Hey devs and cloud builders! 👋 I'm Maria Tzanidaki, a Cloud Engineer at Mondelez in Greece with 6+ years working on AWS, EC2/RDS cost savings, and Terraform automations – all while balancing pregnancy, gym routines, and home renos.
This is my second time applying to the AWS Community Builders program. Last year, I simply didn't have time to create the required contributions amid work deadlines and life transitions. This year, I'm back stronger, ready to share my real-world journey openly.
Why I'm Applying Again
Rejection isn't failure – it's feedback (even though I didnt have any feedback the previous year). Like Sarvar Nadaf shared in his dev.to guide, AWS selects patterns of consistency, not perfection - so thats my goal. Last cycle taught me: start early, contribute genuinely. No swag-chasing; just learning in public about what I build daily.
My Recent Steps Forward
To build momentum:
Delivered two AWS meetup presentations in Athens/Thessaloniki on Terraform schedulers for non-prod EC2 shutdowns and RDS fleet optimizations – turning internal wins into public value.
Planning more activity: From now on, I'll answer re:Post questions on groups, repost AWS launches with my takes, and share weekly insights. I was shy but you know what, it is exposure for sure but I never declared expert. I don't promise groundbreaking research; just honest docs of failures, fixes, and "why this works and the other not".
Lessons from Last Year (The Reality Check)
Time is the killer: Full-time DevOps + personal life = zero bandwidth for blogs. Solution for my 2026: Block 1hr/week for "share what I learned today." Starting now with my first dev post..
Consistency > Brilliance: Two talks > zero polished perfection. AWS wants your voice, a described problem that was solved, not what is this and what is that (terminology), we can always google these.
Public first: Internal trainings don't count – GitHub it, dev.to it, YouTube the demo (this is the most difficult because most of my work is under company's resources - so not displayable).
What Success Looks Like for Me
It's amplifying women in cloud (we're sparse!), mentoring devs via hands-on posts, and scaling my meetups globally. If selected, expect:
- Updates on Terraform modules on GitHub.
- Brief to the point articles like "5min RDS savings."
- Home-lab stories blending AWS + real life.
If You're Applying Too
Don't wait for "expert" status. Like Sarvar says: Contribute what you're one step ahead on.
Remember! Applications are NOT editable so double check everything!
Rejected? Reapply – patterns win. Drop your journey below; let's build together! 🚀
#AWS #CommunityBuilders #CloudEngineering #DevOps
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