Ulrikke Akerbæk on The MVP Show

[mark]: 3:25
today's guest is from norway in twenty twenty one she received her first m v p award she's a blogger active community contributor and has the honor of being part of the portals zero to hero league she's a leader in the community sorry she's

[mark]: 3:38
a leader in the committee for the arctic cloud development challenge a three day hacathon and oslo that runs every year and she's one of the leaders of the slow power platform and dynamics use a group collaboration she's raided as a top fifty woman in tech in norway check out the show notes and you can see her twitter linked in blog and all those great things ricky welcome to the show

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 4:06
thank you so much mark that was amazing

[mark]: 4:1
did did i get your name right tell me what's how do you pronounce your full name

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 4:15
yeah if i would say my full name in norwegian i would say ulric arcetabec and i know that's really that's that's it and i studied in thank you when i studied in in england in autingum for half a year and then they just call me rickie at the end no one no one need butter a little more

[mark]: 4:41
is there a yeah yeah he nottingham is a nice place to be isn't it

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 4:45
oh yeah that's brilliant oh i love it made friends for life from all over the world that was a great time

[mark]: 4:54
don't they claim they have the oldest pub you know that's kind of built into

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 4:58
oh yeah they do yeah yeah they do the oldest pup in the world you

[mark]: 5:04
the side of that castle yeah been there a few times it's pretty amazing oh

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 5:07
don't have to trust because i think every town in england has the oldest pub in the world but i am for sure for sure that's nothing ever the right one and they have this

[mark]: 5:14
totally totally right yeah i love the way it was built yeah built into the into the into the that clint cliff face ain't it

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 5:21
yeah and then in the castle the old castle with the ground and they have this beer festival once a year you get your own beer cup and you can go round to all the er buttles and not all the beer producers and you can just yeah get your tip off so that's yeah miss it

[mark]: 5:37
so good so good do you know i'll give you my my fun fact from oslo and it's not something that kind affects males so much but i had a friend from sydney who went and lived in a low for maybe for five years he works for google and um foundation in australia new zealand that type of thing or moist skin moisture iser sorry moisture iser facial moisture iser is water based but in nautix it's oil base because water base freezes and hurts your face and i never knew that there was like a difference between oil base and water base moistureizer and the freezing cold temperatures yeah yeah she learnt very quickly of course and yeah

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 6:33
poor thing i hope she's all right uh yeah you will learn that pretty quickly and you also learn during the winter season not the shower and just outside because they're here phrases and it breaks yeah yeah i know

[mark]: 6:45
yeah wow wow do you know some of the best such i've had is in slow down on the on the water front m hm yeah it's the first time you know the green stuff with such what's it called with sabi it's where i've had proper with sabi was in oslo and it was amazing amazing the guy came grated it at the table it was incredible top notch much yeah it's down you

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 7:06
wow that's no great wonder if that place is still here how long is it since since you've been here

[mark]: 7:14
know where how would i describe it you know there's a big kind of i'm going to say a brown building it's like a very art kind of center with a lot of art work on the inside and outside of it down where and a lot of art work on the inside and outside of it down where and there's kind of like a whole new area where like google have all their offices and all the tech businesses have their office area and s where you catch them ferries and stuff to go out on the fiords um it's in there there's the

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 7:43
yeah yeah i think it's all right i think i know the building you're talking

[mark]: 7:47
restaurant m m yeah oh well i came back from london just before the pandemic

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 7:47
about and i don't think googles there any more how long could it be since you've been there oh

[mark]: 8:01
i went there i'm also the three six five saturday in the microsoft office there with did you i don't know if you went to that about two years ago

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 8:08
oh was that before they moved for before a market of moved offices because now three years ago

[mark]: 8:14
oh i'm not sure do they have a big draft on their wall painted on

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 8:14
they're down in the city center and used to be way out

[mark]: 8:18
oh i'm not sure do they have a big draft on their wall painted on the wall in their office i just remember the head of jurafpainted on the wall

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 8:27
no no i don't think no not that i've seen i'll have a look in at the next i remember oh ye

[mark]: 8:32
classic classic this is not the normal way i run a podcast by the way this is so all over the place um yeah because the other the other thing

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 8:37
oh it is nice

[mark]: 8:39
about oslo like is the vikings of course and the big viking museum and things like

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 8:44
yeah yeah did you go to the bank yeah i know that's great and you

[mark]: 8:44
that and the with all the statues the park with all the statues that's awesome

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 8:51
know when you're neuwegian and you're in asowoldi'm going in to also later today actually staying over until tomorrow but when you're native you're so lazy you don't go to visit those places and it's a society should be we should be we were good during the pandemic to be tourists in their own in our own country but we didn't go to also because we go to also all the time so we went all over the place in our way and visited all the nice places we have but also its kind of last on the list so we we we were tourist in our own city went to see all the different things that are here but we never ever thought about going to also because that's so boring we're there all the time so yeah maybe you should do that next

[mark]: 9:33
well it's amazing yeah have you done the big fight the bomb fire you know where they make the big bomb fire once a year that to it's the biggest bonfire in the world probably bomb fire is not a word creates yeah yeah all

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 9:47
with all their pallets or whatever it's called yeah i saw it on t v

[mark]: 9:50
the plates and they set it on fire that's cool have you not gone to

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 9:53
didn't it fall on at some point no no no no no no no oh

[mark]: 9:53
it i mean they do it each year right yeah it's it's a i think it's a tradition of norway

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 9:57
didn't it fall on at some point no no no no no no no oh really no i've only seen you once never ever thought about going but it seems really cool to be

[mark]: 10:06
oh m and the the other thing is crayfish parties crayfish that's norwegian it crayfish

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 10:11
the swedish so that would be krifteva that's swedish tradition i think

[mark]: 10:17
parties yeah oh okay so then is there because once again this friend of mine who was in australia she would make us and she never went to she never went sweden she was only norway but do they call them crow fish parties or or yeah but it wasn't swedish i thought it's norway i could be a ro

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 10:32
yeah yeah that's about it and then well maybe maybe she got to know something because you know before in twin eight i think that was a financial crash and we lived in sweden at them at that time and it was no jobs to be found so we got you know all the young swedish people came to norway and they settled here and we call them party party swedish we call them party and good so they would come over here and they would work and they would party and so many of them stayed and so we've seen the couple the last couple of years seen so many swedes traditions because because we live i can i can run to sweden from here so on daily run like easily you know just we were there yesterday so this is really close but also they don't get that much influence but we see that now it's coming so much of the city's tradition you see them further further north than we did before so probably probably because of that i think

[mark]: 11:39
well well so here we are we eleven minutes into a podcast and i haven't even started the podcast yet i did the introduction

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 11:44
and you know what mark well yeah you did well well were chatting i wanted to say high from my boss i started a new at the new company the second of may and my boss is called lise the east gate and she's actually second of may and my boss is called lise the east gate and she's actually from new zealand yeah yeah so she ends her regards we she's i know so

[mark]: 12:13
no way ke that's incredible yeah that's so cool oh

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 12:14
when i told her i was going to be on i guess with us said to send her high since high team yeah yeah that's nice

[mark]: 12:24
that's so cool high back that's so cool i love that i love that tell me tell me you've started at a new company what do you do as an outside of it what do you do when you're not working

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 12:34
i do so many things i don't know how i got time to be an m v p at all really because money life is already full as it is i have a husband for first and formal so he takes up a lot of my time and i have two kids one who's my youngest boy is four and my oldest daughter she's nine and they keep me occupied of course sleepless nights and a lot of activities here in the day of course and then i'm i'm a gardener so in norway we have half a season only so now in may when everything takes off i love it so my birthday is the twenty fourth of may so i love may anyway but this is the best month everything comes to life everything is green you can see things growing you can hear the trees you know making that little noise when the leaves pop in i just love it so i garden and i m and i love to grow our own vegetables yeah sure and the flowers i love roses and i'm really a ninety old ninety year old lady inside so that's me and then during the winter love to so clothes so i i sow from myself and my daughter i love to fix so it really started you know when the kids are small and they were all on their hands and knees all the trousers had big holes in them so i just caught them off and i see so they were shorts i made him into shorts and that's where he started so and i just cut him from there so that's what i do during the winter and then a couple of months ago from my from my aunt i got this uhtesthis box and she's like okay i'm going to give you a gift and it's alive and you need to feed it every day and i was like what is this and then it's how are those starter i need to feed this thing yeah i know and you need to feed it every day but it gives in return is the most delicious bread you'll ever eat so you know twice a week bread and i do differently every time it comes out differently every time but it's the best bed in the world so that's my current my most recent hobby

[mark]: 14:55
wow yeah yeah yeah i love it i love it you have a lot of passions similar to mine now audience i'm sorry you don't get to see this but these are all the seeds that are just arrived today from i just i buy

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 15:05
that's what that's think

[mark]: 15:09
all these unique seeds from people that just you know they share their seeds with you and like an buy it online and i'm always looking for things that you just can't buy from a store you know that are totally unique and i like

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 15:19
that's great

[mark]: 15:21
to propagate them and just see what happens let's see what you know what we

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 15:25
yah oh yeah

[mark]: 15:31
can grow so vegetables as well as native trees to our country and then this month i have planted over a thousand bulbs so you know tulips and deffidls and month i have planted over a thousand bulbs so you know tulips and deffidls and because we're at the opposite season to you so we're going into winter so hopefully

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 15:43
yeah i know oh h you need to send me picture of that that would

[mark]: 15:48
in spring i'm going to get a field of flowers so that's the plan yeah

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 15:48
be amazing because you're living out in the country side now didn't you yeah so be amazing because you're living out in the country side now didn't you yeah so be amazing because you're living out in the country side now didn't you yeah so be amazing because you're living out in the country side now didn't you yeah so because i listened to your podcast was that what because when you told about you because i listened to your podcast was that what because when you told about you know when the pandemic started and you moved out to the country and the barn that you fixed up how is that and

[mark]: 16:12
it looks more like a house inside than a barn but it's very good and next year i'll stop building my house so yep it'll be amazing yes yes yeah

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 16:23
worked out well for you during the pandemic

[mark]: 16:25
my wife works at google so she works remote i work for i b m australia so i work remote you know living in new zealand but that's the thing the pandemic has opened new opportunities in tech right you can work for companies that are geographically miles away but we're doing this now on star link so you know la must provides the internet connection so it's great anyhow this podcast is about you

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 16:52
wow that's cool what the world's become you ah oh

[mark]: 16:52
this podcast is about you how did you become an m v p first how did you get involved in inmicrosoft and then how did you become an m v p

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 17:04
all right so i've worked for a microbe partner for the last ten years started as a share point consultant actually um and then i went on maternity leave and when i got back they had moved chair point to the cloud and then they when i got back they had moved chair point to the cloud and then they threatened to take away share point designer and i was i was working with sharpin branding so they took my job away basically and so i thought all right so what else can i do what's in the markets of spectrum work in this in this space that i can do use my because i'm a developer i'm a communicator i'm a graphic designer and work with with u x so i thought all right so what can i do and they just bought a studio that we now know as porapsportels and so i thought all right that's public web and i've always worked with customers that i wanted to turn because in the beginning all right in twenty twelve and twenty and i think you can you could have share point as a public facing website so i'd work out yeah i was grateful because that's trying to hammer in a nail with the screw driver i think you know it's not the

[mark]: 18:15
that's right that's right then they took it away right

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 18:15
right tool for it and find something else but when you're a consultant on lola evil is not always that your opinion is heard so i did it anyway but that mother story so i i turned to a studio and i thought all right this fits me well it fits i want to do i want to work with us i want work with the end user so this is my opportunity and i was actually so grateful that they sent chipwerthrough the cloud after that but you know was actually so grateful that they sent chipwerthrough the cloud after that but you know we the black belt so we had nick dolman when we had nick he duke jim no back and all these great people that came with with the product from dic studio ut there is not a lot of content other than that so you can search for anything there was there was no documentation there was nothing it was just a big void and so i scraped and i figured things out on my own and then i started the blog mostly for myself because i have the worst memory ever so if i ever solved the problem i needed to make sure that i didn't try to solve the same problem again as i created blog posts for myself just green shots and blah blah blah blah blah what i did and then then i just published it on the web my my husband the developer so he just created over press lug for me um and that's where he started really and he just kept it going and then i saw that other people like my content and used it and started asking agreeing questions in the community forms and then whenever i would ask you something i would create a log post about it because then i could share it on within the people and then i just organically grew from i could share it on within the people and then i just organically grew from there i think

[mark]: 20:05
i like it i like it and and you're so right but about those three guys that you mentioned they're all technologists none of them are designers so all all

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 20:16
that's true the right yeah ay

[mark]: 20:19
all the content was technology related but you know i love that you've come from a design angle my question for you is and i challenge you know mine teams if i could look at your portal and i can tell it's a and i'll loosely say an t x studio portal or let's say a power as portal or let's call it let's just leave it as a power apsupportal at the moment because let's call it let's just leave it as a power apsupportal at the moment because the announcements haven't been made but could i look at the portal and know that it was a power a portal or would i look at it and go wow i wonder technology this is built in because i find it so many portals look like power at portals like just because you change the theme doesn't mean you have done anything revolutionary right do your portals look awesome done anything revolutionary right do your portals look awesome

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 21:11
yeah i think so

[mark]: 21:14
oh so i love it i love it i love it

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 21:16
no but the real the real big projects that i've done they look like portals at all that being said though it's not really portals that's the issue it's the boot strap so you can also look at other websites and think this could be a poor portal if you're not from the development world but i would recognize oh

[mark]: 21:36
totally

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 21:39
this is bootstrap and we're stuck in bootstrap three five in in portals and and now we have bootstrap five is out there so it's a gap we need to feel that markoff need to figure out how to update that because that will bring so many more possibilities in regard to how you can structure your site and then so many more possibilities in regard to how you can structure your site and then mark the another thing and that's you web standards so you should not have your log on the top right hand side you should not have your men on the right on the bottom you should have some kind of standard and that's what i think is good with big strap and an parapspotals being that low code frame were kind of product that it is it should be webstandard first so that if any quotes idiot goes in and creates a portal it should be accessible it should be webstandards it should be design pattern it should be so one goes to search and webstandards it should be design pattern it should be so one goes to search and

[mark]: 22:40
totally

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 22:41
google you know so that should be out of the and you could not have a radical design that way so and then it's up to us as the scientists to do it right and to do it with all those cretarias still in place after you know we've had our customer yet so but but i do i think you could get your point where we could do so much more so and i think the websode boring these days everyone's and i just had this discussion with my think the websode boring these days everyone's and i just had this discussion with my husband the other day that you know back in the nineties web design was creative space and you could have this this bat following your mouth so the pointer and where the curse and you can have yeah no it was awesome you could do

[mark]: 23:29
adobe flash right adobe flash back in the day splash screens splash screens on the

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 23:32
whatever action script oh wow that was great loading you know waiting anticipate and that loading bar when you you had to load everything it was amazing where do you see that even and i love artists websites so bands and artists back in the day when we empty big that was amazing and you don't see that even even artists websites these days my space ruined artists websites just just to point that out so that was my base fault but even after that now they could do so much cool stuff and they don't so it's like my husband pointed out that well websites are dead are they because no artist today would spend money on a good website because it's all social media and tiktok anyways so no one would ever see that website so that's probably why they don't invest as much as they did in that so my peace

[mark]: 24:33
it's i think i think he has some validity in that i used to always say it's so important to have your own website because that's your home that's where everybody comes to and don't trust a social media platform begausete may change there algorithms et cetera and deprortis still believe that but i think to funnel people ultimately your brand i think it is you know like tiktok is today is that brand you're seeing facebook go out of popularity you mentioned there what did you say it was that killed artists you know for people listening to this okay that was the predecessor to web which was a predecessor of facebook that was way back in the day you can google it and i think justin timberlake owns it now or something like

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 25:22
oh mark you make me feel so old i feel really

[mark]: 25:25
that i remember all that i remember that journey crazy crazy crazy uh well rickie

[ulrikke_akerb_k]: 25:38
it was really really nice thank you for having me