Jim Jones, a Veeam Vanguard and a Senior Product Infrastructure Architect at 11:11 Systems, recently sat down with VMblog for an expert interview. During the interview, Jones discussed his experiences with Veeam software, the Vanguard community, and the VeeamON event.
Jones has been using Veeam software for years, and he is a strong advocate for the product. He spoke about the VeeamON event, which he has attended for many years, saying the event has been a great opportunity to learn about new Veeam features and to network with other Veeam users.
VMblog: Please tell us a bit about yourself and your role within your organization.
Jim Jones: My name is Jim Jones and I live in Hurricane, WV. I work as a Senior Product Infrastructure Architect for 11:11 Systems. I have been here for almost 3 years now and in my current role I am responsible for product architecture designs, especially those related to Veeam-backed capabilities and how they integrate into the award-winning systems that power 11:11 Systems’ services.
VMblog: You are also a Veeam Vanguard.  When did that happen?  What does that entail?  And how has it helped your career?
Jones: Yes, I am happily a member of the Vanguard community. I was lucky enough to be selected back in 2015 into the inaugural selection class and have been renewed every year since. As Rick Vanover says “there is no single path to being a Vanguard” and at its simplest it means putting back into the community whenever possible. Over the course of my career that has changed as my employers have but that has meant blogging, speaking publicly about what I do with Veeam products and actively trying to help those at events and over social media use their products effectively.
I would not be where I am in my career today without the influence of the Veeam Vanguard program. Both because I have been able to grow my skills exponentially as well as the ability to freely network with peers both within Veeam but also the larger Veeam 100 community I have been able to transition from SysAdmin roles in SMB or government organizations to architecture roles with the largest Veeam Certified Service Provider (VCSP) in the world.
VMblog: I understand you are also a frequent VeeamON attendee.  How many times have you attended?  And what initially attracted you to the event?  And finally, what keeps you coming back year after year?
Jones: I have been to the majority of VeeamON events apart from New Orleans in 2017 and Chicago in 2018. At the time of the first event in 2014 I was already heavily involved in using Veeam’s flagship Backup & Replication product and the opportunity to take a two-day accelerated version of the new Veeam Certified Engineer (VMCE) course, in addition to three further days learning from the company about their capabilities, is what originally drew me to attending.
What keeps me coming back is just the overall setup of the event. While it is large enough to have a vibrant community aspect to the structure, it is small enough that you don’t feel overwhelmed. Further, the content each year is well chosen and delivered-a nice mix of what you can do today and what is coming. Finally, no Veeam event is complete without well-designed social gatherings allowing you to network and meet others with this similar technology interest.
VMblog: What has been your overall experience attending VeeamON?  How has it evolved over the years?
Jones: My experience in each of the years has been incredibly positive. The general conference has become much smoother and well designed as the years have gone by. While the early Las Vegas events were great, they were a smaller crowd and were more about Veeam staff presenting knowledge. While great, the sessions and overall event didn’t have the same community aspect. The Miami event right before the pandemic was a much more robust version of the conference and very enjoyable.
The wrinkle in all this is the same as it has been for every major tech event, the pandemic brought many challenges and changes. Veeam did a wonderful job of adapting to free, fully virtual events in 2020 and 2021 before returning to versions of a hybrid model the past two years. In each of those events, the content has been consistently good. Even when fully virtual the planners did a great job of finding a way for attendees to interact.
VMblog: Could you share a memorable moment or experience from one of the past VeeamON events you attended?
Jones: I’ve been privileged to be able to speak at four of the five in-person events that I have attended, which has been an amazing experience, both personally and professionally. While I’ve had the opportunity to represent 11:11 Systems officially in a couple of these presentations, the most memorable version of this was this year in Miami. Falko Banaszak and I presented on Architecting Veeam Backup for Microsoft365 at Scale in what ended up being the most registered and most attended session of the conference. We were moved from a smaller classroom to the keynote stage. Speaking in front of giant screens in a large and impressive ballroom is something I will always remember.
VMblog: What sets VeeamON apart from other industry events or conferences you’ve attended?  And do you think it has helped your career growth?  If so, how?
Jones: The biggest thing that sets VeeamON apart from other vendor-led tech conferences is the focus on making sure their event is well designed for all attendees. For a smaller event (but still in the 1,000s) there are several distinct types of attendees, for example, customers big and small, partners and analysts. At any point during the event, day or night, there are always events where those of any of those types of people can either meet and learn in a targeted setting or network and mingle in a more wide-ranging way.
Often I have been at other events where the content is designed for those lightly familiar with their products or deep dives into a small aspect of their portfolio with little to be had for the many people whose knowledge is in between. Further, many of the networking events are designed either exclusively for silos of attendees or open only to their long-time attendees without much room for growth for those new to the community.
VMblog: Have you made any valuable connections or collaborations through VeeamON? If so, could you elaborate?
Jones: I’ve been lucky enough to make many great connections through VeeamON events, mostly as an extension of the Veeam Vanguard program. With the Vanguards being a global group -especially in the early days of the conference – this was the only opportunity for us to get to know one another in person. I’ve also had the opportunity to meet many of the greatest minds, both within Veeam as well as through its partner network, that have led to me having a couple of roles and numerous community focused opportunities. Collaboration-wise, being a part of the community at VeeamON has led to some very interesting ways to utilize both Veeam’s software as well as offerings from both their alliance and service provider partners. I am currently working on a project based off the most recent event that I hope to be able to talk more about soon.
VMblog: How has VeeamON contributed to your knowledge and understanding of the latest trends and innovations in the industry?
Jones: The keynote presentations at VeeamON conferences have always been the perfect blend of leadership presentations with technical demonstrations. Leaders such as Anton Gostev, Danny Allan and Anand Eswaran telling attendees not only about what Veeam is currently working on for v.Next style releases but what they see in the wider industry and technology space that guides their direction to things further ahead. That is then reinforced by the Product Strategy team showing how those concepts and capabilities are or can be utilized to create robust solutions to problems attendees are most likely having.
VMblog: Thinking about VeeamON, one of the major attractions to the event is the speaking sessions.  I understand you delivered a session at this year’s event.  Can you tell us about it?
Jones: Sure, I was able to give two sessions this year, one of which I have already talked about, but the gist of which is that designing Veeam Backup for Microsoft365 for the large customer organization, say anything over 10 or 20,000 users, can be a complex task. When you layer multi-tenancy onto it, as we do as a service provider, it can be even more challenging. In that session with Falko we talked about real-world things we’ve learned through trial and error with hopes that others are able to avoid our missteps.
In my other session with Tim Hudson and Ivan Kochemasov we explained how we leverage our relationship as Service Provider Architect (myself), Veeam VCSP Solutions Architect (Tim) and Veeam R&D Engineer Architect (Ivan) to really make the relationship between Veeam and 11:11 Systems successful and innovation focused on the technical side. By sharing that knowledge with the wider VCSP community the hope was to make things like documentation, support systems and even release cycles more in tune to the needs of one of Veeam’s best-performing segments.
VMblog: Were there any other notable sessions or tracks at VeeamON this year that you thought were particularly popular or well-received by the audience? Why do you think they resonated with attendees?
Jones: I think my favorite breakout session I attended this year was “10 Years Working with Veeam: How it Helped Shape Our Careers” presented by Dean Lewis, Ian Sanderson and Matt Crape. This session focused on the effect within the Veeam technology community has had on their career growth. At a time when there is a good amount of turmoil for those of us who work in IT (Information Technology), it was great that Veeam provided valuable session schedule time to something that has nothing to do with its products and everything to do with how the community can help you as an IT professional grow in your own career or know when to make that next move.
VMblog: What advice or recommendations would you give to someone thinking about attending VeeamON in the future?
Jones: Do it, simply do it. 😉
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