How to differentiate yourself as a Network Engineer with Tim Fiola – ZNDP 083

ZNDP 083: How to differentiate Yourself as a Network Engineer with Tim Fiola

Zig Zsiga: [0:00] How to differentiate yourself as a network engineer with Tim Fiola Episode III in this episode we highlight, ways that you can differentiate yourself as a network engineer is the role of the network engineer now a commodity resource how do we make ourselves stick out and the crowded pool of network engineers, Network designers and work Architects well that's what we are going to answer to today's episode of the zigbits network design podcast. Helping me today is my good friend and fellow non conformer Tim Fiola. We're going to tell you how it really is and how you can differentiate yourself,

Zig Zsiga: Welcome back my friends nerves Geeks and ziglets out there we have what other episode of the zigbits network design podcast where zigabytes are faster than all those gigabytes now we strive to provide real-world context around technology.

Zig Zsiga: Hey what's up everybody I hope everyone is doing great. Zig Zsiga here and welcome to episode 83 of the Zigbits Network Design Podcast. Once again my name is Zig Zsiga and I'm here to help you with Network Engineering, Network Design and Network Architecture and today we are going to have a debate. Round one fight! The debate is going to be about are Network Engineers a commodity resource and if so how can you differentiate yourself as a network engineer

Zig Zsiga: Hey real quick before we jump right into the topic at hand I want to make sure that you know that we have a dedicated zigbits Discord Community where you can have Network design discussions of right now live like literally you could go right this and jump in and have a Discord I have a conversation Discord happy have a network design conversation with me right now or with other fellow Network design experts, you can ask your questions you can get real time answers you can even work if you want to lurking is totally okay and that's fine as well we are all always happy to help.

Zig Zsiga: [1:57] You can join this scored Community by going to zigbits dot text is Discord and honestly it it got to be clear it's a 100% free right this is there's no additional fees or hidden fees or anything like that this is a free community for you to join you can always support this community as well there's ways to support it but there's no need to support it right there's no requirement you can join it ask your design questions you'll get some answers you'll get some feedback and then you can go off and you don't make those design decisions for your organization's your networks and your customers

hey if you go ahead and join today join that Discord server again it's zigbits dot text size Discord and let us know which is zigbits Network design podcast episode is your hey I'll see you there

Zig Zsiga: Our Guest today is my good friend Tim Fiola Tim is a twice published author he recently published this week deploying mpls and the day one navigating the junos XML hierarchy he is a network engineer by training. But it Automation and Cody enthusiasts by choice Tim is also an avid tequila fan and a recovering Lego haleh call when we recorded this episode I got to see Tim's Legos behind him on his entertainment center and they are outstanding things that I wish I had in my office but I just don't have the space once again Tim is a certified expert right and he has had a number of certifications before he's had the jnc I ESP and it is expired today but he is a certified expert and an occasional blogger

Zig Zsiga: Hey Tim thanks for joining us today man I appreciate you getting on the show how are you doing buddy.

Tim Fiola: [3:33] Zig I'm doing awesome thank you it's it's awesome to be here I definitely appreciate your time and the chance to come here and talk about this I'm how are you doing this morning.

Zig Zsiga: [3:43] I'm doing pretty well man I'm doing pretty well can't complain you know probably complaining in the next day or so because our snow is melting here in New York and we don't have grass and regard still

and it becomes a mud pit and we have dogs so I will probably be spending hours cleaning off my dogs every time I take that out so I'll probably complaining then but right now I am pretty happy pretty gung-ho getting

things done accomplishing thing so thanks for asking thanks for joining me today to get you on the podcast you know it's really good to have you tell us a little bit about yourself,

what you do and we'll go from there.

Tim Fiola: [4:17] Yeah will do thank you I so I'm Tim Fiola I'm I'm very passionate about Network automation I started out as a network engineer by training and then about,

about 10 years ago I started to see the real value of automating network operations and the power that coding and scripting can bring to the individual engineer.

In my view it makes the starch to make the network engineer more strategic so I really saw that an action a few years ago I was in the unique position to do so so since then I've reinvented myself as a network automator,

you know along the way I've written a couple books for Juniper Networks.

Um and also start an open source project so you know I want to let everyone know I am very passionate about Network automation because I do believe that for the network engineer it makes you a strategic asset.

And also gives your employer a lot more value from you and that can have some great benefits and we'll talk about those.

Zig Zsiga: [5:24] No that's great that's great hey can you highlight some of those two books that you have I like they could be beneficial for everyone to hear the names of the books and it just over nose before he does I'll have links in the show notes for those books so you can go grab them and consume them you know the great content right there.

Tim Fiola: [5:38] Yeah sure the first book I wrote was when I was becoming an expert in Juno's automation back in 2009 or so it's called a day one it's Juniper day one book,

called navigating the junos XML hierarchy and it talks about how to parse.

And qualify an XML path to get the right information that you're looking for from the Juniper,

data the next book I wrote with a buddy of mine Jamie Panna goes is called this week deploying mpls and that is a technical Deep dive into.

You know assuming you have an igp Network already.

Now you want to add mpls how do you do that why would you do that what knobs were to turn on what knobs would you not want to turn on.

So we talk about Network architecture how to provision mpls services and mpls in that book,

it's a bit of a deep dive into the subject.

Zig Zsiga: [6:41] No that's great that's great I mean mpls is kind of a key technology these days it has been for the last few years anyway right and if you don't know what mpls is you kind of need to know you may not need to know how to implement it per se but I think from our conversation I think you know the implications of mpls what are the benefits

and then,

Michelle talked about automation like how can you automate mpls right how can automate it for your customers because again that's a great use case I think for automation if you think of mpls and having hundreds or thousands of customers,

you can't do the work manually like that just doesn't scale right I mean I would spend all day just modifying one customers we are apps so you really have to,

automation got to embrace it so I think that's a perfect use case there for you know your passion on automation.

Tim Fiola: [7:23] Yeah absolutely trying to incorporate a full RSVP Mash when you're adding one router into a mesh of already 200 routers that becomes non trivial,

so yeah that's that is a great use case for just the scripting and abstraction exercise that you can do.

Zig Zsiga: [7:41] Hey that's yeah man that's that's great all right so thanks for giving us a little bit about who you are some of the key things I think you you have the J&C I ESP.

Tim Fiola: [7:50] Yeah the that Jancy I ESP number 419 was very proud to do it very happy I did it I didn't I ended up not renewed it at one point,

one of the reasons is for what we're about to discuss there were some other ones but what we're about to discuss is one of the reasons why I didn't take the time to renew it.

Zig Zsiga: [8:09] Understood understood yeah I got to renew my CC IES and the CCE so I mean I'm in that boat right now I got like a year or probably less than a year I got to renew everything and I'm like oh man you have a website you have a Blog.

Tim Fiola: [8:20] Yeah I have a personal website it's a lock s-foils.com,

that's lock - s - foils.com and that the site itself is split into two sections one is a technical articles,

and then the other section is just my worldly observations that are not necessarily tech-related yeah and one of those articles I wrote that's on the the website,

discusses you know automation versus certification and as a network engineer what is going to let you give you the most value,

so you and turn can deliver the most value for your employer and hopefully translate that value into a higher paycheck.

Zig Zsiga: [9:02] Yeah no that's great so I think the tight that kind of teased us up to the actual topic that we're going to have a conversation about here today and just to set the stage of everyone right the so what should you do,

get a high-level cert or start learning to code that's that's kind of our just that's our topic and we're going to discuss that from two different points right the high-level side the high-level certs and I would correlate that as like,

again the Jane cie that we were talking about originally and then also the ccie ccds other high-level certs maybe even the cissp is what I put in that bucket,

and then let's start there would you put those all in the same bucket or would there be some other ones that you'd call out to.

Tim Fiola: [9:40] Yeah so you know I do want to draw a distinction here I think the this would be more focused on learning coding versus an engineering certification Zig I know you have some certifications that deal with the design aspect that are more.

That start to incorporate the business side of things and that is a bit different because the business side of it is is a bit different than engineering side so as an engineer.

I'd want to draw the line that engineering versus the business side of it so I'm not sure that the design engineering if that's business-related would would be.

Applicable here.

Zig Zsiga: [10:19] Yeah I think the design is is.

It's like what's the benefit of the business of that technology right and weighing the benefits in the pros and cons but it's not getting down to the ones and zeros or it's not I mean it's not

you're not going in the lab and doing it a tower like technical lab,

you're going and you're getting a scenario when you're discussing hey okay what technology is going to figure so we talked about mpls earlier right so

mpls all three vpns or npsl 2 vpns which one would fit and meet the customers needs that's kind of what the design one is so it sounds like the conversation the comparison here is more on the the expert like IE level

J & cie level and we're talking about being an engineer being an expert engineer getting those certifications or would you go get automation

learn how to code type of thing right.

Tim Fiola: [11:06] Yeah and we're you know what those are both worthwhile halves to go down what I want to draw the distinction here is which one's going to give you most value what's the best way to maximize your that training time.

Zig Zsiga: [11:21] Okay understand understood all right so let's let's kick that off right I think there's a lot that we could talk about there and I just got some things on top of my head and then we can go through kind of our bullets.

I would say the I think they both provide value at a high level and it probably depends on.

The business what the business is trying to accomplish it probably also depends on how you can.

Communicate that value so I think there's some other skill sets here that is you I think each of them have value but if you can't communicate things.

If you don't know how to communicate what the value is to that business what's the impact to the business then you're kind of at a loss no matter what decision you make.

And then the next thing would be how long does it take you to achieve either one right how long does it take you to learn to code so that you could actually provide value and how long does it take you to get one of these certifications these expert certification so that you can provide value and I put a lot out there so.

Tim Fiola: [12:21] Yeah absolutely addressing the last one first yeah I mean when I was taking the J & cie when I was studying for the J & cie it was I mean I can't even count the hours but hours of intense study over,

about 6 or 7 months.

And when I look at all those hours all the Saturdays I spent six or seven hours all the week nights I spent six you know hours plus that's a lot of time so.

Very well in the moment would have been better served to do something else well.

There's a lot there and a lot of it depends where you are in your career path I supposed to a point but some of it doesn't I think there's an absolute value add in an expert-level server versus learning how to code and,

on balance I'd say in this environment and where technology is heading.

It's going to be the ladder you're going to learning to code is going to provide a better value and you know I'd like to start you know I'd like to discuss why when a ready to get to that point because there's there's a lot this argument and you know it's a bit.

Controversial in some circles so you know I'm not trying to start fights I'm just trying to I would love to.

Change perspectives for the better.

Zig Zsiga: [13:40] No I understand I totally get it right I think there's there's a lie right and Rod that Y is going to drive what you do here and

I think this is the point we have to push back on the status quo right that's that's the gist right and so you say this a fight well I say I don't know,

I think you play video games like I do at least we have in the past so I've been on a date myself Mortal Kombat and where you go you know ready fight because that's really where we're at right now round two ready fight and that's that's what we're talking about here which one is the one you should focus on.

I would I would assume without knowing automation.

My background I have a computer science degree I know how to program from a computer science perspective but I do not know ansible as well as I know programming in general and I don't know python

so I'm just throwing that out there giving you a lay of the land for me I would throw up this assumption that is probably going to take you less time to be able to,

learn to code to the level where you can provide value then it would be per se to study for an exam and pass that exam,

that'd be my assumption based on my experience and knowing computer science what are your thoughts there.

Tim Fiola: [14:51] But yeah no absolutely and that's one of the reasons why I wrote the initial blog article on my website because I realized with the with a smaller initial investment,

you can start to add a tremendous amount of value tremendous amount of value as a network engineer and and in doing so you can make yourselves

you can start to make yourself strategic within the company and the end goal here is to make a network engineer a strategic asset let's get the network engineer out of just doing code upgrades and RSVP meshes where.

You know trying to get one router into an existing mesh of 200 routers let's get them out of spending a day doing that let's make it last five minutes and get the engineer engineering.

To make that person should teach you.

Zig Zsiga: [15:41] I love it I love it right that's the goal make the person strategic I always like to say.

Let's get them away from doing the o&m type tasks the operations and maintenance tasks and let's get them to actually work on the business efforts the lines of business efforts that,

historically Network Engineers don't work on or or better yet we're the ones that are blamed when the applications teams can't roll out that new application.

My opinion right that's just my opinion but that that's experienced talking though I've been blamed when I say hey you know we don't have the network resources to roll out this new application we have to go procure it's gonna take three months right so so that he can't say no to the business.

Tim Fiola: [16:24] Yeah the business is the business they're cutting you a check so yeah you are beholding to them very much.

Zig Zsiga: [16:29] So what's this innovators dilemma and innovators solution.

Tim Fiola: [16:34] Yeah they are to put it short there

two bucks that rocks my world they were written I want to say in their 2001 or 2002 or time frame I ended up reading them a couple of years ago

wasn't sure if they were recommended to me wasn't sure if I should read them because I saw that they were a bit older but wow those books rocked my world and gave me a completely different perspective on the nature of innovation.

And what is what is real disruption in the marketplace what causes it and what are the attributes of it disruptive technology,

just these two books together cover all of that and more and you know as I was reading it,

being a being an avid automator and person likes to talk about automation,

I drew some parallels between what I was reading and what I was seeing in industry and that gave me some ideas on how to you know as a network engineer.

[17:36] How you know am I am I as an American engineer being disrupted right now by Automation and I think it's yes and you know in the book.

Clayton Christensen who is the author makes a few points that I'd like to talk about real quick here first of all he talks about commoditization and are you a commodity.

So commoditization happens when a market becomes over served by a lot of different products that all do basically the same things so as a customer if you have a bunch of options.

Amongst products and they all do about what you need to do.

That that thing is a commodity additionally.

Any different you know when you have the series of products there might be some different differentiating factors between the two or the multiple products but.

Customers don't necessarily need those differentiators they don't need those features so if there's a lot of products that do the basically the same thing that the customers need and the differentiators are what customers don't necessarily need.

One the customers not going to pay for what they don't need so the value is going to be diminished and to that thing is now a commodity there's many choices of.

Many different things that do the same thing so go ahead.

Zig Zsiga: [19:03] Yeah so I think that's a great I think that's a great couple bullets right there and I like to use an example to kind of,

tee that up a little bit right and I'm always vendor agnostic so I try to be kind of Gnostic as much as possible so I'm talking about a solution like it's think of SD win right I think St when there's so many vendors out there so many different solutions and sure there's there's.

Proprietary,

capabilities and features and some of them have but under the hood there's a common business drivers for SD Lan and I would ask you is SD win,

commoditized has that been a commodity.

Tim Fiola: [19:38] You know I can't I don't know enough about s DUI to be honest to tell you if it's commodity or not but you might know better if there's a lot of different options.

Differentiators are not yet in the differentiators and I know everyone in there you know everyone in their family had now has an SD when offering I've seen that I see it all the time so I think you could make the case that it is a commodity.

Because there's so many options they all do basically the same thing unless there's some killer differentiator between the options it's probably commodity.

Zig Zsiga: [20:12] Yeah that that's where I was at so there's an example right and I would I would based on the definitions that you mentioned already I would say that today sdn is a commodity,

there are some differentiators out there I won't list them because there's their vendor specific right but if you don't

if you don't have a reason a business need to have any of those differentiators that it's just a commodity right now of course there's going to be some customers have a need for those differentiators and by all means you go you know you go down that vendor specific path

but again at a top level it's a commodity and I think that's a good example to kind of push that point home.

Tim Fiola: [20:48] Yep and what we'll talk about later on and discuss is as a network engineer are you a commodity if the answer is yes and I'm going to argue that it is,

that is bad news so let's figure out how to not make you commodity.

So but before we get to that zsiga I'd like to talk about just real quick set the table with a couple more Concepts covered by Christensen in his books in the book he talks about technology stacks and

modular vs. Integrated Solutions so

and you know let's let's look at a couple examples here I'd say the iPhone would be example of a integrated solution Apple owns that whole stack they own the,

just to put it simply the OS and the hardware they completely control your experience they on the App Store they own the music app they control your experience as Apple.

They control all of it now if you look at Android as the other end of that you have,

the OS and then you have the different Hardware platforms that is an example of modular solution okay so if you look at that in order for a real solution to be viable.

The the technology and the interface between the two modules needs to be well understood the interface needs to be well understood and the technology needs to be stable.

[22:13] You know if the technology is not is not well understood in the interface between the modules is not stable.

A modular solution becomes a bad idea because it results in a bad customer experience and you know if you know I would argue early on when Apple first made the smartphone they made it a completely.

Integrated experience and I think that's why they.

[22:38] Became so dominant in the smartphone market Android it took a while to catch up why did it take a while.

Well well because the interface between the modules the OS and the hardware for example that was not a,

mature stable interface that was kind of a mess for a while there

so as an Android User you didn't have as good of experience now if you look at it today

I'd argue that Android is a much better experience because the technology is more stable the interfaces are well understood so in that respect the mud the modular solution is caught up to the integrated solution to a large extent.

So that's the difference.

Between a martian the modular solution tends to drive down the costs because you can have one company that does one of the modules really well partner with other companies that does other modules really well whereas integrated solution still,

a bit more expensive controlled by a single entity but the integrated solution can be very lucrative.

If the modulus solution isn't working.

Zig Zsiga: [23:49] Isn't functional right like I get it a hundred percent if it's not functional then why would it be used right.

Tim Fiola: [23:56] Exactly exactly the modular experience can be awful if it's not if the technology is not stable so so what I'd argue that's really why Apple started to dominate the smartphones early on.

Zig Zsiga: [24:11] Well so I mean I would take a next leap on this concept

and so everyone knows I'm new to this write these definitions and what we're talking about here with Tim I'm new to these kind of Concepts and I'm just trying to

equate them to a good use case so I think iPhone makes sense I think what you said there with the modularity for Android make sense I would go a step further with apple I mean apples made.

Everything they do a kind of what's the wording I got to figure out the word in here integrated solution I mean yeah like it's.

Not just the iPhone but I mean iPhone was the beginning or iPads I think not iPads iPods I think iPods for the beginning right that was the first thing.

And then it went to I think it was iPhone I don't remember if it was iPhones or iPads but like look at it you got everything now is integrated I mean look at your Apple IDs,

grapple IDs on everything fully integrated sinks everything the ease of use is huge yeah you're paying a premium per se to have an Apple product right but then once you have that product I mean.

I have an iPad on my desk I have a Mac I have an iPhone and all of them are sinking information constantly like it's awesome from a usability perspective.

Tim Fiola: [25:28] And the end exactly what you just touched on that user experience if it's a great user experience people and businesses will pay more for that and so a integrated solution.

Can be very lucrative especially when the option is a modular Solution that's clunky.

So this is going to be a key Point as we as we move on our conversation as to why this modular versus integrated models.

Why you as a network engineer might want to make yourself an integrated solution and we'll talk about what that means in a bit here.

Zig Zsiga: [26:07] So I like this I'm liking this a lot right so we're talking about these things we're talking about modular and integrating we have some examples aren't,

and networking examples per se right and now we're going to take that terminology

I'm assuming so tell me if I'm wrong Tim where to take that terminology those definitions that we just kind of went over we're going to apply them to the certificate options or certification certification yeah certifications

I can't say words right I swear and then also to engineer's to us right do Network engineers and I would go a step further and apply this concept and ask questions about the network Engineers the network designers and the network Architects out there and see,

which ones are modular which ones are integrated for all those roles and all the certifications and then also,

which ones are commodity and which ones aren't I think this is huge.

Tim Fiola: [26:54] Yeah no I like say this these two books I'd highly suggest them they rocked my world they changed how I look at business and Innovation and disruption and they also gave me some insight as to how to leverage it.

As a network engineer.

Zig Zsiga: [27:11] See I like this all right so let's let's move into search then if that's the next step I think that is right.

Tim Fiola: [27:16] Yeah certs.

Yeah I'm not going to I would not never sit here and argue that you know a high-level cert is not a good thing to do it's definitely a value-add it's definitely a way to.

Throw a marker down saying this is what I know and here's someone you trust and Equipment vendor that says Yep this person knows how to do this very well certs are awesome.

But again we're talking about how to get the most value out of though that those training resources you'd spend and my argument here is that that time it takes that you did invest in assert.

And the end for for that matter the money is better spent.

Learning learning coding learning Automation and how to unlock value in that in that area.

Zig Zsiga: [28:10] So let me let me peel that back for a minute I'm sorry for cut you off let me pull it back right so um.

I would agree honestly and I'm not saying that I'm angry because I don't want to fight or anything like that but I agree like like I think that there's a lot of benefit and.

[28:26] Short-term initial short-term value like with Automation and what not even to the point where like,

so I have a team of Engineers are actually Architects and one of them is is working towards his ccia

and I actually said hey we gotta pause we gotta put this on pause like this is a long long long Marathon to get your ccie so I think you need to refocus on the dev net certifications

and learn about Automation and programmability and API is right like there's more value.

Maybe not more value maybe that's the wrong word right it's not more value we're not comparing apples and Apples to Apples we're comparing oranges to oranges or apples to oranges here if a fruit analogy it's not more value.

It's also it's more important that it's,

quicker return on your investment it's quicker value and then you made a comment about money,

and time and I would just call that resources right what are what is the resource cost right time money,

Family Impact right there's a whole bunch that goes into going after a certification versus learning something new there's there's a resource cost to doing that.

Tim Fiola: [29:44] Absolutely absolutely let's maximize that.

Zig Zsiga: [29:48] And I get that a hundred percent get that so I'm on board with that a hundred percent I said a hundred percent free times now so I'll stop saying that oh but I think it makes sense certs are good.

But there's a but right I mean not just Deb that search there's I know Juniper has their own search to right but it's not just the certs it's a learning.

How to leverage coating automation programmability Concepts into a network Engineers function that role.

Tim Fiola: [30:16] Yeah absolutely.

So we've talked about value of few times here so what kind of value are you adding as an engineer versus in automator let's talk about that as a network engineer.

You are you're adding value to the company,

you know kind of at the networking level some architecture may be but you're adding efficiency into the network that's hopefully what you're doing well designed easy to use Network that.

[30:50] That fits in with the business model of your employer awesome as an as an automator.

Your you're impacting a few different ways

you're even just as a script or doing a simple script let's say you're you know provisioning vlans in a data center or doing a bgp mesh in a data center or RSVP LSP mesh we talked about earlier you're doing that

you make a script to do it,

you've now encapsulated that work in that script or ansible Playbook let's say so now I've done this once I've invested the time to do it once now I can do it a hundred times,

in almost no time at all so what have you what have you done there well you've made your growth scalable now you can,

you can do that operation many many times the same way each time reducing human error along the way so you're reducing op ex if you're getting this

if you're impacting turning service up quicker you're reducing your quote to cash interval which involves cash flow,

since you're making the work more consistent your you're making it easier for the company to stay within their SLA.

All those things we talked about typically corresponds more closely to higher-level strategic objectives for the company.

[32:17] And the closer you are to those strategic objectives the more value you are going to add.

So increase in efficiency in the network is awesome but reducing not backs increasing cash flow these are higher value adds and this is one of the reasons why I do believe that the coding and automating.

Is is hands-down a better place to spend your time for a shorter amount of.

For less resources you can have a huge impact higher in the value chain.

Zig Zsiga: [32:51] Yeah I think the return on investment is huge right like I mean I see some some friends that have gone through the automation.

Learning curve I don't I think it's a learning curve depending on it your background right so it may be that takes them for,

I don't know let's just throw that out there and forgot the time frame random time frame that has no basis or factual information let's say it takes you four weeks to be able to

learn Automation in some fashion I don't not specifying a specific coding structure or a tool but you learn it so that you can actually

solve business problems with it some sort of business problem and maybe that takes you four weeks maybe takes you two weeks right but once you do that.

Now you know how to solve that problem every time that problem comes up moving forward so like an example that I would give is.

When we have to change or add a VLAN to a trunk.

I don't know maybe maybe create a new VLAN on Thousand switches right something like that we're not going to run in vtp right and this is getting technical right on The Cisco side you're not gonna run of EDP you're going to manually configure your vlans on every switch.

[33:58] That takes time I have to log in every switch I have to go take my template because I'm not going to type it manually I want to copy a template right and paste it I got a valid verify actually created the VLAN

I got a verify spanning tree came up right I got to make sure it's on the link and I'm going technical here that show the example right it's going to take me.

Five minutes if I'm good fast it's going to take me five minutes per device.

So if I have a thousand devices that's 5,000 minutes I don't know what that math is if I divide that by 60 that's a that's a long time to do that now if I have a.

Workflow let's say it's ansible workflow I don't even know how to run ansible let's say it's ants about workflow,

and it already has this predefined in it and I give it a list of devices or some I feed it some sort of you know.

Device list to say hey go create this VLAN on all these devices and I hate go I don't do anything else.

Like I don't I don't do anything else and let me let me let me share I'm accurate here it validates the changes right it does the change of validates the change it reports back the change it has abilities to.

Fail back if needed and it's asynchronous meaning I think that's the right word meaning that you can go to all thousand devices at the same time.

If they can support.

Tim Fiola: [35:15] Yeah.

Yeah ansible is a I can tell you what ansible is a great platform for all those reasons you just talked about it's you know it's a platform so it even abstracts away the need to know coding.

You're just dealing with ya mobile data you know and how to structure that and and whatnot it's ansible is a great platform for all those reasons you just mentioned.

Zig Zsiga: [35:42] So I just I think that's a huge use case though I mean like like.

Thousand devices is going to take me days to change something on right and a thousand devices a good ballpark I mean you may not have a thousand devices a hundred devices even I don't know if you can go to a hundred devices in a day in eight hour day but if you have

any type of tool automation tool I use danceable as an example but it doesn't have to be ansible any automation tool.

Well now it takes you an hour maybe or 20 minutes to go to those thousand devices because that tool is doing it right yes you have to configure the workflow the books are whatever their call right you have to pre configure how you're doing it in the tool,

but then once it's you pulled out a repo or whatever and you do it I mean that's going to get done your change is going to get done now in 20 minutes I mean it's huge.

Tim Fiola: [36:30] Yeah and absolutely and the learning curve with ansible or with anything with python it can be steep to do something like you just described in that that workflow but once you've done it,

it's done you've encapsulated that work you've added a tremendous amount of value to your company now now if you,

if you are marketing yourself correctly you can go to your supervisor and and say look look what I've done I've encapsulated this work in this,

and this Playbook sequence this is what we can do now this is how fast we can do it and.

[37:06] It won't it won't have human error involved so.

Great even if I leave you'll still have this here as your infrastructure to work with boy that's a great.

That is a great way to show your increased value to your to your employer and you know that should by All rights something that impactful should translate to a higher salary.

If you know I will say there's also a I'd say we're kind of in the middle of the destruction right now so some management might not see that value they might.

They might they just might not see it for whatever reason but I think as this becomes more standardized or expected.

As those managers you know go from Engineers to managers.

I think it's going to be a much bigger deal much easier to make that case and yeah there's this should result in higher value and higher.

Higher pay.

Zig Zsiga: [38:11] Yeah I mean I think the writing's on the wall man like I'm being transparent as always like even the expert certifications that we're comparing two now they all have some form of automation on them like it's

they all have and maybe I'm bucking them all together but maybe I'm incorrectly buckling putting him in the same bucket but I know the Cisco certifications have,

automation embedded on them,

right it may not be to the scale that you can do mass amount of changes to automation but the implications

of automation are

being fed into these exams now too so like for example I'll just do the design exam right because we did highlighted real quick and we were thinking that it's it may not apply here but the recent update to the ççde version 3 the came out in December of,

20

The update includes definite or not just Dev net but automation includes ansible it includes apis and includes knowing Json and what a restful services like in all those things right but it doesn't include it from a point of.

[39:19] Going into the command line and writing it includes it too.

What's the benefit and how what problems does it solve and how can you design Solutions

with those as tools because those are all tools right those are all solutions and they solve business problems and that's that's where I see everything going I see a lot of what we do here.

Kind of merging right kind of kind of merging together and I think that's what we're going to get to in a minute when we talk about the engineering roles.

And the integrated solution.

Tim Fiola: [39:50] And that's that's a good point you just brought up.

You know the roles and whatnot so in the future you know couple years from now five years from now 10 years from now it's going to be not just.

Who you know who is doing it but the type of skill set they have if you're running a network right now you're a network engineer.

Most likely and that might be it in the future it's going to be.

You're a network engineer and an automator to some extent now I do still believe you know the top 1% you know the best the best like in you know.

If you look at show business or whatever you know a lot of people are you know they're starving artist and whatnot but the top 1% still make a very good wage I still think that will be the case for the pure network engineer.

But for the rest of us.

We're going to need to increase en route excuse me increase our value because the higher level strategic Engineers they're going to be doing the real engineering if you don't.

Learn and increase your skill set you're going to be.

Doing upgrades all day or adding vlans in a data center all day and you're a network engineer you're better than this you can be strategic.

[41:19] This is one way to this is one way to unlock that if you're not in the top 1% or 10% arbitrary percent that can still command a very good wage.

You're going to have to find a way to add more value automation is going to be that way.

Zig Zsiga: [41:35] Yeah I mean I think what we do today is Network Engineers is going to change a little bit right like the writing's on the wall like we're not going to be sitting there changing vlans on ports,

any more like that's not going to be our role and that's a simplistic example right but again the the writing's on the wall,

you might do that in an initial roll,

because that's something you might have to do but you know there's controllers out there that are doing it there's already ants automation tools out there that are doing it so you know,

I personally am scared of the day 10 years from now when I'm talking to a junior engineer and they don't even know how to change a VLAN with the,

like like because that's that's I think where we're going long term,

and they're going to know what a VLAN is they're going to know what subnets is are going to know what routing is but they've never changed an actual demon on interface before because all they do is they click a button in the GUI or they run a Playbook and whatever tool that they have and that does it for them.

You know that's that's that's the reality.

Tim Fiola: [42:37] Yep and they're spending the rest of their time being strategic.

Zig Zsiga: [42:39] Exactly and strategic is such a such an important concept like,

what's the definition of it I don't know but the whole point behind it is that wherever organization you're in you are making sure that organizations going to be successful,

that is that's in I always say this and I think I see it on a lot of podcasts I do but if I go back 10 years ago or 15 years ago if I was asked,

what's more important the business or the technology I would have said that Network switches the routers the routing protocols that's all I cared about

that's honestly what I cared about and now I'm like yeah I was wrong like

that stuff doesn't matter I mean it's the business like what is the business trying to accomplish and how can you help them accomplish that right how can you show that you can help them accomplish that and then show them that impact.

And and show them why if they don't do it it's going to hurt them long term.

Tim Fiola: [43:34] Absolutely so you know what I think.

It makes sense now is to look at the network Engineers let's take the state of the network engineer today and why.

We've talked about up to this point really affects and let's let's I really want to drive this home now my you know my first statement here will be.

As a network engineer you are now a commodity,

why do I say that well you know if you look at the ccie I don't even know what the ccie numbers up to for let's say rather than switching is it's over a hundred thousand I imagine I don't know you know it's.

Zig Zsiga: [44:14] The last one I saw a 60.

Tim Fiola: [44:15] It's it's up there.

Okay 60 706 Atmos 67,000 J and cies I'm sure I don't know I'm guessing there in the over 10,000 at this point I saw I don't know a couple years ago.

Wow ways if I turn it expert so it was like a 6,000 or something like that so there's,

minimum tens of thousands of expert-level certs out there right now.

[44:42] You know assuming a large portion of them are still practicing and then if you look at.

The people who are just as good who just don't happen to have the cert you know you could argue that there's hundreds of thousands of very well-qualified Network Engineers out there.

Awesome okay so as a network engineer you know,

do you have differentiators well a you know an ie cert is an expert level cert is a differentiator but but I argue that that certification over serves the market it's a feature employers won't pay.

They might pay a little more for it but they won't pay a lot more for it you know why do I what is you know why do I say that well in a certain exam you know you go in there you have,

let's say 8 hours to fix a network then improve a network you know at the CLI your engineering Network in a few hours.

Wow impressive.

Most companies don't care that it takes you know a few hours or a few days to to engineer a network what.

What a company wants is a consistent person who shows up every day and who can learn Concepts apply the concept smartly to help the business.

Doing that in a few hours is a premium feature most companies don't need you know.

[46:08] Having said that let me just do a funny dumb story that that sort of contradicts it but it's kind of funny so I had

actually just got my IE J & cie and I you know I was a consultant of the time and I was working at a customer side and we're in ela and I'm getting ready to fly home that night.

[46:30] It's like noon and we're wrapping up and the customer says and my flight was at like nine or ten that night to fly home and the customer says oh by the way before we go you need I need you to configure our lab I'm like okay you know what do you got he's like well we got you know

three high-end security devices that we need

virtual routers on and we need Verve sign these couple you know routers high-end Carrier class routers and we need logical systems here we need this one to look like 3 and these vlans and all this stuff and,

wow so I sat down there in the data center Put on my noise canceling headphones and literally engineered a network,

in a few hours and I was like wow this actually does happen in real life because that you know that is the only time I've ever had to like.

Engineer and network in a few hours and what I did could have been its own certification and something I'm sure but while that might happen every now and then

and it's kind of bizarre when it does because it's such an artificial constraint typically that's not going to be your experience as a network engineer

you're not going to have to engineer a network in a few hours.

Zig Zsiga: [47:42] So I would I would agree partially with that I would I don't think I think it depends on where you are

where you work and maybe bucket putting

people in buckets based on their verticals and where they work so I would think that's probably accurate for the most of the

commercial companies Enterprise companies most of the businesses out there they have a network Engineers on staff right they have time the engineer solutions they don't have to do it in a small subset of time

and it's not it's not going to be this massive traditionally complex item,

per se I do think that if you working at a partner at a vendor a value-added reseller that might be a little different.

[48:27] That means your job is to engineer Solutions right that's your job to design and engineer Solutions and you're doing them,

at least in my experience you're doing them very quickly right you're going from one customer environment to the next customer environment and in some cases you're having a meeting with one customer

and then right after they have another customer right you're literally going back and forth on the designs and Engineering so I can see there being a need

to have that quick skill sets knowing all the Technologies knowing you know what's going to work where but also being able to design on the Fly,

because of the business requirements,

I do see that in that space I don't I don't know if I see that in an Enterprise customer though I don't know if I see that and a commercial customer or even like a SAS provider I don't know I don't.

Tim Fiola: [49:16] I typically don't and and one thing I would ask you in that Sarah you just painted you know about the value the VAR engineer.

If that capability to do that to do that engineering on the fly in a few hours you know under the gun constantly if that's getting you paid extra if you're definitely commanding a premium for that capability.

Awesome you're in the right place great you're maximizing your skills your maximizing your value if you have to do that often and you're not being paid more than your peers for that.

That's kind of That's The commoditization Happening where you know you're.

Zig Zsiga: [49:58] Give it away for free right yeah it's an extra benefit and you're getting it you're giving it away for free.

Tim Fiola: [50:03] People want it but they won't pay more for it well that's that is the danger of becoming a commodity.

Zig Zsiga: [50:09] Yeah no I get that I think a lot of us probably fall in that bucket do a lot of us provide value that others don't.

And and we're not getting paid any different right and general so that's an interesting concept that's about us about the value that you provide and getting compensated for it to like it.

Tim Fiola: [50:26] Absolutely so you know you know back to how this the the state of the network engineer and the duties and responsibilities and whatnot there's another thing you know when we talked about modularity,

and versus.

Integrated Solutions and the interface and just kind of what's going on there one thing I think we can agree on right now is you know Network Automation in general.

Is not good enough,

the existing Solutions out there from from a lot of vendors tend to be proprietary or siloed to a certain technology like a data center away an edge whatever

sometimes their clunky to use and they can be complex,

so as a network engineer if you understand the concepts.

Of you know abstraction and Automation in the value they provide and where and how to apply them there's money to be made for you.

As an integrated solution in this not good enough area go ahead.

Zig Zsiga: [51:37] Yeah so I would agree with that I'm on the same boat same page I think there's money there to be an integrated solution.

I think automation is not going to be good enough right I think I agree with that too I think automation is just not going to be good enough you really do need to be.

Everything if I'm being like you really are going to have to be everything moving forward you're going to have to be what I would probably call a true enterprise-wide kind of architect or engineer.

Not from an application perspective I think that I think Enterprise architecture and something different from like an application lifecycle management side of things I mean Enterprise architecture or engineer from a networking perspective.

And truly understanding what you're doing,

network engineering side but then also understanding Automation and how everything fits together right and all the different layers and if we start getting into like things like security

with zero trust I don't know if you're familiar with zero trust architecture or anything those Concepts,

but I mean that's a full layer that's a not a full layer that is all the layers and one architecture and that's where I think things are going long-term so automations critical it's part of that process a hundred percent.

Tim Fiola: [52:50] And you know I'd like to also just touch on your I think it's the ççde where you're incorporating business,

so factors into the design and whatnot you know I would argue that's it that's a huge value add as well for the same reason automation is your your interfacing between two worlds two.

Two modules and that interface can be valuable you know an engineer who can communicate business needs.

You know into the network and also communicate Network realities upward.

Huge it's a huge value add so that's why I you know the ççde I don't think applies to this situation.

I think the ççde and other search like it are valuable for the exact same reason you're becoming this module this very valuable modular so excuse me this is a very valuable integrated solution.

Zig Zsiga: [53:47] So I would I would actually decouple the exams the certifications for a minute from the the skill set of communicating.

Because I think I think knowing what to say and who to say it to.

Is extremely important if you're an engineer and knowing that you know you don't want to talk to your CIO or your CTO or even your CEO.

About ones and zeros if I can use that analogy right they're not going to know the bits and bytes they're not going to know eigrp vs. ospf or says bgp they don't care like that's that's not their language right so if you are a network engineer,

and you can speak with Opex and capex and return on investment and total cost of ownership you know the business languages.

And I'll throw in how automation works with that for helps them right like we're talking about Automation and a lot of what I'm talking about is also on the CCD or network design as a whole but.

How automation helps the business and if you can relay that.

[54:52] You're going to build that that relationship with the leadership in your organization you're going to maintain that trust or build that trust and they're going to be looking for you left and right because then you can take what they care about,

their business priorities,

business outcomes whatever they're trying to accomplish and you can relay that now to a technical side of things within the technical side of that organization I mean this is a huge huge it's all about communication and building trust though.

Tim Fiola: [55:19] Yeah absolutely and by the way if people haven't caught on communication skills matter for an engineer.

They can be a huge huge value add even just communicating your own you know value upward is huge for you as a person and they can add a lot of value for your employer as well.

Zig Zsiga: [55:38] It's like marketing man it's all marketing like it's all marketing self marketing and communicating up and down we can't we can't be that that.

Cliched network engineer locked in an IDF

typing away at a computer that's not going to work right it can't be in that IDF with the lights off and we're at the computer with tons of Mountain Dew energy drinks and we're like I will fix all the problems right now

can't do that anymore right.

Tim Fiola: [56:04] I'm not sure the top one percent and your you can add extreme value that way there are people who can do that I've met him but for the 99% of us who aren't you need to find a different way to increase your value increase your salary.

Zig Zsiga: [56:19] For those one that one percent like I call them like the parachute engineer like they're the ones that get called in fly-in and parachute down to the organization and you know they're so good that they get locked in with all the resources

they need and you know hours later they fix all the issues and then they they take a Rappel lineup or a rope line,

with the helicopter there and it's like a SWAT team for the troubleshooting issues.

Tim Fiola: [56:42] Yeah yeah the definitely there's a special forces of you know of network engineering and more credit to him I am not one of those people that's why automate you know I you gotta find a way you gotta find a way.

Zig Zsiga: [56:53] So I wish I could automate everything then that's where I'm at I want to automate everything like seriously like it was just do it let's just get it over with let's build the processes and the procedures let's get the governance working the culture let's get the culture to shift unless just automate everything.

Tim Fiola: [57:09] Yep and and you know you touched on a real

important part of it we probably won't get to this today but there is a cultural component to this as well as to whether your employer will see the value in you as an engineer trying to abstract automate make things repeatable.

You know a lot of that is a cultural.

It has a cultural impact on the organization amongst the management and your peers for that matter who are you know may just be thinking I know I work the CLI I'm a CLI guy or CLI Cal and I can rock this at the CLI,

back up well good.

There's there's there's a larger picture there's a larger you know progression and place that you will not be able to fight.

You will not be able to fight it.

Zig Zsiga: [58:01] Yeah.

So I think we're almost at the end here I want to kind of ask is there anything else you want to kind of touch on I think we touched on everything but I want to make sure I open it up I think we kind of did a roundabout path right there are bullet points but feel free if there's something else that we did we did Miss,

let's let's hit it.

Tim Fiola: [58:19] Yeah so there was you know this dice real recently came out with their

their tech salary report for technologists and whatnot and you know I was parsing through that and a couple things I want to call out here just the average python salary.

Came out to they report that as about a hundred twelve thousand.

Zig Zsiga: [58:39] Wow wow.

Tim Fiola: [58:40] The average network engineering salary about 91,000.

So there's about a $21,000 differential just in the average taken just the average so what I would tell you as a network engineer if you're listening is.

Go in leading with python lead with python to get.

Just of closer to the python salary then you know it makes sense to do that I'm a python you know or you know python or ansible I think could even work in this.

Lead with ansible python to make yourself more in that segment where you're going to be considered for that $112,000 salary,

and by the way I know network engineering and here's how well I know it I have 10 years and network engineering I've done this stuff I've made these impacts I can talk smartly about these Technologies by the way I can automate a lot of that.

Much different impact than I'm a network engineer and here's what I know $21,000 differential right there so by the way.

Zig Zsiga: [59:49] Point that's a great point right I would say that's how you come across how you mark it right and and how you Market yourself,

is huge like if you come in and be like I'm that network engineer that token I would say token or cliche now we're going to near lock me in a cubicle and you won't see me ever but if you come in like you said.

Tim Fiola: [1:00:07] CLI like crazy yeah.

Zig Zsiga: [1:00:08] Yeah yeah

you come in with hey I'm an automation expert like that's what I do I automate things you know I'm a network automation x / or I am a automation Advocate or whatever right whatever role name it is today,

and like they look at you like oh you know python you know ansible you know

you know get you know all these things that all these tools like oh and I know network engineering I'm a ccie or ccnp or whatever right like it just all comes together man like,

I equate this two years ago when I'll go back to my military time and I was in the Marine Corps it in the Marine Corps,

everyone knows everything they're not there isn't anything that you shouldn't know from an IT perspective now I'm going to be really vague real quick it's.

It's not very technical it's not like you're a ccie like had to be very clear you're not an expert right but there's a baseline of technology that all data Marines will call the mighty data Marines it,

as data Murray all I do all day Tim Raines are supposed to know by Baseline of Technology think of it like the CCNA level of everything but not just

Cisco are networking its server its security it's VoIP it's like everything it's programming its web device or web development

it's so there's a baseline that every single Marine data brain has to know.

[1:01:25] That's more of an integrated system or solution in my opinion than a modular approach because the whole point behind that is,

any leader in the Marine Corps can pick a day to bring I know that data Marine knows what they need to know like there's there's no like there's no difference I guess it's a commodity solution to all data Marines are the same I don't know I'm trying to figure it out here all iPhones are the same right.

That's interesting it's interesting sorry that was my own soap box I'll stop I think this is really beneficial though so thank you.

Tim Fiola: [1:01:54] Yeah I very much hope so and you know and just having interviewed a lot you know I

I will often just interview if someone expresses interest in me even if I'm not interested in leaving a roll just to find out what's important in the marketplace what are you looking for what are the problems are trying to solve.

And having interviewed quite a lot I can say that the salary I'd feel comfortable comfortable asking for in any given role.

It's the salary differential is real.

To me and it's real I'd feel comfortable with it because I've seen the value automation provides and call it Python and ansible are a lot of the common ones so

yeah this and the dice report just drove it home to me market yourself as.

Python as an automator as something and I also network no network engineering really well here's how awesome I am at that.

But by the way I can make all of it repeatable if I leave you'll still have an infrastructure of my code I've built up.

Have fun with that it's going to be awesome for you.

Zig Zsiga: [1:02:58] So I think I think the the key that I would the key one of the key things I would say to is that it doesn't mean you're going to become like a full-time programmer like,

like that's not I know there's a myth right like does that mean I have to stop being a network engineer and I'm going to go become a programmer and write programs all day no that's not the case here that's a myth that we can debunk and say no that's not what's going to happen here you're going to learn tools,

that you can add to your network engineering job like that's that's the point right you're going to add these.

Technologies these understood the understanding the tools and to make your job easier right that's really what for you as a network engineer it's going to make your job so much easier.

Tim Fiola: [1:03:37] Yeah now there is a path for what you just said it doesn't have to be your path but if you decide I want to automate,

I'm going to try and become a full-time automator because I know network engineering because I know it and I know I can add value that way that is a that is legitimate career path at this point in time it's it's one.

Employers are looking for so if you don't want to be on the CLI anymore if you want to just deal with you know automation stuff that's a valid path,

for sure and by the way you know if you're automating these tasks these code upgrades and mass configuration exercises

you are.

You are freeing yourself then to work on higher level engineering task later on and again those higher-level engineering tasks make you.

It's not only are you adding value as an automator you can add more value as a network engineer because now you're not doing code upgrades all day and night,

24/7.

Zig Zsiga: [1:04:38] Yeah some people might think you're lazy right like like that's but I equate to it I always told people I was lazy and how much automating things even back when like vbscript was a thing BBC,

and before before they had other scripting languages like I was using VB script to automate all my switch updates and now I have to update the password I have to update the SNMP string or whatever I'll just run my vbscript to go

you know update everything

so it's just interesting that like this is where we're back we're back to automating everything but now we have actual tools to do it better that might vbscript send keys and keys and I've been using that as an example for a while because that

that sucked I'm just telling you like vbscript sendkeys I mean if you lost your focus on that that screen that you're on it would ruin your entire

if there was a bad bad bad way of doing things,

but that's what I knew that's what I knew at the time and it was not a secret as it was synchronous so it still took forever to accomplish a hundred device changes right like it just took.

Forever but I'm a Ramblin again so hey man,

you know we'd already talked about the certifications but is there anything else you want to mention about the dev net and Juniper devops certs.

Tim Fiola: [1:05:48] Yeah you know those are those are fairly new in the realm here and I'd say you know I'd recommend,

that is a great place to start your automation Journey it's going to be a curated material and you're going to have the vendor backing on that,

awesome start there whether it's you know whatever pick your pick your vendor you want to start with whatever is important to you.

What I would caution though on on those vendors certs is don't get I'll just say that's.

I'd be careful spending your own resources.

Once you start to feel you're becoming tied to a specific automation platform for a vendor like the base stuff,

the the associate ones or the specialist one's awesome your learning Core Concepts that you can use anywhere if your employer wants to pay for you to get a higher level.

You know kind of an automation cert that's more specific to a vendor awesome I would just be careful using your own resources to do that kind of thing.

But you know a lot of the vendors have come a long way with automation certs.

Since I wrote my initial article so I only know I want to throw it in there I'm not anti vendor sir.

For sure I think they're I think they have a lot of value but just be careful with the audit mation search you don't become change to a specific platform.

Zig Zsiga: [1:07:11] Yeah I know you're going to vendor lock-in right platform lock

can I totally get it right and don't spend your own resources to unless there's a reason you want to write like a must that your desire is to be that vendor only automation specialist which those roles for that for sure right,

um but again you got to look at your own and goal I always look at that what's their what you're looking to achieve what your intent and then backtrack from there.

Tim Fiola: [1:07:38] Yeah for sure well I definitely appreciate you you having me here today a zig it's been it's been awesome I definitely appreciate this.

Zig Zsiga: [1:07:46] Hey I've been having so much fun Tim so I appreciate it buddy so a couple questions any last-minute thoughts words of wisdom anything for the listeners before we close it for the episode.

Tim Fiola: [1:08:00] Just being a network engineer isn't enough anymore you have to find.

Value-add automation can be that value-add business can be that value add,

anywhere where you're bridging Two Worlds and you can become a integrated solution to interface between those worlds you're going to find Value there and hopefully a higher salary.

Automation is one way to accomplish that.

Zig Zsiga: [1:08:24] Awesome awesome and then the last question where could everyone find you on the interwebs if they want to keep this conversation going look for you where can they find you.

Tim Fiola: [1:08:33] Yeah lock s-foils.com that's lock - s - foils.com Star Wars reference there that's my personal website it's a Clearinghouse for,

technical articles I've written that are on the site itself and they also have links to other articles blog posts I've done on

packet pushers and apnic and whatnot so that is a place where you can find all my Technical and excuse me world worldly observations,

that I've made over time I'm on LinkedIn Timothy Fiola I also have a repository on GitHub.

Tim - Viola is my username there so feel free to to take a look at my open source projects if you're interested in that.

Yeah I think that's it.

Zig Zsiga: [1:09:21] Yeah yeah so we'll have all those links in the show notes so it's easy to follow Tim and ask them questions and whatnot.

Maybe we'll get you the Discord server to Tim that way if anyone has any questions that can Pump It Up sorry they can jump into the Discord server and ask them that way if you're a Discord fan or not I don't know.

Tim Fiola: [1:09:38] I've done this court I can I can definitely do that for sure.

Zig Zsiga: [1:09:41] Awesome yeah I think that'd be beneficial so people have a place to get a hold of you but will have all those show all those links in the show notes and real quick totally off topic I'm thinking your Star Wars fan

right so are you also a Lego fan is that what I'm seeing potentially behind.

Tim Fiola: [1:09:56] Yes this Lego Star Destroyer the a-wing the y-wing the Lego Voltron bats

in its component Lego lie on lions they're all right there it's I also have a super star destroyer just docked in the side here you can't see very well but yeah no I

I've got a problem I've fallen off the wagon I'm button Legos again it's you might not talk to me again for a while.

Zig Zsiga: [1:10:23] Now this is so this is great right so I didn't know that you were Lego fan or not but I saw them in the background and I'm sorry everyone I know you can't see the video right but he's got a whole bunch of Lego Star Wars Lego sets behind him on his

I don't know what it's called it's like your shelf right

so so I'm a huge like Star Wars fan I have Legos behind me but you can't see them all my son's actually taking most of them apart and we're rebuilding them we have a small Millennium Falcon not the big one not the collectors you know.

The biggest set that.

Tim Fiola: [1:10:53] $100.

Zig Zsiga: [1:10:54] Yeah they're not that one we don't have room for it like honestly we just don't have the room for it but we do have.

Tim Fiola: [1:11:00] Yeah this Star Destroyer was a huge problem once I put it together that's why I bought the shelving because I had nowhere to put this Star Destroyer it's huge.

Zig Zsiga: [1:11:08] It looks huge it looks really big so I was just curious like I was like wait a second that's a star destroyer behind him no way.

That's cool and that's so cool yeah well a Tim I appreciate it buddy I know we probably went a little over thanks for joining it's great and I'm hoping to have you back soon you know we got some other ideas cooking so I can't wait to have you back buddy.

Tim Fiola: [1:11:32] Yeah I'd love to talk about some more stuff with music it's been a real pleasure appreciate it.

Zig Zsiga: [1:11:36] Awesome man

hey friends nerds geeks and ziglets that's going to close out today's episode of the zigbits network design podcast where we discussed how to differentiate yourself as a network engineer.

Today's Show notes will be at zigbits dot text / 83,

hey make sure you follow our guest expert today Tim Fiola and all of his contact information will be on the in the show notes but I want to be really clear he's got his own GitHub repository he's got his own blog he's got books out there so go ahead and get a

go ahead and follow him on all the socials that he's on and go ahead and check out his content he's got some great content out there we have a new giveaway this month March 20 21 we have a joint giveaway,

the one lightweight

lab everyday if you don't know who he is yet in Erica Cooper Tech lady now go ahead and follow both of these two awesome people because they have joined me up this month and we are giving away five not one,

not two not three not even four but five copies of the network Warrior by Gary Donahue

that's right you heard it we're doing this is going to be 5 winners this month so I would definitely jump in and get your name in the Hat so that when we do that drawing at the end of the month,

you have the best chance to win one of these.

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