Expert Predictions for SharePoint in 2015

While the interwebs are alive with technology zealots and doomsayers alike, the SharePoint community is full of experts who are always willing to make themselves available and share their real-world experiences with the platform today – as well as their thoughts on where it is going in the future. The rate of growth of SharePoint continues its upward climb even as naysayers try to tell you that “SharePoint is dead.” The reality is that organizations are still finding it to be a very powerful platform through which many business-critical solutions are delivered. And according to Microsoft, Office 365 growth has outpaced the rate of growth of SharePoint, which had been the company’s fastest-to-a-billion business.

People continue to purchase SharePoint, deploying it online and on premises. Office 365 is also selling briskly. But where is the platform headed? How different is the value proposition that we bought into with SharePoint 2010 and 2013 from what we’re seeing today? How does our approach to document and team collaboration change as the platform evolves?

One of the leading indicators of where things are heading is to look at what Microsoft is talking about, and what they are deploying internally. For one, the volume and quality of data and the support they provide around hybrid SharePoint deployments is night-and-day compared to this time last year. And then there are the tools, content, partner programs, and funding available to help organizations onboard their employees and migrate their data, focusing as much on adoption of the platform as on selling new licenses. But what about the newest features to the SharePoint and Office 365 ecosystem? Office Graph and the new Delve interface, Groups, the Clutter folder in Outlook, and the marketing drive behind OneDrive for Business. All of these things paint a picture of a rapidly evolving SharePoint experience.

Where is SharePoint headed in 2015 and beyond? That’s the topic of this month’s #CollabTalk tweetjam, taking place Tuesday, December 30th at 9am Pacific, with a stellar list of MVPs, MCMs, authors and speakers from across the SharePoint and Office365 community, and around the world.

What is a tweetjam, you ask? It’s a gathering of experts on a very public channel (Twitter) allowing anyone to watch or participate. We provide a site at Twubs.com/CollabTalk to capture the conversation, or you can use Twitter or Hootsuite or any other platform you’d like to follow along or jump in. Over the course of the hour, we’ll walk through 7 main questions and give our panelists and participants a chance to answer, share links and experiences, and to ask their own follow up questions, The only guidance is to remember to include the #CollabTalk hashtag and, where relevant, the question/answer number so that people can follow the conversation.

The questions we'll be asking include:

1. Is SharePoint still relevant?
2. How important is SharePoint’s hybrid support and on prem roadmap to your customers?
3. What kind of impact is Office365 having on you and your customers?
4. What does the removal of Office365 features mean for the future?
5. What 3 features (available or forthcoming) will have the biggest impact on SharePoint in 2015?
6. What are your predictions for SharePoint as a platform in 2015 and beyond?
7. If you could give one piece of advice to Microsoft re: SharePoint, what would it be?

For this month’s event, the following experts will be participating in our panel (with more to be added):

• Marc Anderson (@sympmarc), consultant at Sympraxis Consulting and SharePoint MVP
• Adam Levithan (@collabadam), consultant and social expert at Portal Solutions
• Jason Himmelstein (@sharepointlhorn), SharePoint MVP and senior technical director of SharePoint at Atrion
• Michelle Caldwell (@shellecaldwell), SharePoint MVP and director of collaboration at Avanade 
• Sebastien Levert (@sebastienlevert), Office365 MVP and specialist in Azure, SharePoint, and O365 at Pollen
• Edin Kapic (@ekapic), SharePoint MVP and architect at Spenta
• Brett Hill (@bretthill), Office365 MVP and manager of technical marketing at Riverbed Technology
• Paul Stork (@pstork), SharePoint MVP and MCM, principal architect at BlueChip
• Jethro Seghers (@jseghers), Office365 MVP and programn manager at BitTitan
• Noah Sparks (@noahsparks), customer success manager at Microsoft
• Eric Riz (@rizinsights), SharePoint MVP and ceo of Empty Cubicle
• Treb Gatte (@tgatte), Project MVP and managing partner at Tumble Road
• Barry Jinks (@BJinks), founder and ceo at Colligo
• Dan Holme (@danholme), Office365 MVP, evangelist, and co-founder of ITUnity
• Eric Overfield (@ericoverfield), branding expert and author, founder of PixelMill
• Tracy O'Connell (@EuropeanSP), general manager of the European SharePoint Conference & Community
• Robert Toro (@SharePointToro), SharePoint practice director at Slalom
• Joel Oleson (@joeloleson), director of enterprise search strategy at BA Insight
• Bjoern Rapp (@bjoern_rapp), SharePoint MVP and senior advisor at Steria
• Heather Newman (@heddanewman), cmo at ITUnity and founder, cmo at Content Panda
• Tom Resing (@resing), SharePoint MVP and MCM at Jive Software
• Dr. Steven Marsh (@drstevemarsh), director of product marketing at Metalogix
• Scot Hillier (@scothillier), SharePoint MVP and independent consultant
• Stacy Deere-Strole (@sldeere), owner of Focal Point Solutions
• John White (@diverdown1964), SharePoint MVP and cto at UnlimitedViz
• Kanwal Khipple (@kkhipple), Office 365 MVP and founder of 2toLead
• Mark Jones (@markqjones), founder of SharePoint-Community.Net and Collaboris
• Loryan Strant (@thecloudmouth), Office365 MVP and managing director at Paradyne
• Fernando Melo (@frmelo21), SharePoint architect and evangelist at Helios Cooperative
• Gokan Ozcifci (@gokanOzcifci), SharePoint MVP and managing consultant at Neoxy
• Ivan Sanders (@iasanders), SharePoint MVP, developer and consultant
• Jeff Shuey (@jshuey), chief evangelist at K2
• Jasper Oosterveld (@SharePTjasper), Office365 MVP and SharePoint consultant at Sparked
• Jussi Mori (@JussiMori), SharePoint MVP, social expert and consultant at Peaches Industries
• Martina Grom (@magrom), Office365 MVP and co-founder and ceo of atwork information technology
• Naomi Moneypenny (@nmoneypenny), Office365 MVP and cto at ManyWorlds
• Nick Kellett (@nickkellett), SharePoint MVP and cto at Stoneshare
• Eric Lytle (@sharepointmastr), SharePoint MCM and cto at BrightStarr
• Jeff Fried (@jefffried), cto and vp of engineering at BA Insight
• Jeff Willinger (@jwillie), director of collaboration and social business at Rightpoint
• Hans Brender (@hansbrender), SharePoint MVP and ceo of sqtm PSC GmbH
• And myself as your host (@buckleyplanet), Office365 MVP and managing director, americas for GTconsult

I hope you can join us for this exciting event, and add your voice to the conversation. As always, I’ll publish the stats and a full summary on Storify following the event, and will be working with the team at ITUnity.com to publish some additional content in support of this live event. If you like this kind of real-time event, be sure to follow me on Twitter at @buckleyplanet for updates on what is coming in January!