First off, I’d like to shake the rust off of my keyboard and state that I’m extremely excited to be back in the blogosphere. That goes for consulting in general, and working with Wisconsin clients in particular. There’s just something about helping out friends, connections and worthy businesses in my home state that has always appealed to me, and it’s nice to be back at it.
I’ve already been in touch with so many of you from over the years, and I’m honored by your excitement to work with a world-class Microsoft partner like Perficient as well as the crack team we have assembled locally. Believe me when I say we share that enthusiasm and look forward to partnering with you.
That said, a great deal has changed in the last two years. The last time I was blogging anything of consequence, it was early 2010 and Microsoft was poised to launch the latest versions of SharePoint and Office for general availability. In the time that’s elapsed since then, SharePoint use has evolved dramatically.
Basic scenarios like classic intranets, collaboration platforms and document management have given way to search-based applications, complex-yet-flexible dashboards, and user-friendly social experiences that bring people together and capitalize on an organization’s internal expertise.
Perhaps the single most important thing that I learned in my time at Microsoft is this— successfully deploying SharePoint and building adoption in this decade is going to depend on two things. What are they?
- A sound strategy for social behind the firewall, and…
- An intuitive user experience!
In my next post, we’re going to begin addressing the topic of social in SharePoint. After that, I’ve got a whole series of posts coming down the pipeline to address the topic of user experience, so fear not, UX fans—come back next week, same bat-time, same bat-channel and we’ll make you happy too!
It’s great to be back!
–Rich
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