>> Announcer: From the SiliconANGLE Media office in Boston, Massachusetts, it's theCUBE! Now, here's your host, Stu Miniman. >> Hi, I'm Stu Miniman, and welcome to a special presentation of theCUBE here in our Boston area studio. Happy to welcome to the program Mike Apigian. Mike's senior director of education services at Dell EMC. Mike, great to talk to you. >> Thanks, Stu, thanks for having me. >> Talk about careers, you talk about jobs. When you're talking to partners and end users, what are some of the biggest concerns they have, especially, you know, how do things like skillsets and training fit into it? >> Yeah, sure. I mean, it's twofold, really. Part of it's the technology and how the technology industry's changing so fast, and, to your point, needing to keep up with that, which is blistering. That's definitely a big challenge we look to address. And then the other part of it is just time, time in the day, and the ability to get out of work to train. That's actually driven a big shift in the industry to different ways of learning, different types of learning experiences that don't require someone to be in a physical classroom all the time. >> I have to imagine that that's the case. Tell us, what's the state of certification these days? You know, there's always debates in the industry. It's like, "Ah, have I just had the same certification "for the last 20 years, "and I just kind of go through the rote?" Or, "What am I learning on the job, "how are my certifications changing?" You mentioned remote versus there. What's the industry look like these days? >> There is a big focus, as there always has been, around certifications on specific technologies, vendors products, and obviously at Dell EMC, we have a big focus, there. We have portfolio certifications to meet that need. But what we see in the market and hear loud and clear from our customers is that, with all the change going on and the change driving, IT professionals need to be skilled, knowledge, proficient in much more than specific products and technologies. It's really the connection across multiple demands. Infrastructure, applications, and security, which is really the interesting part of it and opportunity for us. >> What is the focus and why does the Dell family of companies have a right to kind of be a major partner for users in doing the certifications and the education? >> We feel there's no one in a better position to really help build that knowledge and validate those skillsets based upon, first and foremost, Dell EMC's breadth of infrastructure and the capabilities there, and with certifications really broadening across that infrastructure, looking at it more holistically. And then, when you think about the family of Dell technologies and bring in VMware, Virtustream, and Pivotal, and RSA, very much adjacent technologies and broader solutions that really tie into what we envision and what we see and hear from our customers as defining and requiring the skillsets of the future. >> Give us the landscape of what the certifications look like today. You've got some news that you're going to tell us about, you know, what's new today, also. >> Yeah, yeah. I mean, the current state today is, as I mentioned, very product-centric. Maybe a combination of products, and moving forward, now, we're excited to have more transformational certifications which span those different domains. For example, as organizations begin or continue to modernize their data centers, implement integrated systems, converged systems, it requires a different skillset to manage and support that infrastructure that's now being deployed and leveraged in a different way, just as one example. >> You know, you said "Across multiple domains," but bring us inside a little bit as to what's involved here. >> Certainly. There's definitely a simplicity aspect to it, absolutely. Contrasted to deep expertise in server storage network, but that dynamic with the converged and hyperconverged infrastructure is actually administrator that it may not need to have as much depth in any of those areas, but they need to have breadth across all of them. Also, skillsets, knowledge and experience around different cloud and operating models to really round out the skillsets required there. >> Okay. Who are these certifications targeted at? What kind of stage in their careers, what kind of path is there? Help us understand a little bit the journeys that people are on with their jobs and careers, on certifications. >> The new certifications that we have really spans quite a range. We have associate-level certifications. Think of that as very foundational in concepts, which aren't even anchored specifically on Dell EMC products, but more concepts around converged infrastructure, cloud, hybrid cloud environments and concepts. For something like that at that associate level, it could be a technical person, a technical professional. It could be a business professional. It could be someone coming out of a university, or even while they're in the university that's focused on building some knowledge and some skillset to enter the IT industry. For that, there's a pretty broad spectrum. And then, as you go up the levels or tiers within our certification program, as you'd expect, more advanced. Higher levels of knowledge. As you get up to the highest tiers in the program, it's really not just grounded on knowledge, but actually real-world experience. In some cases, the experience required may be five years of the right experience, or in some cases, with our new enterprise architect certification, it's at minimum 15 years of experience. >> How do you balance that, and how does that fit in IT with business and those various skillsets? >> Great question, 'cause you're right on about the technologies. There's the role itself in that example, architecting enterprise-wide solutions where there's extent in many years of experience required. But when it comes down to a technology perspective, obviously the shelf-life on many of those is not quite that long. It is a balance, there. What I'd also say is that what these certifications help validate and what we see required in the market today is not just that technical focus, but very much so the business focus, the business acumen, and the ability to engage with the business, understand business requirements, the corporate strategy, if you will, where they're going, and really translate or convert that into enterprise architecture. An enterprise architecture that's very different than the past, that more sets the stage for an organization to be successful moving forward. >> If I hear you right, it's really a pairing of the technology and the business and making sure that there's good partnership there. >> Mike: Absolutely. >> You mentioned skillset in the market. What are some of the big gaps? You know, what are customers coming and saying, "Hey, I've got people with skills, "but I need to retrain them." Where's the place where you see the biggest opportunity today that some of these new certifications are helping? >> A couple that come top to mind, first one is security. A hot topic everywhere. A critical step in that, in implementing security, is making sure the infrastructure is secure. We hear that over and over again, and what we see is that a very product-oriented approach in IT to securing products or parts of the infrastructure. One of the new certifications we're excited to have brought to market is infrastructure security, and it's looking across the spectrum, across all Dell EMC infrastructure, as well as connections to VMware and other vendors. It's really focused on taking a security-first approach and implementing the right security controls in the infrastructure to meet an organization's security policy and requirements. >> Security, you know, super hot. What else from the announcement do you want to make sure people understand, some of the new pieces that are helping on these transformations? >> You know, I think another area that is definitely worth a shout-out is the deployment of multi-cloud environments. Dell EMC infrastructure, private cloud, connectivity, and integration with different public cloud providers. That's what our large customers around the globe are doing. >> That's one of the biggest problems we've seen is the operating environment for that multi-cloud world is challenging for customers. There is no single pane of glass, and if I'm a Dell customer working with like, Azure in Azure Stack, I've got one thing if I'm a VMware customer, and I'm looking at VM with Amazon, that can be very different, and customers are stuck in the middle. How do you, from an education standpoint, live in that multi-cloud world? What do you do, where do you say, "Oh, hey, I've got an associate program here, "but you might want to take the AWS associate program here," and terminology and, you know, multi-cloud environments. >> The certification is, it's called the multi-cloud administrator expert certification. There's a path to get there. There's actually multiple paths to get there, and it really focuses and anchors around Dell EMC infrastructure and VMware vRealize Suite and the automation capabilities there. Now, the certification isn't just validating the knowledge. It's actually also the real world of experience of managing that environment, and it extends to public clouds. As part of that certification, it's validating that individuals have the experience and have actually working environments where they're actually integrating into those different public cloud providers. That could be, of course, both Dell EMC and Vmware cloud partner providers, but also into other popular cloud providers like Virtustream, Microsoft Azure, AWS, and so on. We're not certifying them on those third-party cloud providers, but our certification validates an individual's experience and their proficiency working with those environments. It's part of a larger solution. >> Mike, your background from the EMC side, maybe speak to a little bit the portfolio you mentioned. Virtustream, Vmware, of course, has very rigorous types of certifications there. How do those play across the various solutions? >> Yeah, there's a lot of great synergies there. As I mentioned, our certification validate into some of those areas, but an additional opportunity for the individuals who are looking to get certified, for example, it's called co-badging. For individuals who have a specific Dell EMC certification, like that multi-cloud expert, as well as a, in this case, a VMware certification, their VCP, not only do they get to proudly wear those two badges, but there's a third co-badge which really distinguishes that person as having a broader set of experience across that even bigger solution. >> Last thing I want to touch on, Mike, is, you know, plan it for the future. Talk to a little bit about the rollout of some of these new certifications, and how does this prep customers not just for the needs of today, but where they need to go in their career for the next five years. >> Yeah, sure. What we're validating in these certifications is absolutely relevant to a lot of our customers that we see that are transforming at a rapid pace. But what I'd like to say is that, you know, transformation's a journey. The masses of organizations are in motion. They're obviously at all different stages, but really, what we're focused on validating is the future skills needed. We see a big, a lot of pent-up demand, actually, for that today. What we, for example, our master-level certification, to your question about what's next, where it's going, that is a extremely rigorous certification, not one that you, that is achieved via an online-proctored exam. It's actually conducted by a board review. Candidates submit applications, and depending upon the application, it's accepted or not. Those that are accepted actually will have the opportunity to present in front of a board. It's something that we'll run quarterly. Our first one at Dell Technologies World, just coming up in a couple months. We'll run them quarterly after that, and for those who passed the board review and have the extensive amount of experience and meet the requirements achieve that master-level enterprise architect certification, in that case. >> Great, well, we're looking forward to being, we're going to have theCUBE at Dell Technologies World. It's actually the first event we ever did was EMC World back in 2010, so it'll be, I can't believe, our ninth year doing theCUBE there. Lots of coverage. Mike, I just want to give you the final word. We were talking offline a bit. We've got friends in the industry, lots of things have changed. Purse level, what do you give people that have been in tech for a while? What advice do you give them? >> I'd say, like any role, even outside of tech, but I think mostly in tech, is keeping up with the pace of things. That right there is a full-time job, as you know and as our customers know. Coming from the learning industry and education services, it's a passion of mine and something I get really, really excited about. >> Mike Apigian, thank you so much for joining us. Congratulations on the update, we look forward to hearing the results from the board reviews at Dell Technologies World and beyond, and be sure to check out thecube.net for coverage of Dell Technologies World. Lots of other shows in 2018 and beyond. I'm Stu Miniman. Thank you so much for watching theCUBE. (fast electronic music)

>> Narrator: From the Silicon Angle Media Office in Boston, Massachusetts, it's the Cube. Now, here's your host, Stu Miniman. >> Hi, I'm Stu Miniman and welcome to a special presentation of the Cube here in our Boston area studio. Happy to welcome to the program, Mike Apigian. Mike's senior director of education services at Dell EMC. Mike, great to talk to you. >> Thanks, Stu, thanks for having me. >> Alright, so, actually a topic I love talking about. We're talking about jobs, talking about careers, and what is the role of kind of the vendor and their whole ecosystem there. But before we get into it, give our audience, since it's your first time on the program, a little bit about your background and what you do at Dell EMC. >> Yeah, sure, well actually I've been a long time EMC employee, started out almost 20 years ago and over my career been, I had the opportunity to really focus on a number of different products in technologies and then a couple years back had the opportunity to join our education services team. And been pretty exciting since then, focused on the also very changing industry of learning. >> Yeah, something that there's definitely, nobody asked a question whether or not there's change going on in the industry. One of the big things I've asked over the last year is how do you keep up with it all? And the answer is there's no way you can keep up with it all but talk about careers, you talk about jobs, when you're talking to partners and end users, what are some of the biggest concerns they have and especially how do things like skillsets and training fit into it? >> Yeah, sure, I mean, it's two fold really. It's part of it's the technology and how the technology industry's changing so fast and to your point, needing to keep up with that, which is blistering. So that's definitely a big challenge we look to address. And then the other part of it is just time, time in the day and the ability to get out of work to train and that's actually driven a big shift in the industry to different ways of learning, different types of learning experiences that don't require someone to be in a physical classroom all the time. >> Yeah, I have to imagine that that's the case. Tell us, what's the state of certification these days? You know, there's always debates in the industry, it's like ah, have I just had the same certification for the last 20 years and I just kind of go through the rote or what am I learning on the job? How are my certifications changing? You mention kind of remote versus there. What's the industry look like these days? >> Yeah, there is a big focus, as there always has been, around certifications on specific technologies and vendor's products and obviously at Dell EMC, we have a big focus there. We have a portfolio of certifications to meet that need but what we see in the market and hear loud and clear from our customers is that with all the change going on and the change driving, IT professionals need to be skilled, knowledgeable, proficient in much more than specific products and technologies. It's really the connection across multiple domains, infrastructure, applications, and security. Which is really the interesting part of it and opportunity for us. >> Yeah, Mike, I want to get your viewpoint on this. You've been with the company for over 20 years. 20 years ago, EMC was a storage company, 100% the focus of the company. Now, what does the certifications, the education services, what is the focus and why does the Dell family of companies have a right to kind of be a major partner for users in doing those certifications in the education? >> We feel there's no one in a better position to really help build that knowledge and validate those skillsets based upon first and foremost, Dell EMC's breadth of infrastructure and the capabilities there and with certifications really broadening across that infrastructure, looking at it more holistically. And then, when you think about the family of Dell Technologies and bring in VMware and Virtustream and Pivotal and RSA, very much adjacent technologies and broader solutions that really tie into what we envision and what we see and hear from our customers as defining and requiring the skillsets of the future. >> Okay, so, don't want to disregard storage skillsets, still critically important? >> Mike: Sure, absolutely. >> The thing we've talked about when virtualization rolled out, when cloud rolls out, somebody needs to understand how stuff works underneath there but what are, give us a landscape of what the certifications look like today and you've got some news that you're going to tell us about what's new today also. >> Yeah, I mean, the state of current state today is as I mentioned, very product centric, maybe a combination of products and moving forward now we're excited to have more transformational certifications which span those different domains. So for example, as organizations begin to or continue to modernize their data centers, implement integrated systems, convert systems, it requires a different skillset to manage and support that infrastructure that's now being deployed and leveraged in a different way, just as one example. >> Yeah, so, one of the values of converged and hyper-converged infrastructure is simplicity so the certification's shorter? Tell us what is involved in, you said across multiple domains, but bring us inside a little bit as to what's involved here. >> Certainly, so there's definitely a simplicity aspect to it, absolutely. Contrasted to deep expertise and server storage network, that dynamic with the converged and hyper-converged infrastructure is actually administrator that may not need to have as much depth in any of those areas but they need to have breadth across all of them, right? Also, skillsets, knowledge, and experience around different cloud and operating models to really round out the skillsets required there. >> Okay, who are these certifications targeted at? What kind of stage in their careers? What kind of path is there? Help us understand a little bit the journeys that people are on with their jobs and careers and certifications. >> Sure, so the new certifications that we have, it really spans quite a range. We have associate level certifications, think of that as very foundational in concepts. Which aren't even anchored specifically on Dell EMC products but more concepts around converged infrastructure, cloud, hyper-cloud environments and concepts. For something like that at that associate level, it could be a technical person, a technical profession, it could be a business professional, it could be someone coming out of a university or even while they're in the university that's focused in building some knowledge and some skillset to enter the IT industry. So for that, there's a pretty broad spectrum and then as you go up the levels or tiers within our certification program, as you'd expect, more advanced, higher levels of knowledge and as you get up to the highest tiers in the program, it's really not just grounded on knowledge but actually real world experience. And in some cases, the experience required may be five years of the right experience or in some cases with our new Enterprise Architect Certification, it's at minimum 15 years of experience. >> Yeah, how do you balance, the jokes always like okay, I'd like somebody with 20 years of virtualization experience and only the mainframe people can stand up. Or it's I'd like 15 years of container experience and once again, there's probably two people that were working on Solaris 15 years ago for that but it wasn't in Linux until less than that. How do you balance that and how does that fit in kind of IT with business and those various skillsets? >> Great question, because you're right on about the technologies. There's the role itself in that example, architecting enterprise-wide solutions, where there's extent and many years of experience required but when it comes down to a technology perspective, obviously the shelf life on many of those is not quite that long. So it is a balance there. What I'd also say is that what these certifications help validate and what we see required in the market today is not just that technical focus but very much so the business focus, the business acumen and the ability to engage with the business, understand business requirements, the corporate strategy, if you will, where they're going. And really translate or convert that into enterprise architecture and enterprise architecture that's very different than the past that more sets the stage for an organization to be successful moving forward. >> Yeah, so, if I hear you right, it's really a pairing of the technology and the business and making sure that there's good partnership there. >> Mike: Absolutely. >> Okay, you mentioned kind of skillset in the market, what are some of the big gaps? What are customers coming and saying, "Hey, I've got people with skills "but I need to retrain them." Where's the place where you see the biggest opportunity today that some of these new certifications are helping? >> A couple that come top to mind, first one is security, a hot topic everywhere. And a critical step in that, in implementing security, is making sure the infrastructure's secure. We hear that over and over again. And what we see is that a very product oriented approach in IT to securing products or parts of the infrastructure so one of the new certifications where we're excited to have brought to market is infrastructure security. And it's looking across the spectrum, across all Dell EMC infrastructure, as well as connections to VMware and other vendors and it's really focused on taking a security first approach and implementing the right security controls in the infrastructure to meet an organization's security policy and requirements. >> Something we've heard loud and clear for the last couple of years, security is not one person's job, it's everyone's job. And it is no longer kind of the firewall and perimeter, it now needs to be pervasive and it goes all the way up to the board of directors inside the company. So it sounds like you're pulling together pieces from across the Dell family of companies there to help it. >> Correct. >> Okay, so security, you know, super hot. What else from the announcement do you want to make sure people understand? Some of the new pieces that are helping on these transformations? >> You know, I think another area that is definitely worth a shout out is the deployment of multi-cloud environments. And Dell EMC infrastructure, private cloud, connectivity and integration with different public cloud providers. That's what our large customers around the globe are doing. And if you think about that, the high degree of automation, and connectivity to those different cloud providers, the skillset that is required is very different than the past. Knowledge of workloads, moving, migrating workloads, it's definitely a big gap that we now address. >> And Mike, that's one of the biggest problems we've seen is the operating environment for that multi-cloud world is challenging for customers. There is no single pane of glass and if I'm a Dell customer working with like Azure and Azure Stack, I've got one thing. If I'm then a VMware customer and I'm looking at VM with Amazon, that can be very different. And customers are stuck in the middle. How do you, from an education standpoint, live in that multi-cloud world? What do you do, where do you say, "Oh hey, I've got an associate program here "but you might want to take the AWS associate program here," and terminology and multi-cloud environments? >> Yeah, so the certification is, it's called the Multi-Cloud Administrator Expert Certification and there's a path to get there, there's actually multiple paths to get there and it really focuses and anchors around Dell EMC infrastructure and VMware vRealize Suite and the automation capabilities there. Now, the certification isn't just validating the knowledge, it's actually also the real world of experience of managing that environment and it extends to public clouds as part of that certification. It's validating that individuals have the experience and have actually working environments where they're actually integrating into those different public cloud providers. So that could be, of course, both Dell EMC and VMware cloud partner providers, but also into other popular cloud providers like Virtustream, Microsoft Azure, AWS, and so on. So, we're not certifying them on those third party cloud providers but our certification validates an individual's experience and their proficiency working with those environments. It's part of a larger solution. >> So, Mike, you're back ground from the EMC side, maybe speak to a little a bit the portfolio, you mentioned Virtustream, VMware of course has very rigorous types of certifications there. How do those play across the various solutions? >> Yeah, there's a lot of great synergies there. So as I mentioned, our certification validate into some of those areas but an additional opportunity for the individuals who are looking to get certified, for example it's called co-badging. So for individuals who have a specific Dell EMC certification like that Multi-Cloud Expert, as well as a, in this case, a VMware certification, their VCP, not only do they get to proudly wear those two badges but there's a third co-badge which really distinguishes that person as having a broader set of experience across that even bigger solution. >> Okay, last thing I want to touch on, Mike, is planning for the future. Talk a little bit about the roll out of some of these new certifications and how does this prep customers not just for the needs of today but where they need to go in their career for the next five years? >> Yeah, sure, so what we're validating in these certifications is absolutely relevant to a lot of our customers that we see that are transforming at a rapid pace. But what I like to say is that transformation's a journey, the masses of organizations are in motion, they're obviously at all different stages, but really what we're focused on validating is the future skills needed. And we see a big, a lot of pent up demand actually for that today. So, what we, for example, our master level certification, to your question about kind of what's next, where it's going, that is an extremely rigorous certification, not one that is achieved via an online proctored exam. It's actually conducted by a board review. So candidates submit applications, and depending upon the application, it's accepted or not, those that are accepted actually will have the opportunity to present in front of a board. And it's something that we'll run quarterly, our first one at Dell Technologies World just coming up in a couple months. And we'll run them quarterly after that and for those who pass the board review and have the extensive amount of experience and meet the requirements achieve that master level Enterprise Architect Certification in that case. >> Okay, great, well we're looking forward to being, we're going to have the Cube at Dell Technologies World. It was actually the first event we ever did, was EMC World back in 2010 so it'll be, I can't believe our ninth year doing the Cube there. Lots of coverage. Mike, I just want to give you the final word. You know, we were talking offline a bit, we've got friends in the industry, lots of things have changed, first level, what do you give people that have been in tech for a while, what advice do you give them? >> I'd say like any rule, even outside of tech but I think mostly in tech, is keeping up with the pace of things. That right there is a full time job, as you know, and as our customers know and coming from the learning industry and education services it's a passion of mine and something I get really, really excited about. >> Mike Apigian, thank you so much for joining us. Congratulations on the update, we look forward to hearing the results from the board of reviews at Dell Technologies World and beyond and be sure to check out thecube.net for coverage of Dell Technologies World. Lots of other shows in 2018 and beyond. I'm Stu Miniman, thank you so much for watching the Cube. (upbeat music)

>> Announcer: Live, from Las Vegas, it's theCUBE. Covering NetApp Insight 2017. Brought to you by, NetApp. >> Hey welcome back everyone, live here in Las Vegas. This is theCUBE's exclusive coverage of NetApp Insight 2017, here at the Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas. I'm John Furrier, the co-founder of SiliconeANGLE Media, and co-host of theCUBE. My co-host this week is Keith Townsend, @CTOAdvisor, and our next guests are Josh Atwell, who's a developer advocate at NetApp, and Jason Benedicic, who's with, Principal Consultant ANS Group Cloud Service Provider in the UK, great topic, talking DevOps. Guys, welcome to theCUBE, good to see you again. >> Good to see you as well, thank you. >> Boy, DevOps has gone mainstream. >> It's a thing. >> Okay, it's absolutely gone mainstream, we've been saying it for years, I remember going back a few years ago, you say, DevOps, huh? Infrastructure as Code? Everyone loves it, it's now the new model, people are moving fast to. What's goin on with NetApp and tell all of us your story. Go ahead. >> So within NetApp, we look at DevOps as a unique opportunity for us to level up. Everybody that's doing infrastructure and going from saying, you just going out and developing an application to saying, we can actually help deliver you the best experience. We look at where applications are being developed and supported, everybody likes to say it's straight out to the public cloud, that's where all the innovation happens, but, it's also happening on premises as well. The reason that we see most frequently is that reduced friction. You know, going to the public cloud, that has become a model that people can go out, they can get what they need and do what they need, and it's been something that's significantly easier than what their local IT organization has had. DevOps is forcing infrastructure and IT to understand that availability and reliability, which is what we've always been measured on, is no longer the core measure that we have to focus on. It's agility and availability and delivering unique services. >> Well I would just say to your point, Wikibon analysts research have validated your point, and they actually show the data that the on premise, they call it true private cloud, numbers, are growing actually, not declining. What is declining is about $1.5 billion in non-differentiated labor, but that's shifting to SAS models. So what it means is, the on premise action, in a cloud operational way, is growing. Which is not saying that's declining, it's just saying, people are getting their house in order. They're doing DevOps on prem. Prep to do cloud. >> Yeah. >> Cloud's got native stuff, you do versioning, you can put some stuff in the cloud, test/dev, sure, there's great use cases, but most enterprises are on prem, getting ready to take advantage of it. >> It's an absolute and conversation, and that's also somethin' that we are working really hard with our customers, in our field and the entire company as a whole. To understand, it's not an or conversation. Most companies are looking at how do we solve a variety of different challenges, how do we accommodate for a variety of different workloads that are being developed, and how do we modernize the mode one operational workloads that we've had and bring them into the future with new services. So, it's an absolute and conversation. It's a pretty exciting time to be dealing with IT. >> So Jason, as we think about DevOps, we give, we have plenty of examples for private cloud and inside of our own datacenters, but you help run a public cloud. >> So we run services within a public cloud. >> Right. >> And a hybrid model. So we run a number of services to man assessments, so we help in the UK, I think we're a little bit further behind than the US is currently, so some of the biggest services that we do is helping people to assess their applications, assess their data, and understand what they can move. Using things like the Gartner TIME Analysis, where we can take best leverage of on premises private cloud, where you've got hybrid approach, where you've got native. We got the expertise around retooling and assessment services to move legacy applications into a cloud model, and then we provide management services on top, and those sorts of things. That's where we use, utilize the DevOps, around taking what would be our managed services ITIL processes, things that people would traditionally do manually. We take a lot of that, and we prepackage that up into workflows and data automation operations for our customers so they can provision where they like, across a multitude of on premises and in the public cloud. So we take that work which would traditionally be done by a analyst on a desk or that sort of thing, package that up, using a lot of NAVs, APIs, and Solufy tooling. So, we're saving enterprises time so they can work on what's really important to them, and that's their line of business applications. >> So from an assessment perspective, I love to get feedback, what are customers learning? Is it, that they thought they could just lift and shift, or that they have to go through some type of DevOps transformation -- >> Yeah, so -- >> What's been the balance of the results? >> Yeah, so a lot of people don't necessarily understand where they are. There are a lot of misconceptions around being able to lift and shift things to the crowd, but that's not really a great cost model. I find in the public sector in the UK a lot, is you've got a lot of legacy applications that potentially people don't have any knowledge of, 'cause the people that ran them and installed them in the first place have long gone. They need to understand what those applications do for their business, what the business processes around them are, and how they can take that forward into a new model. A lot of retooling. Actually, a lot of time we see the application should probably be ditched and let's look for something that we can just build cloud native. >> So, that requires a new set of skills to operate at that higher level of the stack as we call it in the industry, however, that leaves a lot of low level work that still needs to be done, so automation has kind of walked hand-in-hand with DevOps. What is the NetApp story around automation and helping to remediate some of this low level activity that needs to be done repeatedly? >> Big focus for us as a company is not trying to dictate tooling to people. If you are using Docker, we offer a native Docker volume plugin that allows you to plug right into Docker and be able to provision and manage storage as an application owner or developer, to get what you need, and to handle the services that are available there. When we look at configuration management, or helping code and artifact management, cloud, with Openstack, or VMware vRealize Suite, our initiative is to make the NetApp products seamless and invisible into your processes. How do we remove and eliminate handoffs, and how do we make all of those processes effortless, so that as you identify those tasks, and those high effort but low value tasks that has to be -- taken advantage of. >> And automation -- and automation's critical there. >> Yeah, yeah. Being able to automate those things, remove people from that process, and using their skills and talents for things like auditing, and understanding proper behavior, checking that people are delivering what they are supposed to, and consuming from a policy framework. >> I'd like to get back to the automation, but I just want to shift to Josh, so hold the thought on automation. Josh, I want to get your thoughts on, as we get to automation we start talking about hybrid cloud. You're doing hybrid cloud. That's your -- >> Yeah. >> You're on the front line, you're doing it. Also, hybrid cloud also means things differently, so when you think about hybrid cloud, a customer's got to get their act together. We heard earlier from the NetApp folks, the VP of Engineering, we're doing three things: modernizing the infrastructure, that's just like, okay go clean house, fix things, making sure we're solid, rock solid, build the next generation data center, be ready for the cloud. >> Yep. >> Okay. So, there's some things that need to get done there. What's your view on the table stakes to get there, because you got orchestration capabilities, cloud orchestration demo is hot, we saw that, at the show here. What is NetApp doing to make hybrid cloud easier? >> Across all the products that we utilize run NetApp, you've got APIs on everything. They got a lot of really good tools there, and they're moving away from the traditional hardware. I've been working with NetApp for like 16 years on. It was a hardware company, a software company, and now it's just moved on even further. There's a further evolution there, a management company. It's not just, you're managing your data, the data flow, the fabric around it, and the tools that are on offer there are just game changers. Especially the Cloud Automation option this morning. Yeah, that was great. >> As people know NetApp, eight years ago, they were -- I was scratching my head saying, wait a minute, why are you going to Amazon? So, early in cloud, so clearly they know what DevOps is, so it's not just lip service, we know that, that's just my personal observation and experience with NetApp, but Josh, I want you to talk to the audience that is either a NetApp customer or looking at NetApp, what's different now, what should they know about the new NetApp now, obviously you're on the A-Team, I see the shirt there, but, NetApp has changed and they're changing. I mean, SolidFire came in, you're seeing a lot more action on the DevOps cloud with the flash, some good stuff there, but NetApp has been an innovative company, what's the new story for NetApp in your words? >> For me, it's the speed that they're able to react to the market, moving the ONTAP to a cadence model, six month releases, moving products away from tin, into software, it's all about the value of what we can provide. We've got standalone products now from NetApp that can just do Office 365 backup. That's something that's completely moved forward. You've got a level of innovation and speed coming out of NetApp that's just unrivaled. >> Josh, I'd like to get your thoughts back to automation now, I'm CSO, the cost thing I hear all the time is the following narrative, I don't want the shiny new toy, I got to lot of stuff on my plate. I got an application development team I need to scale up and make modern, which is DevOps, not just take the old guys and put 'em in, I got to recruit, retrain, replatform, I have cybersecurity going on, I got to unbolt that from IT and make that essentially a top line, top reporting to the board, do all the cyber stuff, and I got the data governance stuff to deal with, and by the way, I got IoT over the top coming in. If it's not clear as day on the cloud, it doesn't meet my conversation. How do you guys engage in a dialog like that? One, do you agree with that, that makes that statement, but, that's a lot of stuff going on. Bombs are dropping inside the customer's environment, they're like, this is Hell right now, I got to lot of stuff to do. How do you guys help that environment? >> I think one thing that we have to be mindful of is that we've moved beyond being able to define a very static and rigid infrastructure architecture. In the past, we would define what our storage, what our compute, what our networking is, and that's going to -- what it's going to be. It's very easy to say I know how to support 10,000 Exchange users. That's always been something that we've been comfortable talking about. What you outlined, is the new reality for IT in that, we are getting a diverse set of requirements where we'll come in and say we need to deliver this new application so that we can get to market and capture -- I was actually talking to someone in the military. I said, what if the military was to develop a new recruiting tool, and they go in and say, we need to build this recruiting tool, but we actually don't know how much data is going to be required for it. IT is not comfortable with that conversation. But NetApp has developed, our portfolio, and the integrations and tool sets that we've integrated with, to make that conversation a little bit easier. >> They're not comfortable because they can't forecast it, or it's a blank check in their mind, or they don't know what the -- how to architect it, what's the -- >> It's because we're not accustomed to architecting for those types of scenarios. We generally have focused on what is going to be your use case, when do you need it delivered by, how much do you need? We're still having that same conversation, but the answer now is, I don't know, but we have to ready for whichever direction it goes. >> That creates a good point, at VMWorld we noticed that there's a convergence, not a lot of people are talking about this yet, but I can see the canary in the coal mine chirping away, is that the convergence between hardware and software stacks are coming together. There are untested use cases coming down the pike. >> Yeah. >> That just -- I need this, but, we haven't tested it. Or we don't know the capacity, so you have to have a serverless mindset, you got to have DevOps mindset, you really got to be prepared. >> Well there's certainly a lot of maturity that we're working through. We are definitely from a DevOps perspective, in that juvenile phase, where we're learning who we are, the changes that are happening to us as we go, and we're getting a much more responsible view of what we're trying to deliver against. It's really uncomfortable for a lot of people to have a conversation where there's so many unknowns, but fortunately, the technologies we're able to bring to market and deliver, are providing that, as I describe it, a foothold to make you feel stable in that process to at least know that your data's getting where it needs to be and protected. >> Keith, I know you got to question, but my final point of that is that, that kind of, we see that evolve in the customer mindset too, where you start to see the word trusted relationship become real. It became a cliche, we're a trusted partner, but reality now with all this uncertainty, they need the headroom, they got to cross the bridge with the future with proven people. So that's why I kind of like, I don't mean to dis on the startups, but the shiny new toy's not going to win the day. You got to really hit the scenario today, and prepare to cross that bridge to the future with partners, and I think that's what you're saying. >> Yeah, that is a big part, and the partnerships that we have with folks like Red Hat and Jfrog, where we're trying to improve that experience of implementing these environments and supporting these new workloads, is absolutely a big part of what we're doing. >> So I'd like to talk a little about the necessity of requirements coming from the business, and tying it into something I heard from the stage yesterday. I'm not a storage guy. >> Me neither. >> I'm a data guy. And you've said that before, but one of the things that has interested me is this concept of the data fabric. >> Yes. >> Can you tie in the vision of data fabric to kind of this model of DevOps and being able to adjust to the changing needs of the business? >> I think what's really important and to be mindful of is that as we are seeing IT getting these requirements, as the businesses are identifying what is really impactful and the innovation that we need to deliver on, the data fabric is providing choice. It's allowing you to look at being able to deliver these enterprise class protection and replication, and capabilities, and allowing you to develop, innovate, and run your workloads wherever is most important to you, without having to completely reshift your thinking and what your skillsets are. We are able to level up everyone that has been involved with NetApp, and has invested their career, and invested their energy and becoming knowledgeable in that space, now allowing them to extend out into new areas in the cloud, hybrid cloud frameworks, but also providing these capabilities to the people consuming those resources without them having to care about the infrastructure. They know it is there, they know they can reach out to it and define snapshotting and take advantage of clones, and deliver a good developer experience, without having to understand exactly what's happening in the infrastructure. >> Guys, thanks so much for coming on, I see having seamless infrastructure is what everyone wants, but it's hard. >> Yeah. (laughing) >> Final comments, as you go into the future now with DevOps, it's become now operationalized, a lot more work to do, it's not that easy, what's the hardest thing about DevOps, final comment, you guys each weigh in and get the last word. What's the hardest thing about DevOps that people may not understand, 'cause it sounds so easy, it's magic. >> I think the hardest thing for most people is having a critical eye, and being pragmatic about where the challenges really are. If you look at the methodologies that DevOps promotes, it is really identifying the constraints in the work flow process. Regardless of what you're developing and what you're doing, being very pragmatic and realistic about where those constraints are, and focusing energy on solving for those constraints. I think with we deliver out to market, we are providing people some stability, so that as they're going through this process and things feel really shaky as they accelerate their pace of development and release of software, they have some stability so they, when they focus, they don't feel like the wheels are coming off the cart, if you will. >> I think what I find is that you need to -- people need to understand DevOps isn't something that you can buy, you need to build. You need to get the right people, you need to get the right processes, the right mindset, and embrace it. A lot of people think it's just -- You see job adverts these days, I want a full stack DevOps engineer, it's just not that simple. You've got to take the time, take the effort, and move with it, and learn as much as you can. >> And it's a talent issue too, and I just -- I guess one final final question 'cause this just popped in my head, at Big Data NYC last week in New York, what became very clear to us was, certainly in big data applications analytics, a lot of things are being automated. But, question for you is, when should you automate, one comment on Big Dat NYC a guy said, if you do it more than twice manually, automate it. Not that easy in storage and networks and data, but is there -- most DevOps guys have an eye for automate that. They see it, they automate it. What are some of the things you see being automated away? Is there like a ethos, is there like a saying? If you automate twice, what's your thoughts on automation? What should you automate, what's the order of operations, what's the low hanging fruit? >> With respect to DevOps in particular, it is truly finding the constraint. Identifying areas where people are becoming a bottleneck in processes, or the process itself is a bottleneck to success. Focus on that area first. Now, it's also easy to just try to pick the low hanging fruit, and do various things, but there needs to be a discipline in looking at, where are your actual bottlenecks and how can I remove those bottlenecks? >> So you read in a blog post, you got to know your environment, see the pressure point, constraints -- >> Yeah. >> Get some direction, advice, but -- >> Correct. >> You're saying, look at your environment. >> Yeah, we're now moving away from a world where virtualization allowed us to just thrown everything into a big resource pool and we just didn't pay attention to it any longer. We are now actually having to start having conversations -- >> It's engineering involved. >> again, yep. >> It's engineering involved. >> It is. >> Not just writin' some code. Josh, thoughts on automation? What ya automate first? >> I share a lot of those things. You need to look at your processes. You need to look at where you've got your bottlenecks, like he said, things that we would traditionally do in the past as a service provider where you got teams of analysts and engineers working on things. If you can speed that up and allow them to provide a better service to your customers, then yeah, certainly, work on that automation. Deploying out new models, even internal stuff that we need to deploy out, if you need to do that more than once or twice, for test environments, all those sorts of things, then yeah, certainly, automate that out. Because the more time you get out of your people, the more value you are delivering to the business. >> Thanks Josh, A-Team, love the shirt, quick soundbite, what's the A-Team, is there a certification, is there a bar to get over? >> It's a pretty high bar. It's an advocacy program, it's quite a small tight knit group of partners and customers of NetApp. We work in a 360 feedback loop between the NetApp Product Management Teams and other developers, and just give feedback and then rave about them when we feel is necessary. >> Have a beer, or coffee and tea, and say, I love when a plan comes together. (laughing) I couldn't resist. >> That's what John had also mentioned, NetApp has also delivered a developer and opensource community, called The Pub. So at netapp.io, it's a location, we actually have the code on bar behind me, we've got people that are coming in who have interest in containers, interest in Openstack, DevOps, and these new models. We have a large community, over 900 people participating. >> It's called The Pub? >> The Pub. >> John: Is there a URL? >> Yep, netapp.io. >> Netapp.io, and just -- you know we're data driven, seven years been monitoring the community's data, just anecdotally, the favorite drinks of developers in our community, beer and tea. >> Makes sense. >> Pretty makes sense. Beer obviously, tea no coffee? >> Slow release caffeine, I think that probably works better. (laughing) >> Thanks guys so much Josh and Jason, data from the field from the front lines on cutting edge DevOps is going mainstream. This is the cloud native, native cloud, on premise infrastructure innovation here at NetApp. I'm John Furrier, Keith Townsend, we'll be back with more, after this short break.