Microsoft Partner Network UK Blog https://docs.microsoft.com/archive/blogs/mpn_uk/feed.xml Wed, 24 Apr 2019 10:09:52 GMT en-US hourly 1 Partner Skills Initiative https://docs.microsoft.com/archive/blogs/mpn_uk/partner-skills-initiative Fri, 15 Mar 2019 10:28:05 GMT https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/mpn_uk/?p=16035 How to attract and retain talent with the Partner Skills Initiative

By Liz Penning, UK Partner Skills Lead

As Partner Skills Lead, working closely with partners, one of the things I realise we have in common is our passion to ensure employees have the skills to drive business goals and to help our customers succeed. It’s also one of the biggest challenges we face today. Attracting and retaining the best talent is the top emerging risk organisations face globally, according to Gartner. We need to support both new and current employees in both re-skilling and up-skilling their digital skills. To do this successfully we need to work together to create a culture of continuous learning. This can include such things as an effective learning plan built with your HR function, empowering your employees to build learning time into their working hours or creating a learning rewards programme. By creating a positive learning culture within your business you’ll be supporting your current employees to maintain and improve, as well as attract and hire top talent. Because I’m so passionate about all our partners succeeding in this, I’m excited to share our Partner Skills Initiative. We want to help you create new talent for the future, as well as retain and re-skill your current employees. We want to give you the opportunity to stay at the forefront of cloud and new technologies to help inspire our joint customers. The programme aims to give you best practices, tools, and learning options, as well as ongoing support to ensure you futureproof your organisation. It covers the full Microsoft stack of products as well as readying for different job roles. The programme focuses on three areas; assess, learn, and grow.

Assess

Where are you on your digital transformation journey?

The first step is to assess. It’s important to know where you are in your digital transformation – both from a business and technical perspective and to know your starting point and benchmark. The Partner Transformation Readiness Assessment was created to help you do exactly this. It only takes about 25 minutes to complete, and at the end it gives you recommendations and resources you can use to advance your organisation. If you have been working with your Partner Team on the Partner Transformation Index, then please continue to do so and create your plan for moving forward together.

Learn

Learn new skills for the future

Included in the Partner Skills Initiative is an online training centre designed to aid in the re-skilling and up-skilling of your employees. They can use this to learn new skills in new technology areas and by new job roles, for example a sales person moving into a technical role. Our online partner training centre offers ongoing role-based learning pathways and training recommendations based on the job role, skill level, and technology.

Grow

Embrace a culture of continuous learning

Just as your organisation will grow with your new culture of continuous learning, our initiative will too. We’ll provide continuous updates to the learning resources, in-person and virtual live events, and best practices to support you. Also, to help grow your business and talent, we have created a new Partner Talent Playbook to help partners understand how to recruit, hire, develop and retain talent. Coupled with the Microsoft Apprenticeships Programme, these are great resources and programmes for the UK to fill the digital skills gap and for businesses to build their talent pipeline and invest in the future of their workforce. Apprenticeships are a great opportunity for young people to develop the skills they need to succeed in the future of work through hands-on learning. They’re good for businesses and the UK economy too. With an ever-growing digital skills gap, there’s never been a better time to invest in the workforce of the future.

Business leaders

Often business leaders’ learning requirements are overlooked and so I am pleased to also announce the AI Business School. The business school complements the Partner Skills Initiative but is focused purely on AI and is commercially designed to get executives ready to lead their organisation on a journey of AI transformation. The school is a deep dive into how to develop a strategy and identify blockers before they happen as you implement AI in your organisation. Mitra Azizirad, Corporate Vice President for AI Marketing at Microsoft explains: “Developing a strategy for AI extends beyond the business issues. It goes all the way to the leadership, behaviours, and capabilities required to instil an AI-ready culture in your organisation.” On the road to developing a strategy, executives and other business leaders are often stalled by questions about how and where to begin implementing AI across their companies. They ponder the cultural changes that AI requires companies to make, and how to build and use AI in ways that are responsible, protect privacy and security, and comply with government rules and regulations. Launching Microsoft’s AI Business School will help business leaders navigate these questions. The free online courses, built in partnership with INSEAD, is a masterclass series that aims to empower leaders to advance with confidence in the age of AI.

Helping you futureproof your organisation

I believe the best way to move into this tech-driven future is by equipping your workforce with the skills needed to drive innovation, knowledge, and empowerment. That is why I’m proud to be able to share these initiatives with you. The Partner Skills Initiative and AI Business School are part of our plan to help equip the UK partner ecosystem with the skills to succeed in the future. You can also show that you share this vision by signing our Partner Pledge. This is where partners can reaffirm their commitment to helping the UK build the skills we need for our digital future.

Explore our resources:

Readiness Assessment Online Partner Training Centre Partner Talent Playbook Microsoft Apprenticeship Programme AI Business School Partner Pledge  

About the author

Liz Penning is our Partner Skills Lead, within Partner Business and Development in One Commercial Partner UK. Her role is focused on setting the UK strategy for partner learning and executing on this. This can be anything from working on training events such as workshops, hacks and hands-on labs, all the way to landing new programmes, such as the Partner Skills Initiative, and working on plans with our partners to help grow a continuous learning culture. Liz also leads the Apply section of our Digital Skills Programme, which focuses on Apprenticeships for partners and customers. Having been at Microsoft for nine years, she has lots of experience working with our network of partners. Over that time, there has been one consistent message, which is the lack of skills within the market. Skills have a direct correlation to the growth of our partners’ and customers’ businesses and if we can help provide them with the right resources and programmes to engage in learning and new talent, we will get that one step closer to closing the skills gap together. Liz is extremely passionate about Early in Career and diversity – there are many young people who need that extra help to realise their potential, regardless of their background or situation.]]> International Women's Day https://docs.microsoft.com/archive/blogs/mpn_uk/international-womens-day Fri, 08 Mar 2019 08:03:15 GMT https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/mpn_uk/?p=15955 Photography depicts the development and design of AI applications.

International Women’s Day 8th March 2019

By Ella Cockerell, Independent Software Vendor Lead - Microsoft UK

IWD is a great day to highlight some of the great work Microsoft and its partners are doing around inclusion and diversity. In fact it’s so important to our industry’s transformation that we wanted to recognize the great work of our partners by introducing a new Microsoft 2019 MPN Partner of the Year Award ‘Diversity and Inclusion’ that will be celebrated this year at Microsoft Inspire. Personally, I think it is great to see this being recognized as an official award. I’ve been working in the tech sector for 20 years, so far, it’s given me amazing experiences and countless fantastic opportunities. Recently, I found myself reflecting on the tech jobs I’ve had over the past two decades. I thought about how much had changed, in terms of the world, the industry, and myself. I don’t listen to TLC anymore (ok, sometimes they sneak onto my Spotify). I no longer need a special password to access the internet. And I am usually not the only woman in a room anymore.

The shift in gender balance within the industry and the companies I have worked for has been gradual but steady, and momentum has gathered pace in recent years. As someone who works for a very inclusive company, I realise I am in a privileged position. Microsoft has a well-established programme to deliver gender equality across all areas. I also work in business development, which tends to have a more equal gender balance than other sectors of the technology industry.

However, in other areas, and for other women, the story is not so simple. When we think about being inclusive and diverse, we can’t forget about intersectionality. And that means making sure that we foster an environment which is fair and open to all.

Balance for Better

This year, International Women’s Day is all about #balanceforbetter. Diversity and inclusion create a more innovative, happy workforce. That’s why our campaign for International Women’s Day this year ensures we create opportunities for women from a range of different backgrounds and geographical locations.

My role in our independent software vendor (ISV) business means I get to work with some amazing software developers, cloud architects, and data scientists across a range of industries, as well as collaborate with other channel partners. When I attend meetings, there are often discussions around the challenge of finding and building digital skills, particularly in data science. There seems to be a groundswell of concern across our ecosystem. Hiring data scientists is hard, because there is a serious shortage. When I looked at the research, there were some interesting statistics – 80 percent of UK businesses plan to hire a data scientist in 2019. According to a recent Forbes article (cited in Harnham.com), only 26 percent of data jobs in the US are held by women, with that number halving for the UK.

Given that 93 percent of data scientists earn more than the average UK wage, and knowing the importance of having gender balance across all roles, I want to encourage more women to become data scientists.

Closing the gender skills gap

We have so many fantastic people working at Microsoft. And these incredibly talented people want to come out into the community to support those who are considering a career in the technology sector. We know there are many women leaving other industries. We know there are not enough women in tech. And we know that there are not enough data scientists in the UK. We also know our partners are finding it difficult to hire data scientists, too. Could we, perhaps, make some small change to take us a step closer to solving these problems?

To help address the gender skills gap we’re currently being challenged with, we’ve launched a plan to run nine data science bootcamps across the UK on the 2nd May. Facilitated by our channel partners; Amido, ANS Group, BJSS, DevOps Group, DSP, Grey Matter, and Kainos & Incremental, our aim is to host 100 women and support them through their first module of our Microsoft Professional Programme qualification in Data Science. They will then go on to study online from home over the next six months, before returning to their host partner site for a recruitment day.

We aim to have at least half these women to gain their qualification within six months of the bootcamp, with as many as possible securing their first data science role shortly thereafter. We’re excited to launch this for International Women’s Day and hope it will be something that we can repeat.

Paying it forward

I’ve been lucky enough to be supported by some amazing women throughout my career, and I want to pay that forward by offering other women the opportunity to explore the wonder of tech. We are also encouraging those women to pay it forward to others who are less fortunate. The training course and first certificate will be provided free of charge, but we are asking for a nominal £10 donation from each delegate, which will be donated to Smart Works. Best of all, Microsoft will match each donation pound for pound.

Of course, we’re not just focusing our efforts on addressing the gender skills gap for today only. We need to continuously work to inspire the next generation of girls to pursue a career in the tech sector. That’s why we’re running our #makerchampion projects at schools across the UK to change perceptions and inspire girls to pursue STEAM subjects. For more information on that initiative, read this blog from my colleague Sarah Hedley – our UK Digital Skills Lead.

Get involved

Explore the activities we are delivering for International Women’s Day and beyond. Sign our Partner Pledge to show your commitment to building a diverse and inclusive environment for everyone Visit the MPN Partner of the Year Awards site to submit an entry for the Diversity and Inclusion Award.

Image of lady with long blond hairAbout the author

    Ella is the UK ISV (Independent Software Vendor) Lead at Microsoft, where she also enjoys an additional role as Vice-Chair of the Women @ Microsoft board. Working in technology, Ella spent a lot of time in the early part of her career being the only woman in the room. Determined to re-address the balance in any way she can, Ella is passionate about creating inclusive environments, harnessing the power of both genders, and inspiring the next generation into technology. She is a STEM Ambassador and a Modern Muse.]]> Our Shared Opportunity https://docs.microsoft.com/archive/blogs/mpn_uk/our-shared-opportunity Thu, 14 Feb 2019 22:30:21 GMT https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/mpn_uk/?p=15895 Joe Macri, Vice President, UK Commercial Partner at Microsoft, looks back at the recent Partner Summit and reflects on how Microsoft partners can take advantage of new opportunities. It’s been a month since we got together at our Partner Executive Summit, so I thought I’d take the opportunity to reflect on the key messages from the day. Over 600 of you joined us in person and many engaged with the day through our live stream. This is in addition to the hundreds of you who have already attended our regional partner days - thank you for your commitment! However you took part, I think you’d all agree on one thing: it was a fantastic day where we looked at the shared opportunity we have together. If you didn’t manage to get a ticket, please take advantage of the recorded sessions available here. So, let’s recap what that shared opportunity looks like. As Michel Van der Bel, President of Microsoft EMEA articulated, our commitment to the UK is strengthening, and we are thankful for your ongoing engagement and drive for our mutual customers. As our partners, you are integral to our mission to empower every person and every organisation on the planet to achieve more. Partners make more happen and as our UK CEO, Cindy Rose, stated: “We can be bold because we have an ecosystem, a community of partners. We can’t do this alone. We are only successful when our partners and customers are successful.” The UK is the fastest growing cloud market in the world – and there’s a £250 billion cloud opportunity over the next decade. We have a combined opportunity to help our customers empower their employees, optimise operations, and engage customers. And the time is now to use data and AI to develop new, exciting solutions to help our customers achieve even more. At the moment, the UK technology sector is growing faster than the rest of the economy. In 2017, it grew by 4.5 percent compared to 1.7 percent rise in GDP. How can we help keep this momentum up? It’s all about recognising the importance of connecting and co-creating with each other. That means partners working with partners and customers, not just with Microsoft, so our customers can achieve more and remain competitive in their ever-disrupted industries. As we continually reinforce, customer lifetime value is one of the core outcomes we are all focused on delivering and this is never something we should compromise along the journey. Making a difference for our customers and our society relies on many things and there are four key areas we focused as we explored how to future-proof our businesses and make positive change. These were digital skills, apprenticeships, diversity, along with ethical AI. Over 55 percent of our partners now operate in cloud solutions, which is fantastic progression on this journey. Whilst the ability of our ecosystem is growing to drive change and meet demand, around 68 percent of IT teams say they’re facing a shortage of necessary skills. We’ve done a lot of work together to ensure we are able to jointly tackle the growing skills gap. Our digital skills programme is designed to give people the skills that will ensure the country remains one of the global leaders in next-generation technologies. We want our partners to lead with us on this. I’d encourage you to use resources such as the newly launched Microsoft playbook: Recruit, Hire, Onboard, and Retain Talent, and to prepare the UK for the world of tomorrow by signing up for the skills programme. It covers everything you need to know about finding and growing great talent. Download it and see for yourself. Attracting new talent and developing skills is critical to enable ongoing development and progression across industries. Our commitment to the Apprenticeship Programme is already delivering amazing results: over 7,500 people have completed or are about to complete their apprenticeships either within Microsoft or partner organisations. There’s a particularly important point that resonates here – 92 percent of apprentices stay with the company they started with. Investing in talent has previously been a concern for some organisations, so this really proves that investing in vital talent can be a great long-term advantage to not only the industry, but your business. Speaking with many of you on the day, I know you found our UK D&I Lead -Derrick McCourt’s session on Diversity & Inclusion as powerful as I did. At Microsoft we have an unwavering commitment to diversity and inclusion; we truly believe that inclusion brings with it exponential value to all. Derrick shared with you part of the vast amount of work we do to bring this to the forefront of technology. By working closely with teams such as our disability employee resource group, we make sure each innovation and development we produce is naturally accessible. This allows us to empower more, lets you access new talent and makes any workplace adopting the same approach more attractive to new employees and customers. And, of course, innovation equals opportunity. Right now, there’s a huge opportunity to embed AI into solutions that help solve society’s – and business’s – biggest challenges. Whilst AI presents us with this opportunity, we have to use data and AI ethically and responsibly. Not just because it’s the right thing to do, but also because it makes sense commercially. We heard from Clare Barclay, Chief Operating Office – Microsoft UK, that organisations that invest in values, ethics, and processes for AI perform nine percent better than those who aren’t investing in AI. We are asking everyone to work responsibly with AI. You can learn more about our ethical principles here along with how you can join us on the journey . As Microsoft, we strongly believe that having a role to play in these four areas will achieve exciting results. We will continue delivering remarkable outcomes and lifetime value for our customers, strengthen skills and subsequently the UK will continue to thrive both socially and economically. As an ecosystem, partners generate almost £9 of revenue for every £1 of Microsoft revenue, based on the associated services you deliver. This is a fantastic contribution to the industry and value to Microsoft as we continue to deliver the digital future of the UK. To close, I’m sharing a link to our Partner Pledge – we have real belief in the pledge, regularly promoting and driving this, with our London Partner day being no exception. Commit to learning more about the pledge and sign up to work with us with shared values and priorities. Together we can achieve even more. If you missed our Partner Summit, or want to revisit the presentations you can watch the sessions here. Find out more Sign our Partner Pledge Watch the sessions here]]> Seizing the AI opportunity today https://docs.microsoft.com/archive/blogs/mpn_uk/seizing-the-ai-opportunity-today Wed, 31 Oct 2018 08:00:20 GMT https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/mpn_uk/?p=15875 Seizing the AI opportunity today By Joe Macri, VP of Commercial Partner, Microsoft UK Artificial Intelligence (AI) is here. It is swiftly becoming a part of our everyday lives - through everything from email spam filters to voice assistant technologies - but there is still much uncertainty within the enterprise community regarding how that power can be harnessed to improve business outcomes. That’s why today at Future Decoded, we are launching our 2018 report ‘Maximising the AI Opportunity – How to harness AI’s potential effectively and ethically’. With input from more than 1,000 business leaders and 4,000 employees, as well as those already embracing AI within their own organisations, it is an in-depth look at the challenges and opportunities presented for both UK businesses and the nation as a whole. The report reveals that we are at a pivotal moment in AI adoption: 41% of leaders believe their business model will cease to exist in five years’ time, with technology - and AI specifically - driving this, and yet 51% do not currently have an AI strategy in place. This is perhaps not surprising. With AI offering so much potential, many are reluctant to commit to a strategy, selecting which areas to focus on and which technologies to adopt. And yet for those that have a strategy in place, the benefits are already being felt; higher productivity and performance, leading to better business outcomes, is ultimately boosting bottom lines by a significant 5%. Here, our partners will have a key role to play in helping customers unlock these gains, guiding on where – and how to start – when it comes to AI. Partners will also be a trusted ally for customers when it comes to navigating the challenges relating to AI adoption. Technologies such as big data, advanced algorithms and scalable cloud solutions are now readily available, but understandably, clarity is still needed by many regarding how to best use these in specific business cases. If customers can get it right, though, the potential is enormous; employees can be relieved of repetitive and time-consuming tasks, customers can be better understood, and both products and processes can be optimised to serve everyone more effectively. The guiding principle should be to augment existing jobs, rather than eliminate them. And those organisations that are already taking a principled approach to AI, establishing underlying ethics and values, are currently outperforming those that aren’t by 9%. This is why, at this relatively early stage of digital transformation, we believe it is crucial to set out what an ethical AI strategy looks like, ensuring that it benefits employees, customers and society at large. We invite you to sign our Partner Pledge, committing to diversity, workforce upskilling and the responsible and ethical use of AI in your business, to help the UK thrive in this exciting new future. As valued Microsoft partners and customers, we are committed to ensuring that you can make the most of the opportunities available, which is why we’d like to invite you to join our first monthly AI Community Call on the 14th November. On it, we will be discussing AI opportunities and the technologies available to drive your business forward, giving you the tools you need to develop an AI strategy for your business. Join us and take the very first step in this exciting AI journey.]]> Highlights from Inspire 2018: Invest in people and skills - our greatest assets https://docs.microsoft.com/archive/blogs/mpn_uk/highlights-from-inspire-2018-invest-in-people-and-skills-our-greatest-assets Tue, 14 Aug 2018 16:42:42 GMT https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/mpn_uk/?p=15815 By Joe Macri, VP of Commercial Partner, Microsoft UK 'We are lucky to be in the tech industry', these are Satya Nadella's words from his Corenote at Inspire and Ready 2018 and I truly believe it is one of the most exciting times to be in this industry and be a Microsoft partner. We are empowering every person and every organisation on the planet to achieve more and it is with our partners that we make more happen. With every step we take on this journey we must task ourselves to ensure technology is used responsibly and ethically to make the world a better place. We have an amazing opportunity to work together to tackle some of the most pressing challenges in this world such as climate change, energy and education. The ethics and principals we hold ourselves accountable for was a significant theme throughout Inspire 2018 and are fundamental factors I encourage each partner to embed in all practices including AI. During our UK Regional Session I was joined on stage by Kainos, winners of our 2018 UK Country Partner of the Year award, where we talked about their journey and specifically the value and investment they placed on their people and skills from day one as an organisation. In the same session Cindy Rose (Area Vice President - Microsoft UK) announced our Partner Pledge, asking each of our UK partners to actively support the critical development of young people by joining our efforts to create more apprenticeship opportunities and increase the digital skills required for the fourth industrial revolution. Another highlight of the week was the Women in Technology (WiT) charity lunch organised by Julie Simpson of ResourceiT and the IAMCP. It was fantastic to see such active engagement of over 1000 women and men at this event with the support of our Microsoft leadership team including Cindy Rose, Gavriella Schuster, Julia White, Jean-Philippe Courtois, Kathleen Hogan and Satya Nadella. Microsoft and WiT sponsors from the channel are taking responsibility to increase diversity of talent in the technology industry and the time invested by all clearly demonstrates our combined commitment to diversifying our teams and valuing the breadth of skills this brings. In order to continue building strength in our people for generations to come, I encourage each of you to take time to support the engagement of girls into STEM subjects. Sharing the exciting opportunities this could lead to and the impact they can drive as a result will help to inspire them to study and pursue STEM careers. DigiGirlz, our YouthSpark program, gives school girls opportunities to learn about careers in technology, connect with Microsoft employees and participate in hands-on computer and technology workshops. By sharing this program with your colleagues, friends and local schools you will help us to ensure every child is able to pursue their ambitions with support and encouragement. If you would like to show your commitment to our shared vision of responsible and ethical AI, digital skills, apprenticeships and diversity, or find out more about the Partner Pledge, please visit the website to pledge your support. My thanks to all our partners already working with us to develop our next generation and invest in employees, whilst empowering everyone to achieve more with strong values and unwavering ambition. To hear more of the key messages from Inspire 2018, you can review the sessions on demand and for highlights from the event, visit the Microsoft Inspire news gallery to read the daily Inspire blogs.]]> Propelling Smart Energy Forward with IoT Solutions https://docs.microsoft.com/archive/blogs/mpn_uk/propelling-smart-energy-forward-with-iot-solutions Mon, 23 Jul 2018 09:22:35 GMT https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/mpn_uk/?p=15745 Written by Justin Slade Building, deploying, and implementing IoT solutions can take considerable time and resources. Which is why Microsoft recently committed to investing $5 billion in IoT over the next four years with the goals of simplifying IoT and making it available to everyone. And as those in the energy industry work to implement smart energy today, IoT solutions have never been more relevant or critical. Below, I’ve outlined a couple examples of how Microsoft and their partners are helping energy providers transform business through IoT. As renewable energy and distributed energy resources increase, the industry faces new challenges such as fluctuating demands, aging grids, decreases in nuclear and coal energy, and emerging technologies. Customized energy solutions enabled by IoT are positioning energy providers around the world to face these challenges head on. To learn more, be sure to register for the IoT in Action webinar on July 31, Powering the Future of Energy Efficiency with IoT.

Apergy: Transforming Efficiency with IoT Solutions

IoT solutions have applications across countless scenarios. Equipment in the oil and gas industry, for instance, undergoes heavy usage. As such, technicians must perform routine maintenance and troubleshooting to keep the equipment safe and functional, which often requires massive amounts of travel time. According to Microsoft partner Apergy, a leading on-shore equipment and digital technology provider, one large pipeline customer calculated that the cumulative mileage driven annually by all their technicians added up to a trip to Mars and halfway back. This situation is not unique in the oil and gas industry. So Apergy set out to design the Spotlight Monitoring System to continuously monitor, diagnose, and optimize equipment health for reciprocating compressors and engines in the field. The Spotlight solution records sensor data across their fleet. These sensors provide real-time visibility, sending data directly to the cloud where KPIs and actionable insights can be securely accessed by authorized users anytime, anywhere around the world. The end-to-end solution also leverages Azure Cloud and IoT services and recommends condition-based maintenance versus scheduled maintenance, making it easier for industrial customers to avoid catastrophic breakdowns of their equipment and machinery while saving technicians—and themselves—thousands of miles of costly travel. Ultimately, this IoT solution is improving efficiency, cost-savings, and revenue for customers while also providing greater equipment safety, maximizing uptime, and increasing operational excellence.

Agder Energi: IoT Technology Used to Optimize Grid

By 2025, Norway will have banned gas-powered cars entirely and only allow electric vehicles to be sold. While this is excellent for the environment, the increase in electric vehicles and other distributed resources cause new challenges for utilities and grid owners, such as growth in demand and increased complexity in predicting the load. Agder Energi, Norway’s third largest energy group in hydroelectric production, was also facing these challenges and looking at potential solutions. However, the easy solution required expensive upgrades to their grid. Looking for an alternative solution, they chose to partner with Microsoft. By implementing Azure IoT and intelligent cloud technology, they are now able to manage supply and demand, predict loads, and quickly leverage distributed energy resources as flexible assets in their power system—all using their existing grid. With smart energy today, Agder Energi has everything digitized. When a station goes into overload, they can make changes in real time, reducing the strain on the grid. The data collected from millions of sensors in the grid enables them to design new products, make better decisions, and manage their business more effectively. They are also able to give customers better service at a lower price and meet changing needs. And in turn, customers can use rooftop solar and supply energy back to the grid. The implementation of smart energy solutions has positioned Agder Energi to save on infrastructure costs, use distributed energy resources as flexible assets, and increase customer satisfaction. As a result, they are now able to expand these customized energy solutions into new regions. 

Sign up for the IoT in Action Webinar on July 31

Join Microsoft for the upcoming IoT in Action webinar, Powering the Future of Energy Efficiency with IoT, to learn how IoT is transforming businesses across the energy industry. Hear how providers are improving energy efficiency with Azure IoT, as well as how Microsoft and energy partners are leveraging smart energy today to improve power reliability and revolutionize automated data collection. To learn more about the application of IoT solutions across industries, be sure to explore our full IoT in Action Webinar Series]]> You’re going to need a bigger accounting software suite https://docs.microsoft.com/archive/blogs/mpn_uk/youre-going-to-need-a-bigger-accounting-software-suite Tue, 26 Jun 2018 10:25:20 GMT https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/mpn_uk/?p=15565 Did you know? The world's longest goldfish measured a whopping 47.4cm from snout to tail. And it wasn't plucked from a lake or a giant pond. It was raised in captivity by a man called Joris Gijsbers. It's an old wives' tale that a goldfish will only grow to fit the size of its bowl. In reality, the species are indeterminate growers. This means that, with the correct diet and water quality, there's no limit to how big they can get. As much as we love writing about gargantuan goldfish - and we're sure you love reading about them - there's a lesson to be learned here too. In the way that you can nurture a goldfish to grow to its full potential, it's possible to do the same for your SMB customers. Because, believe it or not, they're indeterminate growers too.

The bowl's not the limit

With the right partner (that's you) to take care of them and give them everything they need to excel, SMBs can keep growing in strength and size. They just have to be willing to move to a new tank as their needs - and appetite - become bigger. Take your customers' accounting teams, for example. Sure, they can get by on basic accounting systems. But only for as long as business remains steady. As soon as teams and budgets start to grow, those basic systems will no longer be able to handle the workload. Because the bigger the company, the more complex their accounting challenges. And the greater their need for capable technology that can help them achieve their ambitions. In short, your customers can quickly outgrow the technology they use. Much like how, given the right support, goldfish can outgrow their tanks.

Scaling up with Dynamics 365

Of course, with growth comes change - a factor that's essential for success in today's dynamic business landscape. However, some of your SMB customers might fear change, and could be unsure about buying in to new technologies, even when it's clear their existing solutions aren't up to the job anymore. These customers might be worried about having to move away from old, ingrained ways of working. They might be facing so many challenges on a daily basis that improving their systems doesn't sit very highly on their list of priorities. Or they might simply think the whole thing will be too much hard work. Fortunately, you have the tools to help customers of all shapes and sizes scale up and achieve their goals. With Dynamics 365, you can give your customers the space, tools and opportunities they need to grow to their full potential. And the confidence to embrace change, rather than to shy away from it. And it's not just SMBs that can benefit from the support you can provide. For you, the partner, the rewards of a growing customer are many. By helping them navigate their journey to success, you can enjoy a stronger relationship, more opportunities to engage, and chances to unlock additional streams of revenue. Now share the Connect and grow your business e-book with your customers. It's designed to inspire those that have outgrown their accounting software to take a leap from the tank they've outgrown into a bigger, better one. So they can enjoy even more room to swim.]]> The customer won't listen: advice for modern marketers https://docs.microsoft.com/archive/blogs/mpn_uk/the-customer-wont-listen-advice-for-modern-marketers Tue, 19 Jun 2018 10:18:01 GMT https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/mpn_uk/?p=15545 In 1987, The Smiths released a compilation album, The World Won't Listen. The title was born from Morrissey's frustration that the band hadn't reached the mainstream success he wanted. In the UK, it reached number two in the charts. People who already listened to The Smiths loved The World Won't Listen. But the critics didn't. Nor did the world at large. In fact, this collection of singles, B-sides, and re-recordings only got to number 62 in the American charts. The reason? It was a piece of content the world didn't ask for. Or want. Because while Morrissey had done a lot of talking, he hadn't done much listening. And whether you're a musician or a Microsoft partner, it's the same. To appeal to a new audience, it's you who has to do the listening.

The power of listening

Morrissey was right about one thing. We seem to have forgotten how to listen. And that's particularly true of modern marketing. There's lots of noise, but not always much insight. The thing is, customers have more autonomy than they did in 1987. This is their self-directed, opt-in world. And they're very comfortable exploring the customer journey by themselves. A report from IDC and Salesforce revealed that 83% of customers are only going to pay attention to something relevant and contextual. And relevant and contextual depends on insight. It's the insight that makes us really valuable to our customers. It's the insight that'll make them sit up and pay attention. It's the insight that turns a compilation album into a greatest hit. Otherwise, we're just creating lots of content and hoping we catch the customer at the right time. Talking more than we're listening. To get insight, we need to be listening twice as much as we talk. So how can you make sure you are? How to have conversations that count Modern marketing should be listening, talking, and assessing - in that order. Listen After all, says Pardot, only 17% of B2B leads are sales-ready when you first get them. For the rest, you've got to keep your ear to the ground and find the right time to reach out. Stay in touch. Follow their social media feeds. And get in touch with your peers on the UK exclusive Microsoft Partner Concierge channel to hear about their experiences, too. Talk For any partner, but especially those constrained by budgets, every communication has to count. How do you know your content is going to hit its mark? Well, that's where our Smart Partner Marketing resources can help. Take a look here. Wherever you are in your marketing development journey, there's something to help maximise the impact of what you're saying. Assess How did you do? What did your customers see when you approached them? What did they hear when you talked? Listen to the experts at Maya to find out. This quick test rates your web, blog, and social marketing so you can see what your customers saw - and spot areas of improvement for conversations to come. If you listen to what they want, respond with relevance and context, and assess your outgoing marketing, you'll earn customers' attention. Then, says Demand Gen Report, 90% of customers will find you when they're ready. And we'll be ready to support you when they do.]]> Kainos in the Spotlight: UK Country Partner of the Year 2018 https://docs.microsoft.com/archive/blogs/mpn_uk/kainos-in-the-spotlight-uk-country-partner-of-the-year-2018 Tue, 19 Jun 2018 03:00:18 GMT https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/mpn_uk/?p=15695 Kainos, on their fantastic award. Founded in 1986, Kainos is a leading Microsoft Gold Cloud Platform and Direct CSP partner with a vision to “Enable outstanding people to create digital solutions that create a positive impact on people’s lives”. Recognised as one of the UK’s leading digital services and digital platform companies, they have delivered major transformation programmes across healthcare, government and private sector. “We are delighted to be recognised by Microsoft – we have an excellent cultural fit, we are people and outcome focused and this award is worthy acknowledgment of that approach and our talented staff. We are currently delivering open source solutions on Azure at scale, across a variety of verticals, including Financial Services, Government and Healthcare. We also continue to invest in applied innovation working together with Microsoft’s Data and Artificial Intelligence specialists to deliver unique solutions for our customers. We look forward to working closely with Microsoft to build on our continued success together.” – Brendan Mooney, CEO of Kainos. After attending Microsoft Inspire in 2017, they recognised how both Microsoft and Kainos could build a partnership and made a strategic decision to further strengthen their relationship, creating a robust business plan that would accelerate Microsoft Azure business across their markets and offerings. 'We are honoured to recognize Kainos of the United Kingdom as a Microsoft Country Partner of the Year. Kainos has distinguished itself as a top partner, exemplifying the remarkable expertise and innovation we see in our Microsoft partner community to deliver transformative solutions.' - Gavriella Schuster, Corporate Vice President, One Commercial Partner, Microsoft Corp. Since partnering with Microsoft, Kainos has delivered some truly inspiring offerings built on Microsoft Azure’s advanced features which have been well recognised in helping advance the digital transformation of all aspects of the healthcare sector, including Royal Brompton & Harefield NHS Foundation Trust back in January, as well as wider public and private sectors such as HM Courts & Tribunals Service, Her Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service and the Welsh Revenue Authority. “Being named Microsoft’s UK Partner of the Year is a real accolade for us.  Providing a transformational force in the UK Public and Private Sector with our reputation for award-winning digital delivery is the foundation for Kainos success as a high growth Microsoft partner, driving Azure revenue and adoption.  Our partnership is at the heart of our growth strategy and is based on shared values and working together to identify and progress opportunities. It’s also invaluable to our diverse community of more than 1,200 people, who we invest in with in-depth Azure training and who have voted us a Sunday Times Top 100 Company to Work for, six years in a row. It all makes for an incredible launch pad to fuel expansion of our UK Digital Services business and rapidly expand our success in the commercial sector.” – Russell Sloan, Digital Services Director. It doesn’t stop there: Kainos has made significant investment in people and skills with their Earn as you Learn apprentice places (including in-depth Azure training) and award winning social and tech programmes including Codecamp and AI Camp, supporting young people in learning Azure skills. We are hugely excited about working together with Kainos and the opportunities that working together brings us. Once again, congratulations to Kainos, our 2018 Microsoft UK Country Partner of the Year.]]> Don't Perspire at Inspire https://docs.microsoft.com/archive/blogs/mpn_uk/dont-perspire-at-inspire Thu, 14 Jun 2018 10:31:57 GMT https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/mpn_uk/?p=15585 By Sarah Croxford, Enterprise Channel Manager, Microsoft UK.

I have been asked many a time by partners, "How do I make a success of Microsoft Inspire?" "It's a big investment, how do I justify it?" Having been to several WPC and Microsoft Inspire events I thought I would share some guidance for partners as to how to make the most of their time there. I have been going every other year since 2008 (Houston, New Orleans Los Angeles, Orlando). In 2008, I was 3 months into my tenure at Microsoft, sat in the UK Lounge and met Richard Gibbons - three years later he went onto write this blog and I think this is a great reminder of the fact of how important Inspire can be for many of our partners.

1. Prep it

Start preparing now and prepare early
  • What do you want from Inspire? Is it the partnering relationships, engagement with Microsoft, updates and news from MS Execs, knowledge and learning? What will help you to determine the ROI you gain, and some benefits are non-measurable. The partnering piece is here where many companies have found investors, collaborators, new start-ups, innovation offerings some of this is shorter-term and some longer term
  • Who is going? There Is a connection tool available once you have registered. Try and engage the individuals now - some people will rarely take a meeting request unless they have heard of you. LinkedIn and Twitter can be helpful for that - following up on articles will help to encourage you to build some links before you go. Book appointments as early as you can as some people will get very booked out
  • Get your LinkedIn Profile up to-date - many people will make this the first point to check alongside your website. Updated events & content are key (we come onto messaging in a minute)

2. Prop it

It's all about your proposition. You will meet 100's of people. Each of those will meet the same. You need to make sure your company stands out for the right reason and like touch paper a well-developed proposition that is clearly articulated in 10 second will fly around with "You really must speak to x, they have some exceptional stories, really aligned - have a chat to them". If you cannot articulate what you do in 10 seconds. They will forget you. How to create a 10 second value prop
  • Differentiate yourself from your competition and be clear about who they are
  • Appeal to the emotion of the individual in your statement its either time, money or people
  • Know your market - if your expertise is in a vertical use that, if you're a horizontal solution offering make sure you are clear about the markets you play in
  • Articulate what you do in one sentence and make sure all the team with you know that's what you do - they are your biggest brand ambassadors ensure they are fully aligned and briefed before attending.
"We deliver secure IOT cloud first solutions for healthcare that provide the insights that will save lives and improve the efficiencies of ambulance workers " Follow that up with... "and it drives Azure consumption within 2 months, it's an IP Co-Sell qualifier, we are co-seller ready with p-sellers and a fantastic way to penetrate into new customers you should be onto a winner" As a newer partner, the start up and innovation message is important too. Microsoft people are looking to meet with new partners not always the ones they have always done business with. Build out strong customer references
  • Have a quick ready reckoner on customers you are working with or have delivered in. Have quantifiable information that backs up your solutions.
  • Have you got a customer that can tell your story? Will they advocate for you?
  • Have you got videos/short podcasts that you can share?
Become a good story-teller
  • Make your customer reference a story. People like stories - they can visualise what and how someone went through the pain and solved their challenges and the happy outcome. Most people are positive and want the story with the warm fuzzy feeling at the end.
  • A good story will take them through the ups and downs, driving an emotive engagement with the audience. Those emotions don't need to pull at the heart strings but can hit the emotions of a buyer through addressing their challenges around saving cost, investing wisely, improving productivity or helping people to achieve.

3. Pace it

Pace yourself it's a giddy experience for first-timers. When you walk into the conference you get hit by the size of the audience and that everybody in the room is either Microsoft or a partner. It's a phenomenal global ecosystem so take time to savour that moment.
  • If travel and time allows, try and get there for a day prior so you can attend any local meet ups and get over your jet lag/travel and to be able to orientate yourself. You can pick up your entry badge so give yourself some time to do that.
  • Take some time to recharge - head to the UK lounge for a chill out and to relax amongst others and network there
  • They are long days - even the early starts from breakfast to later evening events and you will meet many people
  • Keep hydrated - its Vegas. It's also too easy to dose up on loads of fizzy drinks and random snacks
  • I personally am always in awe of the huge logistics that go behind the food stations - you don't need to queue too much, and you should be able to find somewhere to sit - working out how they do this and get everyone bused around is phenomenal.
  • Take comfortable shoes - and multiple pairs. You will easily do your 10,000 steps every day.
  • Take some time to explore the Expo - there are loads of good innovations, partner resources etc and more for a first time its worth trying to get some time to have a look around.

4. People & Networking

  • Head to the UK hosted opening event or if you miss that due to flights then go to the UK Lounge. It's the hangout for the entire UK team and many EMEA UK-based teams too.
  • The Microsoft UK team are normally in their Union Jack jackets so easy to spot. If you get stuck, don't feel afraid to ask.
  • At lunch you can meet a host of people from all round the world as they head to their lunch areas, you could be sat by an Azure Sales Lead for a country or a new business partner. Feel free to introduce yourself and remember your 10 Sec pitch and join them.
  • Get onto twitter and follow the UK Microsoft Partner Network Tweets.

5. Prioritise your follow up

  • Leverage and share your experiences of what you learned and your experiences on a blog. Not a great writer? Video it. Face for radio? Podcast/Skype recording. Person of few words? Tweet. Either way share your experiences and it's a terrific way to remind Microsoft and partners
  • Who did you meet? It's wise to follow up on email at the event and then set a reminder a least five days later to follow up again. Ensure they have your value prop summary, customers references and video props and agreed actions and contacts.
  • Share the content internally. Much of the content will be available or live streamed so you can share the core key notes etc with your teams
Sarah Croxford is Enterprise Channel Manager for Health Lead at Microsoft working within the One Commercial Partner group (OCP). Sarah has been working in the partner channel for over 20 years, ten years of which have been at Microsoft in various partner facing roles and is passionate about helping partners to grow and succeed together with Microsoft.]]>