Introducing the View from the Top
Some of you may have noticed a couple weeks ago when I added the header to the web site that I included a reference to something called “View from the Top”.
Today I’d like to introduce that new occasional series that we’ll be running about once a month here at onlytraitofaleader.com. In View from the Top I’ll be handing the mic over leaders in government, academia, and industry with an open-ended question: what would you like to say to students and young professionals just getting started in their technology careers?
I’ve got the first two guest authors lined up, and I can tell you that I’m very excited to have these folks contributing in this space. Our first two leaders have set the bar very high for our next authors, and I hope you find as much to learn in what they have to say as I have.
Reading these pieces has also brought me something unexpected. As you are reading each guest leader’s essay take the time to reflect on how each is different from the others. Asking an open-ended question has already provoked a variety of responses, and I think there will be as much to learn from what each guest chooses to write about as there will be in the specifics of what they have to say.
Let me give you some flavor of what’s to come by talking about the first two guests.
Our first guest has been a fixture in my career since I was an undergraduate, and he is still shaping my professional experience more than 14 years later. Dr. Joe F. Thompson is currently William L. Giles Distinguished Professor of Aerospace Engineering at Mississippi State University. Joe has a long and distinguished career during which he founded an NSF Engineering Research Center, revolutionized computational aerodynamics, and served on the President’s Information Technology Advisory Committee from 1997 through 2001 under presidents Clinton and (the first) Bush.
I’ve known David Sobotta for several years now, beginning when he was at Apple as Director of Federal Sales. He has a lifetime of leadership in the community and business, starting with the Boy Scouts and even including advocacy for equal educational opportunities in rural Canada. We met professionally and have kept touch even after our professional circumstances no longer intersected. David is currently the Vice President of Market Development for Webmail.us, a leading provider of email services for small business. He and his wife live in Roanoke on the side of a mountain where he publishes the View from the Mountain blog.
Stay tuned: our first guest essay will run tomorrow.
