🚝Robert Novak's Linkedin Analytics

I'm a server and infrastructure guy with a penchant for the big picture and a lifelong love of technology. I'm not looking for new opportunities at this time. Ask me about my homelab, and ignore the huge backlog of projects. I've redone my home networks for the end of my Meraki licenses. I've worked in networking and storage although it's been a little while. I was last a developer in 1993. I've never waited tables (even database tables) but respect those who do. I admit what I don't know and learn quickly. Today I'm an engineering product manager for UCS networking in the compute business at Cisco. From 2022-2023 I was product line manager for software management products at Supermicro. From 2018-2020 I focused on channel partner enablement, partner sales engineering, solutions engineering at Cisco. From 2014-2018 I played storyteller/matchmaker between big data ISVs, Cisco channel partners and internal sales teams, and occasionally a customer or 100. I've been doing big data since late 2003/early 2004 (really) and Hadoop since probably 2008 (CDH1). I presented at partner events and public conferences including Strata+Hadoop World (2x) and Cisco Live (4x, Distinguished Speaker). On the first day at Cisco (right after lunch), I pushed a half million dollar deal over the edge with my personal experience outweighing a competitor's positioning. From then on, I brought context and proportion to challenging situations, helping our customers succeed and our sales teams make money. I believe those two should not be mutually exclusive, and I consider it my mission to bring them together wherever I work. Before Cisco, I was a senior level Silicon Valley systems operations professional with nearly 20 years (different years, even) of production UNIX system administration in multiple varieties of UNIX (Solaris, Linux, BSD) as well as experience in other desktop and server platforms. I built a proven history of delivering enterprise class scalable server, network, and disaster recovery/business continuance environments within stringent budget and time restraints. I blog at rsts11.com and rsts11travel.com. Specialties: Big data platforms, hardware, and education; system administration, hardware planning and management (even clouds need hardware), Hadoop, written English (documentation is our friend), UNIX-based email systems, coffee preparation & procurement, operations team building and sustaining. I'm not a developer or coder although I can read or tweak some code. I don't have an MBA or a PhD. I'm not looking for new opportunities at this time.