids if you don't like the situation you're in or you want better for yourself that was something my mom really if you don't want if you want better go get it and that that was it i just like the game needed to change and i changed it and so that's a lot like what lexi did right like she was in a situation she wasn't super happy with and sometimes that stuff is temporary in life so she put an end date on it right like it expires this day and you know she did she set an alarm she set this reminder she did this like self-check again and realized i'm still not happy time for a change so yeah i'm gonna tackle that from now on like when i get into a funky situation i'm gonna put an end date on that and check in later on and uh you know change the narrative if i'm still not happy at that point and that's what it is and like i said is your answer going to come right away absolutely not but if you start flipping that script right we've all heard that old adage you start flipping that script something's got to give somewhere and and it's just a matter of those stars aligning like like for me that i'm for this this all fell into my lap and and a big part of why they found me was because of two things number one because of my my blog and my brand and the content they're using a lot of my how-to's and just they were they were following me for about a month or two and then they reached out to a fellow champion they found you you didn't like find them and apply to the job they found you well so they found so i talked to all right so a fellow friend of mine robinson he's a fellow cisco champion i talked to him for a few weeks again because i was looking and i was like listen i'm very interested if you guys have any engineering positions and he said absolutely brother he's like right now working out some stuff you can say if you want to send me your resume in the future i said great okay and that was it that was like weeks ago uh i talked to the director from hawaii because again i was home for a week and he had called me he goes gerard uh i took the initiative and applied but he had said well we that's funny you applied because he goes we've been kind of like looking at you for like about a month two months something like that i said really and he goes yeah because we've followed your brand your content is flawed like amazing i said thank you like i didn't know you were even looking at me or following me like we talked to robinson we talked to like three other people in here you're connected with on linkedin and they say you're just an amazing dude and i wanted to sit down and you have 30 minutes of your time i said absolutely i had a whole week i had time and nothing but time and and a 30-minute conversation turned into over two hours like i said i wrote this i've never in my in my entire blogs two-year life i've never written about a company and i wrote one last week they are the culture the the people the organization as a whole they're just thriving and what they're doing and it's it's amazing and it just floored me you know you just you know when they say you know you know like that's what happened yeah i talked to wade and i just i knew it was like this okay this is really serious this is incredible just ingenuity right all the key points that i told you guys earlier like the genuineness the care that is like you know i want to make sure what you're doing is best for you your family i wanna make sure you and your family take it okay never had that i was like that that just spoke volumes outside of anything else you could offered me xxx amount of money that would have mattered that that that just that that floored me so i was like yep and then the rest just kind of fell on its place man that's amazing more money more money more problems right but but i think you kind of set it in there too like you know more money is great but at some point it's not about the money it's about the culture yeah do you feel welcome there are you treated well does the company care about your well-being and you know there's a whole lot more that goes into it and that plays a big part of it now i'm sure everybody has a sliding scale right like if you're paid more money you're willing to put up with a certain amount of bs but at some point the bs might become more than the money they're paying you and and i don't know everyone has their own balance of course it's all their own i say that all the time but it's all they're all like everybody has a like they could pay you a ton of money and you may not care how they treat you and that's fine for me i feel it is possible done right you can make awesome money you can make astounding money and you can have incredible culture there's a way you just got to look for it because like i for years i i would have jobs and be like man i'm making you know money hand over fists and a treat of crap or i make and not so great money but you know the other ending of the spectrum and everything in between so i've kind of been all over that so that's why i said for the first time in 15 years i'm like okay great culture good benefits monetarily and otherwise and then a path because the remaining service writer so you know i know aj you know better than anybody been in the msp game for a while they're like they are adamant on the learning and i love to learn i'm a lifelong learner as we all are therefore like okay certifications training bettering yourself bettering for you your family helping the organization and furthering us so i it's just it's just a win all around and i knew too i think we talked like a few weeks prior i was like my next move is it's got to be an msp because that's just where the fit is for me and that's why i thought this was this was perfect it was like a a gift sent from god do you have a good idea what your day-to-day is going to look like so prior to snow i was telling aj i think i'm not really going to have a a general idea until like i get my day one on boarding i got a general overview like i'm gonna be doing patching um you know patching like a lot of after hours stuff especially because they're a major law for oh well they support major law firms in you know in the night in the big parts of philadelphia new york and other regions so i'm going to be doing some patching after hours maintenance windows things of that and i'm also excited because i've talked to the engineers and they said you know once you get in the mix and get going you can come down here we'll get you going and you could you know start building out with us because they have fortnight gear and i've never done anything with a piece of fortnite hardware uh there was an sd-wan summit two days ago or yesterday i believe and it was just crazy i just i was free and i registered and i sat in on that for two hours to really get a just a good depth understanding of their platform right because obviously we know sd-wan we know all the other ones but i really wanted to learn what i could okay well what is fortinet the history culture and then what does your platform look like and it's it's awesome so kind of gonna take what i applied there and then just go do the physical hands-on stuff when i get that up that opportunity very cool very cool so it sounds like you got like a big wide nice path in front of you got a good support system at home it sounds like you're gonna have a great support system at work and you're hungry yeah i i'm always hungry no pun intended but yeah yeah if you you want more i always want more and i won't take on a project like each piece i do when it's like finalized completed and i submit it or i send it out like like blog wise or content i make i won't do it unless i know it's going to be the best quality possible because that's my name on it right like i want people like what's the takeaway there could be a bunch of things what are the two things like number one what's the takeaway people are gonna get from it is it good content would i would i would i sit down and and you know and again i always reference back to like that piece aj because like you kept like there's got to be something or something's in there like what makes you want to go back or what makes you want to like man i want to read another one another you know blog he wrote i want to watch another one of those episodes like and that's one of the things like making content or anything in life if you just give them that experience and you give the best thing forward they'll keep coming back yeah i i want to i want to step back to your entrepreneur days because i think there's a lot to be said for knowing as an i.t professional knowing and understanding uh the purpose of the business and what the business operations are and and how to make the company better you really need to understand what it is the company does so what advice can you give for it professionals uh being a business owner what were some of those business people skills that you learned over the years that helped you be a better technical professional three just came to mind and i just talked to somebody and so i'm glad you asked number one this is kind of a joke but it's also serious don't fix everything for free like we we say that we hear it but when i started and i wasn't too bad about it maybe i'm being a little biased in my answer i didn't fix everything for free eventually and i think it was i want to say it was about the time i left circuit like or i left best buy and i went to the network job that's kind of when it was like a three year four year period i'd say about three years you know everybody's like okay right so we all know you know out there in the world you're always going to have people who are just technologically you know not with it right like they we're here for a reason we're the experts this is our our our forte our craft for a reason and it's easy for us to fix it in maybe less than 15 minutes even five minutes right and then we're not gonna don't worry about it don't worry about it when you're running a business and it's not overnight you have to be able to before you do anything now i didn't know this i just kind of went in there and did i learned as i went along but if i can give this now to the next generation or people who want to start a business or in it be able to differentiate and separate okay i can help you and do this but there's going to be a charge right like your time is valuable don't undervalue yourself is the takeaway and it's so often than not and i've talked to tawan about this and you know months ago i've done it you know we've all done it because how do you know you're worth at the time especially when you're going in you're like well i don't know if i should charge that much that maybe seem a lot or maybe that's you you have to find those checks and balances along the way but don't undervalue yourself if you feel like this is fair you know do some research you know okay well these are other what's other places offer for services maybe give a competitive edge to yourself but yeah don't undervalue yourself that's number one number two have a good business plan because again now i'm not saying i'm gonna go in front of you know uh a fortune 500 investor tomorrow and someone's gonna give me you know 1.5 i'm not going on shark tank but if you have a plan it ties back to what tim said you have a mission you have a purpose you have uh like what's your core values what do you what like what is the goal of your business you know where do you see it in like a three to five or i think it was 369 a three six nine year plan you know look up do a ton of googling ton of research on you know what it takes to start a business depending on your space man i think i need a three six nine day plan yeah yeah again i was i was like 21. now i don't know if you ask me my 369 plan is now get up and survive like that's my plan survival survive survive survive the chaos from from 6 am on that's it get to lunch time then reassess i know god just get to lunch i don't know what a nap is i haven't had one of them in years so i want to focus i want to focus on that for a little bit um tim did you have a question or something you're going to say before no way he gave us two what's your number three yeah number three i got this is gonna be a toss-up if i had to give number three have good branding i would say i didn't again early episodes art of network engineering every episode and i told the everyone that would come out i was like my life week by like like i would deal with something one week it was like branding i'm like like like i'm looking at like is like like did they do they like know that this is what's going on it was just so fitting because like you guys did a branding episode and like i had an issue with like like branding if i'm like what the hell like how or like i think it was like generalist for centralized i'm like you know like you know how do you deal with the on-call phone i'm like like okay like we bugged your house and that's what early ideas from you guys came to pa it didn't even tell me well we got handy right there so this is true did we oh it really was um but yeah like have good branding right so with with my dynamic i.t solutions business i didn't have the kind of branding like with tech house i didn't i didn't understand the interesting this was over the course of my years even continue i'm still learning stuff right like i've looked into a brand expert to do additional work but have a good brand like have something that's recognizable am i going to be mcdonald's no you know that's not going to be overnight but if you see something and people recognize it they go hey you know what i saw that's that brand recognition like what's the experience you get from start to finish like and everything in between aj said it best a while ago that the aj murray experience right you want to leave them with a taste in their mouth and they want to come back for more that's that's how i've always lived my life so then when you guys say that it's just like that's the maple syrup that's really it right that's that for a little yeah like it's just have something that you want when people get a taste that they want to come back and get more and get more and get more because and then that builds customer loyalty and it gives you those opportunities because again once you see that word of mouth i don't care who you are in today's world world of mouth word of mouth is a powerful tool always has been social media great but word of mouth i'll still like something like oh man that pete's place is good is it really okay try it out exactly when you start like treating yourself as a business that that really changes things right like you when you think about like places that you like to go to you know you heard about it like like gerard just said somebody just told you like hey go check out that pizza place they got really good pizza sweet i'm gonna go there i'm gonna have some pizza did i have a positive experience with their staff did the food actually taste good all right cool i'm gonna come back here you know and so when you take on that same kind of attention to to the people that you're dealing with you know did they have a pleasant experience to me was i nice to them you know did i have a nice experience with them kind of thing like treat yourself as a business you're you're not just a person when you're in the working world you're a brand and and that's how i've always looked at myself i'm a brand i want people to come back and get more of this and and think of me the next time something comes up so that way they call me and and i'm the guy that they want so yeah it's that's that's how you got to do it i i want to go back and i want to focus on uh you got a lot going on at home man and you got a lot going on with your brand you get a lot going on period so i kind of want to pick that apart a little bit how do you do it you know like you're you're a family man you're a father of five you got a wife and you got all this other stuff that you do so what what's some of the tactics and tools you use to keep track everything you got going on aj you stealing my question yeah wait what's going on wait i got a question you got kids it is halloween sorry guys it's funny i've i've talked to so there's somebody right now right like okay so one of the many things you know as part of that brand expansion over the last year is i offer career consulting offer i.t consulting for businesses and so forth in the area but i also offer career consulting i wanted to try that space out and i connected with someone who's in our our discord his name's ricardo he's he's the bomb right like he is super intelligent super knowledgeable aj you mentioned you talked to him a couple times he mentioned that to me and i've been helping him with just certain things throughout his career and and he's asking me the same question everybody's like what do you how do you do it i don't have a magic wand i've written about i don't have an answer i don't have tools and all tactics what i believe in is prioritizing and i feel like again it goes back to just that old school my mom mentality prioritize what's most important if it's the most important thing in the world you'll make time for it i'm always serious with with this with this question as i am a law but with this one particularly because very easy you know okay you're growing your brand and you're doing these things and there's more and more right well there's eight hours in the day well there's 12 but there's eight hours that like you know we have and then we shut that off and we spend time with the family we decompress and some people don't i may get my no matter what when i come home it's time with the kids if i'm doing something here i utilize that those business hours and sometimes if i have to write you know it's after the kids go to bed or after i've played cars with benjamin or after i've read mary claire's story once that's done then then you central circle back because they're only that small once and when they come home they don't understand even my older ones right like i'll play fortnight with them don't understand how to play that game but i'll play it and they come first same with my wife right like having that one-on-one time just date nights and and going out now obviously with covet and everything when that hit that was you know we were kind of adapting and people went from home and all that stuff but now they're kind of transitioning out of that and back into some semblance of normalcy having those set date nights like just just shutting off interacting with one another face to face not about like she has hey this is what's going on what's going on but just balance it out it's balanced is the best way i've always put it what that is for for me is definitely not going to be for everybody else and that's fine you know especially like in like aj you know your travels i've never been in that situation how would i balance it i don't know but again you know he put something out there it's like well this is how i did it and like you know there's ways it's challenging and it's real and it's raw but but this is how i got through it this is how i do it that's always what i've tried to do as i've been so transparent with the community with you guys like that's what i do i don't have any tools i don't oh you know what i just boom i did this and this is done and i wrote this and i filmed this podcast nah it's prioritize schedule like i'll do my schedule months like a month before you know like i'll do the week sorry i'm doing this on this date we have this we have a calendar a physical calendar in our house because my wife's old school if it ain't on the calendar it ain't getting done and and that's how do you sync those calendars like well here's the thing right yeah i'm just curious i'm sorry i gotta sit down so pretty much here's what it is i write on my calendar shakes on my phone everything else and then i take hers and she doesn't use her phone she's on her phone all the time don't use the calendar so i gotta go back i gotta go back you know zip the pen and i gotta start writing it in here and i'm like you gotta be kidding me right now so it's it's always a good time but that's yeah she's a visual learner whatever but that's what i do if it ain't on the calendar it doesn't get done but at least if it's on there you know okay basketball practice so like in the next few weeks here i'm gonna be coaching alex my oldest son is basketball i gotta do that you know like in that dude that's gonna be fun but then okay well what about the other stuff figure it out after yeah remove the pieces that comes first that's that's how i've always done it prioritization man it makes a lot of sense like so are you a guy who watches three hours of sports a day no um so like i so i do like football but i just even this year i've been lucky if i sat down for one game right it's just the way it is because like then because the weekend's like sad like and then they when we all know they blink right like friday's there and you play again it's sunday night i'm like where the hell did the weekend go i've sat down and watched maybe about two hours of football maybe this this year and that's that's okay you know i'd rather watch horror movies with the kids well that's what that's what's happening it's not a priority your kids are the most important thing you know followed by your career and and that's that that resonates with me for sure there's a lot of things i'd like to do but there's only so much time in the day and i have my priorities and my family's going to get what's left over after work you know and then so exactly yeah but did you watch some squid games though i i did because she's like we should watch this and this wasn't dude again it was like it was like what it was like 11 at night she's like you want to check this out and i'm like sure and she puts it on and i'm like what am i watching yeah i'm with you yeah i have no idea couldn't tell you but then like my kids start watching it i'm like here we go yeah here we go why are you watching this i don't know it was just on yeah i'm sure it was not i got you though your priorities is what you're putting your family first and then you'll figure out the rest of it is basically what you're what you're kind of getting at right all yeah absolutely and all you know my career all that that's that's the top child like that's all important because the way i look at it is all my and i'm blessed humble all my benefits all my successes everything i want it for them like i do this for them right like yeah because i love what i do and i love technology the industry the community and the passion but i want them to succeed you know what i mean just to have those opportunities to like as i said my mom said do you give it all and then you want to create those opportunities for them like again we go to disney they're going to enjoy it i'll probably be sleeping somewhere they're gonna reap the rewards of the hard work you know and that's that's what that's all i ever want you've mentioned your mom a few times she sounds like she's really had a positive impact on your life and really giving you some lessons that have taken you far she she definitely did man it was just me and her you know i didn't know i didn't have a dad and it was just me and her and she taught me a lot she had to be she had to wear a lot of hats and one i mean you know what most moms do but she was you know you know the provider the mom the nurturer the imma come down the school if there's a problem she did it all yeah i i mean she was a tough woman you know she's you know the irish lithuanian she used to be a power lifter way back when and uh like she was just she'd do it all she didn't stop and i think that that is a big part too why am i like go go go go like not to the point where you bring yourself out because you got to step back and be like i don't care who you are you got to step back like all right let me breathe sit on this couch all right take a breather 20 minutes half hour hour whatever and then you're just okay let's go back now and do this next set of things but that go go go like it's just i always saw that you know i just never watched her she just she was like a machine never stopped well you definitely have a go go attitude so i have to i think it uh yeah ceo transferred i i consider myself somewhat of an ambitious person but yeah i i hear gerard and not just here but c all the stuff he's doing is his career he's got his families the the career consulting all the blogging being on different podcasts that kind of thing and he's just this is great go go go go and that i'm i'm stressed out with all of the stuff gerard's doing right sorry man no i tha that is kind of a kind of an actual question do you you really have a passion for all of this it doesn't you don't get a lot of high levels of stress from it it's just you just have that drive i'm gonna go back and tim it's i'm glad you asked that question because i'm gonna circle this back to you so remember a few months ago i had uh i wrote something right i wrote a piece and this is funny because you even reached out to me and i thought it was so i was like thank you man like i just so my wife got her computer infected she got a virus i was like did you click that thing that i told you not to click yeah cool so again i've said this on many times it doesn't matter whether you're an engineer you're a solutions architect doesn't matter who you are cio you're those 71 tickets you're going to deal with them for the rest of your life so you're going to deal with my my printer doesn't work so that's that but she she she had that issue i came home fixed it and i just i was like you know what i got to use this tool and it was malware but i haven't used this tool since like retail this was fun and i fixed it and i was like i want to write about this and then i wrote my malwarebytes piece posted it and you had reached out to me tim and you're like dude i say like that's awesome how you could just and i appreciate the compliments because that's all like that's how it comes to me it just flows like naturally like i don't get stressed i don't i look forward to it you know because that's my release right like some people bake some people cook or shop or you know do whatever to kind of solve their problems and and decompress and step away from life and that's that's what i do i write i make content because i love it and there's i have all these ideas and there's some of work are crazy you know you guys you you i'm sure you've mostly think i am but it's just because i know they could there's something and they can go somewhere if you believe in it and you you execute it right you don't jump the gun don't just throw something you do it gradually it reflects in the work find your passion i love it that's it man so so i'm i'm hearing some some common themes here so so you got the confidence and the passion uh you definitely believe in what you're doing you you got like the power the energy uh the prioritization is real i think that that's a really key point here is that a lot of people think they can prioritize things but what they do is they hold multiple things with the same priority right and then when it comes time to do something they don't know what to do because they're both the same priority but you you actually prioritize things for dan over there aj is taking all of andy's bits tonight you're actually talking about me right now you actually prioritize stuff in that like in that moment what is the most important thing right now and then you just you go for it right like in the moment hanging out with your son you know playing video games with him or reading a bedtime story or whatever that's it and you live in that moment and don't let anything else distract you and then when you're done with that and you decide now i'm going to write a blog article that is the only thing in that moment that that's important and that's that's just one hell of a way to attack things as you as you roll on through so yeah now dude now i'm human do i have nights where i'll start that blog article i'm like all right i'll finish this in the morning yeah of course i mean we're all going to have it you know especially that was my next point is that you recognize balance you don't just keep doing this and doing this and doing this until you're burnt out you recognize you get to a point where okay it's time for a break yeah and again a lot of people don't have that they just want to get it done get it done and then before they know it you know they spent their gas tank right um what i know we're coming toward the end here but you know the whole hour we've been talking everything just seems way too easy to use so is there something that you find difficult like so prioritization is critical for what you're doing right but like dan was raising his hand earlier and you know i'm in that i'm in that ballpark too there's 10 things i would like to do and i don't really know if i'm good at prioritization like you know you sound good at everything right so like is there something you're not good at or another version of that question is like in this whole you know uh discussion we just had is there anything in there that like shows that you're a human struggling with things that are hard right because sometimes i talk to people like you and i consider myself passionate and energetic and trying to do too many things but like you just seem to have a smoothness and a handle on it better than a lot of times i feel i do and and that's what i'm asking is like how do you make it so easy or are there things that we're not seeing that you're like oh dude i suck at this other thing don't worry about it you know does that make sense i think it's i think it's the swag mr g smooth you know um no i was wondering if you bleed or not are you are you human you seem to be a machine and you know i feel like i feel like that and and sometimes you know it it's keeping it all together so what i mean by that to kind of tie it up with a nice little ball is keeping it all together right like okay you have those days where i got to run the grocery store gotta run here gotta run the practice and some days it's just it falls apart like i had a day three days ago yeah and i don't ever you know and i'm i don't want to give any misconceptions like oh i'm human it's just i guess i i that that like what you see right like that visual like i don't i always want my kids to see all of them like man my dad worked hard and he you know and it's not an act it's not a gimmick like that's just who i genuinely am and i love these things and i go but you fall like right like sometimes like i just can't always keep it all together like it falls apart on me you know when it happens and i'll sit there like man the list sucked you know like there's nothing i could do because yeah i'm a very positive person and you guys see i'm happy or i'm posting and yeah you know like some days and i post about you know like like mental health will kick in you know i'll just be like man like i you know i had a rough go with it today and i just need to like step away from everything it falls apart on me more often than not yeah and that's just kind of part of it like it's all like again aj everybody said it but it's all about the journey it falls apart sometimes it's all right you just pick the pieces back up keep moving forward tomorrow's another day you know you can you can live to fight another day and sometimes you just need that awesome i love that attitude i love it yeah i i do want to thank you for coming on gerard you have been a real voice of the community for a long time in fact you were the first faces of the journey article that that we wrote and that was an easy decision to make uh because remember that you have such that uh such a strong voice for the community you're always bringing people up and i know everybody appreciates that so thank you for spending time with us tonight oh thank you for having me i just feel like it came full circle right like i got to do that be a part of the community be the first one on that and that came full circle so like thank you to all you guys seriously it was it's an opportunity to be here i i don't want to miss this i appreciate it i really do so gerard where can uh where can people find you if they want to learn more about you so if they want to learn more about me again you can find me at techhouse570 uh i'm on twitter at g cavallinas i'm on linkedin take a google search i'm i'm not hard to find i'm definitely not i'm all over the place uh i definitely uh got a bunch of upcoming projects coming up i've been i've been really wanting to to to share this because like it's been something that i've been sitting on for months i've been like foaming at the mouth and aj's down there smiling so i to keep this very brief and i don't give too much away i've had all these projects and all these things right but there's this like mothership project that i've just that's my that's been like the big world domination run right so i talked to aj and tim a few months ago and i was watching something and i was like you know it was it was one of those like shows where they travel and they were just having like this adventure of a life so why aren't we doing something like that it's like again this is where the craziness comes in i said guys i have a concept i want your id and i you know i'd like you to be part of it and it was brilliantly titled the link states so it would be the three of us going on this this this epic road trip adventure sitting down with technology visionaries who they really are and you know who they are outside of that you know just like what we discussed and you know highlight cuisines in the area local you know just events going on and the event would culminate at cisco live right where like it's the biggest event and it's it's a way that nobody in this world has ever seen cisco live outside of i.t professionals i mean globally so started doing some stuff we've been working with the company uh screen connect uh joel has been amazing and the goal is around january or maybe after to sit down put this final sprinkles of magic on the sizzle reel and then go uh present this to the senior vice president of discovery and if all goes well and it gets green lit then it's going to take what we do to a whole other level because like i said when i got into this community i didn't even know about it and now that i've been a part of it i'm like there's so many people here that that and not just in i.t but like again we've the topics we've all touched based on like the mental health and everything and i'm like this is so much bigger and we should be taking this to a new level and hopefully this project can do that and and give everybody opportunities that are just it's the possibilities are endless and which again i have other ideas for that that'll be more stuff coming down the pipeline so yeah man i i'm super super excited i've been sitting on this for like six or more months i'm like it's more than that yeah i've been like dude i'm not saying a word i haven't just been doing you know the footwork and extra stuff and i'm like whenever i'm blessed to get on here that's when i'm gonna make that announcement so who are you pitching this idea to did you say there's an event they yeah discovery plus because their platform and they actually just did a merger with uh warner media so now it's discovery like there's just so much going on in entertainment which that's a whole new space and i'm like not learning it to be a master of but learning it enough to like okay well here's where i can put a footprint yeah and yeah i talked to them and and we've been doing stuff and put we have sizzle reels we just have to get one more and then put all together and send it and then you know the guy our friend joel has a production company he has three lined up that he's like i'm gonna give it to them they'll take it and they'll sit down and this is what the next steps are because pretty much you go into it like alone you're going in there like again green like this isn't my space you go in there with a production company it's like holy shit these guys are all right well they got a production company they got real okay well these guys pretty credible okay and you know just we're gonna see what opportunities and we get green lit that's it we yeah seriously right very cool if you if you need a cameraman hey i'm just i'm just saying no seriously like that like everybody this this is and you know what i said we have so many different like i don't say characters but just big personalities in the community right like the art of network engineering everybody on here you got lab every day you got all these people and i'm like so many people don't know about this and they should they should why don't they because once you see us it's like we're the experts in this you know who should be leading the charge you don't see a lot about technology out there you hear about it like oh technology plays a role but what kind of role here's how this is how we do it so that's pretty cool dude yeah thank you it's good i can't wait and it's are you going to call it nerdy job listen tim tim beautifully crafted the league state like i like i love it that's that it just fits it fits tim ross pf kick if you can't tell well wait wait what's it called the linked states the lincoln states yeah well gerard this has been a ton of fun um we were going to drop all of that info into the show notes so if you want to find the links to gerard you can look there we will also link back to his faces of the journey article so if you missed that you can read it or read it again and as we make progress on the link states you can bet we will report back here and let you know hopefully it's a it's a show you're popping on in uh discoveries here in the near future so you see our smiling faces thank you fingers crossed uh anyway thanks again gerard i am aj murray this is the art of network engineering and we'll see you next week for another episode see ya hey everyone this is aj if you like what you heard today then make sure you subscribe to our podcast and your favorite podcatcher smash that bell icon to get notified of all of our future episodes also follow us on twitter and instagram we are at art of netench that's art of n-e-t-e-n-g you can also find us on the web at art of network engineering dot com where we post all of our show notes you can read blog articles from the co-hosts and guests and also a lot more news and info from the networking world thanks for listening you