I was last week in both Technology Days in Buenos Aires and Santiago de Chile. At difference last year I did not make a technical presentation. I talked about community activities and the posibility to make a Community Day in South America.
People here wait for Technology Day with a lot of expectation, they are working with SAP technologies every day and they want to know about new products and innovation. Really it’s a great opportunity to be tuned. A lot of hot topics are clearly presented: Composition Environment, Enterprise Services, Business Process Management... . and those presentations usually are published ( I’m going to update this blog including url to download presentations when they will available ). But... I’m not going to talk in this blog about that tech info, ending my short presentation I invited to people to participate in a Community Day in their country ( Argentina and Chile) and I just want to present some impressions that I got from those events.
I had an extended networking talking to people about my Community Day experience this year in Las Vegas. Some things had an incredible level of response:
- “Bring your laptop” (Workshops/Hands-Ons/Hacker Night )
- “You are invited to talk” ( I had to find a simple way to explain “unconference” idea )
- “Meet your collegue” Round Tables of interest ( the same, a simple way to explain “Speed Networking” )
To SAP Customers I was talking about how community can help them in their actual ( or new ) implementation. Some of them even does not know about SDN/BPX capabilities (forums, blogs, downloads). I was explaining to them how can use SDN/BPX to increase their knowledge.
We, SAP Partners have a great opportunity. Some time we are competing to win a business, and other times we are working together, adding value in our best field, some proyects even have three or four, even more, SAP partners working together. So, we learned to compite and we learned to collaborate, and I think those are two main roots of innovation. For all of this, it was not a surprise to me that I found a great response in SAP Partners to make a Community Day in South America, I expect make contact with them in near future to know about proposal for presentations and topics of interest for event.
I talked to SAP employees too, they can be the sucessfull factor of all this, They can move inside. SAP Community Day needs a strong SAP employees collaboration. They have possibility to be part of SAP and SAP Community, it’s a position of privilege.
I think now we have to work together to define a strategy to make Community Day a reality, my first thoughts:
An special day for Community Day ?
Community Day hapening the day before Technology Day ?
Same day both events ?
Every idea or collaboration concern please write a comment here or send me an email (it’s in my business card).
Acknowledgments
I talked just 10 minutes in Buenos Aires and Santiago, You can think it should not be a great thing,but, frecuently litle things have a great effort back. I have to thanks to these colleagues, maybe not knowing they were helping:
Iain Ballesty ( Special thanks to Iain, he gave me an excellent guide to talk , is an excellent orator, was my mentor for these events).
Gustavo Trivelli ( He really has an incredible level of patience with me to teach me and explain me about new solutions ).
Ivan Labra, Fernando Mauric and Loreto Reyes (without their support I had not been able to make it).
Daniel Bianchin, Pablo Galiñanes and Ariel Martinez ( They showed excellent presentations and always it’s very enriching talk with them).
Paula Santos, Magdalena Ugarte, Laura Arcusin and Federico Morello from ADP Consultores. ( I have their support and help every single day, this is my opportunity to thank them in public).
I want to highlight interest and words of support showed from colleagues working in other partners:
Ezequiel Martin (Reynox), Cesar Rodríguez (Neoris), Cristian Colombo (Neoris), Juan Jose D’alessandro (Softtek), Claudia Irueta (Teknoda) and Nora Salmun (Teknoda).
And of course a big thanks to Marilyn Pratt, Mark Finnern and Christine Godek for help me from the beginning.
By the end, I don’t have yet one year of contribution to Community, it was a great year. I began some Community projects and I had possibility to be in TechEd and to know a lot of people. So, thanks to everybody and see you in Community Day ! ( Buenos Aires ?, Santiago ?, Las Vegas ? ) ...everything can happen .
Regards,
Ignacio.
Thanks to Magdalena Ugarte for pictures from Technology Day in Buenos Aires.
Bonus Tracks:
Aconcagua (highest point in America) from air
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