Presenting the first session of the business track in Manila, Dux  Raymond Sy exhibited all of his trademark energy and passion for SharePoint while talking about Empowering Your Organization with SharePoint 2010.  Dux explained that the intent of his session was "to look at SharePoint as a business platform, [show] how to automate business processes with SharePoint, and how to leverage SharePoint with existing technologies."

At the core of his presentation was what Dux refers to as "Six use cases to [help you] be successful with SP."  Dux feels that "At the heart of SharePoint is this word 'sharing,' and having a centralized point."  Explaining further, Dux said that "Sharing is collaboration, and as for having a centralized for information such as reporting and accessing customer data (noting that, depending on your particular role within the organization, you'll have specific needs around centralization of information, for example, an on-boarding process in HR), "SharePoint is flexible enough to support that."

Beginning to work his way through the six ways SharePoint can empower your organization, first up was "Easily create a collaboration website."  Dux helpfully illustrated all six empowerment methods with SharePoint 2010 demos.  For the first method's demo, Dux created and talked about the benefits of an out-of-the-box team site.

For the second method, "Efficiently manage information," Dux discussed the document management features of SharePoint and showed how to auto-sync a SharePoint calendar with Outlook out-of-the-box, and provided a demo of the version history of files that can be maintained automatically with SharePoint out-of-the-box.

Moving on to number three, "Facilitate better team collaboration" Dux said that by using its native collaboration tools, SharePoint can be leveraged much better than email ("a 1973 technology" and still the single most common collaboration tool in the enterprise).  Dux showed that he "can easily tie a [SharePoint] discussion board to Outlook, as if it was an email.

The fourth method, "Seamlessly integrate with existing tools," and Dux demonstrated this by showing that using Excel 2010, a spreadsheet can be converted to a table and published to SharePoint, allowing sync "as part of a project site."

Moving on to number five, "Automate business processes," Dux used a change request as his example, joking, "Don't you love scope creeps?"  Dux showed an out-of-the-box change request form, how to create a change request workflow, showing status and rules options that can be setup, and finally demonstrating the automated kickoff of the workflow.  As an added bonus, Dux explained that, by its nature, the workflow provides "traceability" with process, as it's possible to see what the status of the workflow is at any point.

Discussing the sixth method, "Generate relevant reports and dashboards," Dux said that "management loves to see a pie chart."  By way of providing an example of the ease of creating reports in SharePoint, Dux inserted a Chart Web Part, explaining Web Parts as being "pre-made software pieces," and chose the pie chart option with a 3-D look, connected it to existing expense data, and voila, SharePoint converted the data into a visual  pie chart presentation.

Wrapping up, Dux addressed his "Last point… how do you make this happen?" and said that the most important first step is to answer the questions, " What are your business needs?" and  "What are your pain points?"  Dux advised that you "go for the quick wins" to ease pain points at first, and to also focus on what you can do with SharePoint out-of-the-box first.  If your business needs can't be completely met out-of-the-box, Dux said, "Go and get a third-party solution from Bamboo Solutions or somebody else, [but think of] custom coding as a last resort."

Read our complete coverage of the Sharing the Point Tour:

• Microsoft Hosts a Fantastic Inaugural Sharing the Point Event in Beijing
• Michael Noel’s ‘Best Practices for SharePoint 2010 Virtualization’
• Paul Swider’s ‘Developing Social Applications with SharePoint’
• Microsoft Philippines Hosts the Second Sharing the Point Event in Manila
• Dux Raymond Sy's 'Empowering Your Organization with SharePoint 2010'
• Mark Miller’s 'The Missing Link Between SharePoint & Your Business'