June 01, 2026

Betting on Yourself with Frank Lesniak

1 hour 7 minutes

Frank Lesniak joins Andrew Pla for a wide-ranging conversation that covers Frank's newly minted Microsoft MVP status, his journey through PowerShell, and what it looks like to build a real presence in the tech community. Frank talks through the pipeline struggles that tripped him up early on, how his VB Script and object-oriented background made the shift to PowerShell's object model feel disorienting, and how AI has quietly changed the way he approaches scripting today. The conversation takes a thoughtful turn as Andrew and Frank dig into impostor syndrome, the value of conference speaking, and how showing up consistently in the community compounds into a career. Frank also shares an update on DuPage Animal Friends, the nonprofit he serves, which supports one of the country's highest-performing open-admission animal shelters.

Key Takeaways:

The PowerShell pipeline is one of the most commonly cited stumbling blocks for newcomers, especially those coming from text-based scripting backgrounds. Learning to visualize what your objects look like at each stage of the pipeline, using tools like Get-Member, is a skill that pays dividends long term.

Showing up at conferences and user groups, even when you feel underprepared, is how you build the reps that eventually make it feel natural. Frank's consulting background gave him a head start on presentation skills, and he's clear that no one is born polished.

Community involvement and career growth are more connected than they might look from the outside. Engaging with people on GitHub, at events, and through open source creates a feedback loop that builds confidence and opens doors.

Guest Bio:

Frank Lesniak returns to The PowerShell Podcast, this time as a Microsoft MVP (Microsoft Azure, PowerShell). Frank is a Sr. Cybersecurity & Enterprise Technology Architect at West Monroe, where PowerShell runs through client work on corporate M&A: carve-outs, tenant-to-tenant migrations, identity consolidation, endpoint moves, and security posture improvement across Microsoft 365, Azure, Entra ID, Active Directory, Intune, Defender, and Windows.

Beyond consulting, Frank speaks at technical conferences, mentors first-time speakers, and publishes open-source PowerShell standards and tooling, including PSStyleGuide, GloryRole, and PSConnMon. His public work threads least-privilege identity, cloud role mining, cross-platform observability, and high-quality AI-assisted development through standards, automated tests, and automated code quality reviews.

Connect with Frank: https://linktr.ee/franklesniak

Connect with Andrew: https://andrewpla.tech/links

PSConnMon - PowerShell Network Monitoring - https://github.com/franklesniak/PSConnMon/

GloryRole - Automating Least-Privlege Azure and Entra ID Directory Roles - https://gloryrole.com

PowerShell Style Guide - https://github.com/franklesniak/PSStyleGuide

PowerShell Style Guide + Coding Agents Lightning Talk - https://github.com/devops-collective-inc/pshsummit26/tree/main/PowerShellStyleGuideForCodingAgentsAndHumans-Lesniak

Coding Agent Accelerator Template Repo (Coming Soon!) - https://github.com/franklesniak/copilot-repo-template

ProStateKit - the DSC v3-Intune Starter Kit - https://github.com/franklesniak/ProStateKit

ProStateKit Promotional Commercial - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cA5vMH522F0

macOSLab - Automating Legit macOS VMs - https://github.com/franklesniak/macOSLab

DuPage Animal Friends - https://www.dupageanimalfriends.org/

PDQ Discord: https://discord.gg/pdq

The PowerShell Podcast: https://www.pdq.com/resources/the-powershell-podcast/

Previous episodes with Frank Lesniak: https://powershellpodcast.podbean.com/?s=Frank+Lesniak

The PowerShell Podcast on YouTube: https://youtu.be/Eg-uEGaurmY

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