At SHARE Pittsburgh 2026, we recognized outstanding community leaders whose contributions have shaped technical education, innovation, and volunteer leadership across the IBM Z ecosystem.
Frank De Gilio, chief technology officer for “declunkification” at IBM System, received the SHARE Distinguished Service Award, recognizing his exceptional contributions to the SHARE community. Carla Flores, global cybersecurity solution advisor at Broadcom, was recognized for her outstanding service for SHARE in the last year with the SHARE President’s Award, and Marna Walle, a senior technical staff member in z/OS development at IBM, received the John R. Ehrman Award for Sustained Excellence in Technical Education to honor her contributions in technical education.
SHARE Editorial Coordinator Serena Agusto-Cox spoke with SHARE’s 2026 award recipients, Frank De Gilio, Carla Flores, and Marna Walle, about their mainframe journeys, the role SHARE has played in their careers, and the lessons they’ve learned through decades of service and technical education. In this Q&A, they reflect on leadership, mentorship, volunteering, and how today’s members can help shape the future of the mainframe community.
SHARE HQ: WHAT’S YOUR MAINFRAME STORY? HOW DID YOU COME TO THE PLATFORM?
Frank De Gilio: My dad was a teacher. Every summer he ran a computer summer school. I wrote my first COBOL program before I was 10. That program went on to become quite famous. You may have heard of it: HelloWorld.
By the time I was old enough to write real code, I was writing almost exclusively in APL and that’s when I first met the mainframe. I took Dad’s class summer after summer until eventually, I was helping him teach it. Along the way, I picked up a pile of languages and became a reasonably adequate programmer.
I joined IBM as a tester, but I fell in love with helping customers put the latest technology to work on the platform. I stopped writing code and started architecting solutions that connected the mainframe to everything else. My focus now is the same as it was then: bringing modern technology to mainframe shops around the world.
Carla Flores: (pictured right: receiving the President's Award) I became interested in computers after taking my first programming class during my freshman year of high school and I was instantly hooked. While helping with manual accounting records at my father’s trucking business, I wrote my first program to automate his billing.
In college, I learned Assembler, JCL, and COBOL. While I enjoyed programming, I knew it wasn't a lifelong path for me. My mainframe career started on the night shift as a computer operator where I quickly learned that the mainframe was the true backbone of the organization.
Over the years, I worked across various areas of the data center — including operations, systems programming, Unix, and z/VM — before ultimately finding my home in security (ACF2). Nearly 30 years later, I'm still deeply engaged and enjoying every aspect of working in mainframe security!
Marna Walle: I joined the mainframe family right out of college. At the time, I was interviewing for a lot of IT jobs and only one of them was for the mainframe.
The IBM Poughkeepsie recruiter kept telling me how important this platform was, and how the world couldn’t live without it. I knew then that I wanted to be where the action was. In the interviews, the managers shared all the exciting technology the development team was working on and I was even more convinced. I could see the power and future of the platform — I was sold.
SHARE HQ: HOW DID YOU FIRST LEARN ABOUT SHARE? AND WHAT MADE YOU WANT TO JOIN THE SHARE COMMUNITY?
Frank De Gilio: I started at SHARE as a stand-in. Hilon Potter would sign up for sessions, and when SHARE rolled around, he was often on vacation. So, he’d hand me his foils (for younger readers, those were transparencies you put on an overhead projector) and I’d get up and present them. It turned out I loved it. Standing in front of people from all over the world and talking about how to make things work was a blast.
Eventually I started submitting my own sessions. At one SHARE I presented 13 of them. I was exhausted, but I loved every change to show people what modern technology could do on the platform.
Carla Flores: My first exposure to SHARE was supporting the CA Technologies booth in the SHARE Expo. As I became more involved, I knew it was an organization I wanted to contribute to further. I began speaking and engaging more in the technical program, eventually jumping on a volunteer opportunity in the security track. I started as a project scheduler, advanced to project manager (track lead), and took on additional roles across various committees and leadership positions.
Eventually, I joined the SHARE Board as a director, and when Broadcom became a strategic partner, I assumed the role of Broadcom board liaison.
Marna Walle: (pictured left: receiving the John R. Ehrman Award for Sustained Excellence in Technical Education) SHARE was always the conference that the development team talked about. We worked on gathering feedback from clients and others in the mainframe community, resolving problems brought back from SHARE, and helping launch new functions.
Early on, I thought it would be wonderful to attend and even present on a small topic. When I first went, I knew there was something special about a week at SHARE — information overload every day and I loved it!
Over time, the friendships and technical education have kept me coming back. SHARE connects me to the worldwide experts who know and love the mainframe. What could be better than that?
SHARE HQ: WHAT DOES THIS AWARD MEAN TO YOU?
Frank De Gilio: I’m humbled and honored in equal measure. When I look at the list of past recipients, I honestly wonder whether I belong in their company. I’m in the later chapters of my career, but I’m in no hurry to write the last page. It means a great deal to know that others feel I’ve made a positive difference in this industry.
Carla Flores: Receiving the SHARE President's Award is a tremendous honor and a deeply meaningful milestone in my career.
SHARE has been such a vital community for me — both professionally and personally — for many years. Being recognized by an organization that I care so deeply about validates the years of volunteering, collaboration, and passion I’ve poured into the mainframe community. It reinforces my commitment to keeping this community vibrant, educational, and supportive for the next generation of IT professionals.
Marna Walle: I was very surprised when I heard I would receive it. The prior recipients are true giants in the industry and I am deeply humbled. There is still so much I want to do on the platform, especially in helping people use the great functions they need but may not even be aware of.
I think about how much John Ehrman contributed to the platform. This award is a constant reminder of the challenges John faced and how many people he taught with grace and patience. He made complicated things easier to understand. He made the mainframe an exciting part of their lives and inspired them to pass that spark along. This award makes me want to do the same to honor him.
SHARE HQ: HOW HAVE SHARE CONFERENCES SUPPORTED YOU IN YOUR PROFESSIONAL GOALS?
Frank De Gilio: SHARE has been my megaphone. It’s where I’ve been able to show people the cool, modern things you can do on the platform. A lot of my work traces back to someone sitting in a SHARE session and seeing the art of the possible.
It helped my career, too.
Presenting at SHARE was a visible way to give back to the community and that mattered when promotion time came around. Most importantly, SHARE has let me put new and different ways of using the mainframe in front of a huge number of companies.
Carla Flores: SHARE has given me the opportunity to grow and support my professional goals in several ways:
- Technical Education & Knowledge Sharing: Access to high-quality, peer-led technical sessions has kept me at the leading edge of mainframe trends and security developments, allowing me to bring actionable knowledge back to my daily work. It has also afforded me the opportunity to share my knowledge with others and give back to community.
- Leadership Development: Volunteering at SHARE in diverse roles has allowed me to sharpen my public speaking, project management, and strategic governance skills in a supportive environment.
- Networking & Mentorship: The conferences provide an incredible platform to build lasting relationships with industry peers, mentors, and strategic partners, creating a strong professional network across the mainframe ecosystem.
Marna Walle: SHARE has given me a vast network of diverse IT professionals. There are so many specialties on the mainframe and SHARE brings them all together. It is the place where I can learn about something I wasn’t aware of, dive deeper into a topic I only know a little about, and even share some laughs in a social setting.
SHARE has broadened my scope of expertise and given me the opportunity to share my knowledge with others.
SHARE HQ: WHAT ADVICE WOULD YOU GIVE OTHER SHARE MEMBERS ABOUT VOLUNTEERING AND PROVIDING TECHNICAL EDUCATION IN THE COMMUNITY?
Frank De Gilio: I’ve spent more than 30 years in this community as a volunteer, a presenter, and an IBM representative. In all that time, nothing has given me more great conversations or more great ideas.
As we head into the AI era, SHARE will need to reinvent itself around the next generation of mainframers. That’s your opening. Step up and be more than the mainframe expert at your company.
Help shape the future of this community and build on what the rest of us started.
Carla Flores: There is no better time than today to get involved.
Reach out to peers, connect with other SHARE members on Basecamp, or explore the various ways to contribute, whether through technical presentations, committees, or speaking. Look for mentors if you are new to the mainframe or find ways to give back to the community and the mainframe ecosystem that has supported your professional journey and brought you to where you are today.
Feel free to reach out to me personally, I am always happy to help you get started!
Marna Walle: Presenting or co-presenting a session is a great place to start!
Start small with something you know well to build your presentation skills, then branch out from there.
Write articles for SHARE’d Intelligence and other publications and share them with the SHARE community.
Volunteer as a session chair, committee member, or dinner organizer — these roles will expand your network and introduce you to people across different disciplines.
The mainframe community is a big place and participating at SHARE is one of the most rewarding things you can do in it.
Learn more about our volunteer opportunities and become a member today!
Frank De Gilio is a distinguished engineer with IBM Systems where he gave himself the title chief technology officer for “declunkification.” He’s dedicated to making the mainframe simpler to use, manage, and love and he’s also the driving force behind z/OS Everything as Code (XaC).
He started as a computer and systems analyst at Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette and joined IBM in 1985 in mainframe development, writing and testing code that tied together MVS, OS/2, Windows, and a handful of UNIX platforms. In 1999, he built the IBM Design Center and he was an early pioneer of Linus on the mainframe.
Frank has written books on J2EE security and cloud computing, plus plenty of whitepapers on infrastructure design. He also writes the “Let Me Be Frank” column for the Tuning Letter at Planet Mainframe and hosts Terminal Talk, a mainframe podcast with more than 100 episodes and over 1,000 listeners.
Marna Walle is an IBM Senior Technical Staff Member in z/OS Development, dedicated to making the world's most critical operating system easier to install, upgrade, and maintain. A University of Florida and NYU graduate, she holds 15 worldwide patents, co-authored IBM Redbooks, taught at Marist College, and is a SHARE Distinguished Speaker, blogger, and podcaster. Whether writing technical articles, presenting at conferences worldwide, or working on the next generation of z/OS simplification, Marna is equally at home learning from the room as speaking to it.
Carla Flores, global cybersecurity solution advisor at Broadcom, has over 25 years of experience in mainframe cybersecurity and compliance. Throughout her career, Carla has held several roles, including security administration, systems programming, product management, product marketing, and technical consulting. Her areas of greatest interest include security optimization, best practice recommendations, audit remediation, guiding customers along their cybersecurity journey and mentorship. A resident of Pittsburgh, PA Carla also works to further STEAM interest at local elementary schools and supports Women in IT at SHARE, Broadcom and a local Pittsburgh chapter. In her spare time, she enjoys gardening and spending time outdoors with her family and pups.