Azure DevOps Podcast: Kendall Roden on Microsoft’s Cloud Native Global Black Belt Team

Kendall Roden on Microsoft’s Cloud Native Global Black Belt Team - Episode 137

Apr 19, 2021

This week Jeffrey is joined by another podcast host! Kendall Roden is a Senior Cloud Native Technical Specialist on the Global Black Belt team at Microsoft and a co-host of the popular show, The Azure Podcast.

Kendall began her Microsoft journey in July 2019 after graduating from the University of Alabama. In her first 2.5 years at Microsoft, Kendall worked in Microsoft Consulting Services, focusing primarily on C# development and app modernization. She then transitioned onto the Premier Developer team, where she focused on learning and leveraging a variety of cloud-native technologies to empower customers in their digital transformation journey. In her current role as a Cloud Native Global Black Belt, Kendall works with customers to architect cloud-native solutions. Some of her specialties include microservices development, design, and architecture; Azure Kubernetes Service and OSS related to the k8s ecosystem; Dapr; event-driven architecture; and Azure API Management.

In this episode, Kendall takes a deep dive into some of her specialties, elaborating on the work she does within Microsoft’s Cloud Native Global Black Belt team. She speaks about Dapr, where she sees Azure (and the industry as a whole) headed, how to do DevOps well on Azure with API management, and more!

Topics of Discussion:

[:38] Be sure to visit AzureDevOps.Show for past episodes and show notes.

[:50] About The Azure DevOps Podcast, Clear Measure, the new podcast Architect Tips, and Jeffrey’s offer to speak at virtual user groups.

[1:24] About today’s episode with Kendall Roden.

[1:40] Jeffrey welcomes Kendall to the podcast!

[2:15] About Kendall’s podcast, The Azure Podcast, and where to listen.

[4:09] Kendall speaks about the Microsoft Cloud-Native Global Black Belt Team that she is a part of and what their current areas of focus are.

[6:55] The state of AKS and when Kendall recommends that developers migrate over to it.

[11:42] Where Kendall sees the industry as a whole and Azure headed.

[14:08] Kendall speaks about what falls into place with API management now that developers can count on as well as what is coming down the pipeline this year.

[18:35] Kendall elaborates on how to do DevOps well on Azure with API management, as well as when you should look into API management vs. when you shouldn’t.

[22:13] A word from Azure DevOps Podcast’s sponsor: Clear Measure.

[22:47] Is the ARM template the way to provision?

[24:42] Kendall explains the method of modifying the configuration of API management during a deployment.

[27:26] Does Kendall’s teamwork on the Dapr framework or the infrastructure side of it?

[29:34] A note on what Dapr is and what it is used for.

[30:33] Talking acronyms in the industry.

[33:17] Is Kendall’s team working on anything exciting for the .NET 6 release in November?

[34:24] Kendall recommends some resources to check out if you want to learn more!

[37:07] An update from the Azure open-source space.

[37:30] Jeffrey thanks Kendall for joining the podcast!

Mentioned in this Episode:

Architect Tips — New video podcast!