Monthly Online Seminar: Properly plan your SharePoint implementation around your business

Guest Author: Matt Passannante
SharePoint Experts, Inc.

A note from Mark Miller: Matt and I have known each other for a couple years. The first time we met, he was on his knees, literally, in front of a standing room only workshop at SPTechCon, begging people not to proxy the discovery phase of a SharePoint implementation. “Please. I beg you. Do. Not. Proxy!” I knew I liked that guy.

If you haven’t had a chance to see Matt in person, what is described below is the next best thing. It’s a little late for the first session, but I’m sure he’d love to hear from you for the ones coming up. SharePoint planning has been sorely lacking in many implementations I’ve seen. I fully support what Matt is trying to do, and hope you’ll take advantage of these complimentary, live online seminars.

Hello,
My name is Matt Passannante.  I am the Director of Implementation Services at SharePoint Experts, Inc. and the author and instructor of several SharePoint IT/Admin courses for 2007 and 2010 .   I’d like to personally invite you to join me as I deliver a FREE monthly online seminar focused strictly on SharePoint planning. 

“Why deliver a FREE seminar on planning?”

From the architectural and administrative perspectives, SharePoint 2010 is a completely different animal when compared to Microsoft Office SharePoint Server (MOSS) 2007.  Just because we happened to be successful administrators or architects in MOSS 2007, doesn’t mean that we’ve got enough in our skillset toolbox to automatically take on 2010.  A lot of things have changed, and we all have a lot of learning to do.  And wow, there is a lot to learn! So much, in fact, that I had to select something to pull from my SharePoint IT/Admin course for 2010, so we could cover everything we needed to in class!

For years, I would spend the first two days of my SharePoint Admin & Planning Bootcamp walking through my process for properly planning a SharePoint implementation. At the end of every course delivery, I ask each student the same question.  “How does your Monday change after attending this class?” The overwhelming response is always…

“I need to educate my boss on the business-focused approach to planning SharePoint so that we can be successful in our implementation.”

My planning approach is applicable to both SharePoint 2007 and SharePoint 2010 and educates the business on SharePoint features and functionalities while remaining focused on the business itself.  My planning process is unique and effective and doesn’t revolve solely around SharePoint.  Instead it provides guaranteed visibility into the true needs of the business and uncovers a roadmap to implementing the next most critical business value and applying the right SharePoint-related solution.

The best way for me to meet the needs of my students was to pull the planning component from my course to make way for more information on implementing SharePoint. However, I didn’t want people to miss out on learning these valuable and essential planning steps. So a free seminar was born. I want everyone to have a successful SharePoint implementation, and I want to help you get started.  That is just how passionate of a guy I am about successful planning for SharePoint! 

How did you come up with this planning approach?

For many years now I have been implementing SharePoint, and my personality has always served me well for providing a unique, personal approach to supporting the SharePoint community.  I ran a user group in Denver, Colorado for seven years and in that time I helped establish additional groups throughout the country.  I’m a board member for the SharePoint Summit in Montreal, Canada, and I speak at many of the premier conferences around the nation.   I have had the pleasure of speaking one-on-one with many administrators and business owners.

Throughout all of my experiences as a SharePoint administrator, architect, evangelist, author and instructor, the culmination of my professional and community-related SharePoint efforts over the past eight years has imprinted upon me one very important and reoccurring theme…    

“Organizations continue to have trouble planning their SharePoint implementations!”

I’m not talking about SharePoint planning for capacity, performance, or scalability. I’m talking about understanding where and how SharePoint fits within your organization.  I’m talking about providing communication and visibility to business owners before the SharePoint administrators and architects implement the SharePoint solution. 

Way too often, SharePoint implementations fail to maximize their return on investment for the business because a technology-focused approach was used to implement SharePoint.  This often leads to improper solutions, silos of information, inadequate hardware, burned-out resources, poor end-user adoption and a ton of rework.    

What organizations need to do is to take a business-focused approach to implementing SharePoint.  They need to start asking the right questions to the right people.   They need to understand the true needs of the business so that they can evaluate the multitude of functionalities that SharePoint provides and select the right solutions at the right cost and within an acceptable amount of risk for the business. 

Excellent! Sign me up!

I am delivering my SharePoint Planning Seminar monthly.  Every seminar is hosted from 9:00AM – 12:00PM Central (GMT -5) on the following dates:

• September 3rd
• October 15th
• November 19th
• December 3rd

Bring your administrator, bring your architect, bring your power user, but don’t forget your boss!  Click here to sign up now, or learn more about this seminar.
Thanks!

Guest Author: Matt Passannante
SharePoint Experts, Inc.

Matt is an energetic person, whose passion is driven by real-world experiences in learning, planning, and implementing Microsoft SharePoint solutions. Matt is a very process focused individual, who finds great joy in helping others learn more about Microsoft SharePoint.