The Trouble with Travel
You’re attending a tradeshow abroad, or visiting a customer site across the country. You intend to check in regularly on your blog, and even lay out some high-level plans for content over the 
week, with the best intentions. And then reality happens. You are in constant meetings with customers and partners and team members from your remote offices, followed by event activities and parties which are yet another opportunity to network and talk in person. They’re all valuable activities and the whole reason why you went on the road in the first place…but the blog gets neglected, you feel guilty, and so you write a short post about why you’ve not been blogging over the past week. Alas…
Although things have been quiet on the blogging front, its been an extremely busy and productive week. Axceler was an exhibitor at the Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference (#WPC11), with team members attending from our offices in London, Sydney, Redmond (Seattle), Los Angeles, and headquarters in Woburn (Boston). We also had folks from our satellite locations of Baltimore and St. Louis in attendance. Overall, we had close to 20 people on hand throughout the week, in meeting after meeting with current and prospective partners. While the team has had a very structured agenda while at WPC, setting up meetings well in advance of the event – and throughout the week with those they’ve met – to help build out and expand our partner channel, I’ve been able to float all week, keeping myself fairly free to join those discussions where appropriate, as well as help out in the booth on demos, and to funnel people toward the booth. I’ve been having some fantastic conversations. It helps when you have a product everyone loves (ControlPoint, which happens to be #1 in its category) and another product with unique features that everyone wants to see and get their hands on (Davinci).
One other area of focus for me this week has been helping promote a couple themes here at WPC: the International Association of Microsoft Channel Partners (#IAMCP) and the Microsoft Partner Network (@MSpartner, and #MPNLive) by participating in a live webcast panel event on Wednesday, and tweeting news about both programs all week. For those unfamiliar with IAMCP, here’s a quick overview:
IAMCP is the International Association of Microsoft Channel Partners. By "Channel” we refer to every company in the Microsoft partner eco-system and our membership is open for everyone being part of the "Microsoft Partner Network” ("MPN” for short). IAMCP is the established leader in P2P business networking for the Microsoft ecosystem. We are the hub of partner activity with thousands of members in countries all around the world. Nearly 100 chapters strong, we provide networking activities and events on a regular basis for members. (Find out more here)
And while most partners are familiar with MPN components (Axceler is a Gold ISV Partner), many are unaware of all of the resources available through the program. You can find a quick overview of the program and the core competencies here.
So here I am, at the end of yet another successful WPC event, finally updating my blog. I flew from Los Angeles to Seattle earlier this morning, and came straight into the office to get some work done before heading home and seeing my family. When you travel as much as I do, it’s good to keep the work and the family environments separate. So after a couple updates (and an article submission), I am heading home…and hopefully get to see that boy wizard movie that everyone is talking about.
