Wrapper's Delight

Well, where did that all that time go? In June 1997, a fresh-faced young fellow joined a wave of other people walking into Microsoft UK at the Winnersh Triangle HQ. After a good few years of imposter syndrome (a common trait, apparently - even The Wrong Steve addressed it) and a variety of different roles in technology, sales, engineering and business development, today marks the end of this journey.

In 1997, I was having conversations with enterprise customers about why they should adopt this thing called Exchange, and for a good few years that defined what I was known for. One of the best things about a large and flexible company like Microsoft is the ability to move around as an employee - many people have upped sticks and relocated to other parts of the world, while others get to change their whole career path in ways they could never have foreseen. When doing a talk about Microsoft's history to a group of new interns, I was asked "Why have you never left?" - and the answer hit me, that it felt like I was starting a new part of my career every couple of years.

Fast forward a good few years, and I wrote an article about the 20th anniversary of joining, imaginatively titled, It was 20 Years Ago Today...

Lots of things happened 20 years ago from today. Exchange 2003 was released (codenamed "Titanium"; it's predecessor Exchange 2000 was "Platinum", and Exchange 5.5 before that was "Osmium". A nerdy Exchange fact; a hybrid environment that contained Titanium (Ti), Platinum (Pt) and Osmium (Os) servers was known as at TiPtOs, or "Tiptoes").

Concorde retired from flight in October 2003. I was very lucky to fly back from JFK to LHR in 3 and a bit hours, travelling faster than a rifle bullet and high enough to be able to see the Earth's curvature.

We rode "Alpha Golf" 5 weeks before she took her final commercial flight and ultimately retired to the Museum of Flight in Seattle. Much to the disappointment of the airplane geeks who thronged the area (as Concorde had never been to Seattle before), the pilots didn't mess around giving everyone a good look. She made the coast-to-coast journey from New York in under 4 hours thanks to the Canadian government allowing supersonic flight over land.

In 2003, Honda UK released the award-winning "Cog" 2-minute TV advert and campaign. It took around 100 takes to film, and as part of the campaign, you could sign up to receive a DVD of the ad and a short film on how it was made. They really had a purple patch with adverts, did Honda, with the Grrr ad for diesels (some things age better than others) coming a year later, and Impossible Dreams a year after that. For motoring-related ads, that's arguably bettered only by Shell's 2007 "Circuit", a montage of Ferraris that can make your hair stand on end.

During the last 25+ years at Microsoft, I've had numerous roles, maybe a dozen laptops, several offices and (I think) 20 managers, though I won't list them in case I've missed someone out. Similarly, I've worked with hundreds of colleagues many of whom remain good friends. As a twenty-something going to work at what was the peak of my career at the time, I could never have imagined the experiences I've had and the people I've met and enjoyed spending time with.

What's next? Well, we'll see. Perhaps I'll be engaging with people who need help in forming and maximising their partnerships with other technology companies. One thing that's going to happen is that Tip of the Week will return in a new guise - watch this space.

Back to "Cog". It closes with the opening bars of the Sugarhill Gang's seminal 1979 hit, "Rappers Delight". Which ties back to the original point of this article - I decided it was time to wrap up my tenure at Microsoft and to delightedly say thank you to everyone who's been part of it.