2019 Collaborate

Collaborate for the first time in ages was not in Las Vegas which really pleases me although it is back there again next year.

This is the biggest user event in the calendar and I had 5 sessions, across the 3 uaergroups.

Monday

I was part of an OAUG Cloud Panel facilitated by Alyssa Johnson and it also included Mohan Iyer and Alfonso Pinan from City of Atlanta who had previously shared their story at OOW. This was a good session and showed the interest from users.

JENNIFER

Later in the day I facilitated a panel session on Community, which was the idea of Jennifer Nicholson who runs the ACE Program. Also on the panel was Michelle Malcher, Karen Brownfield, Mia Urman and Opal Alapat. Everyone shared stories about how communities, especially the ACE program has helped their careers both privately and professionally.

The ACE Program also launched a new ACE Directory.

Wednesday 

I spoke on 'Which Cloud Should I go to', this is my flowchart presentation based on the article in Oracle Scene. I am very passionate about this because I think Oracle have separate conversations with their customers and not a single strategy approach. I spoke to one customer who told me they had both their Apps Account Rep selling SaaS to them and their Tech Account Rep who wanted them to go IaaS, at Collaborate, entertaining them separately!

I also gave my presentation on VBCS, which in Ireland last week I realised is more just an example rather than this actual example. In Collaborate it was the last session of the day and no one turned up. This is the first time this has happened to me and I was very disappointed. I know the session time is part of it (other people had no shows as well), but I also think I need to change the extract to reflect its true objectives.

Thursday

FLOYD TETER

I also had an early session on Thursday, after the party Wednesday night, so I was worried it was going to be badly attended as well, but I shouldn't have worried it was a really big crowd. This was my Back to Basics session that talks about what is under the covers of Fusion. It may be true that you can't touch this but for those moving from on premise they do have an interest. 

I also got the chance to catch a session from my great friend Floyd Teter who is part of the Oracle HCM CoE.

As like last year the User Group Royalty were together again. Thanks to Quest for sorting the room, Michelle Malcher, Sue Shaw and I were together again. I attended a session Sue gave on living in the cloud and it was excellent. 

Sue, Michelle & I - UGR

Networking was also fantastic, I had dinner with Jennifer, then the ACE Dinner, loved the big party although bowed out early and finished the week with a great night with Sue and Michelle with dinner on the River Walk after a bus tour of the city.

MICHELLE AND I AT PARTY

Despite it being Las Vegas I look forward to next year.