Posts Tagged ‘Microsoft Partner Network’

Do you know this man – Eric Ligman?

Friday, June 17th, 2011

If you do and you’ve had interactions with him then I have a very important announcement to make…

Eric Ligman is a wanted man.  He’s number 1 on the SMB IT Consultants most wanted list.  He’s wanted over a string of improvements he’s put into effect over the years that have positively influenced the Microsoft SMB IT Community.  If you have specific feedback on how this man has affected your business, please take a moment to read this blog post and contribute to his continued success. 

Remember – without you, this man will continue to do what he believes is right (he’s doin’ pretty ok now), but WITH your feedback, he can do what WE believe is right. 

Ok – for those that don’t get my humour – I’ve have the hugest level of respect for Eric – he’s been championing the cause of the Partner in SMB within Microsoft for years.  Personally I believe it’s so very important for us to provide feedback on both the programs that Microsoft release, and also the people within.  Eric has taken the brave step of asking us – the community to contribute… therefore speak up.

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Where can I download SBS 2011 Standard as a partner?

Monday, March 7th, 2011

One of the questions I’ve seen asked by many in the various partner groups recently is about where can they download SBS 2011 Standard edition as a partner.  Well – Eric ligman is the source of all knowledge like this – and he’s done a great blog post over on his blog – rather than rehash what he said – read his story here

Thanks Eric for all you do for us – now get cracking on the next big thing Smile

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Pip pops back… a great move!

Wednesday, January 5th, 2011

Pip Marlow annointed chief of Microsoft AustraliaI saw this morning that it’s been announced the Pip Marlow has been appointed as General Manager for Microsoft Australia.  Congratulations Pip – I think this is a fantastic move for Microsoft Australia.  Anyone who has worked with Pip when she was Partner Channel director will know all too well that she had an amazing grip on reality of the partner channel.  One can only hope that in her new role there she can help reinvigorate the channel in Australia and restore some of the faith that I hear is been lost.  Welcome back Pip and congratulations.

Oh and Pip – sorry for the corny blog post title – but I just had to. Smile

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Congratulations Amy for SBSC Partner of the Year

Thursday, June 24th, 2010

Amy Babinchak – Owner of Harbor Computer Services and ThirdTier.net and fellow MVP has had her company Harbor Computer Services named as the winner of the Global SBSC Partner of the Year by the Microsoft Partner Awards team

This is a huge honour and due in no small part to the dedication of Amy and her team show to their clients and the market place in general. Congratulations Amy!  Well Done.  You can read a little more about their award here

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SBSC Program is dead… No – wait – it’s not.

Wednesday, May 19th, 2010

SBPI_US_rgb Microsoft announced at the Worldwide Partner Conference in 2009 that the SBSC designation would be dead in 2010 and it would be replaced by a new Small Business Competency and then later a Small Business Advanced Competency.  While I was not keen to see the death of the SBSC program, it did make a certain amount of sense.  It combined the best bits of the SBSC program into the main partner program and at the same time allowed those serious SMB focused resellers such as my company Correct Solutions to achieve the Advanced Competency in Small Business which shows our clients some serious commitment to the SMB space.  Bear in mind that Correct Solutions has been focused on the SMB space now for 13 years and a Microsoft Certified Partner for over 10 years.  This was now THE WAY that we were going to show ourselves above the smaller SMB focused companies.

Well – in typical Microsoft fashion, last week they reversed this decision.  Now it’s great that Microsoft listened to the community – I applaud them for that.  However… they’ve taken away something that I believed was critical to us and our business – the ability to show we are MORE THAN A ONE MAN SHOP in the SMB space.  There are many one man operations out there that do a good job servicing the SMB space.  I have no problem with that – I started there once as well.  However those one man operations and my 14 person operation provide a totally different level of service and capabilities to our clients.  I saw the new Competency as a way to really show our differences using Microsoft branding.  Unfortunately we can’t do that now.

SBPI_US_rgb GOLDEric – I know you listen and thank you for that, however I believe you listened too much to the wrong people on this decision.  Maybe you can morph the SBSC into an Advanced section – hey – tell you what why not make the Blue Badge into a Gold Badge for those large orgs like ourselves.  Look… I’ll even do the design for you – how does this look? :-)

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Microsoft Australia – refocusing on SMB

Friday, November 27th, 2009

Microsoft Australia have announced this week that they have selected a full time resource for the role of SMB Partner Technology Advisor.  They have appointed Mark O’Shea to the role which is a massive boost for the SMB partners here in Australia.  Those that don’t yet know him will come to appreciate his straight shooting, no holding back style.  Mark is a long term MS stalwart whose focus on the technical side rather than marketing has always been appreciated by many of us.

Mark was actually THE GUY that is responsible for me being involved so closely with Microsoft Australia.  Back in the SBS 4.5 days, Mark was a member of the SBS2K list (before it was yahoo) and put the call out for any Aussies to catch up with.  Following on from that I got involved in discussions with Mark about how hard many out there saw it to move from SBS 4.5 to SBS 2000 (bear in mind there were no wizards at that time).  I’d been doing my own version of a same domain migration for some time moving people from SBS 4.5 over to SBS 2000 without all the pain.  Many people now know as Swing Migration which Jeff Middleton has taken further.  Anyway – long story short – it was through Mark that I became involved, and I know that with Mark “back in the fold in SMB” that it will go a long way to help us all be better informed about the technology side of SMB stuff here in AU.

Give Mark a break though… he’s spent years trying to get SBS out of his blood and has denied it’s existence for some time so that he could focus on his other roles inside Microsoft. He will need a little time to come up to speed with SBS/EBS etc :-) … ok times up Mark :-)

I’d give you his email address, but he’d kill me for doing that. Make sure that you say Hi to Mark when you see him around the traps.

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Microsoft Partner Competency Transition Tool

Friday, October 9th, 2009

In July this year, Microsoft announce their new Microsoft Partner Network (MPN for short). As part of that all partners need to transition over to new competency based arrangements.  This is initially a little confusing for us all so we’re lucky that they’ve released a transition tool to help us.  It was announced today on the Microsoft Australia Partner blog here

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