20 December 2018 - Bursary winner given Cardiff University 'Outstanding Contribution Award'
Cisco Live conference reflections
In June 2018 I was lucky enough to receive the ucisa bursary to go to the CISCO Live conference in Orlando, Florida. The conference brought together thousands of IT network professionals from all over the world to learn and discover new technologies. Five months later I have been reflecting on the benefits of the bursary and the conference.
As an individual it has helped me grow as a person as well as with my work. My main aim was to attend the ‘CISCO Empowered Women’s Network’ and in doing so it has helped, especially with regards to my work. I always felt like I wasn’t allowed to fail and because of this I often didn’t try new things. The opportunity the bursary provided enabled me to push myself and when I returned to work I started a secondment in the network team. I felt far more confident in my abilities and it reflected in my work. I wrote about the ‘CISCO Empowered Women’s Network’ in my ucisa blog.
I shared a lot of what I had learnt with my colleagues in the network team and my original team, the IT service desk, on my return from the conference. I discussed various new products that I had hands on experience with in the ‘World of Solutions’ and discussed future CISCO innovations and products that would be of use to our team. I am also looking at sharing what I learnt in a Q&A session at our university IT staff conference in January.
Everything I learnt has helped with my work and as a result I was nominated for and won an ‘Outstanding Contribution Award’ at Cardiff University.
Following on from my experience of the bursary, I recently contributed to a session about potential future ucisa bursary schemes. I would encourage anyone to apply for the bursary, you learn so much and it gives a massive sense of achievement both in getting the bursary and then attending a conference you would have not been able to attend otherwise. It also really does make a difference to your personal and work life.
