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Archive for tag: Event

Microsoft Convergence 2013: Fun in the Sun and MS Dynamics Trends for Everyone

April 3, 2013

While making our way down from snowy Montreal to sunny New Orleans for Convergence 2013, we were filled with excitement! Looking forward to the heat, jazz and incredible food, but also to the unveiling of new Xpertdoc features to a record-breaking number of attendees. On the agenda: the New Xpertdoc Portal leveraging HTML 5, our new User Interface with a sleek Windows 8 feel, and the debut of the Xpertdoc PMPack, a set of pre-made project management templates.

As a first time attendee, the show was an incredible learning experience. While speaking to participants at the expo, I discovered an increased need for today's software to integrate with various Dynamics-based ERP solutions. In response to this trend, Xpertdoc provides directly (and through partners like Jovaco) a host of integration options to Dynamics AX, NAV, GP and SL. These integration capabilities range from web front-ends to web services API and full back-... Read more

Xpertdoc’s Presence at MS BUILD 2012

November 20, 2012

This year was the second Microsoft BUILD conference. We went to the first BUILD conference last year and there was no way we were going to skip this year's conference. Last year Microsoft formerly announced their plans for the next version of Windows, and they were hard at work since then. They shipped the final version of Windows 8 on October 26^th and shipped Windows Phone 8 on October 29^th, so we knew that they would be talking about what was shipped. It was even more important for us this year to see what our options were regarding new technologies because we are about to start the development of our next versions of Xpertdoc Template Designer and Xpertdoc Portal. As a Microsoft partner leveraging all kinds of technologies, we wanted to know which were the relevant technologies we should embrace and which we should avoid. (Don't worry, we won't release our next version of Xpertdoc Portal on the Silv... Read more

PowerConnect 2012 – Enhancing Customer Service

November 19, 2012

Xpertdoc was very pleased to participate as a sponsor of this year's PowerObjects User Conference - PowerConnect 2012 held in their home town of Minneapolis, MN.

The keynote speaker - Kathy Cuff of the Ken Blanchard Company shared insights on how to create customer excellence by showing you care… pulling from the teachings found in Ken Blanchard's bestseller Raving Fans. This book is certainly an easy read (read the book years ago!) - written in the parable style, it casually shares how to build your business through your customers' eyes. First released in the 90's (I think it was 1993 or thereabouts) this book and its message is so continually relevant that it has developed somewhat of an underground cult following! In her presentation, Kathy worked through what they describe as the "3 secrets":

1. DECIDE… what you want.
2. DISCOVER… what is of importance to the client.
... Read more

Government Procurement Tradeshow

October 10, 2012

On October 3 the Journée des acquisitions et des TIC [Government Procurement Tradeshow] was held in Quebec City. Xpertdoc participated as an exhibitor at this event organized by the Ministry of Economic Development, Innovation and Export Trade, in collaboration with the Shared Services Centre of Quebec. More than 500 participants from the business sphere and representatives from public and parapublic sectors - departments and agencies, municipalities, as well as education, health and social services - gathered at the Convention Center in order to learn and acquire the offerings of 60 suppliers from various sectors, including information technology.

It was my first experience exhibiting at a show; it was rather stressful, but also very rewarding, and my overall impression of the day was positive. We took the opportunity to showcase our targeted products and services ... Read more

I.B.I.S. iSight 2012

October 9, 2012

At this year's User Conference, I.B.I.S. once again repeated the conference across two venues: Atlanta and Charlotte - to support their customer base in each region. I.B.I.S. also brought some keynote speakers to the diverse group of attendees. Greg Bustin, CEO Coach, shared insights on managing and leadership strategies. Although a little off-focus for the mid-managers and operational staffers in attendance, there were key take-aways that everyone could use as they translated Greg's messages to CEOs to their personal life and challenges in working with colleagues.

Microsoft also supported the two conferences. At the Atlanta session, Microsoft showcased their Retail launch and demonstrated upcoming releases including Windows 8, Surface tablets and mobile devices.

Participants came from businesses "local" to each of the two venues. ... Read more

IASA Fall Planning Meeting 2012

October 5, 2012

Having only recently joined the Xpertdoc family, I jumped on the chance to represent the company at the  IASA Fall Planning Meeting 2012 in Atlanta, Georgia. The weekend was thoroughly enjoyable, and provided me with good industry insight to take with me going forward.

My first order of business upon arrival was a new volunteer's session; where new volunteers were introduced to the IASA staff and mentors. Prior to this, I have to say I was rather curious about the organizational structure of the IASA. Here was a conference that was being planned largely by professionals external to the IASA organization, without any additional form of compensation. In other words, these people were giving up their own time and energy to bring this together. All committee members and volunteers are spread out over... Read more

Customer Effective – CRM 2012

September 24, 2012

As a relatively new partner with Customer Effective, this was our first occasion to have a presence at their User Conference. It was so well presented that I felt sharing some of my reflections was well deserved… so here are some highlights:

This was the 5^th year that CEI has held a user conference … hosted in their home town of Greenville, South Carolina. A beautiful town with a very eclectic mix of restaurants, bars and shops... The conference was attended by companies from various industries - so the pre-show industry roundtable breakout sessions allowed users with common interests and backgrounds to meet up and share their challenges, successes and different perspectives on their CRM projects.

Participating in the Insurance industry session, the pains around SBC compliance were clearly apparent amongst the health care providers … and discussions around a ... Read more

Quebec Tech Association Rocks

October 28, 2011

Hi everyone!

I had the opportunity to speak about the Quebec Technology Association (http://www.aqt.ca/en/) at their annual networking cocktail last September. You can listen to what I had to say here.

SharePoint for Insurance

October 26, 2011

Last month I was invited to speak at the IASA Mid-West Regional Chapter about Microsoft SharePoint, what it is and what it means for insurance carriers.

I started my presentation by mentioning that SharePoint is actually many things and, more specifically, different things to different people.

According to Microsoft, SharePoint makes it easier for people to work together, set up Web sites to share information with others, manage documents from start to finish, and publish reports to help everyone make better decisions.

According to Wikipedia, it is a replacement for multiple web applications that supports various combinations of enterprise website requirements.

Here's my own stab at describing it:

• It's a web site.
• It's a tool to create web sites.
• It's a container for "stuff"
• It's a tool to collaborate on, organize, protect and sh... Read more

CIO Insurance Summit in Miami

October 21, 2011

Another great year with the delegates at the CIO Insurance Summit hosted in Miami this year!

While Miami weather did not cooperate (virtually constant rain, thunderstorms and even a tornado watch!) the interactions and dialogues during the session tracks and networking sessions were open and insightful as always.

Realizing a High ROI on Client Communication

Xpertdoc had a presence as a repeat sponsor (our 3^rd year) with a special presentation track geared at highlighting the real ROI on technology investments possible in the client communications space.

Recognizing that insurance companies must find a way to remain relevant whil... Read more

IASA 2011 Annual Educational Conference and Business Show

June 9, 2011

It has to be said this year's IASA technology conference hosted in Nashville has to be one of the best shows from the perspective of a vendor. Xpertdoc certainly had a stellar experience at this year's show - it was certainly on target with respect to our focus on the insurance sector. And Xpertdoc was very well received by clients and partners alike, with the Insurance Industry focussed document output solution from Xpertdoc clearly making waves with this audience.

Unfortunately, a by-product of the Xpertdoc team being so busy at the show was that there was no chance for us to attend any of the conference educational tracks. As such, any comments I can share about the speakers or content would be purely anecdotal. So I'll leave it to you to find those who attended sessions themselves to share their experiences with yo... Read more

ACORD LOMA 2011 – Insurance Moving Forward with New Technologies

May 25, 2011

San Diego California was the scene of this year's ACORD LOMA insurance systems forum annual conference.

Relatively well attended - although a lower number of industry professionals (some 300 if we exclude vendors, consultants, analysts, speakers, etc…) - than previous years, the overall buzz amongst participants was positive and engaged.

The conference sessions covered the usual business tracks for the various lines of business (general, life health & annuity, property & casualty, reinsurance) … But with my personal bias on operational efficiencies and customer experiences, those 2 tracks got most of my attention this year. In the sessions attended and dialogues I had with industry players, there was interesting 'trend', if you want to call it that. There was a higher prevalence of technology in the sessions and people were certainly exploring technology solutions to age-old business problem... Read more

Conference Roundup - Trends in Client Communications...

June 25, 2010

Another whirlwind couple of months of conferences and events with a plethora of topics focussing on the customer experience! Let me catch up on last month's travels and bring this blog up-to-date with more recent sessions I participated in this month...

I won't run down all the sessions offered at each conference. Rather, you have the links here for each site if you want more info. In this entry, I've chosen to highlight some nuggets of wisdom and insights gleaned from recent conferences as it pertains to client communications. Take the journey with me as I re-live some key moments over the past couple of months...or click on the link of interest to jump through my blog!

• Info360: AIIM Expo & Conference
• Women Presidents' Organization - Annual Conference
• Microsoft Dynamics Convergence
• LOMA - LIC
• OCTAS... Read more

Commentaries from AIIM 2010

April 22, 2010

Hello all!

Just a quick commentary from the AIIM 2010 Conference that is just wrapping up here in Philadelphia. We are very excited to report that Forrester's Craig Le Clair, one of the foremost analyst on document output automation and client communication management, publicly said that Xpertdoc had a very impressive offering for Microsoft SharePoint and was the one to watch in this space. I will add other notes from the conference in the next few days, so be sure to come back!

Office 2010

July 30, 2009

Earlier this month I had the privilege of attending the Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference in New Orleans, Louisiana (great food, great music, friendly people :-).

The most interesting information I got there was news about the upcoming Office Web offering and Word Services.

Scheduled for public release sometime in 2010, the Microsoft Office Web Apps will open up a host of new possibilities for genuine Word document creation and editing on the road and over the web. This will be especially great in conjunction with the subdocument feature of Xpertdoc Designer - that allows light clients to provide rich content when filling portions of enterprise-governed templates. My hope personally is that it will spell the end, once and for all, of the antiquated RichText format that is still prevalent in many web-based solutions.

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