SUSECON 2016: Open Technology, Passionate Users & A Real Sense of Community

Before SUSECON 2016, I shared some of my thoughts about the evolving theme of SUSECON and looking forward to this year’s event in Washington D.C.

I love being at SUSECON, interacting with customers, and being able to see first hand the awesomeness that is our community. This year, I found myself happily reflecting on how this company really is different than other companies I’ve worked for, and how SUSECON is different from other events I’ve attended.

One of the sessions I attended was with a very happy customer, who traveled to SUSECON to share his successful implementation of SUSE Enterprise Storage. I know it’s always the same thing that we talk about in marketing at SUSE:

• Open
• Flexible
• Scalable
• Cost Efficient

But it was energizing to me as an employee, to have a customer telling me these things!

After the session, I introduced myself to him and he was just as enthusiastic. I left that room genuinely feeling good about how we help people (who work for companies) to solve their pains.

I love the personalization, openness, and culture that we have maintained here at SUSE, honestly trying to help fix these pains, connect them with training and resources, and equip them to solve future problems in their data centers.

Here are a few more things during the week that made me smile:

• Having an employee meeting beforehand where the focus was how we can be good to our customers and partners.
• Our CEO, Nils Brauckmann, sitting and eating at the lunch tables with our customers.
• Our demo team sharing their passion and geekiness on stage during our keynotes.
• Our SUSE band supporting our event throughout the week (Employees who were also leading sessions, demos & training)
  • Nicknamed SUSE and the Band Cheese. 10 points if you get the reference.
• Our executives talking with partner companies about how we can work together to better support our customers.
  • Fujitsu, HPE, IBM, Intel & SAP
• Sharing fun videos and creating some with our partners and customers, being a little silly and cheesy together, and getting to know each other a little more.
• Seeing customers from previous years’ events and having conversations like it was just yesterday we last spoke.

I work for a company that cares about us, our customers and partners, and is truly fostering an always open, we adapt, you succeed environment.

Thanks to SUSE and our incredible customers and partners that make SUSECON Possible!