Holiday Countdown 2020 - The lost days part 10 - Jimmy Seddon
Due to the article size limit, older days have to be removed from the main article.
Here is day 15:
Song of the day is a special request by Jimmy: Hey Santa by Bowser & Blue - but be careful: this song is not suitable for work! (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Un49tUHBPQw)
If you need one for work: Fairytale of New York by… no not the Pogues - let’s listen today to the version of Katzenjammer, a band from Norway: (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MGD0I5qdw8c)
We left the US straight to the North, to Canada and visit Jimmy Seddon in Guelph, Ontario. He’s living there with his family and his dogs Spirit and Tana.
(Photo By TheGiantVermin at English Wikipedia, CC BY 2.5, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=3728309)
Jimmy won this year’s Rising Star - award! He is not only an online Leader but also hosts events in Waterloo. Read more here: https://community.atlassian.com/t5/Community-Leaders-articles/Congratulations-to-our-award-winning-Community-Leaders/ba-p/1338217
Hi Jimmy, welcome to day 15 of our calendar! Nice to meet you!
Please tell us, how and when did you become one of Atlassian's Community Leaders?
I learned about the online community at the 2019 Summit. At the time I was looking for mentoring opportunities which weren’t possible at my company, so I saw this as an outlet to share my knowledge (I had been an admin for multiple Atlassian products for about 6 years at that point) Three months later I had an invitation from @Erica Moss to join the Online Leaders program (July/August of 2019).
Wow, just three months - that's really really fast!
What do you like about being a Community Leader?
As I mentioned above being able to help people is a great feeling to me. I have also really enjoyed the number of opportunities I have had to speak with various members of the Atlassian product teams to help make the products better.
I ask everyone about their first encounter with an Atlassian product - what's your story?
When my previous company decided to start using Jira, I volunteered to configure all of the workflows since I previously also worked at a company that was a competitor to Jira and I had experience using similar tools. Diving into the Admin interface on a Jira server (version 6.1.4).
Jimmy please share your favorite Atlassian memory to date with us!
I submitted a proposal to speak at the 2020 Summit based on a series of articles I wrote on the Online Community. While it didn’t get accepted, I was asked to take part in a Customer Panel at the Atlassian Team Tour Event in Toronto, Canada. While I was there someone say my name tag and recognized me as “the guy that wrote the articles about migrating to Jira Cloud”. That was a cool experience!
That’s what happens, if you’re a rising star, Jimmy! I also loved your weekly articles about working remotely. They were great! Jimmy wrote 14 articles about that topic this year - you should read them, if you haven’t yet. Start reading here: https://community.atlassian.com/t5/Off-topic-articles/Working-Remotely-A-Week-One-Retrospective/ba-p/1330265
If you could go back in time to give yourself an advice, professional or personal. What would it be?
Don’t do anything different. As much as some unfortunate things may happen, everything happens for a reason, and you will get to meet some awesome people and do something you really enjoy!
I love that positive attitude!
Jimmy loves video games:
I love playing video games, 2020 also encouraged me to get into streaming my gameplay on Twitch. I know some people don’t understand why people would do this, or watch others do this, but this led me to getting involved in streaming gameplay for a charity fundraiser that supports my local hospital.
That's a great reason to play! And look at these shirts in the background :-)
I asked Jimmy for his New Year’s Resolutions:
Based on an amazing post that @Jodi LeBlanc made to start 2020. Instead of a resolution, I chose a single word that would be my theme for 2020. I chose the word “Unstoppable”. Based on everything that has happened and where I’m at right now, I feel I have lived up to that theme.
So, I have another special song for you, your song of the year: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HgzGwKwLmgM
What is your favorite holiday treat?
Homemade Gingerbread Cookies!
Which holiday song do you love?
There is a Canadian comedy duo called “Bowser & Blue” and I LOVE their song “Hey Santa” (NSFW by the way, but hilarious! - see link at the top of the article)
And your favorite holiday movie?
Home Alone, it came out when I was quite young, and my wife and I enjoy watching it each year.
What are you grateful for?
I’m extremely grateful that my family is healthy, safe and that my wife and I have remained employed during the entire pandemic.
Do you decorate your house for the holidays? If so, what kind of decorations do you put up?
Yes, we put lights on the front of the house and some in the flower beds. Inside we always have a Christmas tree, a festive garland on the fireplace mantle, some Christmas musical items get displayed on end tables, and we have a wreath on the front door.
Everyone at the Seddon Family has a tree:
:-)
Grinch or Santa?
I love the Grinch movie. But I would consider myself a Santa. I love giving people gifts, especially ones where they mentioned something they would love to have/do which they might have thought was forgotten and the look of absolute joy and surprise when they see what’s in the gift is my favorite!
How do you usually celebrate New Year's Eve? Will it be different this year?
We are boring. The goal is to make it to midnight then go to bed. That won’t change this year either. We generally watch a bunch of movies to make it to midnight.
Why should this be boring? I’m no party guy either - we are playing board games until it’s mitnight!
If you could change something about the way we celebrate the last days of the year, what would it be?
We never got the 2020 Summit Bash we wanted. I would love to be able to wave a magic wand and get rid of COVID-19 and allow us to have an Atlassian Summit New Year’s Bash. I think that would be the first time I would do something outside of staying at home for New Year’s.
This is really a nice idea! I wish there would be such a magic wand!
What was your best video game in 2020? Why?
The Final Fantasy 7 Remake was the best video game to come out this year. I pre-ordered it in July of 2019 at the local videogame store (Microplay) because of the pandemic I didn’t get it when it released mid-April, I had to wait until mid-June. This was a re-imagining of the game they released back in 1997 (I was 14 at the time) that game was revolutionary as it was one of the first games with 3-d graphics and this new version had some nostalgia while also adding some fresh and new to it that made it a lot of fun to experience.
Here's your chance to give a special shoutout to someone - who is it and why?
@Andy - PTC Redundant Barker and @Teodora _Old Street Solutions_Tempo_ Vasileva the three of us formed the ACL Ragtags group. Not sure how it happened, but we do weekly zoom calls to keep each other sane and I wouldn’t have made it through 2020 without their support!
Jimmy, thank you so much, it was a pleasure talking with you. Thank you for your extraordinary engagement in our community. I wish you and your family a merry Christmas, lots of fun and an awesome new year 2021 - and I’m sure, we’ll meet in 2022 when all this Covid thing has gone.
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Thomas Schlegel
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