In September, Christian Buckley asked if I wanted to try and join him in 90 blogs in 90 days.
Don’t get me wrong, I WANT to join him in this, but realistically, it’s not happening. So instead, I’ve made a new goal. Well, a couple.
- I’m going to post, monthly, a summary of what I did on the month. Thanks for the idea Christian. 100% not original. 100% stealing it from you. I’m ok with this.
- I’m going to post at least one major piece of content a week. Somewhere. And while I want to say I’ll post it here, let’s be real, this is not easy, so if I post it anywhere, at least I know it will come back here next month when I do my summary.
So, here we are, mid-October, finally taking half an hour to pull up the draft list of “what did Jay do in September” blog and finalize it.
Jay’s September 2021 Roll Call
I’m going to break this up into a few recognizable categories, let’s try it by medium, this month. Shall we?
Podcasts & Videocasts
If you were wondering, I host three videocasts on a mostly monthly basis: Buzzkill IT Podcast and This Week in Teams, on the OTSN Podcast Network; and M365 Government Community Call on AvePoint’s network. This was a decent month as each of them pushed out content!
Buzzkill Episode 17 – IT Security Series: Why MFA? With Thomas Heinz
The interview with Thomas was exactly why Hunter and I love this podcast. It’s an off-the-cuff interview with old friends who just want to geek out on technology, but do so in a consumable way for the non-technical. If you want to learn about MFA, and maybe even get excited about it, check out this interview.
TWIT Episode 34: Live at SharePoint Fest Chicago with Andy Huneycutt
Episode 34 was special for Craig and me: it was our first live, in-person, episode on-site at SP Fest Chicago (now M365 Educon, FYI). I can’t say how WONDERFUL it was to (safely) see people in person and visit with this wonderful technology community. We met Andy at the conference (well, we had emailed before, but never met in person). Andy had his AV rig up most of the conference at the podcast table, and he was kind enough to join us for half an episode to show off what he does, and how. So, check out E34 for a quick update of what it’s like to be in person, and then to hear Andy’s story and learn some amazing tips on how to have a really good audio/video rig in a remote world.
AvePoint’s M365 Government Community Call – September 2021
In this episode of the month M365 Government call, Microsoft’s Tasha Scott and MTC-now-EY’s Sean Bugler joined the usual panel for a conversation bout Power Apps in the Government tenants (GCC, GCC-H, and DOD). As usual, we did a news brief and round-up of monthly community events, but the highlight was this great conversation between Tash and Sean. Massive thanks to them (and to our video production team) for another killer episode. [ Microsoft Tech Community blog post – authentication required ]
Christian Buckley’s MVP Buzz Chat
Christian has this AMAZING series called the MVP Buzz Chat in which he interviews Microsoft MVPs to understand their story. How did they get to what they do, and what DO they do, and what makes it unique, and why is this community so awesome. Since I was announced MVP in July Christian has been on my tail to get with him and we finally did. What a blast of a conversation. Thank you for including me in your series, Christian. I’m not worth!!!
Blog posts
I didn’t author a lot of official blog content last month, but while Iw as digging around I found this white paper I wrote a few years back (10) about the intersection of People, Process, and Technology and how it would drive technological change. And damn if a decade later Microsoft isn’t pushing almost the exact same concept in the age of Digital Transformation. If you’re curious what 30 year old Management-Consulting Jay Leask sounded like (with some amazing friends), check out this article and click through for the original white paper. Let me know if you think it aged well!
Community Content
In the future I will link to community content, but looking back on September I’m not sure at this point what I might have done. So … I’m just using this as a placeholder for the future.
Planning but (maybe) not committed
I may have a few things up my sleeve, so in the hopes that it commits me more to getting them done, here’s some of what I’m hoping to kick off (but maybe not release) in October.
So, what can you expect?
- M365 Chicago will be back January 14th, 2022, with It’s M365 below in Chicago. Expect a Call for Sponsors, a Call for Speakers, and a Call for volunteers to come soon. If you’re intersted, ping me! And keep an eye out on the M365 Twitter account for details!
- This Week in Teams is looking at Microsoft Viva starting … maybe next Monday? Yikes!
- As the Buzzkill IT Security series continues, we are looking at another topic that barely gets conversation, and talk with the Chief Data Officer to better understand their role in cloud collaboration.
Upcoming Speaking and Conference Schedule
Last but not least, where can you find Jay in the next two months?
- October 26-27: AFCEA TechNet Cyber, Baltimore Maryland
Booth Babe: Find me at the GDIT booth as we showcase AvePoint and GDIT’s solutions for M365 DOD migration and management. - November 12: M365 Friday Cabo San Lucas (virtual) – FREE CONFERENCE
- Speaking: The Modern Workplace architecture is Flat – I will be joining my co-conspirator on Flat Architecture for this virtual conference, “The Joy of SharePoint” Joy Apple.
- November 18: Teams Day Online (virtual) – FREE CONFERENCE
- Speaking: How Viva Insights and Workplace Analytics Enable you to Measure Business Productivity – Microsoft Customer Engineer & CTO Craig Jahnke and I bring an updated presentation on Viva Insights and Workplace analytics to the stage. Viva is growing fast, so this one hasn’t gotten old yet, no matter how many times we pesent!
- Panel: M365 Government Community Call #TeamsDayOnline – The M365 Gov team brings you a live version of our monthly call where we will focus on security & adotpion of Teams. This is a roundtable, so bring your questions!
So, there you go. It’s no 30 posts, but not a bad roll call, eh Christain? See you in November!
