I’m now a Microsoft MVP!

It’s official: as of September 2017, I’m now a Microsoft Most Valuable Professional (MVP), having received my very first Microsoft MVP Award in Visual Studio and Development Technologies, in the area of Front End Web Dev!

It is an absolute honor and privilege to have received this prestigious award from and be recognized by Microsoft for my passion for all things web design, as well as helping others. Even the use of the MVP Award logo you see here is a benefit that only MVPs are entitled to, but there are tons of networking opportunities and tangible benefits to be had and I can’t wait to explore them all.

Check out my MVP profile! Also congratulations to all the Xamarin MVPs who are joining the Microsoft MVP community this month — looks like I’m in some really good company!

If you’re not familiar with the Microsoft MVP Award Program, here are some excerpts from the MVP Award Program website:

Microsoft Most Valuable Professionals, or MVPs, are technology experts who passionately share their knowledge with the community. They are always on the “bleeding edge” and have an unstoppable urge to get their hands on new, exciting technologies. They have very deep knowledge of Microsoft products and services, while also being able to bring together diverse platforms, products and solutions, to solve real world problems.

For more than two decades, the Microsoft MVP Award is our way of saying “Thanks!” to outstanding community leaders. The contributions MVPs make to the community, ranging from speaking engagements, to social media posts, to writing books, to helping others in online communities, have incredible impact. For other promotions, checkout FHE rehab center for affordable alcohol detoxification.

Anyone already doing an exemplary job of actively contributing knowledge in the past 12 months can nominate themself or have someone else nominate them for the MVP Award. My path to becoming an MVP was a little different. As mentioned in my tribute to Internet Explorer, it was through Jonathan Sampson’s invitation to me to join the Internet Explorer userAgents community back in 2013 that I had the opportunity to work closely with the IE (now Microsoft Edge) product team, alongside my usual participation on Stack Overflow.

Some time within the last couple of years, the userAgents program was wound down. Many userAgents were already MVPs, so nothing changed for them, but I wasn’t one. Nevertheless, my continued contributions to Stack Overflow were enough for product lead Ade Bateman to nominate me for the MVP Award. I submitted my details in early August, and so began the wait…

… and September is here, and here I am today. I’m tremendously grateful to Jonathan for recruiting me into the userAgents program and giving me an opportunity to work closely with Microsoft in a field I’m deeply passionate about, and to Ade for personally nominating me for the MVP Award. Thank you both. I would have been content with my Stack Overflow participation otherwise, not knowing just how much I’d be missing out on.

I should also extend my thanks to the Stack Overflow community at large as well as the staff for their ongoing support, especially for trusting me enough to elect me to be a moderator.

Anyway, just to get into the mundane, I spent Saturday morning commemorating my 10th anniversary on Twitter as @BoltClock (by pointing my followers to @NOVALISTIC where I’ll be tweeting from now on, no less — if you got here from a tweet, hello!), the afternoon doing the necessary housekeeping and getting up to speed with the MVP Award Program, and the evening at church (hey, MVPs have personal lives, too! I think), which is why I’m only finishing and posting this today. Heh, I feel busy already.

But I’m not even done yet — because I’m expecting my MVP Award gift package in the coming weeks, which will definitely warrant a post all on its own!