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Alex_Katsila

Meet our October Mastermind: Mark Salomon from München, Germany

Learn how the HPE Master ASE certification brings insight to both the presales cycle and marketing view and why this Mastermind feels recognized and valued to have reached the pinnacle in HPE certifications.

Name:  Mark Salomon
Company: ACP IT Solutions AG (since 2012)
Title/Role: Enterprise Architect
Location: München, Germany
Education: Dipl. Ing. (Electrical Engineering & Tech. Informatic)
LinkedIn Profile: Mark Salomon
HPE Community profile: Mark Salomon

 

Mark Salomon.png

Certifications:

  • HPE Master ASE – Advanced Server Solutions Architect V3
  • HPE Master ASE - Storage Solutions Architect V3
  • HPE Master ASE - Storage Solutions Architect V3
  • (Working on) HPE Master ASE - Hybrid IT
  • (Working on) HPE Master ASE - Compute

 

Tell us about your day-to-day job? Types of customers you work with, how you help them.

As an enterprise architect, I focus on our large customers during their digital and hybrid cloud transformation and their overall IT strategy from a presales perspective.

These customers vary greatly, from healthcare and pharma, government, and insurance companies to engineering and construction companies—all in different stages of hybrid cloud transformation. And that is what I love about my job: every customer and its requirements are different; every solution is different.

My personal approach to helping customers is to first identify their pain points and boundaries and then show them a vision and strategy in which they can solve and simplify those obstacles with select strategies, enabling them to focus on and accelerate their main business.

Having this mixture of customer types and scenarios as well as different technologies, products, solutions, and strategies in a hybrid world requires me to be not only an expert on one certain topic (e.g., virtualization), it requires me to have a solid knowledge in almost all of those fields when building an overall vision and concepts. And this is where HPE helps me with its three outstanding training and certification pillars: the regular HPE certifications, HPE Service One certifications, and HPE Tech Pro

How do you best study for HPE certifications? Study guides, online/in person training, etc.

It really depends on the certification. Where I am deeply experienced, I mostly use the study guide and online resources available via HPE Tech Pro, and the course material. When I am not familiar with a topic, I always book a training course.

What is the earliest type of HPE equipment you’ve worked on?

HPE EVA 5000, which is one of the first systems in Germany.

What projects are you currently working on?

The first project to mention is a datacenter strategy project for which we have the opportunity to guide and support a customer during its datacenter strategy and concept design and decision phase. Currently we are challenging two different hyperconverged solutions against a classical compute/storage concept both from the technical and commercial standpoints.

The second project is a healthcare customer who is evaluating the cost and feasibility of a cloud transition vs. outsourcing vs. a local datacenter renewal for his management. Here we have to cover all aspects of all three versions. For the cloud transition, we are currently planning an Azure-based hybrid-cloud approach. For the outsourcing concept, we are planning the housing and managed services for the customer within our own datacenters. And for the local datacenter renewal, we are planning all classical datacenter technologies plus external container datacenters.

The third project is a VDI project with a CAD focus. Our customer is planning to replace his CAD workstations and their local boundaries with a VDI-based CAD approach. We are currently in competition against an AWS-based solution. Our vision is a local VDI solution based on HPE ProLiant, Alletra, and Citrix that enables the customer to start with its virtual CAD workstations in a local scenario in which the data is close to his manufacturing infrastructure and in a secured environment, while also giving the option to extend this environment in a real hybrid multi-cloud approach.

What have your advanced HPE certifications help you do better?

The advanced HPE certifications contain extremely detailed content, enabling me to more deeply understand and better convey the HPE strategy and vision. They also cover specifics that may not be a part of my day-to-day business or even my technical comfort zone. Sometimes this is annoying, but it is important for me to challenge my personal limits. In the end I learn new things and discover more technologies, products, and strategies that I can build my future projects upon. One example is the HPE Master ASE - Compute Solutions V1 certification, for which I did labs on HPE Superdome Flex 280. This was an eye-opener for me—what a great technology!

Earning a certification, gives me access to HPE Tech Pro benefits and the continuous learning platform. It allows me to boost my knowledge, access news, and best practices around the latest HPE products. To acquire and keep badges for certain technologies or products, participants take part in webcasts and webinars, most of which are around one hour in length. Throughout the year, as a new webinar is launched covering technology updates, one’s badge automatically changes from active to transitional until the new webinar is watched. This makes it easy for participants to track what is new, gain badges, and stay up to date with their knowledge.

What motivates you to learn more?

The best thing about learning new things is that you are always growing and that you make progress in your life and the way you are able to perform in your job. As a consultant, we are defined through our experience, strategies, and knowledge. All of our customers directly benefit from the fact that we are continually engaged in learning and advancements.

In addition, achieving more than one HPE Master ASE certification is a personal target for me. The awareness and recognition of who I am within HPE and the partner ecosystem is extremely high level. It also helps opens additional doors.

What HPE resources do you find most helpful? HPE Tech Pro, Yammer, HPE Sales Pro, PSNow, etc.

I use HPE TechPro, Yammer, and Seismic on a daily basis.

What would you tell someone starting out today in the industry?

The harder a certification is, the better it is for recognition. It took me years to receive my first Master ASE, but it was more than worth the work. Today I am broadly recognized and involved in many decision-driving HPE programs and boards and a proud member of the HPE community.

Follow me on Twitter @ Alex_kats
About the Author

Alex_Katsila

I’m an Activation Lead and working in the IT industry for almost 10 years now. I love Instagram, blogging and sharing fascinating stories about our HPE sales, presales and channel partners.