Carike Botha's Journey from Marine Biology to Power Platform Success in South Africa

Mark Smith: 0:06
Welcome to the MVP show. My intention is that you listen to the stories of these MVP guests and are inspired to become an MVP and bring value to the world through your skills. If you have not checked it out already, I do a YouTube series called how to Become an MVP. The link is in the show notes. With that, let's get on with the show. Today's guest is from South Africa. She works at iSolve as a software development consultant. She was first awarded her MVP in 2024. You can find links to her bio, social media, et cetera, in the show notes for this episode. Welcome to the show, Karik.

Carike Botha: 0:51
Perfect. Thank you so much, Mark, and thank you for having me.

Mark Smith: 0:55
Good to have you on the show. I always like to see South Africans come on the show, being that New Zealand, Australia, South Africa, we're the tri-nation countries, we're all in the Southern Hemisphere and I don't get to speak to a lot of people from South Africa, it seems. I don't know how big's the community over there in business apps.

Carike Botha: 1:13
So in business apps from just our user group, we've got a fairly big user group. I'd say we're about maybe 50-odd regulars that show up monthly. And then we, I think last year we started with having our first global power platform bootcamp in South Africa. Prior to that it wasn't. We haven't had one yet because it seems like the clients have only picked up on power apps recently, like start of last year, and really picking up the pace this year. So I think our community is a very rapid-growing one at this stage, but it feels a bit behind if I look at the communities from overseas. Right, but it is growing and that's the exciting part. I'm very excited about that. A lot of people are starting to talk about Power Apps, power Automate, especially with Copilot Studio as well, now entering the game.

Mark Smith: 2:10
It's funny because I lived in the UK for a while and the community I feel is the strongest in the United Kingdom in biz apps, without a doubt. Even stronger, I feel, in America. If people think I'm wrong, let me know why. But what's interesting is one of the key leaders in that community. Up there is a South African, Chris Huntingford.

Carike Botha: 2:32
Oh, yeah, he's smart. He originally comes from South Africa. Yeah, actually, he's been in the UK for such a long time I actually forgot that he's from South Africa.

Mark Smith: 2:41
Yeah, yeah, he brings a lot of energy.

Carike Botha: 2:48
Yeah, doing amazing work.

Mark Smith: 2:48
I love watching his journey. Yeah, so cool, so cool. Before we get underway and understand your career into tech and MVP and all those great things, tell me a bit about you. So tell me about your family, tell me about the best food to eat in johannesburg and tell me what you do for fun awesome, so, um, so, actually I live with my aunt and my cousins and, uh, close close to them.

Carike Botha: 3:18
It's actually ironic that I do live with my aunt and cousins now because when I was younger, I made my cousin make me a promise that we will like stay close-lit forever. I was being the eldest. I was like I was laying down the law and he stuck to that law, so I'm so happy for that. And we've got some cat children and doggy children in the house, so we love both cats and dogs. Uh, for, for the parties who love either or please don't come for me we've, we've made a rule in the house that the animals will get along, irrespective of the the stereotype behind cats and dogs.

Carike Botha: 3:58
Um, yeah, and uh, yeah, I am a very religious person as well, so I, I, honestly, I, I fervently enjoy talking about the things of the Lord. That gets me excited. And then food is second on my list. Absolutely enjoy having a good meal. You know, something cheesy, something rich, creamy, absolutely love that. But funnily enough, my favorite dish is not a South African dish, it's actually Korean food. I love myself a good bowl of ramen, so yeah, and we've actually seen them popping up in South Africa more frequently, so I'm very excited about that.

Mark Smith: 4:40
Yeah, the world's definitely becoming more and more multicultural. As you know, different nations spread out. I'm finding that as well. When I returned to New Zealand after being away for it was over eight years and I noticed how many new ethnicities had moved into New Zealand Like it was quite different over that period of time than when I left it was quite noticeable. So definitely the world is becoming a big mounting pot, as one of the famous New Zealand singer sung some years ago. Tell me about how did you get into tech?

Carike Botha: 5:14
100%, so I have my dad to blame for that. I actually originally wanted to become a marine biologist and then when I was in school and that feels so long ago now, but that was the dream and obviously when you talk about being a marine biologist the first thing is like, oh, you wanted to swim with dolphins. Like yeah, that's kind of the idea that I had about being a marine biologist. And my dad, being in tech himself, was like, no, you're gonna go into tech, that's where your career path is taking you. He made me do an aptitude test and the aptitude test ruled in his favor. So I was like, oh, darn it, okay, let's do this.

Carike Botha: 5:55
So I actually didn't, um, enjoy tech at all when I was in school. I was petrified of the exams. I thought like being a grown-up or being adulting is going to be very similar to school. And after school I realized like, oh, adulting is actually a lot more fun than school. And I went through a bit of up and down, like in my tech. Career path started out as a SharePoint administrator. Still love doing it to this day. Then I went a little bit into some C Sharp ASBnet. I enjoyed doing it, but the opportunities weren't as many. And then Power Platform was born and I started playing with it and I just fell in love with the platform. So ever since I've adopted that platform, that's been the main focus. Like I can still do everything else, but I preferred working in the Power Platform main focus like I can still do everything else, but I preferred working in the power platform.

Mark Smith: 6:48
Awesome. So do you have any specific tools that you work with more than others, like, is it more the power automate side or power apps, or what's your? What's your go-to set of tools that you like to work with?

Carike Botha: 7:00
100. Thank you so much for the question. So I I majority most of the things or the requests coming through as well is power, power automate related. So a lot of uh clients looking for flow, so I spend most of my work days um building flows. Um, but recently there's been an uptake on building the power apps. I think it becomes confusing to to clients who is like but SharePoint is a form as well, so why do I need it as a power app? Um, those kind of like, identifying when it's the best kind of scenario to use which um. But I found myself I don't use power bi a lot. I'm really not. My reporting, the reporting element is really not my strong point and um, I've really been enjoying dataverse as of late. So, um, but I mostly, I mostly use power automate more than anything else and I love um playing with the ai side of things, so fiddling with ai builder and seeing what that can do awesome, awesome, okay, so that's.

Mark Smith: 8:00
That's very cool and it's interesting. You've you've gone heavenly automation. I love that you're using dataverse, even though you've come from a strong sharepoint background. Um, you know it locks in so many, uh rich tool sets. What type of projects are you commonly working on?

Carike Botha: 8:17
so with um, our company, we kind of develop a spoke solution. So there's we. We don't really have anything which we can develop or which we have developed that is something that we could reuse for different clients. So we often go to clients and their solutions or the industries are so bespoke that we kind of develop for what it is that their needs are. But um, we deal with a vast set of clients, so anything from insurance to banking, even like the marine industry, which is very interesting, and it's so interesting to learn from all these different kind of industries and just see how they all work. Essentially, in the end it's all processes, automation. But just to get down to the nitty-gritty side of things and understand how the company works, now everything gets put together, it's just amazing and how the company works, now everything gets put together.

Mark Smith: 9:36
It's just amazing. Are there any specific tools that you use to do your day-to-day job that are not the Microsoft tool? So in other words, whether it's running requirements, gathering with those customers, whether it's tools around projects, running projects, et cetera. What springs to mind when you think about tools that you just have to have to make you more effective in what you do?

Carike Botha: 10:03
So the recent add to the tool set is definitely ChatGPT. I use ChatGPT on my daily. Someone asked me today if I tried Gemini. I was like I haven't, and being a Gemini myself, you would have thought that I would jump at the occasion, but I haven't, or the opportunity. But yeah. So I use ChatGPT daily From a non-Microsoft tool set. I wouldn't say that I use From a non-Microsoft tool set. I wouldn't say that I use a lot of non-Microsoft tools. Like, my daily life literally consists of Microsoft tools. But I do use some like task orientation the name escapes me right now that is not Microsoft driven. So, for instance, don't use to do, I'd rather use that one. I can't believe the name escapes me right now, but we've used that, like as a community, to to manage ourselves. Like sort out the venue, sorting out the food. Who still needs to do what? We just found that to be very easy. And then, um, yeah, the rest of the time I literally just use Microsoft things. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Mark Smith: 11:07
No, I literally just use Microsoft things. Yeah, yeah, yeah, no, it makes sense. Makes sense. Tell me about I know I asked about the community before and your user group In South Africa as a whole. How big is the Microsoft brand there? Is it a big deal, or are you seeing more in the market? Sap or pega or service now, or you know, blue prism from a automation side of things, or oracle um, what, what do you see in the market? Is microsoft quite dominant there, or what's your feeling?

Carike Botha: 11:42
yeah, my personal feeling is that microsoft is quite dominant in the market. The SAPs are doing good. I mean, most of your big companies they do use integration of SAP with Microsoft, the Microsoft tool stack, but they're not the majority. So there's most of the clients that we work with or people that I talk to, always use SQL, but here and there you've got your Oracle and then we've also got obviously, our IBMs on the side as well, which does with the private clouds. You know that's not necessarily like your Azure or your AWS. There's also a nice uptake, I would say there's like a balance between aws and azure on this side of the world. So, um, because of the, there's a good balance between, like your aws users. There's a lot of um, especially banks, that use aws, a combination of azure and aws. So, um, yeah, I think it's a nice balance, but microsoft definitely being the the top.

Mark Smith: 12:46
And do you have an Azure data center? Yes, we do In country, Ah that's brilliant.

Carike Botha: 12:52
So data sovereignty is all supported, yeah.

Mark Smith: 12:54
Okay.

Carike Botha: 12:56
Yeah, we've got one in Johannesburg and one in Cape Town, as far as I know.

Mark Smith: 13:00
Okay, brilliant, brilliant. How did you get nominated to become an MVP?

Carike Botha: 13:09
That was actually interesting how that happened. So I've been part of the community for quite a few years, even pre-COVID. It was all part of that career shift that I had, because I was sitting one day and I was like I don't know if I want to be a SharePoint administrator for the rest of my life I don't see myself retiring at this and I started going to community events. And the one year I remember very clearly I think it was in, I don't want to lie, I think it was 2014, there was a Microsoft Ignite in person and after I attended that I was hooked by the community and I just loved seeing the MVPs because at that time um, before COVID the MVPs in South Africa there were so many of them and they were really so inspirational. They were showing us all the cool stuff that you can do with tech. And you know, when you got that in some imposter syndrome you feel like I don't want to go to this community because I don't know enough. I feel like I'm going to be like the odd one out amongst all these smart people. And I remember very, very clearly I was going to it was still the MS Doug, so Microsoft developer user group community. I got there and then Matthew actually works for Microsoft. He asks me well, what do you know? I said, well, I don't know anything, I'm just here to learn. And he's like well, you're at the right place, I'm so glad you joined us. And that made me feel so welcome.

Carike Botha: 14:36
And after that I started getting very involved in the community. It took me a long time to actually present myself because I was so you know that once again that fear. You think back to school, when you had to do your school, your in front of class speeches and it was petrifying and um. And then COVID happened and I actually did my first presentation and I was like, oh, this isn't so bad and um, but yeah, I've always been involved in the community.

Carike Botha: 15:05
The MVPs, also of South Africa knew me by that time and I think after COVID they started asking me it's like listen, when are you going to start filling in the form for MVP? And I was like well, I don't even know where to begin, I don't know how this works. And they they actually started nominating me and they were like one of my friends actually started a hashtag because I was so reluctant to fill in the form and she started a trend where she goes like hashtag, fill in the damn form, and that's how I eventually got to just completing the form, but being recognized by the community and that was such a privilege.

Mark Smith: 15:53
So good, the form and uh, yeah, but being recognized by the community and I was such a privilege, so good. Now, you know, for those that don't know, part of the becoming an mvp, you have a nomination process. So if somebody from either microsoft or another mvp needs to nominate you, you need to then fill in the form, um, accepting you know that, the nomination. Now, following that, you've got a list. You know all the contributions you've made. You've got a list. You know all the contributions you've made, particularly over the last year. When we think of contributions for what you do, what's your focus? Is it, is it more, user groups? Is it more? You know forums? Um, you know feedback response. Is it more blog posts, youtube, what's what's your thing?

Carike Botha: 16:25
My thing is definitely presenting to the community, so being involved with the user groups, connecting with the community. So I'm very involved, like arranging events and getting new people to come and talk, inspiring the community to come and give a presentation, you know whether it be a beginner level or expert level, but my thing is all about the networking and connecting with the people in person. So I have considered the YouTube thing but haven't really got into it at all. I've tried the blogging, but I'm really not a writer of note. I'd rather go. I'm a talker, so if I can talk and have a conversation with anyone, that's. That's my space.

Mark Smith: 17:06
I love it. I love it when you think of the next 12 months ahead. What's your focus as in, particularly around skills development? What are you going? You know what? This year, I'm picking up these skills. You know what's that focus for you?

Carike Botha: 17:21
Awesome. Thank you so much. I've actually been having this conversation with colleagues a lot because I've recently. Two new people that joined my team are also Power Platform developers and I absolutely love their drive. They were like, what exam are we doing next? And they're so driven. They really inspire me to be driven as well.

Carike Botha: 17:42
But this conversations that we've been having is since we've done the certifications for Power Platform, so that's kind of ticked off the list and we feel quite adequate in that space. I mentioned to them that what I would really like to upskill on is definitely from an Azure side of things. So, and something that I really like but I'm a little too scared to go into fully yet is security. I actually thoroughly enjoy talking about security, finding out about security and how things work, and I feel it's such a critical thing for Power Platform as well, because oftentimes we get all the marketing about how Power Platform is amazing and it's so quick to build apps. Yes, it is, but we don't talk about security enough. So that's kind of my focus is to just upskill on the Azure side of things and maybe get a little bit more, a little bit more knowledge on uh security I love it.

Mark Smith: 18:38
I love it. What my observation is is that big companies, they buy on risk mitigation and the security story is the biggest risk mitigating story that you can have around the power platform and so, um, I think that's smart right, as in, you know, particularly if you're going to deal with you know the, the types of, like rand bank or any type of financial institution, any anybody that's dealing in a lot of you know personal uh information or pii information from customers. Security is going to be right up there at the top of the stack, and I find people that are, as in organizations. I find that is the fastest way to close a sale. Is the security discussion right? Risk mitigation, as in, businesses don't buy so much for opportunity, they buy to avoid risk, and the security story of the power platform is becoming more and more robust all the time. Um, this has been great. Um, talking to you, do you travel internationally? You speak at any international conferences? You going to any of the microsoft events like mvp summit or anything like that?

Carike Botha: 19:48
I unfortunately just missed mvp summit this year. Um, I got nominated, just nominated, just before the summit, so I was literally on the brink and so I wouldn't have had the time. But, believe me or not, I've actually never set foot outside of the border of South.

Mark Smith: 20:03
Africa. Wow, do you have a passport?

Carike Botha: 20:05
I have literally the furthest I've been. I've got a passport but I've never been anywhere. And my fellow MVPs in South Africa they've been like pressing me. They're like, listen, seriously, you haven't lived if you haven't traveled. So I'm excited but also petrified because I always tell them like listen, guys, have you seen Taken? And they're like, seriously, just don't talk to strangers, come on.

Mark Smith: 20:31
Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. I was surprised, you know, when I went to Seattle for the first time and I met up with all the other fellow MVPs and this was back in 2013, I think it was, no, 2012 is when it was and I was surprised at how many Americans don't have passports. Oh wow, everything's in America. Right, they can travel to Hawaii, they can travel to Alaska, but everything's there. And then, particularly, I was talking to this one guy which I knew had served in the military and of course, it hadn't dawned on me when you get flown into a military zone, nobody checks a passport, right, you're part of the military, so there was no need for even you know, to have a passport on military deployments and stuff.

Mark Smith: 21:22
And so I found that very interesting, because I think, when you come from the ends of the world, like you know, I do in new zealand it's like's like my kids you know, I've got my I think six months old was the youngest my child got their passport and they did an international flight before they were nine months old. You know, we'd gone to Australia at least, and it's just, I don't know. I feel that when we're in the bottom of the world, there's a thing in Kiwi, kind of psyche, that as soon as you finish school, you're out of here, you're going to the Northern Hemisphere, you're going to London or Europe or something like that. It's like to escape the cabin fever of being controlled in this tiny wee country at the bottom of the world. Yeah, it's built into, built into our psyche.

Carike Botha: 22:14
Yeah, everyone just goes, everyone's like out of here yeah, that is very interesting, but they return though, don't they?

Mark Smith: 22:22
well, yeah, after a while, because it is a beautiful green country and it's a great place to raise kids, um, and but yeah, I still. I feel like I'm going to move into my lifestyle at least a quarter of the year in Europe. It's just my favorite part of the world.

Carike Botha: 22:39
Yeah, it looks like a lot of the athletes are also having a lot of fun in Paris before the upcoming Olympics as well.

Mark Smith: 22:46
Yeah, yeah, so true, so true, Carike, it's been so cool to have you on the show and to listen to your story. Thank you, thank you.

Carike Botha: 22:54
Thank you so much for having me, Mark. It's been so awesome to chat to you too, and look forward to some more discussions in the future.

Mark Smith: 23:11
Hey, thanks for listening. I'm your host business application MVP Mark Smith, otherwise known as the NZ365 guy. If you like the show and want to be a supporter, thanks again and see you next time. Thank you.