Jennifer Mason News & Articles

So often when we look at how to work with SharePoint we focus in on specific features or functionality based on a silo of information, but the power of SharePoint comes in the ability of users to create simple solutions by combining multiple techniques and tools. 

Based on simple math, we all know that 1+1=2. This is a simple concept that we learn very early in life. When it comes to SharePoint though, when you consider the tools available to you, you have a huge advantage of being able to use more than one tool, combined together, to create an outcome that is far greater than 2.  

With the announcement of the Yammer integration roadmap a question remains: which direction should your company choose?

Following up on our review of the Social Features that are currently available within SharePoint 2013, let's highlight some of the features available within Yammer. This high level overview will get you thinking about the powerful things that your organization can do with the tools available within Yammer.

When you look at SharePoint 2013 Social Features, it is important to understand the Social features are really just a way to highlight how users are already working. Once you've flipped things around and are starting with the user and common actions, it becomes easy to see how the tools available to you can simply enhance current activities of users.

Unless you are hiding under a rock, then over the past few months you have probably been slammed with the idea of Social in the Workplace. If you are like me, you like to review the demos and look at the concepts but then chuckle a little inside when you have to look at how you actually implement something like the demo in your workplace. Everything sounds great, but how in the world does it all just happen? 

Driven by a passion to find technical solutions to real world business problems, Jennifer Mason freely shares her knowledge of SharePoint best practices. We interviewed Jennifer to find out what makes our top contributor of 2012 tick.

The fun part of every December is to look back at the year and think through all that has happened. Looking at all the ups, the downs and the unknowns can really be an eye opener to get you ready to make the resolutions and plans for the next year, because there really is no point in looking back if you don’t take the extra steps to plan forward.

This year at the SharePoint Conference something was different. Something that has existed at all the other events, but something that this time was front and center, loud and clear! This year the Community was made into a central component of the conference. Community efforts were noticed and encouraged.

At this year's SharePoint Conference I took the opportunity to put the Surface device to the test. Instead of dragging around my laptop I wanted to see how well the Surface would do to fulfill my computer needs for the week. I was pleasantly surprised.

There is no way that you've heard anything about the newest release of SharePoint without hearing about the new Social features. With this release of products, the SharePoint team has put a huge emphasis on social and how it works within the environment. After being here at SharePoint conference, I think the best summary of the Social features that I can give is that this release of products simply highlights things that users already do. Wait! Before you stop reading because you think I am flat out wrong, hear me out. 

Thus far, the SharePoint conference has been full of conversations surrounding the Project Server and how it fits into the vision of this release cycle. From the pre-con session, to mentions in the keynote and a full set of sessions, Microsoft has proven that it is committed and will be coming out strong with their new release. 

This year has been abuzz with the newest Microsoft product releases, from the much anticipated Surface, Windows 8 phones and a new version of Office, there really is a whole new wave of products that are available to the masses. SharePoint 2013 is a huge component of the story, but it is important to see that it is still only a piece of the story. 

The keynote of any Microsoft conference is really not to be missed, it is when the entire group comes together to hear the latest and greatest and to get a glimpse into the vision of the product team. Any good keynote will have some surprises, laughter and good demos. Yesterday's SharePoint Conference keynote fit the bill and in some cases raised the bar for keynote events. A great foundation was presented that will really carry us through this next release of the product. Here I touch on the high points and focus on the aspects that really detail the future of SharePoint.

Last week I had the great opportunity to participate in the Tweet Jam for the Evolution of Enterprise Collaboration. During this quick one hour community chat there seemed to be just a few underlying concepts that brought everyone together in agreement. I was reminded of these concepts with Microsoft's launch last Thursday.