I have taken a full time position. What does that mean to followers of EndUserSharePoint.com?
I have taken a fulltime evangelist position with Global 360. What does that mean to the followers of EndUserSharePoint.com? — Mark
The EndUserSharePoint.com audience has matured over the past two years. At first, the community was interested in just getting a handle on SharePoint and what it could do. Then we moved together into the interface enhancements phase where we explored what could be done at the presentation layer when the site owner had no access to the server.
Now it’s time to move beyond thinking of SharePoint as a stand-alone platform, and start providing solutions to real business problems, by reaching the “Unconscious Competence” stage.
As the SharePoint Community of End Users has matured over the years, I’ve tried to keep pace by providing deeper content for SharePoint Power Users, such as the content the jQuery teams have been providing, as well as providing direction for the beginning End User. This weekend at SharePoint Saturday Tampa, I rolled out a new presentation with Global 360, “The Missing Link Between SharePoint and the End User Community”.
The “Missing Link” presentation is the beginning salvo of a new type of content we will be providing on EndUserSharePoint.com, that of Business Process Management.
I see the next stage of maturity in the SharePoint market happening at the Business Analyst level. Too much has been done, and is still being done, in SharePoint that does not have a direct correlation with Business Processes. As I look around the landscape it has become clear to me that the most value I can provide now to my mature users is to start concentrating on Business Process as it relates to being exposed through SharePoint.
As a Business Process Management company, Global 360, has asked me to come on fulltime as their evangelist for SharePoint. What does this mean to you, a follower of EndUserSharePoint.com? How does this affect the site, the content and my objectivity?
EndUserSharePoint.com is not becoming part of Global 360. EndUserSharePoint.com stays the same! This was a concern to some of our authors. EUSP stays an independent , stand-alone voice, as it has always been. EUSP has not been bought by Global 360, they do not have anything to do with the site, other than providing occasional articles and content about Business Process Management in SharePoint.
Natasha Felshman continues to handle the day to day aspects of EndUserSharePoint.com, as she has done for the past two years. Natasha works fulltime to keep the content fresh and help the authors whenever needed. I find content and authors for the site, she handles getting the content formatted and inserted into the publishing schedule. That won’t change.
EndUserSharePoint.com has over a dozen authors, providing SharePoint specific content on a regular basis. In addition, I am adding content providers from the Business Process Management field to provide vendor agnostic articles on Business Process Management and how it relates to your SharePoint implementation. I think the analysis of current processes in a business environment is a critical piece, the “Missing Link”, for Power Users and Business Users of SharePoint.
At this critical juncture in the maturation of the SharePoint Community, working at Global 360 will give me the strongest position to learn and expose solutions to Business Process with real world context as it relates to SharePoint.
I’m excited about stepping up to the next level of understanding with EndUserSharePoint.com and I hope you are too. I appreciate the support you’ve given me in the past two years and sincerely hope you’ll stay with me during this phase of connecting SharePoint to real world business needs.
Regards,
Mark Miller
Founder and Editor
EndUserSharePoint.com
on
Congratulations, Mark, I look forward to seeing the new content on the site!
.b
Grats on the new gig, Mark! This additional content sounds really exciting; I look forward to continuing to learn about SP from the many generous gurus and site members at EUSP.
(And thanks for the heavy lifting, Natasha!)
Thanks, Erin!
This is very exciting for me as someone who is working in business process role. I’m excited to learn as much as possible and looking forward to the expanded focus :)
Mark:
I congratulate you as well. EndUserSharePoint.com seems to be in good hands. I will continue visiting the site and *evangelizing* its unique perspective.
– Preston.
Very exciting for you Mark, and very timely for us! We are in the early stages of dealing with the Missing Link here at VHDA… Looking forward to some great postings – see you in DC!
Congratulatins Mark! Good to know I can continue to point our end users to your site and that I will be able to continue on my learning journey – all in one location.
Congrats Mark!!
As someone with a MBA degree that also writes code I can fully appreciate moving towards more BA topics and a bit less JQuery. That’s where all of us could use better guidance. We have the system, we’ve heard the sales pitch, now let’s apply it towards a real goal and see results.
Congratulations and best wishes!
Congratulations Mark! There is indeed a great need for the business processes aspects. Looking forward to it. And good luck at 360!
(And yes, thanks Natasha!)
Congrats to you, Mark!!!! I’m looking forward to hearing more from you and your role at Global360. Thank you so much for all you’ve added to the SP Community.
~Beth
Thank you to everyone for your kind comments. I’m really excited about this and I hope it comes across. If I can help people make the connection between what they are doing in their business and how that can relate to SharePoint, we all win. — Mark
As all the other comments state, this is hitting me at the perfect time too (as does nearly every topic you publish here!) Congrats! Looking forward to the new content.
And Natasha, thanks for keeping it all pulled together for us!
I’ve said for a long time that I felt like there needed to be a business analyst as one of the primary team members on any implementation of SharePoint. Nice to see that others share the same opinion.
Congrats Mark, we all know you’ll do well!
- Jay
Congratulations Mark! Good to hear the efforts are paying off for you! I love the idea of Business Process as I am having an issue with that now ;) Looking forward to the future!
Congrats Mark and best wishes in your new role.
Well, congrats to Global 360 for getting you on board :-)
Congrats on the new gig. Although I’m relatively new to Sharepoint (6 months) I’ve been passionate about business users being able to automate their own business processes for more than 10 years.
I believe every Fortune 1,000 company would benefit from an internal Sharepoint evangelist whose job is to achieve measurable cost savings by empowering business groups to automate their own business processes without the aid of a dot net Sharepoint developer.
Well, obviously I’m just piling on here, but this is one more hearty congratulations and another voice to say that any content applying Sharepoint to BPM is going to be read carefully and with great interest!
Congratulations Mark!
I too look forward to a different approach for EUSP.
I tallied the last 50+/- posts and roughly categorized those to see how many were actual hands-on, end-user solutions. My rough estimate was a little more than a third. To cap it off and with all due respect to today’s post writer (The Ring for the…..), the article couldn’t be more tech-esoteric and unfamiliar to a moderate end user.
With SharePoint growing like a weed, it’s vital for the ones who are maturing in their competence to understand that end-user solutions are the hooks that grab us and make our work lives better. If I want theory, I’ll seek out another blog.
Thanks for all your tremendous guidance and stewardship of EUSP. I’ve grown smarter for your involvement and I’ve come to know some incredible players in the SharePoint world. You’ve brought it all to my doorstep.
Charlie Epes
Buffalo, NY
Congrats Mark!
As a BA that uses SharePoint as one of my main tool sets, I agree with the “Just because we can doesn’t mean we should” approach. There needs to be a business reason and that reason should be to benefit the customer.
Tamara
Congratulations..
Long John Willoughby: Hey, stop worryin’, Colonel, fifty bucks ain’t gonna ruin me.
The Colonel: I’ve seen plenty of fellas start out with fifty bucks and wind up with a *bank* account!
Beany: Hey, what’s wrong with a bank account, anyway?
The Colonel: And let me tell you, Long John, when you become a guy with a bank account, they gotcha! Yes sir, they gotcha!
Beany: Who’s got him?
The Colonel: The helots!
Good luck Mark, things turned out OK for Gary Cooper.