Malcolm's Ramblings

Recently, I crossed a milestone at Acquia having been there for a year.

It is neat to see my name listed on the anniversary emails and presentations that go out to staff. At the start of my journey, I didn’t know if I’d make it a year, and now I find myself planning and hoping for way more.

When Mayank first asked me if I would ever work for Acquia, I took a beat to consider what he was saying. Could I work at Acquia, the Drupal mothership? What would I really have to offer a company of that scale and a team of people with those abilities?

Sure, I had managed teams and many projects that used Drupal, and I had some basic Drupal builder experience from back in the day, but the Technical in Technical Account Manager gave me some pause. I don’t know Drupal super deep, so how would I provide value to any customers they sent my way?

But I love to interview and keep those skills sharp, so I said yes to the interviews, and right away it became clear to me that I didn’t fit the normal mould of people that they hired for this role. While I was heavily experienced in project management, had some deeper server management experiences, and could present information well, questions and concerns related to my Drupal experience came up more than once. I remember thinking a few times that I might not get the position.

When I got through the gauntlet of interviews, I think I remember saying to Annie that it felt like a coin flip. That they might go with me, or they might not. At that point, I was already pretty excited about the prospect of working for Acquia, and knew I would be disappointed if I didn’t get it, so I was glad they didn’t make me wait too long to find out that they were going to hire me.

Acquia’s onboarding is some of the best I’ve ever experienced. It is well organized, well curated, well managed (at least in my experience) and multi-layered. I was given a lot of information, but not an overwhelming amount. I felt like I was being set-up for success.

The role isn’t about Drupal. At least not entirely. To this day, there are things that I ask about that are likely simple for most of the deeper Drupalists within the team, but those questions aren’t coming up as often as I thought they’d be. Most of the clients I work with are already really strong with Drupal. They need someone to help them in different ways.

I love solving problems, digging into a bunch of data, and looking for a potential solution. I get to do that as a big part of my job. I love helping people stay on track moving towards their technical goals and keep them informed of what’s happening in the space. That’s a big part of my job. I love learning new things and then turning around and teaching what I’ve learned to my colleagues and clients and that is also a big part of my job. I’ve been afforded the time to dive deep into Acquia’s products and some interesting tools, and I’ve enjoyed that immensely as well.

We work as a hive mind. When I first started as a Technical Account Manager, I remember feeling so overwhelmed with the number of products and services that Acquia provided, but my boss really helped alleviate my early fears saying that none of us can know everything and so we have to work together as a brain trust to provide the best solutions for our clients. That advice has really stayed with me as I’ve moved forward, and I love that I am now at a point where I have enough knowledge in certain areas that people come to me for answers.

I feel like I’ve really lucked out on the community within the Technical Account Management group. When I first started, and my boss told me to lean into the rest of the team and to him, I always assumed, like my experiences elsewhere, that there would be judgement, backstabbing, and other negativity that would eventually sour the experience. While I like to think of myself as a fast learner, there is no way anyone wants to put up with me always asking the “easy” question, but I’ve felt more supported in this role than any other in my entire career. I feel like everyone on my team is not only on my team but wants to see me successful.

For the first time ever, I was able to take a vacation longer than two or three days and I didn’t need to check on work because I could trust those that volunteered to look after my clients that they would, and I know and have done that for them. I don’t know how many times I’ve thought, “holy smokes, this is how working as part of a team should work!”

I’ve started to become a contributor to Acquia with improvements to some of our tooling, deeper learning about some of our observability tools, and being an AI enthusiast evangelizing the opportunities with generative AI within the company and being asked to participate in various efforts towards that goal.

My current goal is to work towards getting a promotion to a Senior Technical Account Manager. I see that as a step on the longer term road of someday managing a team of Technical Account Managers. I can’t tell you the last time I was in a job where I felt like it made sense to have long term career goals. All of my promotions over the last ten years have been due to changing companies and changing jobs, so if I make this personal goal a reality, it’ll be the first time in more than a decade I received a promotion by staying at the same company!

The good news is that it seems like the promotion system for Technical Account Managers at Acquia is merit based. When I first started they provided me with a document that defined the expectations of each role level and my boss let me know that I should record information to help prove my case regarding my growth, value, and development and so I’ve been taking notes.

When I think back to the Malcolm of a year ago, overwhelmed by every piece of the opportunity, it feels like I’ve come a long way from those early days and there are still people saying that it takes two or more years to really get in the groove with the position as it exists today.

I’m looking forward to that day and I feel very fortunate.