Good times in Boston. I was coming off a trip to Sweden #SEF2010 which I still need to wrap up. Look for that next.
My SpTechCon Session Slides:
Making SharePoint Social – A look at the challenges and problems that the SharePoint Social features address as well as tips on SharePoint 2010 social deployment. Demos included looks at status, rich profiles, ratings, activity feeds, and tags vs. managed metadata.
Anatomy of a Failed Deployment – This look at SharePoint Worst Practices is designed for all audiences and designed to help you understand “What NOT to do.” Tips include recommendations around service applications, social deployments, site collection vs. site, and roles and responsibilities.
Wed Night I ran into Dux and Mark Miller in the hotel. Before long we had Brett Lonsdale, SharePoint Sara, and 9 people ultimately piled into my rental. I’ve made it a point to get a vehicle with a good trunk cause who knows how many people you may need to stuff into your trunk.
After we all headed over to the #SharePint at Beerworks where we ran into 20-30 SharePoint people. A number of them had already headed back to the hotel.
After that I suggested we take on Quincy market area where some of the oldest bars in the US, and normally is pretty hopping. Those of us who were ready for a bite stopped and got some wings.
SPTechcon itself was really one of the best conferences I’d been to for a while. You can see the impact the SharePoint Saturday’s have had on conferences as many of the speakers made their way through community by getting real speaking experience and showing their depth at events. It’s great to see the large number of SharePoint speakers. I never got the final count on the conference, but attendance seemed well over 700 with possibly over 1000. The vendor hall was really good. Over 60 booths with good giveaways including characters like a SharePoint Ninja all the way from Japan.
I did work on a video that I’m really looking forward to. We had a professional video guy, so I’m anxious to see how it turned out. Definitely plan to see more on that.
After the Boston SharePoint Usergroup we had the highest SharePoint IQ ever in a single panel was great to stand beside Andrew Connell, Dux Raymond Sy, Bill English, Heather Solomon and Mark Miller. Loved the broad base. Was especially significant to me to see Bill, AC, and Dustin embrace at the end of the ATE. That’s a big deal. Mindsharp, Critical Path, and SharePoint Experts all embracing shows you how different our community is, and how we’ve really evolved.
On Thursday night out for another #SharePint after the SPUG it was great catching up with @michaeltnoel as he came straight from Teched South Africa with a stop at Swaziland and CapeTown SharePoint Saturday. Great to compare stories. AC started calling our table at John Harvards the Frequent Flier Table. Would be funny to see the YTD miles covered by our table.
Ultimately my wrap up is on seeing the community really healthy. Jobs are good, vendors seem to be doing ok, consultants are happy, travel is up, and slowing over the holidays. Speaking of travel, early next year and spring are really crazy with TEC in Vegas, SPTECHCON San Fran, UK Best Practices, Best Practices US, NZ SharePoint Community Conference, and AUS Community Conference and more SPConnections. It’s always tough figuring out which conferences to go to, and usually you don’t have them all in front of you when you have to decide. Wish I was in Singapore right now, but I just came off one of the craziest travel months in my career. I was home 6 days in October. Next 2 months I’ll be away 6 days. So It’s good to find some balance.
What’s next!!!? SharePoint Connections in Vegas Nov 1-4 and SharePoint Saturday Miami/Ft. Lauderdale, Dec 4.