Never Give Up! - Credo for professional and private life.

Today something more personal, more private, but very honest about the reality of life. Hope you will find it interesting and inspiring. :)

My journey in IT industry has started more than 20 years ago. During the nineties, everything has looked different. In my country Internet was not publicly available. To be honest, at that time you could use it only as a student, trying to chat on IRC channels, playing shell in Unix terminal, building some very simple web pages. All of that in University computer's room or later on with very slow modems in your home PC environment. Learning technology was even harder, as you had to buy very expensive books abroad. The truth is that Internet resources were very limited, not like today. Of course you could sign up to some forums and share some guru knowledge but first, you had to possess the respect of the other forum members. So definitely at that time, you had to invest your own money and constantly study and learn. As quickly as possible. Hackers culture approach was the best thing I could do. And that was I was doing. Constantly seeking & never giving up in exploring new stuff, many times with failures in the middle!

At that time my father (doctor of medicine) has helped me a lot. I can admit it without hesitation. He has given me an opportunity to build my first big enterprise application. This was 1998. I have had more than 70 thousands of lines of code in Pascal and C languages on top of Novel NetWare with some Oracle database behind the scene. This application has started to be a bloodstream of the hospital, which was my first employer. I was very proud, at that time. It was something very unique - to build one of the most original EHR (Electronic Health Records) systems which have helped the doctors to cure people. I remember it extremely well when one of the doctors has arrived in my room and thanked me for some new query features in my application. He admitted to me, that this has helped him to diagnose some very rare disease which could only be found when you analyze health data for longer period of time. With paper documentation, it wouldn't be possible. Yes, it was great to see the value, especially the value for people, significant value for any human being.

But someday I have found I needed to do something else in my professional life. Learn even more. Exercise even quicker. Very precisely speaking I was passioned about Oracle databases. I was dreaming to work with this software in bigger enterprises then my hospital. Become real Oracle DBA or/and Oracle Developer, try to be an expert on that subject matter. This couldn't be possible without bigger projects and hands-on experience. Afterwards I have changed my work two times and finally, I have joined extremely interesting IT Operations team in Hewlett-Packard. As an Oracle DBA for dozens of customers, with ITIL approach organization, during next couple of years, I have become a team leader, and finally manager of the big part of that business with more than 60 people reporting to me. Someone could say that I have done a lot to be successful in the tech industry. Far from it... the truth is I was extremely tired and frustrated by the corporate organization. Lack of the control and tools to build teams, permanent changes, and unwise pressure has pushed me to take a risk of another change! Dramatic in some sense, but healthy one in the longer distance. With the help of the friends, I have created my own startup in ... Healthcare. Kind of the clone of US-based ZocDoc.com and PracticeFusion.com. From the technological perspective, this cloud-based enterprise was a success. Patients have started to make e-appointments with the doctors on this Internet-based web marketplace. Medical practices have started to use this toolset for their purposes. Again I was very proud. Again it was something useful, something with significant value for the ordinary people. Unfortunately, as many other startups, we have failed and this journey has finished after 2 years. I have spent and finally lost most of my money saving in that endeavor. This was a price for my freedom. High price, but on the other hand I have learned to fail. "Ability to fail" was something very intriguing when I was reading about Silicon Valley principles, rules of business. California spirit - it was something I have learned by myself. The failure that has taught me a lot. Especially to be strong! I have decided to move on, have not given up and save my family first with some money earned as quickly as possible. After short freelancer period, only partially successful, I have returned to the corporate environment. This time it was Oracle, with the very interesting job of Oracle Public Cloud adoption opportunities. From a professional perspective, it was very challenging to step into US customers and show how to work with the best practices. Fortunately, I have found here extremely good people and great team, Oracle A-Team! Again I was proud to be a part of Oracle company big change, shift into the Cloud.

But 2 years ago something horrible has happened in my private life. My wife has been diagnosed with brain cancer and after one year fight she has passed away. I was alone in the dark, with 2 daughters on board! I have found I need to take them up and help them survive. Lift-&-Shift into a new life. Do not forget about the mother, but also hopefully believe in the good future. For that moment in time, it was my big project! I was working, as much as I could, but on the other hand, I have to be a strong and wise father, showing light at a distance, giving support and hope. It has taken something about 1 year to reach the surface. I have never given up! Next, in remarkable turns of events, I have found a girl, which soon will be my second wife. She is my partner and together with her son, we are now trying to build energetic, full of love, 5-members family. Optimistic one, open for the future. We trust that every time you fail, you should stand up and move forward. It is a good rule for professional as well as for private life! :)

Lucky Luke.