Meet DCG – Joshua Kranhold

 Guide us through your career journey: How did you end up here?  

• I started my career as a financial analyst, working on reports for a farm machinery company. From there, I began getting into development by stealing SQL queries out of reports that one of the IT guys had made and repurposed them to fit what I needed. After getting “caught”, I started working on customizing the company’s CRM system and have been doing work with Microsoft Dynamics ever since.  

  

What influenced your decision to become part of DCG?   

• Blame Patrick Vogtner, it’s all his fault. 

  

What’s your go-to productivity trick and how did you come up with it?  

• My go-to productivity trick is blocking out all the sound around me. I usually turn the music waaaaay up and put in earplugs (I keep a tub of them on my desk in case of emergency needs for focus). 

  

What is your favorite Microsoft product that we offer and why?   

• My favorite Microsoft product is Portals. I feel like there’s tons of possibility in portals and I find it fun to create them. 

  

What advice would you give to our readers if they are unsure about switching to Microsoft Dynamics?  

• The advice I give to our readers is that Dynamics can be incredibly powerful and flexible in the right hands, and the people we work with are very capable of making the platform do whatever you need it to. 

  

What are some of your pet peeves?    

• My pet peeve is people who tell other people that they’re smart. If you must tell someone you’re smart rather than them being able to figure it out by your actions, then you’re not actually smart. Just something that triggered me and has been a pet peeve since. 

  

If you could bring back any fashion trend what would it be?   

• I would bring back tie dye shirts; simply for the express purpose of laughing at people for wearing tie dye shirts. 

  

What advice would you give your teenage self?  

• “You’re cool, dude. Just keep being cool.” 

  

What is one thing most people don’t know about you?  

• One thing most people don’t know about me is that I was a teacher before working on Microsoft products. I taught middle school special education math for a year before teaching economics as a graduate assistant at my alma mater.  

 

What would you most regret not  having done by the end of your life?     

• I’d regret not having left something behind for everyone that’s still around when I’m gone. I don’t know what that thing is, if it’s knowledge or money or memories, but I’d regret not having left something. 

  

What’s your guilty pleasure?  

• My guilty pleasure is earthy red wine. I lived in central California for a while as a kid and my parents would go wine tasting pretty much every weekend, so I got to grow up around the culture of wineries and wine making. I can never drink cheap wine ever as a result.  

  

What is your most interesting/embarrassing office story?    

• My most interesting/embarrassing office story is I joined a conference call unmuted, blasting a punk cover of a Backstreet Boys song for everyone to hear. You’re welcome, other attendees of that conference call. 

 

If you were the only human being left on Earth, what would you do?  

• If I was the only human left on earth, I would raid the liquor store, hit the beach and enjoy the quiet. There is nothing quite like a peaceful day on the beach.  

  

Where is your favorite place to travel and why?  

• I like to travel EVERYWHERE. In the last year I’ve been to Minneapolis, Phoenix & Tucson, Indianapolis, Denver and Los Angeles. I’m going to visit family in New York in a few weeks and we’re planning a trip to Maine for later in the summer. My favorite is probably central California though, for wine country and the landscape. 

  

If you could pick a new skill in an instant what would it be and why?  

• My new skill would be being able to learn foreign languages quickly. I’ve tried a few times with different languages and never have been able to figure out a good way to retain what I learned. 

  

What character from Game of Thrones do you most identify with and why? 

• I identify most with Tyrion Lannister. I usually like to try to fit the role of being the smart guy that works behind the scene but can step up to the leadership role when it’s the right thing to do. I like to think I fit his self-description of “I drink, and I know things” pretty well. 

  

What is your favorite quote that you live by?  

• I stared at this question for roughly half an hour and didn’t think of anything. Imagine it was something snarky and clever though, because that’s absolutely what it’d be. 

  

How would you spend one million dollars?  

• If I had a million dollars to spend, it would probably be super boring and invest most of it for retirement, but I would certainly spend some of it on a trip to Europe. 

  

Over the course of your life, how many cities have you lived in? Which was your favorite?  

• My father was in the Army when I was growing up, so I’ve lived all over the country and the world. I think I’m on my 12th city right now. As an adult, I’ve lived in Kansas City, Indianapolis and Atlanta. Kansas City is easily my favorite, but I wouldn’t mind living in Indianapolis again. 

  

If you didn’t need a job, were healthy, and had plenty of time, what would you do?  

• If I had this luxury I would travel, literally everywhere. I try to travel as much as I can but would probably never stop if I didn’t have to. 

  

If you were an ice cream flavor, what flavor would you be and why?  

• If I was an ice cream flavor I would be cookies and cream because it’s the best flavor hands down and I challenge anyone to tell me otherwise. 

  

What superpower would you want to have? 

• Is it acceptable to say I would want to be Iron Man without having to do the crime fighting thing? I just want the money and the brilliance.  

  

When you were a kid, what did you want to be when you grew up?   

• As a kid I don’t remember being that focused on the future, so I imagine it was the cliché things like a firefighter or astronaut and what not. Going into college, I wanted to be a teacher. I’m glad I turned out to be doing what I’m doing now instead of any of those other things. 

  

If you could meet one person, living or dead, who would it be and why? 

• If I could meet someone, anyone, I would want to get a beer with Obama and ask him how he feels about the world. I feel like he’d have insightful words and a unique perspective.