SolarWinds, a
leading provider of powerful and affordable IT management software,
introduced Chrystal Taylor as the newest member of the company's
renowned Head Geeks team.
Taylor brings a myriad of skills and experiences to the Head Geeks team, including:
- Nearly
a decade of technical IT experience. Of note, Taylor spent the last
three years working as Managed Services Team Lead at Loop1, a SolarWinds
solution-dedicated training and services company, where she provided
escalated assistance for customers and acted as a key subject matter
expert for clients using SolarWinds Orion Platform and Security Event Manager (formerly Log & Event Manager) products.
- An
extensive list of certifications and technical licenses. This list
includes Neverfail Certified Implementation Engineer (NCIE) 6.3 and
Alliance Scrum Master Certified (SMC), along with a number of SolarWinds
certifications, ranging from SolarWinds Certified Professional for Server & Application Manager and Network Performance Monitor, as well as Adobe InDesign.
- A
passion for all things IT and helping customers. In her previous role,
Taylor assisted with optimizing SolarWinds deployments to suit specific
customer needs, while staying up-to-date on latest developments in
SolarWinds software.
"The
SolarWinds Head Geeks are the driving force behind helping IT
professionals keep up with industry trends and acclimating to new
technologies and architectures," said Darren Beck, CMO, SolarWinds.
"Working client-side for the past few years, Chrystal has been a proven
asset to our customers, guiding them through product updates and changes
for the past few years and is a very welcome addition to the Head
Geeks. We're excited to have her on board supporting broader customer
and thought leader initiatives."
What Is a Head Geek?
The
SolarWinds Head Geeks bring over 120 collective years of real-world
expertise and renowned industry credentials to provide the tech pro
community with perspectives, advice, and discussion on the latest trends
and challenges in technology.
The
Head Geeks are experts in all areas of IT, including cloud, DevOps,
enterprise, hybrid IT, security, networking, database, virtualization,
and more. The SolarWinds Head Geeks engage with technology pros on
THWACK, the SolarWinds community forum; on the Orange Matter and Geek Speak blogs; in-person at events, including conferences, trade shows, and SolarWinds User Groups; and in monthly SolarWinds Lab sessions, where they provide advanced technical training.
Meet the Other Head Geeks
Leon Adato - Adato
is a CCNA, Microsoft Certified Solutions Expert (MCSE), and SolarWinds
Certified Professional. His 25 years of network and systems management
and monitoring experience spans the financial, healthcare, food and
beverage, and other industries.
Sascha Giese - Giese holds various technical certifications, including being a Cisco Certified Network Associate (CCNA), Cisco Certified Design Associate (CCDA),
Microsoft Certified Solutions Associate (MCSA), VMware Technical Sales
Professional (VTSP), AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner, and Network
Performance Monitor and Server & Application Monitor SolarWinds
Certified Professional (SCP). He has more than 10 years of technical IT
experience, four of which have been as a senior pre-sales engineer at
SolarWinds.
Patrick Hubbard - Hubbard
boasts over 20 years of hands-on experience, spanning software
development, operations, applications, networks, virtualization, cloud,
and more. Today, he's helping enterprise and cloud-native teams move
past DevOps hype and rationally integrate real development and
operations techniques to keep businesses going forward.
Thomas LaRock - LaRock
has over 20 years of IT experience, holding roles such as programmer,
developer, analyst, and database administrator. He is a Microsoft
Certified Master, VMware vExpert, Microsoft Certified Trainer, and 10-time Microsoft Data Platform MVP.