Microsoft Flow Virtual Summit – Demos

collab365-virtual-summitsToday was the first day of the Microsoft Flow Virtual Summit sponsored by Collab 365. I really enjoyed being able to sit back and watch my recorded session and spend my time answering questions from the attendees. The comments I got in the chat window were all very gracious and complimentary. It didn’t take long during the session for people to start asking if I would make my demos available after the session. I promised that I would export all seven and post them here on my blog and also send them to the Collab 365 folks to be posted on the Summit site. The demos have all been exported and sent via email to Collab 365.  Now I just need to upload them and post them here:

  1. Applying custom formatting to the approval email
  2. Recording approval results and comments
  3. Creating custom responses without premium licensing
  4. Forwarding an approval if the approver is out of the office
  5. Escalating an approval that hasn’t been responded to
  6. Periodic reminders about pending approvals
  7. Serial Approvals with dynamic list of approvers

NACS 2019 – Wrap up and Slides

The North American Collaboration Summit (NACS) concluded last weekend in Branson, MO. This is one of the great small SharePoint conferences in the US and I always look forward to attending. It fell again this year on the weekend before the MVP Summit in Redmond at Microsoft, so travel arrangements were complex.  But it was well worth the effort. Most of my sessions were well attended and the one highly technical session that had a low turnout probably had the highest interest from the attendees who were there.  It was a pleasure to feel that I was sharing information that people really wanted to learn about.  It was also great to spend time with a number of long time friends who were also presenting.

I promised to make my slides available, so I’ve uploaded them here.  Sorry for the delay, but getting anything extra accomplished while at the MVP Summit is almost impossible. If you have any follow-up questions please email me at pstork@dontpapanic.com.  You can download a copy of the slides from each talk using the links below:

Intro to SharePoint 2019: What’s New

Desired State Configuration (DSC): Controlling SharePoint Deployment in Azure VMs

Intro To OneDrive NextGen Sync: What is it, how it works, and can I manage it?


Re-awarded as an MVP for the 11th Year

MVP_Logo_Secondary_Blue288_RGB_300ppiFor the last 10 years July 1st has always been a day that I both looked forward to and dreaded.  I’ve looked forward to it because its anniversary of the day that I was awarded the honor of being named as a Microsoft Most Valuable Professional for the first time. But I’ve also dreaded it.  Because no matter how many presentations you’ve made or how much you’ve answered questions on the forums or active you’ve been in the community, you always wonder if its been enough. But then sometime around mid-day the email arrives saying that you have been re-awarded for another year as an MVP.  That email arrived for me today around 11:40 AM (9:40 AM Redmond time). So for the 11th year Microsoft has decided that my contributions to the SharePoint and Office 365 community were sufficient to earn  me an MVP award again for the category of “Office Servers and Services”. 

But this coming year will be a little different than previous years because I plan to move towards partial retirement from my consulting career. Before you get the idea that I’ll be less involved as an MVP, think again. Being an MVP has always been about your contributions to the technical community over and above your regular job. So in the past I often took vacation time to speak at conferences or spent time on the forums before and after work.  Since I won’t be focusing on “earning a paycheck” anymore I’ll be able to devote even more time to community activities. I’m expecting my contributions to the community will go up as I move to retirement, not fade away.

So, I make this offer to Community Leaders

If you are looking for a SharePoint or Office 365 speaker for your event, and you can help me defray travel expenses, I will be willing to travel almost anywhere, at anytime to share what I have learned over the years.

SharePoint, Office 365, and Dynamics CRM are subjects that I’m passionate about. And my moving towards retirement is just a partial thing. I still plan to continue to do consulting and training for many years to come. If consulting/training opportunities come my way I will continue to work. Because that’s now I keep learning new things. But if paying jobs don’t happen to come my way then I’ll live off my retirement savings and spend even more time speaking and answering questions. 

So here’s to another year as an MVP. I think it will be an exciting one.

Presentation to Cincinnati SPUG: Protecting Your Content with SharePoint DLP

security and compliance centerLast week I presented a talk to the Cincinnati SharePoint User’s Group entitled, “Protecting your Content: Demystifying Data Loss Prevention (DLP)
in SharePoint 2016
”. I couldn’t make it to the user group in person, but they were nice enough to let me present it via Skype. At the end of the talk I promised to post my slides.

You can download a read only copy of the slides from the talk using the link below:

Protecting your Content: Demystifying Data Loss Prevention (DLP)

SharePoint Fest – DC Wrap-up & Slides

My wife and I really enjoyed our visit to Washington DC last week.  The conference attendees were great and both my sessions and workshop were well attended.  It was a pleasure to feel that I was sharing information that people really wanted to learn about.  The week was even better because at night we got to spend time with my daughter, son-in-law, and 6 month old granddaughter.  Getting to present at a conference and spend time with family and friends is a great combination.

I promised to make my slides available, so I’ve uploaded them here.  They are also available on the SharePoint Fest DC site for attendees.  If you have any follow-up questions please email me at pstork@dontpapanic.com.  You can download a copy of the slides from each talk using the links below:

WS 203 – Office 365 Feature Explosion: What should you be using

ADM 105 – Protecting your Content: Demystifying Data Loss Prevention (DLP) in SharePoint

BV 204 – Implementing SharePoint: Failure to Plan is Planning to Fail

SPT 202 – Ensuring Business Continuity: Planning for High Availability and Disaster Recovery in SharePoint