Getting to know datacenter employees: Diogo Nicollette de Oliveira

Microsoft’s success depends on our people. We are proud to introduce some of the talented folks in your community who work in our global datacenters. Discover what inspired them to seek a career in the tech industry, the different pathways they pursued, and what a day in the life of a datacenter employee looks like.

Introducing Diogo Nicollette de Oliveira

Senior Datacenter Technician

Campinas, Brazil

Employee since 2020

Early days

Diogo is a 36-year-old Brazilian who is married with two children. He grew up in the rural area of São Paulo state with his parents. As a child, Diogo loved dinosaurs and space and always watched cartoons about them. He played a lot with his friends from the neighborhood and school. Diogo has always been interested in technology—he still plays video games to this day—and loves to read about new technological trends that will change the way we live.

The path to technology

Diogo started working at Microsoft nearly four years ago as a Datacenter Technician. It was a challenging moment for him because he had to learn many new things. He sought information, talked to more experienced people, and progressively developed his skills. After about a year and a half, his role shifted to Datacenter Deployment Technician. He acquired additional skills such as overseeing the work of third-party teams in cabling. With this extensive knowledge of datacenter infrastructure, network topology, and more, Diogo also began assisting other technicians with their tasks. Diogo participated in various pilots to enhance the team’s efficiencies. Finally, Diogo was promoted to Senior Tech where he applies all the knowledge he has gained to contribute to the success of operations on his campus.

Superpowers

One of Diogo’s superpowers is expertise in project managements. He loves feeling challenged and learning new things, as well as finding solutions to issues that have a significant impact on the team. Having been an English teacher for 10 years, Diogo enjoys helping and sharing what he knows with others. “Contributing knowledge and sharing it with people has always been one of the things that makes me feel most fulfilled,” he says. Diogo also believes that his resilience has been crucial in his career progression at Microsoft, as he constantly faces new challenges and needs to find different ways to handle them successfully.

A day in the life

Diogo’s key responsibilities include installing, diagnosing, troubleshooting, replacing, and decommissioning equipment. For complex changes such as upgrading entire racks, Diogo carries out hardware decommissioning in accordance with established procedures. Additionally, he provides guidance, handles escalations, and ensures that the team is well-informed about solutions and answers. He keeps relevant stakeholders updated on the status of work to minimize the need for further adjustments. Furthermore, Diogo verifies security compliance during decommissioning. Diogo loves working with new projects when it comes to deployment and talking to different teams around him. Learning new things is what drives him daily.

Favorite childhood food

Diogo’s all-time favorite food has always been and will always be pizza. The significance of dough runs strong in his family due to their Italian roots, and pizza, along with pasta, has always been a unifying factor for everyone to gather around the table and share a meal while discussing life itself.
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