27Oct2023
19May2023
The future is bright, according to Bing’s New Chat Bot
“I think Copilot is an amazing innovation that can transform the way we work and make us more efficient and creative. I am glad to see Microsoft leading the way in AI technology. 😊” Thanks for that insight, Bing. I don’t know what I’d do without you. It is hard to...
28Jul2020
Is “Best Practices” a myth?
I often find myself musing over this question these days. Granted, I actually do publish something called The Microsoft 365 Best Practices Checklists--but really these are more like recommendations. In fact, I recently updated them to include governance decisions around collaboration (e.g. affecting apps such as OneDrive for Business, Teams...
21Jan2020
Understanding file server migrations to Microsoft 365
In my opinion, there is only one viable migration path to move data from old file servers to Microsoft 365: it has to be a user-engaged migration. IT people always ask me about tools--stuff like the SharePoint migration tool or Microsoft's recent acquisition of mover.io, and there are even fancier...
25Nov2019
Unpopular opinion: Do not restrict users from creating Teams (Office 365 Groups)
I realize that advocating for no (or very limited) boundaries on who can create Teams puts me in the minority. When I look out across the community, I mostly see consultants in this space suggesting the opposite is a superior approach for various reasons--that the privilege should be constrained heavily....
21Nov2019
When would I recommend Windows Virtual Desktop to a customer?
Call me crazy: I don't see the value in a Remote Desktop or Virtual Desktop experience for its own sake. The purpose of this kind of solution is to provide centralized management and remote access to specifically Windows-based applications. In short: Remove your dependency on Windows, and you've removed the...
25Apr2019
Two philosophies for deploying Microsoft Teams in an organization
IT admins throughout the world subscribe to one of two worldviews today: Control mindset: IT's job is to control and restrict, and of course, to protect the clueless users from all of those scary threats out there in the world today (including themselves)Empower mindset: IT's job is to educate and...
02Feb2017
The Four Causes of Technology
Aristotle, in his work The Metaphysics, enumerates a number of “causes” which describe the essence of a thing. Your business’s technology is a thing. If we want to gain a good understanding of what this thing is, then we should be able to describe this thing--in its essence--we should be able to...
29Dec2016
Resourcefulness, Initiative and Grit
When faced with some problem, most of us (let's be honest) are habituated toward shopping for and purchasing some product that "solves" our problem. But the marketplace is not lacking in products. What is lacking, I believe, is spirit. When I was just a young boy, I thought that owning a...
20Oct2016