Name: Dan Brinkmann
Blog URL: http://www.danbrinkmann.com
Twitter handle: @dbrinkmann
Current employer: Lewan – Denver, Colorado
How did you get into IT?
After college I was unable to find a job in my field (Business Administration) and was spending a fair amount of my time finding "free" music and software on BB's and newsgroups. One day I saw an ad for a desktop support technician and a few days and one giant lie of an interview later I found myself in completely over my head working as an IT contractor at John Deere in Waterloo Iowa. A few months of cramming later and I passed all of the tests for my Microsoft MCSE. Shortly thereafter I moved to Denver Colorado and have been working in IT in Denver ever since.
How did you get into working with VMware and becoming a 2012 vExpert?
VMware ESX 2.0 was being demo'd at a Microsoft TechEd conference, vMotion looked like magic but after a lengthy conversation with the person in the booth I knew datacenter design would never be the same again. We put VMware ESX 2.5 into our production environment the week after it came out. I've been involved in virtualization ever since. I've been involved in my local Denver VMUG for a number of years, both as a customer and now as a partner. I was an early Twitter user (number 650,163) and in recent years I've put more effort into blogging and education. In my current role I am nearly 100% focused on educating customers and helping them with their virtualization architecture and design decisions.
What would you tell someone who wanted to get a job like yours to do?
Reading is fundamental.
