Hi! I'm Michael

I'm a Software & Cloud Services Engineer

About Me

As an engineering professional I consistently aim to further develop myself both professionally and personally. In my spare time I enjoy playing with video games, tinkering with electronics, or taking photos.

Throughout the past few years I have grown to enjoy the infrastructure side of the cloud. Day-to-day you'll find me working on the physical hardware of servers, switches, routers, and firewalls, all the way up to dealing with the applications running on a virtual machine. Having control over the whole tech-stack is my passion.

What I have learnt from my time as an engineer within software and cloud services is that the technology is constantly changing. I plan to continue developing myself professionally by completing more industry certifications and transfer that knowledge to my team. As a professional I have the following skills:

  • Strong networking skills
  • Advanced Linux experience
  • Advanced VMware ESXi and vCenter experience
  • Proficient programming in multiple programming languages shown on my GitHub profile
  • Strong communication skills - evident in my excellent customer service feedback
  • Leadership - strong leadership skills outlined in my teamwork and leadership sections.
  • Self-learning - demonstrated by my certifications which are self-taught

Professional Experience

Cloud

In a professional setting, I create value through my industry leading knowledge and fast problem solving skills which prove critical in my day to day duties. This is evidenced by my ever-growing collection of industry certifications and the excellent feedback provided by both customers and colleagues.
One of my greatest contributions at work is the development of some automation around our Fortinet firewalls and the automated patching of our ESXi hosts. My automation has allowed the team to receive daily reports on our progress of upgrade tasks and report on any issues identified.
In terms of excellent customer service I have been admitted to the Macquarie Telecom Group Heartbeat club several times for going above and beyond. Heartbeat recognises and rewards employees that demonstrate exceptional Personal Accountable Service (PAS) to our customers and prospective customers.
In terms of certifications, so far under my belt I have the following:

  • Cisco Certified Network Associate (CCNA)
  • ITIL v3 Foundations
  • RedHat Certified Systems Administrator (RHCSA)
  • Microsoft Azure Administrator (AZ-104)
  • Fortinet Network Security Architect (NSE 7)

At Macquarie Cloud Services I have spent my first 2 years as a tier 1 HMC Engineer. I have now spent the last 2 years as a Tier 2 HMC Engineer, becoming the most senior non-manager engineer in the team.
As a HMC Engineer, I am part of a team of cloud specialists delivering hybrid cloud solutions for business customers. My role currently consists of being one of the engineers in direct contact with technical experts from our customers to provide the first and second level of support across a wide variety of compute and network issues.
I also spend a significant amount of time dealing with Australian government agencies through supporting the operations of our Secure Internet Gateway (SIG). This usually involves diagnosing complex routing and firewall issues, and dealing with complex business logic surrounding emails.

Education

I'm currently studying a Bachelor of ICT Engineering with a Submajor in Software, and a Diploma in Professional Engineering Practice at The University of Technology, Sydney (UTS).

As a student I have performed exceptionally well at the more practical subjects which is evident in the marks received for these subjects:

  • Introductory Digital Systems - Distinction mark of 83
    - This subject allowed me to gain a fundamental understanding of electronics at a low level
  • Software Engineering Practice - High Distinction mark of 98
    - This subject provided a real world experience of working on software projects in an agile workplace
  • Internet Of Things - High Distinction mark of 90
    - This subject taught me fundamentals of IoT communication protocols
  • Engineering Computations - High Distinction mark of 90
    - This subject helped advance my skills in Excel

While UTS has taught me a lot of soft skills, the practical subjects are where I do best as I am passionate about getting the work done and learning about how to apply my skills to the real world. This is evident in the above mentioned practical subjects being some of my highest academic grades.

The following image is from one of the best practical assignments in Introductory Digital Systems, where we programmed a logic board after soldering it together:

Logic board

Leadership

Having spent the past 2 years as a tier 2 engineer I have been providing mentorship to the junior engineers in my team. I am now the most senior non-manager engineer in my team and this brings the responsibility of being a leader. This is demonstrated by my manager entrusting me to lead the team when he is on leave.
My leadership skills are highlighted especially well when dealing with major incidents as these require co-ordination and teamwork. I always take ownership of issues and delegate tasks to appropriate resources.
Following the correct process is important in just about any job but especially important when you are leading a team of engineers. If you can't follow the process yourself then you can't expect your team to also follow the process.
Being a leader I always lead by example and perform as best as I can to have the rest of my team follow in my footsteps. While I am senior and can instruct other engineers on what to do, I still prefer to be active and perform the same duties as they do.

Teamwork

I am excellent at working in a team environment and excel at understanding the strengths of my team members so that I can have them work on the most appropriate tasks and tickets for their strengths and weaknesses.
Evidence of my teamwork can be seen particularly when we deal with major incidents at work. When dealing with a major incident we all work together with different roles focused towards the resolution, such as can be seen from the following handover:

teamwork

Resume

If you are interested in downloading a copy of my resume then you can go to the following
Dropbox link