The Townsend Report

Building a Digital Future: A Transformational Blueprint for Innovating with Microsoft Dynamics 365 by Lipi Sarkar and Vinnie Bansal. (Wiley, 2021) Buy on Amazon   Digital transformation has been one of my favorite topics since it emerged as an industry buzzword.  Many books and articles discuss digital transformation as an abstract concept, but few of them can cite specific technologies, products, companies and case studies. Building a Digital Future fills this niche with a wide-ranging set of industry examples, all related to Microsoft's platform for digital transformation.  Part 1 sets the stage with an introduction to digital transformation, illustrated with case studies showing how organizations can harness disruptive change to improve themselves.  It explains the capabilities of the Microsoft Power Platform, including Dynamics 365, Power Apps, Power BI and other tools.  Finally, it covers the rise of low code/no code development along with the citizen developer.  Part 2 pres

[This is a guest post from Steve Vickerage of pavliks.com. For more information, see the pavliks.com blog .  ] Although it is not a new trend, we continue to see accelerated movement from on premises servers to cloud computing from our prospects. For many, the move is triggered by the need to upgrade aging server hardware. This leads to reconsideration of costs and new options to meet computing requirements. Here are the Top 5 reasons to consider moving your infrastructure to the Microsoft Azure cloud: 1. Scalability If you need another server, we can provision one for you relatively quickly. If you need more resources for an existing server, we can add it for you on the fly, no need to buy drives or RAM and schedule onsite visits. If you need more capacity for your back up and disaster recovery solutions there is no need to buy costly appliances, just add more space and retention as needed. If you are hosting a webserver, Azure can handle spikes of traffic and scale with no proble

  by James Townsend Updated 7/5/2022 Microsoft Power Apps is one of my favorite subjects, and I enjoy reading blog posts from members of this thriving technical community.  Here are some of my favorite bloggers and their blogs: The Official Microsoft Power Apps Blog   I have to start with the official Microsoft Power Apps blog.  It has many contributors, largely Microsoft program manager, including frequent posters Denise Moran ,  Greg Lindhorst , Kartik Kanakasabesan , and  Adrian Orth .  This is the place to go for product announcements, updates and technical how-to for a broad range of Power Apps topics.  April Dunnam April Dunnam was formerly focused on SharePoint and now devoting herself to Power Platform.  April offers highly understandable explanations of Power Platform, Dataverse and other top Power Apps topics. She joined Microsoft in late 2019 and has a thriving YouTube channel .  Carl De Souza Power Apps Blog and eBook This is one of the most extensive and best organized blo

Source: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-viva/sales This month Microsoft introduced Viva Sales , the first role-based offering on the Microsoft Viva employee experience suite. Viva was announced in February 2021 and included many new tools and features as well as extensive integrations with third party providers of training, collaboration, analytics  and productivity tools.  For instance, Microsoft announced these integrations in November 2021: Viva Learning : SAP SuccessFactors, Cornerstone OnDemand, Saba, Coursera, Skillsoft, Pluralsight, edX, Udemy, Go1, Infosec, Josh Bersin Academy, Udacity*, Harvard Business Review*, OpenSesame*, and EdCast* Viva Connections : Qualtrics, ServiceNow, UKG, Talentsoft, StandOut by ADP, Adobe Sign, Moveworks, Lifeworks, Limeade, Tribute, Blue Yonder, Zebra-Reflexis, Workday*, DocuSign*, EdCast*, and Espressive* Viva Insights : Qualtrics, Glint and Headspace Viva exists in the security context of Microsoft 365 and is integrated with Microsoft

Serenic Software published a new case study on how the Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition (GAIN) uses Serenic Navigator accounting software to support its mission of improving nutrition around the world.  GAIN makes extensive use of many Serenic Navigator features such as budget plans and budget ledger. GAIN can define sub-plans, track the progress and status of multiple budgets simultaneously, and allows adjustments to posted budgets within Serenic Navigator.  Serenic Navigator further enables project accounting functions, including projects supported by multiple funding sources which each bring their own compliance requirements.  Serenic took on the responsibility of advising GAIN on best practices when it comes to the management of grants and projects through the use of Serenic Navigator financial reporting dimensions. Dale Cockman, head of GAIN United States and Senior Manager for Financial Systems commented,  “What’s great is our budget preparers can easily access current and

Photo by  Mika Baumeister  on  Unsplash Guest Author:  Kirk Evans [this post first appeared on pavliks.com ] Keep your business moving forward instead of being stuck in neutral waiting for bottlenecks in the Supply Chain to open. There are many things I miss about owning my own business.  The freedom to decide on what opportunities to pursue.  Decisions on how you will perform and present yourself as a business.  What I don't miss are the challenges you all face daily.  Workforce shortages, increasing costs, and a problem that is becoming more prevalent with no signs of going away, supply chain issues. The last issue is the purpose of this blog.  While I cannot offer a solution for global issues, I may have a cloud-based alternative to get your business moving forward instead of being stuck in neutral waiting for bottlenecks in the IT hardware supply chain to open. Secure Solution is Paramount  If you have been reading our posts in the past, you will understand that pavliks.com'

Photo by  Richard Horvath  on  Unsplash I have worked on  grant management systems for federal, state, and local governments as well as non-profits for over twenty years.  I have noticed a new emphasis on the requirement for flexibility in creating a system which can be easily modified to handle new grant programs and changes in business rules. Here are my top dos and don'ts from our experience and that of our customers: Whether you are a grantor or a grantee, don't develop a new system for every program .  When a new program is created, it may seem simpler to start from scratch and spin up a new system in order to avoid changes to your existing system.  This approach is an easy trap to fall into, but later you will end up with multiple systems which separately need to be maintained, upgraded, and enhanced.  Creating reports that combine data from multiple systems is needlessly difficult compared to using a centralized, integrated approach from the beginning. Consider yo