The Sun Also Sets, as the deal was finalized. Today Oracle announces plans to streamline Sun Microsystems International. http://bit.ly/aP0GJZ
We have laughed together, cried together.. and as Lori Shaw can attest, tandem kicked a few snowclods together-- every moment worthwhile. Nearly 2 decades of treasured friendships forged globally.. Meaningful business, and life. Margi Mellott was the first visitor at Louisville hospital to visit and hold my son, Kyle, born 6 weeks early. Kathryn Montle, Lesly Curtis, Noelle Bohnenkamp, and Margi the first to vist and hold my daughter, Caitlyn.
DAWN MULAR, #31034 blogged as http://blogs.sun.com/dmular_itil
MPK10: CORPORATE MARKETING INTELLIGENCE: My career at Sun began in March, several weeks after my birthday, with a 2 hour commute to Menlo Park building 10. I was Corporate Marketing Intelligence Group Executive Administrator to a very smart group of professionals in Massachusetts and California reporting to Sun's first jobshare of 2 Vice Presidents in Marketing sharing one job while they raised their kids.
My best friend and surrogate team was Quality Assurance, because of my dear friend, Carol Zamberlin. Carol and I went to coffee every morning and solved the problems of the world. SunTeams were amazing and our project, Carol's and mine was to launch the first "AdminsWeb Portal" a project that lived on, for almost 2 decades, until probably, today. My first encounter with Judith Price, who taught me how to code HTML, and offered the ideas that gave our vision wings.. Judith would be a theme of goodness that would continue through the rest of my life.
MIL04: ENTERPRISE NETWORK SERVICES: Still a 2 hour commute, but in the east bay area of California, Tom Hayes interviewed me, Bob Meetin mentored me.
My corporate friends said, "Don't go to IT, you will totally lose the great visilibility you have here at corporate, and it all happens here." NOT one to buy that I asked Tom, "Okay you sure there is enough for us to do here for me not to lose visibility, and to keep learning." I SWEAR Tom said with a gleam in his eye, KNOWING he was giving me the buggiest app in IT to support, "Oh there is plenty of opportunity." Several weeks later he was SOOO right! We were a 30 person help desk, THERE WAS PLENTY to do!
BRM: INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY OPERATIONS: SMI is moving strategic support operations from CA to Colorado! Okay I'm in.. My home sold in 3 weeks.. began househunting in Colorado WHILE working one overnight shift a week to stay horribly behind in my support queue for Applix Application Support, and some random Framemaker and Netscape tickets. Worked out of temporary offices in Gunbarrell Boulder, Colorado, and then Broomfield before our offices were built. In Boulder, it was pretty much a handful of us--- Jay Littlepage, Eric Peterson kept things fun.. Judith Price kept a network of how to get things done.. Troy Quigley, Bob Meetin, Jeff and Nancy Haynes... well really a handful of us moved.. all with the challenge of selling CA homes, moving to CO and now the 30 person helpdesk was about 10! "Uncle" Frank Tawil took interim management of helpdesk operations, which meant he had the dubious honor of being screamed at for the changes we were trying execute relatively seamlessly DESPITE being understaffed, overworked, and moving cross country.
HIGHLIGHT: The rest of Sun had "donut wednesdays" we had picnics n spontaneous Friday beer and pizza parties with two crazy execs competing for the best party. AND then there were the times when Tom Lawton from Florida, Greg Hjemlstad from IL and Johnny Bush came in from Canada-- ummm they think they were reasonably well behaved.. Ask me I KNOW the truth.
FIX IT LOCAL: Who's the Dutch dude? Rob Ghielen came in.. nice guy, observed alot, seemed kinda quiet, listened way more than he talked, and didnt seem to have ideas... until some 36 days in, and then he rocked our world with a complete, detailed and personal picture for how the Help Desk would restore its reputation. The challenge, grow operations from 30 to 130 in some 9 months WHILE sustaining operations, moving cross country, and learning to do business where we had no networks. We were all IT and Recruiters, representing Sun in the Community.. IT WAS AWESOME.. We had to hire, grow, train, support and deliver and WE DID IT!! LOTS of people were instrumental in the success of making Sun shine.. and IT work!! and it was a great path- Bob Worrall, Dave, Sandy, Susan, Greg, Christine, Margi, Andrew, Alex, Kathryn, Brian, Nancy, Jeff, Bob, Sandra, Edwin, James, Manuel, ...
HIGHLIGHTS: Process Improvement talks in England, Netherlands, and Singpore.. WHY didnt we get to go to Australia? OR more locally hmm what about that Melting Pot bill in Louisville Colorado?
EXPAND IT Global: Six Sigmas the way the truth, and the life.. Rob was the best leader I had known for his ability to create vision, and a plan of execution, and engage us to deliver what we never dreamed possible. We created a common vision, a global team, and a plan for standard service operations within the Help Desk and Operations Support.. The people had a myriad of ideas, talents, and gifts to bring to the table..
We WERE ALL better for this process improvement, and it didnt seem to matter the vehicle-- we tried PSPI, CAP, PRINCE2, ITIL, HDI, Six Sigma, CMM The biggest challenge is which best practice actually get the right tool and result for the job. At the end of the day it was the key progress we could we all agree upon... and how to deliver what was important that resulted in how we came together to agree the scope, the timeline and what must happen.
HIGHLIGHTS: Sun Top Achievement Recognition Summit in Cancun Mexico-- something about too much fun, sand and tequila right?
Hiking and abseiling in Malaysian Jungle with Bill Vass, Rob Ghielen, James Worsley, Chee Leong Ngai, Mike Martinez and others..
WORST, Bill Vass and a few others trying to torture me with steamed fish with eyes in it...
OPTIMIZE IT FOR CHANGE: September 2001 changed our business and our business model, for the first time in our industry, we had to rachet down fast, which implied some of the growth to ramp up, had to be reduced. PEOPLE mattered, and we had to learn to be transparent, and fair, open, and more caring than ever.. MOST excelled at rising to this most difficult challenge.
Its easy to be great when business is booming.. It took character to keep focus when all are in churn, facing career obsolescence for matters completely out of their control and sometimes random. WE were Optimizing Standard Practice, while disrupting standard! BEST part of that experience--- Geoff Coe's technical documentation, making us seem way more brilliant than we were. Enter Sarbanes Oxley, COBIT, IT Service Management. There were the great minds of Bob Franks, Jim Dorvee, Sheryl Driscoll, Dale Avery, Lori Shaw, Sameer Malholtra, Jon McCombie.. MUCH passion, desire to do the right thing and hard work.
Suddenly for the first time.. all those people we hired, enjoyed and worked with had to be laid off. Judith Price introduced me to this new thing called LinkedIn.. seemed fun, but I was pretty busy helping people.. Judith got it way before I did... and helped me learn why I should care.. OH THANK GOODNESS.. it was strictly social networking that allowed me to help place thousands of laid off professionals IN MY SPARE TIME in addition to my day job!
I am grateful for Sun Microsystems, and the many great people who know I love them! THERE is 2 decades of goodness, how can we cram that into one short blog.. :D
As the Sun Sets.. I think back with gratitude, with joy for the many people on the path. 
Dawn Mular was laid off June 2009 from Sun Microsystems.. Today she is in the top 25 most Influential Recruiters. Dawn is founder of Helping Friends Career Network and CEO of Helping Friends LLC a nationwide full service employment agency. She runs LinkedIn Recruiting Professionals Group a global recruiting network of over 31K recruiters nationwide, and hosts several recruiting oriented radio shows, best known for "Connected-- celebrating social networking for recruiters".
- THERE IS NO FEE EVER for JOBSEEKERS TO BENEFIT FROM HFCN JOBS N CAREER SERVICES
- WE APPRECIATE RECRUITER SPLIT PARTNER AND EMPLOYMENT/JOB LISTING REFERRALS, AS WE HAVE MANY MORE LAID OFF STAFF WITH GREAT SKILLS AVAILABLE IN THE COMING WEEKS!!
Dawn Christine Mular Owner/CEO of Helping Friends LLC 3867 West Market #102
Akron, OH 44321
001.330.703.1007 or toll free U.S. 1866.256.1227
Founder of Helping Friends Career Network (theHFCN), a nationwide Employment Service.
Akron, OH 44321
001.330.703.1007 or toll free U.S. 1866.256.1227
Founder of Helping Friends Career Network (theHFCN), a nationwide Employment Service.
