Every year, Innovia sends a team to Microsoft Convergence so we can network with Microsoft employees as well as with other partners and customers, deepen our knowledge about Microsoft products, and continue to prepare ourselves for future improvements Microsoft announces during the conference.
Why do we do it? In order to bring all that knowledge back home! That way, we get to share what we’ve learned not only with our team, but also with our customers.
One of the biggest things we've got to share with you is that Microsoft Convergence has made sessions from the conference available to the public! The majority of sessions are available as video at this link. You will be required to provide your Name, Company, and Email address to access them, but after that, you can view as many as you like.
We asked our team to highlight their favorite sessions for you, and we've included links to the videos if they are available. Here's what Tom, Alan, Kerry, and Mark all had to share from their week at Microsoft Convergence!
Tom Doran, Customer Engagement Director, summed up the week by saying, "One Microsoft is the message we need to bring to all of our customers. Cloud and Office 365 along with Dynamics NAV work better and more collaboratively." Tom was particularly inspired by Microsoft's emphasis on telling the One Microsoft story in every video and every demonstration shown during the conference and hopes to carry this forward when engaging with existing and future customers.
Invisible or Remarkable: Tips from Seth Godin's bestselling books
This session was a favorite for Tom because Seth challenged conventional wisdom and dared us to take action! This was also a fave for Kerry who noted, "Seth's emphasis on how we find our tribe in a connection economy is spot on and supports Metcalfe's Law: The network works better when more people are using it." The video for this session was not available, but Tom and Kerry both recommend Seth's books, Tribes, Purple Cow, and Poke the Box.
Microsoft Dynamics NAV: 60 tips and tricks in 60 minutes
Tom and Kerry both picked this session as one of their favorites. "This session always gives me at least two great ideas to bring back to our customers", said Tom while Kerry said, "I always see things I'm familiar in using one way, but didn't think about applying in a slightly different way, so it's great to get a different perspective".
Alan Wyne, Business Analyst, said the overall message of Convergence this year was, "Microsoft is committed to being the leader in business systems to businesses of all sizes. NAV is an integral part of the drive for leadership and significant investment is being made in NAV. Microsoft is also committed to offering NAV across all devices and operating systems."
Power BI Overview and Technical Drilldown
This session provided an excellent overview of the Power BI tool. The examples did a great job of highlighting the ease of use and how well the tool can provide key reporting at a glance.
Microsoft Azure: An Overview for IT Leaders
The presenter was able to provide an excellent set of key points to review while moving into an Azure implementation. He showed how the costs are calculated and provide ways to minimize the costs. A good discussion was provided about the safety of Azure and trusting a provider with your data.
Microsoft Dynamics 2015: A Business Solution from Microsoft
An excellent overview of the user experience for NAV and how it remains consistent over different devices (PC, Web & Tablet). There was a focus on new features in NAV 2015 and the way those features help provide business process improvements. The presenters spoke about the new features in NAV and provided a roadmap for future development.
Kerry Rosvold, Application Consultant, added "The Cloud first, Mobile first message came through loud and clear, and built on the previous years' messages of "Microsoft plays well with others". We saw plenty of demos highlighting Cloud capabilities using tablets and phones, including Apple products, and a new hashtag #IonlydemoinAzureandonO365 emerged during the conference!"
Microsoft Dynamics NAV in Microsoft Azure Galleries
This session covered step by step how you can set up NAV on Azure with Office365 all by yourself. If you need to demo NAV or if you're just curious about the latest and greatest, this session walks you through every bit of detail you need to do it. There's also a nice section on Azure pricing if you want to run a few what-ifs to see what your business will cost in the cloud.
Mark Christie, CEO, noted, "The clear message is that both
Microsoft and technology will be moving faster yet. Great technology is coming and we as a company will not only keep up but become a leader through structure, process, and people to enable the vision."
Best Practices for Customer Service in an Engagement-Driven World
The speaker challenged everyone on innovation, noting that we must meet customer's expectations with the right information at the right time at the right place.
The Responsive Organization: A Framework for Changing How Your Organization Works
Mark thought this was a great session that showed struggles of organizations moving from traditional hierarchy to a responsive network and had some neat suggestions on how to get closer with your customers as well as culturally supporting taking risks. Tom also liked this session because it provided some interesting methods to help foster collaboration and encourage people to take chances. There was no video available for this session.
Digital Detectives: Protecting Data, Commerce and Privacy in the Age of Cybercrime
It was great to see Microsoft dedicating resources to something that is a worldwide issue, and it can become much worse in the future with cyber-terrorism. From a technology standpoint, it was also good to see how Microsoft is using their tools themselves, with Big Data, Azure, and analytics.
