As you all might already expect, I am René Ferwerda. Born March 18, 1987. Ever since then I have been living in Stiens, a small village in Friesland. Yes, Friesland. One of the most Northern provinces of The Netherlands (oh yes, we have our own marketing video on YouTube). I live here together with my wife and two kids.
I started my bachelor of Engineering in 2005, studying embedded software engineering, which I successfully completed in 2009. After this I directly started my career. In my first position I worked as a project engineer at the NHL University of Applied Science in Leeuwarden. Here I worked at the centre of expertise on Computer Vision, where we conducted all kinds of feasibility studies in the area of computer vision. Besides that we were also responsible for teaching the subject of Computer Vision.
Three years later it was time for me to move on, my position at NHL was intended as a stepping stone for my career and was supposed to end after this three years. Due to all the different projects done, I got acquainted with a lot of companies. And through this network, I ended up working as a software engineer at BD. It was here that I got introduced to working with the Scrum framework.
In February 2015 I managed to get my Professional Scrum Master I certification. I mainly did this to get a better understanding of the Scrum framework and how this can be implemented within teams. It wasn’t until roughly eighteen months later that I actually started taking on a role as Scrum Master within a Scrum Team. A role I have ever since been executing with great pleasure! I just enjoy working together with the people in the Scrum Team and to constantly try to optimize our way of working to be able to deliver the most value for the product in the least amount of time.
A few years later I was given the opportunity to participate in a Professional Scrum Product Owner I course. Even though I never had the intention to take on a role as PO, it was a chance to broaden my view on the Scrum Framework by getting a better understanding of the Product Owner role, which I seized with both hands. I must say it was a very interesting course, which indeed gave me loads of new insights. But it also gave me the confirmation that I won’t be pursuing a role as Product Owner.
And then finally, we reached this point. Starting my own blog. Why? Because I have been thinking about this for a couple of years. To have a place to put away my thoughts on things that I come across during work, that I find interesting and that I think I should record somewhere so I can later grab back to them. I don’t have the illusion that I will write any groundbreaking stories, or always be writing about the latest and greatest technologies. My intention is to just put away my thoughts, to share my ideas with each and every one willing to read it.
-Cheers-
René