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Jeffrey Walker: an Irregular farewell

By | September 3, 2009, 2:46am PDT

Summary: Living on Central European Time means I don’t always get news in a timely fashion. Some news I don’t want to get.  Jeffrey Walker’s passing came to me via a Tweet and I am crushed. Jeffrey was one of ‘us’ Irregulars. A gentle and courageous soul who never used his position as president of Atlassian to [...]

Living on Central European Time means I don’t always get news in a timely fashion. Some news I don’t want to get.  Jeffrey Walker’s passing came to me via a Tweet and I am crushed.

Jeffrey was one of ‘us’ Irregulars. A gentle and courageous soul who never used his position as president of Atlassian to sell me any thing. I admired that - a lot. A gentleman who was always thoughtful, quiet yet passionate. At times like this words fail me. I am crushed. I leave it to other Irregulars who do a far better job in the comments to Jeffrey’s blog:

Jevon MacDonald

Jeffery, you will be missed dearly. Your openness about your fight against cancer taught me a lot about life and I am thankful for the few dinners we were able to share.

You’ve impacted an incredible amount of people and may you carry on through us all.

I’ll have that martini now please.

Dan McWeeney

Jeffery you will never know the distance of your reach or its impact on those you touched. Your fight against cancer was an inspiration to watch and a celebration of the human spirit. I can’t thank you enough for letting us walk with you while you fought.

My heartfelt condolences go out to your family.

Anshu Sharma

I am sad to hear that Jeffrey has moved on. But he did leave us with the precious gift of his friendship while he was here, and his gift of words, and things he built over the years.

He is and will always be an inspiration.

RIP.

Susan Scrupski

Sadness consumes me with this news, but I know this is not what you want, Jeffrey. I celebrate the courageous, fun, warm, ballsy hero that you are.

Rock on my friend. We will always be tuned to your station.

To family & friends, deepest sympathy.

Eddie Herrmann

I only met Jeff a few times, but they way he talked and opened up, it was as if we were long time friends. I will never forget his positive attitude during his battle with cancer…Jeff Walker, you are an inspiration to us all, my friend. We will miss you!

Michael Krigsman

Jeffrey was an incredible and inspiring person in so many ways. He was also a real person, with genuine interests extending in different directions. Perhaps most important was the excellence of his character. We will all miss him.

Sandy Kemsley

Jeffrey, you will be missed. I’m glad that we had the chance to meet, if only a few brief times.

There are plenty of other comments to sample - many of which are from others I know.

…and Zoli Erdos’ eulogy that starts:

Damn. Damn. Damn.  Cancer s**ks.  And here I am, the blogger who thinks can write about everything, yet I am speechless.

Apologies if I’ve missed anyone.

To Jeffrey and his family: Farewell sweet prince…

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Dennis Howlett has been providing comment and analysis on enterprise software since 1991.

Disclosure

Dennis Howlett

Dennis Howlett is committed to maintaining the independent and opinionated stance that his writings are well known for and does not enter into contracts that would limit his freedom of expression in any way. However it is important in the interests of full disclosure to inform readers of those relationships so they can form their own judgment. This page therefore lists all Dennis Howlett’s current business relationships.

Dennis’s consulting arrangements occasionally bring him into direct or indirect business relationships with some of the companies about which he writes, and/or their competitors. Where such a relationship exists, it is disclosed at the end of any article that references the company concerned.

Dennis owns AccMan, an independently produced blog covering the professional services market, primarily focused on Europe. It is currently sponsored by selected TextLink Ads and named sponsors in the ‘Sponsored Content’ block.

He is a member of Enterprise Advocates, a loose association of consultants, and analysts who are concerned with the buyer side of the buy-sell enterprise relationship.

He is a paid contributor to IT Counts, a site dedicated to discussing technology issues as they related to ICAEW members. He also advises ICAEW on certain aspects of its member outreach programs.

He is an SAP Mentor and participates in SAP Mentor webinars. He has recently produced a guide for SAP resellers wishing to record customer videos. Other than as disclosed here, Dennis maintains no business relationship with SAP and is not financially rewarded for his role as a Mentor.

Dennis maintains relationships with a range of end user organizations and in all cases is subject to non-disclosure agreement. He has no current ‘paid for’ relationships with ITC vendors except as disclosed above although certain vendors comp travel and expenses claims. For the benefit of doubt, T&E reimbursement is a common practice among European based writers. It is often the only way we can attend important events. Even so it doesn’t impact our analysis of what vendors have to say. If you believe otherwise then feel free to ignore what is written here.

Except as mentioned above, Dennis has no other investments in any tech industry participants. This page last updated 23rd February, 2010.

Biography

Dennis Howlett

Dennis Howlett has been providing comment and analysis on enterprise software since 1991 in a variety of European trade and professional journals including CFO Magazine, The Economist and Information Week. Today, apart from being a full time blogger on innovation for professional services organisations, he is a founding member of Enterprise Irregulars and an investor in a European start-up. Prior to, Dennis was technology and tax partner in a British firm of Chartered Accountants for 10 years. Prior to that held various senior finance roles across a broad range of industries.

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