You’ve heard it a million times: The only constant in information technology is that things are going to change. But just because no one knows what’s coming next doesn’t mean that the new kids on the block can’t learn from the experiences of those who have already lived through “the next big thing” time and again.

Take Chris Colotti (pictured), field chief technology officer of Tintri Inc., an IT company based in Mountain View, California. Chris gave one of his first presentations at a Virtualization Technology User Group event back in 2010 when cloud and automation were bleeding edge concepts. But eight years later, he still sees companies struggling with the same problems: “What do I put in the cloud? What don’t I put in the cloud?”

“”I think people … need to figure out it’s not about cloud so much as automation. We’ve got to simplify the way we do things; we’ve got to automate more. We’ve got to take day-to-day operations and do something different with them,” Colotti said.

Colotti spoke with Stu Miniman (@Stu), co-host of theCUBE, SiliconANGLE Media’s mobile livestreaming studio, during the VTUG Winter Warmer event in Foxborough, Massachusetts.  They discussed career trajectories, cloud, virtualization, storage, and a little bit of football.

Networking and storage evolve

Although most people would consider that networking and storage are very different to what they were 10 years ago, Colotti sees more similarities than differences. Attending VTUG is an opportunity for him to seek out innovation and industry game-changers.

“I think that’s the tough part — how do we move forward? How do we evolve to the next really big, innovative thing that just blows people’s minds?” he asked.

One hallmark of Colotti’s varied career is that he has always actively sought out opportunities to learn new things. But there’s more to being successful than knowing the technology. Colotti believes that knowing where you want to go, what you want to do, and then working out how to get there is the key to success.

“[You can’t] just sit and say, ‘Well, it’s never going to happen for me.’ You have to make something out of it yourself,” Colotti concluded.

Watch the complete video interview below, and be sure to check out more of SiliconANGLE’s and theCUBE’s coverage of the VTUG Winter Warmer.

Photo: SiliconANGLE