In that time, he's shown an extraordinary eagerness to learn. I applaud this attitude...

Thank you Ken for your kind words.

The whole reason for being here in the Monastery is to learn. A year ago I could not have imagined just how much I would learn in a short 12 months! I am also brutally aware of how much my ignorance outweighs my knowledge. I am not a professional programmer. I run a company that has nothing to do with technology other than we use it across all areas of the business. I am an enthusiastic amateur who creates many of our internal systems and outward-facing marketing presence. In many ways, writing code is not the best use of my time. However, I enjoy it and it is useful when we need to make changes rapidly...I am thankful for having written our systems when I hear of other businesses calling up a developer and being told the lead time is several weeks.

It is also part of our culture to push out and test changes very regularly. Having at least some development skills in-house certainly helps with this.