The Best Practices Conference (BPC) is officially underway, and a veritable "who's who" of SharePoint experts has descended upon the Washington, D.C. region to fulfill the BPC's mission in providing clarity, direction, and confidence to the assembled attendees.
In his role as BPC "host," Bill English provided the introductory remarks at the beginning of the keynote this morning. As is customary, Bill shared some stats related to the BPC and its attendees. This instance of the conference, taking place in Reston, VA, features: over 375 attendees; 130 sessions being presented by over 60 speakers, including five MCMs (Microsoft Certified Masters, all five of whom were to follow Bill in delivering the keynote proper), and 18 MVPs; 30 exhibitors, half of whom (including Bamboo) are BPC sponsors; attendees include 100+ CIO, IA, Director, and/or PM; and federal employees represent 25% of all attendees.
Bill explained that the official BPC 2010 tagline of "Clarity, Direction, Confidence" equates to the BPC philosophy thusly: "Where there is confusion, speakers will provide clarity; where there is aimlessness, they will provide direction; and where there is hopelessness, they will provide confidence." Bill also mentioned that a benefit of a smaller conference with a large number of speakers is that attendees are able to "rub shoulders" with presenters, and better ensure that all of their questions will be answered.
Further discussing the BPC philosophy, Bill said that "the focus is on what you should do with [SharePoint], not what you can do with the product." Bill underscored that philosophy by saying that, "At this conference, we connect the business layer to the technology." Accordingly, Bill explained that attendees should expect each speaker to include at least three best practices recommendations, one worst practice, and one "trade-off" in each session.
And though this wasn't Bill's final note during his opening remarks, I'm going to make it mine: The next BPC will take place in La Jolla, CA, at the Hilton Torrey Pines from March 7-9, 2011, so if you're based on the West Coast (and, given the location, especially if you're an avid golfer), you might want to save the date now. I was fortunate enough to attend and cover the previous West Coast BPC at Torrey Pines in 2009, and it featured every bit the high-powered speaker list that the inaugural East Coast edition had offered several months previously.
Check out ourfull coverage of Best Practices Conference 2010:
- Dux Raymond Sy on 'SharePoint as a Gov 2.0 Platform'
- 'Enabling Social Media through Metadata' in SharePoint 2010 with Christian Buckley
- Mark Eichenberger on 'Making Social Networks Successful in SharePoint 2010'
- Managers' Quick Guide to SharePoint Server 2010
- Mark Miller Explains 'How to Build a Community in SharePoint'
- 'SharePoint 2010: An Administrative Odyssey' with Lori Gowin
- Building Solutions That Users Get
- 'Making SharePoint 2010 My Sites Work for Your Organization' with Michael Doyle
- Best Practices in Leveraging Microsoft Project 2010 With SharePoint 2010 for Project Management
- Building SharePoint Applications with InfoPath and SharePoint Designer with Darvish Shadravan
- SharePoint 2010 Workflow with David Mann
- Cathy Dew Answers the Question, 'SharePoint Branding – Where Do You Even Begin?'
- How to Best Gather Requirements for SharePoint Projects
- SharePoint End User Adoption with Kay McClure
- BPC Keynote: 'What the Masters Think About SharePoint 2010,' Facilitated by Spence Harbar
- Greetings from the Best Practices Conference! (AKA, Bill English Sets the Tone with His Introductory Remarks)
- The Coolest SharePoint T-shirt of the Year So Far
- Live Blogging Archives
