Almost a decade and counting now, my time at NetApp has been a career oxymoron. You see, I've never been at a job (or contract) longer than 3 years before I joined NetApp (known as Network Appliance then) back in 1998. Those who know me well often ask me why I'm still here, because they're keenly aware of my tendency to get bored easily and look towards the next challenge after the inevitable multi-year itch comes around.
I plan to expose many things in this blog, so in the spirit of fairness let me first expose myself a bit and explain the Zen of NetApp that not only keeps me here, but has me looking forward to my next decade @ NetApp. To do that, I had to look waaaay back to my formative years when I read Robert M. Pirsig's Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.
Robert's book title and text is widely quoted on the Internet, but it's his exploration of the spirituality of quality regarding how things are made and how they're used that always stuck with me. Interestingly, that Zen seems to resonate increasingly over time during my career at NetApp. So let's break that down a bit.
INNOVATION
Innovation is probably at the heart of it all. This covers the "how things are made" part of the Zen in question. My inner geek is still drawn to cool technology. Our core DNA (summarized here by Bruce) is what attracted me to NetApp a decade ago, and our engineers continue to re-capture my imagination every few months with each new product release cycle. I will no doubt post countless blogs on this topic alone, so I won't belabor the point here, but click on the graphic above & to the right for a short flash overview of but one great example of NetApp technology innovation widely used today.
APPLICATION
Layered on top of innovation is the "how it's used" part of the Zen. The application of our innovation knows few limits today, being used across all industry verticals spanning the globe. We help Main Street make and sell things, and we help Wall Street trade. We help move people by land, sea and air. We help provide energy, offer cost-effective services and after a good day's work we also help people play, but I personally believe there is no more noble application of technology than helping people heal.
SATISFACTION
One of my proudest moments at NetApp was seeing my initial storage customer in 1998 be awarded the inaugural NetApp Award for Individual Innovation several years later . In and of itself that would have been cool. But what took it to a higher plane was that Mark's organization was the first to decode the SARS virus applying NetApp innovation!
Seemingly many others enjoy a high sense of satisfaction with NetApp. We are not only one of the highest ranking storage suppliers to be selected by Fortune Magazine in their Best Places to Work surveys, but we are actually the only tech company other than Google to crack the top 10! Fortune also lists NetApp as one of the most admired tech companies. Cross reference those two Fortune Mag lists and we humbly find ourselves in some pretty heady company!
Pulling it all together for me, "Zen and the Art of Enterprise Storage" is really about a heightened sense of personal satisfaction from the broad application of NetApp's unique innovation.
P.S. Ironically my day job running our competitive team is conversely related to this Zen, where my team and I work hard to make sure our competitors sing the blues, specifically the Rolling Stones' (I Can't Get No) Satisfaction. I'll have much more on that later, so stay tuned!
which I will generously extrapolate equals roughly 5000-6000 systems deployed in the field (they tend to be sold in pairs using IP replication).
