My Contributions to the Renowned Sitecore Community in 2018

Observe and learn something from the people around you is a continuous process to improvise. Sitecore community is here with no exceptions, a community full of inspiring personalities to learn and get motivated from.

While working on Sitecore over the years, every time when I faced any issues or stuck with some technical hitch, most of the times I was just one step away from the exactly expected solutions or guidance towards the same. Just googled my problem and directed to numerous knowledge sharing channels like blogs, forums, videos, answers on community platforms like Stack Overflow, later on Sitecore Stack Exchange, Sitecore Community Slack etc, to get suggestions from. I am always glad to utilize this reservoir of knowledge. Apparently, it’s being self-centered to keep learning from others if you are not giving something back to the community.

When you cease to make a contribution, you begin to die. – Eleanor Roosevelt

One fine day I started blogging. As my baby steps I was initially blogging about very basic topics on Sitecore. Being novice, couple of my initial blogs were so kiddish that I preferred to delete them later on. Gradually I started blogging in a bit matured manner about my real time experiences with Sitecore such as any technical issues, customization in OOTB features or anything new which I came across. However I was under impression that I am giving back enough to the community. But when it comes to  contribute, there is no word like ENOUGH in the dictionary.

And then I attended my first Sitecore Symposium’17 in Vegas, which turned out to be an eye opener and game changer for me. I met people across the globe, meeting and greeting each other, appraising and thanking for their contributions either via blogs or videos or SSE or Slack. I realized that people are not just blogging or publishing videos or answering question on SSE/Slack, indeed they are actively contributing in every possible way. And this undoubtedly require another level of dedication and commitment, above all it’s obviously additional to your current jobs/duties you are on to earn for your living.  Being said that it consumes quite of your personal time to contribute in a 360 degree way. I must say since then things has changed drastically for me and today I can certainly relate to the quote that says it louder:

Help one another, there’s no time like the Present and no present like the Time. – James Durst

Post my return from the Symposium I made up my mind to invest my time to Sitecore community and contribute in 360 degrees:

1. 1. As I was blogging often but then decided to publish at least 2 blogs per month on an average.

1. 1. Engaged myself more actively on Sitecore Stack Exchange. Editing posts, answering questions, improving wiki tags, raising helpful tags, voting etc

1. 1. Looked for a Sitecore User Group near me and luckily found 2 of them – SUG New England and SUG Queen City, I joined both.

1. 1. Though Queen City SUG is almost a 3 hours drive from my home but the excitement to join 2 excellent talks per month, amazing people to network with and my passion towards driving, helped me to be consistent. Today its been 12+ monthly meetups and I never missed one. In fact after initial 2-3 meetups our very own Sitecore MVP Mike Reynolds offered me to be a co-organizer and host with him to run the SUG, I accepted the opportunity proudly.

1. 1. Presented 4 times at different SUGs like Bangalore, NCR and Queen City.

1. 1. Its not always possible to attend all SUG in person, that’s why we have SUGs being live streamed. Hence I started joining other SUGs which were live streamed and it was so much fun. I was able to attend meetups all across the globe and gained knowledge from the excellent talks at various SUGs like Bangalore, Sri Lanka, Brazil, Dubai, Ecuador, NCR etc

1. 1. Attended many official Webinars from Sitecore and Sitecore Virtual Developer Day is my favorite one.

1. 1. Participated in Sitecore contests like My Developer Trial Story, proudly shared the runners up stage with Sitecore MVP Michael West and Sitecore Sam. In fact using the trial program I explored a lot on Sitecore Experience Platform which dint get chance to do on my current official assignment. I explored and learnt features/modules like SIF, Sitecore Forms and SXA using trial program and later presented at various SUGs on these topics. Fun fun fun…

1. 1. Joined Slack Channels and actively contributing in every possible way.

1. Consistently active on all social media channels for Sitecore like Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook and Sitecore Community.

But as I said there is nothing ENOUGH while you are contributing. I know there are still other areas where I have plenty of scope to contribute. Hence, I am committed towards the contribution in upcoming years as well.

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Sitecore Technology MVP Award 2019 and Me

Now when it comes to the Sitecore MVP Nominations, what I learnt from the day I heard about Sitecore MVP Award is - "You should not contribute for the greed of becoming an MVP but to follow your passion to contribute." Keep contributing in all possible ways and most importantly be consistent throughout the year, not just near the time when MVP Nominations are around the corner. 

For the entire year 2018 I was committed for the same and I wish this year the award finds me deserving to be entitled as a Technology MVP. All I can do is make people aware about what I have contributed throughout the year, let the eligible recommenders to evaluate if they find me eligible for their kind recommendations and further Sitecore MVP award to take a call whether I am a Deserving Nominee to earn this Prestigious Title.  

Fingers are crossed.

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Summary of my contributions in 2018:

In a nutshell, here I am listing out my omni-channel contributions to the renowned Sitecore Community in year 2018:

Sitecore User Groups, Presentations and Webinars

1. Attended 50+ Sitecore Presentations/Talks in total at various SUGs @ 2018
   • Appeared in 30+ SUGs (13+ In Person & 17+ Live Streamed)
   • Attended 10 Talks on Sitecore Virtual Developer Day
2. Co-organizer and host of Queen City SUG, Manchester, NH
   • 12+ Monthly meetups so far, still counting
   • 24+ Tech Talk by Sitecore community folks both In person and remote
   • 2 talks from my side on Sitecore Forms and SXA
3. My Presentation / Talks both in-person and remote
   • 4 Presentation at different SUGs
     • SUG Queen City on Sitecore Forms
     • SUG Bangalore on Sitecore Forms
     • SUG Queen City on SXA
     • SUG NCR on SXA
   • 2 Presentations are under discussion to get lined up with SUG Chennai and Ecuador.

Blogged 60+ post in total

1. • 35+ posts in 2018 -> 25+ Technical & 10+ Informational
   • 16000+ Visits on blog posts in total (12000+ in 2018)
   • 30+ Followers 10+ Likes 15+ Comments
   • 5+ Mentions of my blogs by community friends on their posts
   • Honored when Sitecore CEO Mark Frost liked and commented on a tweet about one of my blog post on Sitecore 9 Installation. Blogging goal achieved. 🙂
   • Sitecore Trial Story Contest Runner Up

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Sitecore Stack Exchange

• Joined Aug’ 2017
• 1760+ Reputation
• 1 Gold 6 Silver 29 Bronze Badges
• 12 Questions 32 Answers 2 Wiki
• 305+Revisions 104+ Posts 105+ Comments
• 6 Accepts 125+ Reviews 185+ Suggestions
• 620+ Votes 23+ Helpful Flags 40+ Tags

Consistently active on various Sitecore Channels

• Sitecore Slack Channel
• Sitecore Community
• Twitter / LinkedIn / Facebook

Timely Fashioned View of my Contribution:

As I said its more important to be consistent contributor throughout the year rather getting active on the communities just before the MVP nominations. Hence here are my month-wise contributions to the community:

Prior November’2017

I understand that for Sitecore MVP 2019 awards, only the contributions during 2018 will be considered. But not just for the award but to let everyone know who is reading this blog that how my contribution is transformed from a single channel to 360 degrees. Before Symposium’17 I blogged 25+ technical blogs in total and was also active on SSE and other social channels like Sitecore Community, Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook etc.

November’2017

1. Blogged:- 9 reasons why Experience Analytics and SQL Server are buddies again in Sitecore 9
2. Blogged:- Did you ask why should I upgrade to Sitecore 9?
3. Blogged:- Sitecore Free Developer License 90 days trail

December’2017

1. Attended 2 SUG Meetups
   • SUG Queen City Manchester NH
   • SUG New England MA
2. Blogged:- Sitecore 9 Installation as easy as cooking delicious meal
3. Blogged:- Step 1: Sitecore XP9 Install using SIF – Collecting the required Files
4. Blogged:- Step 2: Sitecore XP9 Install using SIF – Let’s Install and configure Solr
5. Blogged:- Step 3: Sitecore XP9 Install using SIF – Lets configure Solr on HTTPS
6. Blogged:- Step 4: Sitecore XP9 Install using SIF – Ask your SQL Server to buckle up
7. Blogged:- Step 5: Sitecore XP9 Install using SIF – Install and Import SIF Modules
8. Blogged:- Step 6: Sitecore XP9 Install using SIF – Executing SIF Installation Script

January’2018

1. Attended 3 SUGs and also presented at 2 of them
   • Presented at Queen City SUG Meet
   • Presented at SUG Bangalore Virtual Meet
   • Attended Sitecore User Group Ecuador Meetup

February’2018

1. Attended FIVE Sitecore User Group Meetups and off course the Sitecore Virtual Developer Day was a bonus on top of everything.
   • Queen City, Manchester SUG Meet
   • SUG Bangalore virtual meetup
   • SUG Ecuador February Meetup
   • SUG Meetup NCR
   • SUG Srilanka Meetup
   • Sitecore Developer Virtual Developer Day
2. Blogged – Sitecore Cortex and Machine Learning

March’2018

1. Attended 2 Sitecore User Group Meetups
   • Queen City, Manchester SUG Meet
   • SUG Meetup NCR – By Ankit Joshi
2. Blogged – Differences between Sitecore Updates and Patches

April’2018

1. Attended FIVE Sitecore User Group Meetup Presentations
   • Co-organized Queen City, Manchester SUG Meetup
   • SUGUAE Blue Green Deployments with Rob Habraken

   • SUG Bangalore – Let’s Talk Commerce with Hetal Dave

   • GDPR Compliance Webinar by Ayantek

May’2018

1. Attended 3 Sitecore User Group Meetup Presentations
   • Co-organized Queen City, Manchester SUG May Meet
   • SUG NCR – Omni Channel Content Distribution
2. Blogged: Hiccups during Sitecore 9 XP0 Installation on a server

June’2018

1. Attended 3 Sitecore User Group Meetup Presentations
   • Hosted and Co-organized Queen City, Manchester SUG Meet
   • SUGUAE Meetp – Troubleshoot Sitecore Like a Ninja by Kiran Patil

July’ 2018

1. Attended 2 Sitecore User Group Meetup Presentation and 1 Webinar
   • Hosted and Co-organized Queen City, Manchester SUG Meet
   • Optimus for Sitecore XP Live by Altola (Alex Shyba)
2. Blogged: Powerful Sitecore Tools and Modules to make your life easier
3. Blogged: Sitecore Rocks unable to connect with Sitecore 9
4. Blogged: Could not resolve type name: Sitecore.Data.SqlServer.SqlServerProxyDataProvider on Sitecore 9

Aug’2018

1. Attended 2 Sitecore User Group Meetups
   • Hosted and Co-organized Queen City, Manchester SUG Meet
   • SUG Srilanka – From Forms to Riches by Michael Reynolds
2. Blogged: Sitecore Developer Trail – My Story
3. Blogged: A Blog Series – How to upgrade Sitecore?
4. Blogged: Assess and Document: The Present
5. Blogged: Brainstorm and Define: The Future

Sep’2018

1. Presented at 2 Sitecore User Groups
   • Sep’2018 Meetup SUG Queen City, Manchester, NH
   • Sep’2018 SUG NCR Meetup
2. Attended 2 Sitecore User Group Meetups
   • Hosted and Co-organized Sep’2018 Meetup SUG Queen City, Manchester, NH
   • Sep’2018 SUG Brazil Meetup

Oct’2018

1. Attended 2 Sitecore User Group Meetup and how can I miss Sitecore Symposium
   • SUG Queen City
   • SUG NCR – Akshay Sura
2. Blogged: Analyze and Pick: The Upgrade Approach

Today and beyond

Without any doubt I am committed to continue whatever I am contributing as of today but on top of that for the next year I will also be focused on developing and publishing Sitecore Modules, as I know that is one of the channel I missed to contribute this year. Obviously you can expect more:

1. 1. Blogs

1. 1. Presentations

1. 1. Sitecore User Groups

1. 1. Answers/Activities on SSE and Slack

1. Tweets, Posts on LinkedIn and Facebook etc

from my side throughout next year.

Requesting Recommendations

Do you think my contributions listed above to Sitecore Community can propel you to be my friend? Do you think I deserve your kind recommendations to be entitled as Sitecore Technology MVP 2019? Do you think this prestigious award will find me worth winning?

If yes I will be looking forward to your recommendations if you are a current MVP or Sitecore Employee. Please DM me on Slack, Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook etc for the email ID I am using for my MVP nominations.

Heartfelt gratitude for your kind recommendations in advance. 🙂

Closing Keynotes

As a closing keynote to this blog post, my heartfelt Thanks to each one of you for being my energy booster and motivator throughout the year to turn me into an active contributor. Big shout out to all followers on my Blog, Twitter and LinkedIn. I feel honored that my posts are worth your precious likes, comments, retweets and share.

Last but not the least, my special Thanks to Mike Reynolds for mentoring me entire year which definitely helped me to keep up my momentum. Enjoyed the long drives every month that too against the Mother Nature at NH in winters.  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Best wishes to all the current and aspiring MVPs, may the God of Awards be with  you this year. But if not, don’t worry, consider it like other’s contribution was even more deserving and they have set another level of contribution goal for next year.

Let’s hope for the best and leave the rest. 😊

Success is not a function of the size of your title but the richness of your contribution. – Robin S. Sharma