Engin Çetinkaya

The story I have written below these sentences is told in a plain and sincere voice, not the way you are used to from artificial intelligence or corporate language, but the way that makes those who know me say, “Ah, that's Engin Hoca!”

The beginning of the story goes back further. It starts around 1987, in my high school years, with the Commodore 64 craze that had just arrived in Türkiye. The excitement that began with the Commodore Fan Club I founded with my friends in high school and with Freeze Frame cartridges continues today without losing any of its value.

In the years I studied computer engineering at university, as those who remember those years will know, it was very hard for us to reach foreign sources. Getting hold of an original book was impossible anyway; we used to find photocopies of foreign books at the second-hand booksellers in Beyazıt, at Çınaraltı. The first book I bought was the C++ book written by Bjarne Stroustrup. In later years Bjarne Stroustrup came to Türkiye as a speaker. Years later I apologized to him for using a photocopy of his book, and he said he was not angry 😊

Perhaps these difficulties taught us to share. What wonderful years the 90s were! With a few valued friends who knew the importance of sharing very well, we founded an IT organization called Sitebuilders. We had a mailing list, the popular technology of those years, with hundreds of messages every day; questions were asked and those who knew answered. I tried to answer actively too, helping others reach knowledge.

Those were the years when not everyone knew everything, but everyone knew what they did not know. Even as competitors, we helped each other. Rumi's words never leave my mind: “A candle loses none of its light by lighting another candle.”

Over the years, working in various technical roles at some of the largest companies in the world and in Türkiye gave me experience in many branches of information technology. I was also a Microsoft Certified Trainer (MCT) teaching MCSA courses at Netron, the most famous IT training center of its time. Once again I was sharing what I knew. And how much I learned from my valued fellow trainers and my students there; if I managed to teach them something too, all the better. I still keep in touch with my students from those years; all of them now work in information technology at various companies.

Then a new page opens in the story. In the companies I worked for, I was always in technical roles. I always thought IT should be managed differently. This led me to develop a different strategy and perspective on IT management. Then one day I read the story of how Mark Knopfler, the lead singer of Dire Straits, started making music. Mark says: “One day I decided that the music I wanted to listen to did not exist in the world, so I made the music I wanted to listen to.” Wow, I said, yes, that is the solution! If I did not like the IT management in the companies I worked for and could not change it, I had to found my own company, where I could build my own solutions.

With exactly this perspective I founded Çözümtek. I set out on my path with all the technical knowledge I had learned and gathered.

Then, alongside that, I took on VMware training. As a VMware Certified Instructor (VCI) I began delivering VMware training to many companies. I can easily say that people truly learn best by teaching. If you want to teach the best, you work very hard. One of the most distinctive aspects of all the training I gave was that, because I was not only a trainer but was also working with many companies in the field, I was building serious practical knowledge at the same time. Sharing this practical knowledge in my courses caught the students' attention even more, because I also told them what was not written on the training slides.

Over the years I looked around and found that I had become a cloud provider; I had gone into the local cloud provider business in Türkiye. The answer to why we are not as big as many companies even though we are much older than them is actually very simple. I don't know the sales and marketing side of this business... Honestly, even the people we hire to do sales and marketing turn into technical people within three months. It is in the company's DNA.

I have also tried to be ethical enough to gladly support my competitors at the points where they could not find their way. Everyone knows this, and no one denies it.

I know I have gone on too long; let me slowly bring this part of the story to an end. Where we are today, we try to do our work in the best way, just like on the first day. Remember how we used to type L (Shift) O (load) to load a game on the Commodore 64? The excitement I felt typing that, I still feel today.

Oh, and if all this has made you think I am a workaholic who knows nothing but work, that is not the case at all. From skydiving to mountaineering, motorcycling, diving and sailing, I have been into all kinds of outdoor sports. We can talk about that part of the story somewhere else.

My story still continues. It must be 20 years now on the Altın Örümcek jury, and more recently, together with Sercan Akdemir, I keep learning, enlightening and sharing through the SpeakUP Tech videos.

May you have a story in life too. May stories shed light on others and show them the way. Of course there will also be those who envy you. Believe me, they are people who have not filled up and gathered as much as you have. Just smile and move on...