All SharePoint Conference 2014 sessions are available at Channel 9. Most sessions at Best of
SharePoint NYC have a corresponding SharePoint conference session (ctrl-click the TITLE to go to the
session).
SESSION ABSTRACT BY TRACK
TRACK 1: BUSINESS VALUE & STRATEGY
10:15am-11:30am
“Why measurement is critical to any SharePoint initiative”
Speaker: Chris Gardner, WebTrends
Any investment in an IT project has to exceed a specific ROI in order to be justified. However, it is easier to
calculate “hard dollars” benefits for investments in ERP or eCommerce solutions than it is for collaboration or
enterprise content management solutions such as SharePoint. Nonetheless, organizations have heavily invested
in such solutions over the past 10 years, as benefits associated with collaboration solutions are undeniable,
even if they are hard to quantify. Come join us to understand why measurement is critical to any SharePoint
deployment. When to start measuring. Who to involve. How to plan and execute a measurement strategy.
11:45am-1:00pm
“Using Nintex Workflow and Forms to Automate and Integrate SharePoint and a Whole Lot More”
Speaker: Brad Orluk, Nintex
1:30pm-2:45pm
“Leverage what you already know about SharePoint as you move into 2013”
Speaker: Lou Gucciardo, Microsoft
This session, designed for business and IT executives, helps you better understand and plan how to leverage
your existing investment in SharePoint 2010 to get the most out of SharePoint 2013 and/or SharePoint Online.
Learn how to leverage your current knowledge, training, and content organization to maximize your SharePoint
2013 benefit. Learn how to use the key features of SharePoint 2013, such as the new intuitive experience, to
improve your portal, collaboration, and document management experience. Also understand how you should
leverage related technologies, such as Yammer and Office 365. This is the first session to provide a roadmap for
a successful SharePoint 2013 and/or Office 365 journey.
3:00pm-4:15pm
“Content Types Metadata and You”
Speaker: Ira Fuchs, Microsoft
In order to keep your SharePoint environment from becoming used as 'just another file share' there are things
you can do to make it more valuable and usable. Understanding how content types work and implementing
them in your environment helps you and your users make sense of the content. Add in the benefit of working
with Managed Metadata to create and standardize the terminology and your environment will be easily
searched, understood, and utilized. This session will focus on understanding content types, implementing them,
planning and using metadata term sets, all to help you build richer SharePoint environments.
TRACK 2: ARCHITECTURE/IT-PRO
10:15am-11:30am
“SharePoint on-premises, in the cloud, and everything in between”
Speaker: Sanjeev Nair, Microsoft
This IT Pro track overview session will focus on what's new and coming soon for SharePoint 2013 on-premises including highlights of SP1. Going further, we'll expose how online and hybrid improvements increase both
deployment scenarios and value, this includes upcoming updates and capabilities. We, too, will articulate our
on-premises strategy beyond SharePoint 2013.
11:45am-1:00pm
“Creating an effective search strategy”
Speaker: Mike Himmelstein, BA Insight
Search is a critical aspect of any SharePoint project. Through his many years of experience and hundreds of
projects Mike has recognized patterns and identified best practices. He will discuss how the applicable of his
experience can lead to successful search implementations.
1:30pm-2:45pm
“Deploying SharePoint in Azure Environment”
Speaker: Donal Conlon, Jornata
This session will provide details on guidance from the TechNet content team discussing SharePoint solution
architectures using Windows Azure Infrastructure Services. This session focuses on technical architectures for
Windows Azure-based solutions with focus on two architectures-SharePoint disaster recovery with failover to
Windows Azure and Internet-facing sites. Come to this session to learn how to design the SharePoint farm for
each solution, including managing identity across the environments.
3:30pm-4:45pm
“A strategic and pragmatic conversation on governance”
Speaker: John Peluso, AvePoint
SharePoint 2013 and SharePoint Online change the landscape in many ways, particularly with its application
model and cloud capabilities. From a business perspective, this makes the job of the governance teams more
difficult and complex as these issues become key priorities (and areas of weakness) for the organization. This
session is a strategic conversation around the elements governance teams should be most concerned with,
from data ownership to creating the correct policies and social rights to security. Attendees will learn tactical
strategies which can be used as soon as they return to the office
TRACK 3: DEVELOPER
10:15am-11:30am
“Deliver adaptive and personalized experiences for your SharePoint 2013 sites”
Speaker: Samer Raphael, Neudesic
This session will explore SharePoint's integrated analytics & search driven publishing capabilities and how to
use them to provide a continually evolving, effective user experience. We'll show, via real demos, how to exploit
the full power of the SharePoint 2013 search & analytics platform together with numerous Web Content
Management (WCM) features in your internet/intranet site, including personalization, promotions, social,
recommendations, content re-use across channels.
11:45am-1:00pm
“Complex problem solving with the new HTML5 APIs”
Speaker: Scot Hillier, Scot Hillier Technical Solutions
HTML5 and CSS3 are now a standard part of the Office and SharePoint developer's skillset. While much of the
buzz around HTML5 and CSS3 focuses on creating a responsive and satisfying end-user experience, a whole
new set of JavaScript APIs was also introduced. These APIs provide powerful capabilities that either didn't exist
before, or were only available in 3rd-party libraries. In this session, we'll focus on these new APIs and use them
to solve real-world problems such as maintaining context in a SharePoint-hosted app, caching app data, and
communicating between app parts. Attendees will exit the session with a host of new ideas for using the
HTML5 APIs to solve real-world problems.
1:30pm-2:45pm
“Adjust the perspective with responsive design”
Speaker: Ernie Bryant, Aspect
Creating designs to respond and work with multiple browsers and device types has become critical to broad
usage and adoption. As we examine the concepts behind Responsive Design, you will learn the best ways to
apply this to your SharePoint sites and which challenges you will face. In this session you will receive real world
examples of the approach to design and development as well as real world challenges and examples of
Responsive Design for SharePoint 2013 and SharePoint Online..
3:00pm-4:15pm
“Get started developing Apps for Office & SharePoint 2013”
Rob Windsor, Portal Solutions
Office and SharePoint 2013 introduce a new app model that brings the best of web development to Office and
SharePoint. This session will show you how to get started and quickly create apps on this new model with the
browser based tooling codename Napa, and how you can turn those apps into more advanced, rich scenarios
with Visual Studio
TRACK 4: SOCIAL
10:15am-11:30am
“Microsoft roadmap for enterprise social”
Speaker: Ed McGillis, Aspect
Enterprise Social is enabling organizations across the world to transform their businesses, to harnesses the
power of their most valuable asset, their people, by connecting employees, customers, and partners. In this
session you will learn about the value of enterprise social, Microsoft's vision and our latest product roadmap.
11:45am-1:00pm
“The Responsive Org”
Speaker: Munish Agarwal, Microsoft
Historically, competitive advantages came from optimizing for efficiency and labor productivity of standardized
product, with companies such as Walmart and Ford being common examples. As the flow of information
increases, the competitive advantage is held by the organization that can react the fastest to new information.
Companies achieve increased responsiveness by reducing the friction of information flow, increasing their
iteration rate, decreasing their cost of failure, and optimizing their structures for adaptability. In this session you
will learn the characteristics of a responsive organization and how your organization can demand.
1:30pm-2:45pm
“The strategy behind building a successful social intranet”
Speaker: Mark Smith, OSC
Know your business. Know your business requirements. Know your users. And then introduce a new social
fabric that up-levels your workforce inside and outside the firewall, cross device, cross platform. This session
will focus on the strategy behind moving your entire organization from an informed user base into a dailyengaged, active community. Lines of communication can go top down, bottom up, and it all happens wherever,
whenever.
3:00pm-4:15pm
“Make your SharePoint portal social in 1-2-3!”
Speaker: Prashant Nayak, Microsoft
Do you have an old static company or department portal? Are you spending too much time actively
maintaining relevant content for it? Social is in! In this session we will enhance a company portal in a few easy
steps and enable it for open social communication inside both Yammer and SharePoint. We will walk through
the different ways of integrating Yammer including Open Graph, Embed and REST API. We will also show you
how to utilize search and recommendations to move from a static site to a dynamic and user engaging portal.
TRACK 5: OFFICE 365
10:15am-11:30am
“Authentication and Identity”
Speaker: Clayton Cobb, Planet Technologies
Office 365 can work with your existing user directory and this session will review all the different ways that
identity management can be configured, We will start with an overview of the identity management
architecture used in Office 365 and you will gain insight to the simple options you have for integrating with
existing directories or creating new ones. We will talk about cloud identity, synchronized identity and federated
identity models.
11:45am-1:00pm
“SharePoint Online Management and Control”
Speaker: John Peluso, AvePoint
In this session you will learn how to manage your SharePoint Online (SPO) environment in the browser (the
SharePoint Online Admin Center) and by using the SharePoint Online Management Shell (aka, Microsoft
PowerShell for SPO). We will cover numerous scenarios and demos for both seasoned SharePoint admins and
to the new SPO admins.
1:30pm-2:45pm
“Using cool new search features in SharePoint”
Speaker: Mike Himmelstein, BA Insight
In SharePoint Online and SharePoint 2013 search takes center stage. The search center has been updated and
many new features have been added. Join Mike for a tour of these new features and how you can use them to
create awesome interactive and personalized experiences.
3:00pm-4:15pm
“Overview of Power BI for Office 365”
Speaker: Ram Madhurakavi, Microsoft
Power BI for Office 365 makes it easier than ever to find the story in your data and your spreadsheets express
themselves in surprising new ways. In this session Ram will walk you through the new features and discuss how
you can use Power BI to easily gain insights into your business.
SPEAKER BIOGRAPHIES
Ira Fuchs
Company: Microsoft
Title: Technical Specialist - Productivity
Session: Content Types, Metadata and You
Email: irafuchs@microsoft.com
Phone: 646-621-3222
Ira Fuchs is a SharePoint Technical Specialist working out of the Microsoft New York
district office. For nearly five years he has assisted some of Microsoft’s largest
customers deploy and exploit the features and capabilities of the SharePoint
platform.
Ed McGillis
Company: Aspect Software
Title: Portals Practice Manager
Session: Microsoft Roadmap for Enterprise Social
Email:
Phone:
Ed McGillis (PMP, MCTS, MCITP) is the Aspect Software Portals Practice
Manager. Aspect Software is a Microsoft Gold Partner and actively
participates in the Microsoft SharePoint Partner Advisory Council (PAC). Ed
has been working with various incarnations of SharePoint since 2001. He
has worked on dozens of SharePoint implementations and engagements.
His areas of focus include SharePoint strategic consulting, planning,
enterprise content management, social, process automation, and
collaboration.
Chris M. Gardner
Company: Webtrends
Title: VP Partnerships
Session: Why measurement is critical to any SharePoint initiative
Email: Chris.gardner@webtrends.com
Phone: 415-609-3924
Chris is responsible for partnerships at Webtrends. He works closely with partners
and clients to leverage analytics which help drive SharePoint user adoption and
engagement. Chris has over 15 years of technology experience including leadership
positions at SapientNitro, RightNow, DoubleClick, and Mediaplex. Follow him on
twitter @gardnercm or connect via LinkedIn www.linkedin.com/in/chrisgardner/
Prashant Nayak
Microsoft
Title: Senior Premier Field Engineer
Session: Make your SharePoint portal social in 1-2-3!
Email: pnayak@microsoft.com
Phone: +1 (917) 388-8859
Passionate about helping people, implementing technology &
troubleshooting issues. 15+ years of IT Pro /Development experience.
Socially active. Formerly MCS Consultant, and currently Senior Premier Field
Engineer. Helping Microsoft’s Premier Customers to deploy and support
SharePoint and Cloud solutions. Love to travel, tweet (re-tweet), and tell
some corny jokes. 
LOU GUCCIARDO
Company: Microsoft
Title: Productivity Technology Solutions Professional
Session: Leverage what you already know about SharePoint as you move
into 2013
Email: louis.gucciardo@microsoft.com
Phone: 917.388.1187
Lou Gucciardo joined Microsoft in 2010. Prior to joining Microsoft Lou has
held technical and leadership positions in information technology and
finance. His corporate IT background covers diverse technical and leadership
areas including SharePoint (of course). He has held leadership positions in
corporate finance as well as private equity and is a registered Commodity
Trading Advisor. At Microsoft Lou’s focus is on Office 365 and helping his
customers maximize return on their technology investments. Lou holds a
Masters degree in Financial Analysis from Fordham University.
JOHN PELUSO
Company: AvePoint
Title: Vice President, Product Management
Session:
Email: John.peluso@AvePoint.com
Phone: 732-485-0089
John is a Technology and Corporate Training professional with more than 17
years of experience helping organizations understand how they can drive
results and business productivity through an effective use of technology. He
has consulted with technical and business decision makers at organizations
of all sizes, and conducted SharePoint planning session workshops for clients
considering new or upgraded SharePoint deployments, helping stakeholders
understand all capabilities of the SharePoint product and identify key
features to be leveraged in phased implementations. Having held both
technical and business management roles, John has a deep understanding of
the priorities and concerns that drive all business lines in enterprises today.
John holds Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer and Microsoft Certified
Trainer certifications and serves as the Vice President of Product
Management with AvePoint, Inc.
Ernie Bryant
Company: Aspect
Title: Senior Consultant
Session: Adjust the perspective with responsive design
Email:
Phone:
Ernie Bryant is a Senior Consultant for the Interaction Enablement Services division
of Aspect Software. He specializes in front-end development and has spent much
of the last 7 years working with some of the biggest names in healthcare &
education to deliver highly customized SharePoint implementations. When he’s not
working with SharePoint, Ernie is delivering solutions built on a number of other
software technologies such as MVC, Web API, Windows 8 Apps, Knockout.js, &
AngularJS. He holds his MCSD certification in Windows Store Apps Using HTML5
and is passionate about the convergence of beautiful design and elegant code to
create highly intuitive user experiences.
Brad Orluk
Company: Nintex
Title: Technical Evangelist
Session: Using Nintex Workflow and Forms to Automate and Integrate SharePoint
and a Whole Lot More
Email: brad.orluk@nintex.com
Phone: 425-324-2466
Brad is a Nintex Technical Evangelist with over 10 years of IT architecture,
administration and sales experience. As an Information Architect at a Fortune 500,
he has worked on business and IT process improvement and automation on a
variety of real world global projects and productivity initiatives. Brad’s unique,
technical yet business focused, background gives him the ability to help users
leverage their SharePoint investments to drive value and increase adoption across
their businesses.
Rob Windsor
Company: Portal Solutions / Pluralsight
Title: Senior Consultant / Author
Session: Get started developing Apps for Office & SharePoint 2013
Email: rwindsor@portalsolutions.net
Phone: 416-500-9256
Rob Windsor is a Lead SharePoint Consultant with Portal Solutions - a Microsoft
Gold Partner based in DC and Boston. He has twenty years experience developing
rich-client and web applications with Delphi, VB, C# and VB.NET and is currently
spending a majority of his time working with SharePoint. Rob is a regular speaker at
conferences, code camps, and user groups across North America and Europe. He
regularly contributes articles and videos to MSDN, TechNet, and the Pluralsight OnDemand library and is the co-author of Professional Visual Basic 2012 and .NET 4.5
for Wrox. Rob is the founder and past-president of the North Toronto .NET User
Group and has been recognized as a Microsoft Most Valuable Professional for his
involvement in the developer community.
MIKE HIMELSTEIN
Company: BA Insight
Title: Vice President – Strategy
Session:
Email:
Phone:
Mike Himelstein has almost 11 years of practical experience developing
deploying, and architecting search based applications. Mike has advised
hundreds of the largest companies in the world and worked directly as a
trusted advisor and architect for major finance, media, and health care
organizations helping them to shape their strategy around unified
information access. A proven leader in search technologies, he has worked
with organizations during the full life cycle from initial introductions to
search based technologies to final deployment and user acceptance. At BA
Insight, Mike helps organizations understand the power that search has to
unify information in ways other integration technologies have been
unsuccessful with in the past. Prior to joining BA Insight, Mike was the
Technology Solutions Manager in the Enterprise Search Group at Microsoft.
Mike came to Microsoft through the acquisition of FAST where he was the
Technology Solutions Manager for the NY Metro area since 2004.
MUNISH AGARWAL
Company: Microsoft Corporation
Title: Director Cloud and Social Computing
Session: The Responsive Org
Email: magarwal@microsoft.com
Phone: 646.229.7385
Munish has been with Microsoft since Nov 1997, he is a Director in our
Cloud and Social Computing business based in NYC. He is a member of the
WW black belt specialist team focused on Social for the East Region (which
includes New England, New York, Mid Atlantic and Greater Southeast
Markets). He has spent his career in field facing customer roles including
Senior Consultant, Managing Consultant, Engagement Manager, Services
Executive, Global Technology Advisor, Global Business Manager, Sales
Manager, and National Lead for Global/MNCs)
SAMER RAPHAEL
Company: Neudesic
Title: Senior Consultant III, Solutions Delivery Group
Session: Deliver adaptive and personalized experiences for your SharePoint
2013 sites
Email: Samer.Raphael@neudesic.com
Phone: (610) 885-9240
Samer Raphael, MCAD, MCTS, is a Senior Consultant with Neudesic and is a
SharePoint Architect with over 20 years of experience in the IT industry, 16
years in software development and infrastructure, and 8 of which are on
SharePoint. Samer has implemented SharePoint 2003-2013 solutions and
infrastructure in Intranet and Extranet environments for Higher Education,
Data Processing, Manufacturing, Healthcare, and the Pharmaceutical
industries. He has specific expertise in SharePoint Infrastructure,
Governance, and ECM solutions including Taxonomy, BCS, Content
Management, and Workflows. In his previous life, he was a Wireless
Engineer and worked on Telephone, Radio, and Avionic systems for large
telecommunications and consulting firms and for the US Air Force. He
graduated from the Pennsylvania State University with Bachelor’s degree in
Electrical Engineering focusing on Communications and Computer Software
and Networking. In his spare time, Samer likes travel, cook, football, and
squash. He is an emphatic No Reservations fan. He most of all enjoys
spending time with his wife chasing his children around their home.
SCOT HILLIER
Company: Scot Hillier Technical Solutions, LLC
Title: MVP
Session: Complex Problem Solving with HTML5 APIs
Email: scot@scothillier.net
Phone: 203-288-2600
Scot is an independent consultant and Microsoft SharePoint Most Valuable
Professional focused on creating solutions for Information Workers with
SharePoint, Office, and related technologies. He is the author/coauthor of 18
books on Microsoft technologies including “Inside SharePoint 2013” and
“App Development in SharePoint 2013”. Scot splits his time between
consulting on SharePoint projects, speaking at SharePoint events like the
Microsoft SharePoint Conference, and delivering training for SharePoint
developers through Critical Path Training. Scot is a former U. S. Navy
submarine officer and graduate of the Virginia Military Institute. Scot can be
reached at scot@scothillier.net.