VAN RIPER: Hi, I'm Van Riper.
ADRIANA CERUNDOLO: And I'm Adriana Cerundolo,
Community Manager for the GDG Program.
I want to first wish you a very happy new year, and happy 2015.
Really excited for this year.
And I also hope you all had a wonderful holiday season,
for all of you who celebrated.
VAN RIPER: And with a new year sometimes comes
change, and we have a change to announce.
I'm going to be taking a new position at Google, working
with communities inside of Google
around mindfulness practices.
It's actually a very exciting opportunity for me,
but it does mean that going forward,
you'll be coming solely to Adriana about GDG support.
And of course, with Sarah, supporting her.
I just want reaffirm to you all that my leaving the program
does not indicate any less support from Google for this.
In fact, if anything, support is greater
than it's ever been inside of Google.
I can tell you from my early days here at Google,
there were times when there were some questions about whether we
should be investing in this program.
At this point, with the impact this program
has had for us, that's no longer question.
It's more about, how does Google invest in these communities,
and how do we work best with these communities?
That's really what's going on.
You see these new things going on,
like the study jam program as we're
exploring new ways to work with the community
and scale our efforts, and at the same time
provide opportunities to you in the community.
So I just want to underscore that-- in fact, I probably
wouldn't be leaving if I felt that there were
things that were not going well.
The very fact that I'm leaving is
made possible by the health of the program within Google.
So I just wanted to underscore that.
I do want to say this-- it was a very hard decision for me.
This program has been a labor of love for me.
I know many of you I consider close friends now,
and I hope that we will continue our friendship.
This is not a goodbye.
This is more of a we-will-meet-again situation.
And I know to the extent that I can be involved,
I would like to stay involved on an, obviously,
less formal basis.
So you may not be rid of me completely yet,
but I have every confidence in Adriana
in taking this program forward.
I think I'd like to take this time
to actually use this as a teachable moment,
because one of the things I feel really
good about in the situation is the way that Adriana and I have
worked together and really shared responsibility
for this program over the last two years
so that she knows this program inside and out.
And I know that she's as passionate about this community
as I am and that she's going to be
a great advocate for you guys.
Sorry.
These are actually tears of gratitude,
because I'm so grateful for the opportunity
to work with all of you.
When I took this job, I said that it was just amazing.
I never thought that I would get paid
to do something that I love like this
and to work with so many incredible people.
It's been a real gift, these last four years.
Actually, the whole seven years I've
been involved with it, but particularly
these last four years, where I could spend all my energies
on this.
But if there's something I wanted to teach you all--
and people ask me about this, about how
do I get to work at Google-- and I said,
don't worry about working at Google.
Find what you're passionate about and do that.
And if that lead you to Google, that's a plus.
But if it doesn't lead you to Google,
you're still doing what you love.
And I was just fortunate enough that what I love
brought me here.
And at this point in my life, a new passion
has really come up for me around mindfulness practices,
and there was this unique opportunity
to do that at Google and leverage my community
experience.
So it was just, again, another opportunity I couldn't pass up.
Otherwise, they would have to drag me kicking and screaming
from this job.
So the thing I wanted to say there
is that what made this really easier for me--
it's still hard-- was knowing that Adriana
was ready to step in and be solely
in charge of this program and take it forward.
And I want to strongly encourage you, number one,
to follow your passions.
And if they lead you away from GDG communities,
so be it, because it's more important
that we have passionate people in the communities.
And I know those of you that are in there now
are passionate about this but, your passions
will change just like mine have, and you need to follow those.
But in order to be able to do that and not
leave your communities stranded, you
need to be building a community of leadership.
You guys need to become meta-community managers, just
like Adriana and I are meta-community managers.
You need to be coaching and building
other community leaders in your communities
so that when the time comes for you to go on to new things,
you can do that knowing that your community will be fine.
In fact, I wouldn't be here-- I want to actually take
this point to thank Kevin Nielson,
because if he hadn't stepped up when I needed help
with the Java user groups in 2006--
I was starting to get burned out.
I would have probably stopped doing community work
altogether, but because Kevin came on board, I got energized.
Not only did I do the Java work, I
started doing the Google Technology Group
work with Kevin's help.
That led to this job.
Similarly-- I don't share this publicly, but I am now.
In 2000, after I started this job, it was my dream job
but it was a very challenging job
and I was feeling really burned out by it about a year
or two into it.
And that's when we hired Adriana.
And I was seriously thinking about leaving the job.
Not because I didn't love the work, but it was just killing
me physically, emotionally, doing the job.
And it was with her support that I was able to then, again,
get reenergized.
You need to find good people.
I've been fortunate in finding those good people in my life
to work with that support me in following my dreams,
even if it takes me away from them.
So I want to encourage you all to do that in your lives, too.
And I guess with that, I'll just turn it back over to Adriana.
ADRIANA CERUNDOLO: Van, first off I just
want to thank you for all the amazing work
that you've done with the community.
Obviously without you, this global program wouldn't exist.
Van, as you all know-- or maybe those of you that are new
don't-- he was a pioneer for the GDG program.
Before that, it was really just an idea in a few cities.
And because of his passion around this work,
Google basically poached him to create this global community.
And it basically went from two groups to now
we have over 550 globally.
It's really amazing.
Van-- I think he already knows this,
but it's just so you all know-- he's
seen as a leader and thought-leader in the community
space as a Community Manager here within Google.
People come to him asking for expertise and support
on programs that they're running.
It's really amazing to see.
And selfishly, I'm glad that he's staying within Google
to do community work, because I personally as a Googler
am going to reap the benefits of the awesome community
that he's now going to be creating around mindfulness.
At the same time, I'm obviously really going to miss you, Van.
It's been an amazing two years working with you.
Not only on a professional level.
Also on a friend level.
Obviously that's not going to go away,
and I'm so glad your staying within Google.
But I also want to take this moment
to thank you for all the mentorship that you gave to me.
I did have community manager experience when
I came into this role, but it was really
through the tutelage, I guess you can say,
of Van over the last two years working
with a really passionate awesome community that's
organically growing around the world
to understand what community management is really all about.
And without that, I would not have the wealth of expertise
that I currently have.
And that being said, going forward I will certainly
still use Van as my consultant as I have a hard decisions
to make, and working on this program-- on this community--
and continuing to grow it.
And on that note, I want to reassure everybody
that, as Van said, nothing's changing here.
I will be your main Program Manager, or really,
Community Manager at Google for this global program.
However, things will continue to be carried out just
as they have been, because whenever I have a decision
to make and I'm not sure about how to go, I ask myself,
what would Van do?
I actually had that thought just yesterday.
So thank you for all your amazing work.
And I know that you will be, obviously, sorely missed.
Not only by myself, but by the awesome community out there.
But I am also really excited to be leading the program,
to taking this forward, and having an amazing 2015 year.
We have a lot of great things coming ahead,
and I just urge you all to keep doing what you're doing
and know that this program is in a great position
and has more eyes on it internally
from Google than ever before.
It's the sole channel for reaching developers globally,
and so that's a really powerful place to be
and it's very much valued.
So I'm really looking forward to all the opportunities
and resources that's going to be coming through this year.
You can stay tuned by the end of this month
to get an update on what's to come for this year
directly from me.
And also, please continue to be nice and work with Sara,
as she's going to be my co-pilot going forward.
So thank you, Van.
Thanks to everybody.
And we will surely be in touch.
If you have any questions or concerns about this,
please feel free to reach out to me.
You all still have Van's email address, as well.
I urge you to reach out to him, as well.
We're both here as resources for you.
VAN RIPER: Yes, I'm still happy to hear from any of you.
If it's a specific thing about running the GDG
support from Google, that needs to go
through Adriana going forward.
But whenever you're in Mountain View,
I'd love to see you for lunch.
Have a great 2015, everyone.
ADRIANA CERUNDOLO: Bye-bye.