I have been an active and enthusiastic member of LOPSA East Tennessee
since 2013.  Participating in my local LOPSA chapter has been very valuable
to me personally, and I want to help others find that same value.

My experience in system administration is long and varied.  I did not
realize system administration was even a career when I started as a "lab
assistant" in college.  After a brief detour as a programmer, I returned to
jack-of-all-trades system administration at the beginning of the .com
bubble.  When that wild ride came to a spectacular end, I started working
at a Fortune 1000 as a network administrator.  I transitioned into
converged networking, storage, VMWare virtualization, and finally back to
server administration and AWS cloud infrastructure.  Two years ago, I
transitioned my career into management with a team of eight cloud
engineers.

LOPSA has been a wonderful thing for me to be a part of.  I have made
professional contacts and personal friends through the organization.  I
have learned new things from fellow presenters, and have learned public
speaking by giving my own presentations.  Once moving into management, I
have even been able to hire fellow LOPSA attendees.

In short, I value LOPSA, and I want to do my part to help this
organization.  As a Board member, I will first and foremost help support
and promote local chapters.  The many-to-many personal networking provided
by these groups is invaluable for those willing to take advantage of it.  I
also hope that my wide-ranging background will help me keep LOPSA a big
tent, with an eye towards people in other careers than just Windows and
Linux server administration.

Andy Cowell
https://www.linkedin.com/in/andy-cowell-29865b8/