The continued cost of the war in Ukraine and those it leaves behind

Harassment happens ALL.THE.TIME. And it happens in nearly every possible situation.  Even professional settings. They happened when I was younger, and they still happen now.

It seems that something about conferences emboldens these abusers.  That’s what they are.  Abusers.  Predators. 

The net results of these incidents are, at a minimum, women avoid these situations altogether, and this reduces their careers advancement opportunities.  Sometimes they are in actual danger (see the roofie incident below, thankful for friends keeping me safe).

Here’s a few of my more memorable stories.  There are many more that are in more personal settings.  Here's some that could have impacted my career.

2007- I was at the MIX conference in Las Vegas. No fewer than three male colleagues felt it was ok to rub and squeeze my thigh with their hand at various dinners, happy hours and such, at least one under the table while my husband sat on the other side of me.

2009- I was at the attendee party at Tech Ed Los Angeles. I got roofied and don’t remember much of the evening.

2012- Expo hall of a conference, stopped at a booth to chat about the product they were offering.  I was offered something else from the guy at the booth. Something very specific.

2016- I was at MVP summit at a semi-official social gathering. I was enthusiastically greeted by someone who then tried to kiss me on the mouth. He drunkenly “whispered” to me that he was trying to kiss me on the mouth.

2017- I was at a professional conference and a friend of a friend was very uncomfortable with the unwelcome and unprovoked attention she was getting from a male attendee.  With her permission, I approached him to explain how it was making her feel and demand he leave her alone.  He claims he had no idea she would not welcome his attention.

2023 -At another conference on the expo floor a vendor’s representative was purposefully getting into the personal space of several women in attendance.  He was very blatantly getting right up to us, as close as he could without touching.  Very smarmy and obvious.  It happened to me and at least one other attendee who came to me with her concerns.

What’s the solution?

• Don’t be that person.  Don’t be the person who behaves this way.
  
  
• If you see this happening, put a stop to it.  But remember, the first rule of rescue is don’t become a victim.  So, find a way, any way, to simply interrupt what is happening. You can do this by simply walking right up and starting a conversation about anything.  You’re at a conference, talk about the keynote.  Shopping, ask where to find the milk.  Interrupt the flow of the abuser in such a way that the situation goes away on its own.
  
  
• Hold people accountable.  You see someone you know acting this way, YOU go tell them to stop it.  Demand higher standards from one another.
  
  
• Check in with your colleagues when you're at events.  See that everyone is safe returning to their room after the social events. 
   
• Keep telling the stories until the ones who need to hear them are actually listening.
  
  
• Tell someone in charge.  Events now have a code of conduct.  And they enforce it, if they know.  So, tell them.

As much as we like to make stories relatable and sure, we’re all someone’s daughter, sister, mother, wife, grandmother. 

But I am a person. 

Me. 

Recognize that I have importance even without needing to be attached to someone else.  And I deserve safety and equality too.

’Twas the night before Christmas, and all through the house,
Mrs. Claus was busy — chasing a little mouse!
Her mind was abuzz with the holiday spree,
“I need a solution, Power Platform, hear me!”

“I am Mrs. Claus, and I’m here to request
A tool for my husband, the holiday’s best.
Santa needs help with his global endeavor,
Tracking kids’ gifts and their behavior — clever!”

The Planner responded with AI delight,
“I’ll draft your solution to make it just right.”
Out came user stories, one, two, three,
For Santa, Mrs. Claus, and the elves’ jubilee.

Santa’s app would keep him on track,
With routes and kids in his digital pack.
Mrs. Claus, the queen of inventory,
Had a dashboard and tools to tell the full story.

The elves got a workspace, tidy and neat,
To log toy completions and schedules to meet.
Dataverse powered the data so well,
With naughty or nice lists as easy as Excel.

The Planner then showed the data model’s might:
A table for children, one for gifts, just right.
Relationships clear and entities defined,
Santa’s task list was instantly refined.

“Now approve,” it prompted, “and apps will appear,
For tasks, gifts, and kids — all holiday cheer!”
With a click from Mrs. Claus, the work was complete,
A suite of Power Apps, efficient and sweet.

Santa’s sleigh dashboard tracked every last deed,
With Power Apps lighting his way at top speed.
Nice kids like Tommy, who helped rake the leaves,
Would wake to new toys under festive trees.

But for Emily, who teased her poor brother Sam,
A lump of coal was in the program.
Even the elves sang the praises of tech,
“Power Platform has saved us from wreck!”

When the work was all done, and the elves went to bed,
Mrs. Claus raised her cocoa and happily said,
“It’s an AI Christmas miracle, all thanks to this tool,
Power Platform has made us the Yule-time cool!”

So to all holiday makers, here’s wisdom to savor:
When planning gets tough, trust Power Platform’s favor.
Happy holidays to all, and to all a good night,
May your apps and solutions be merry and bright!

Oh, AI, you’re everywhere. 

And that’s ok.

I usually adore you.

Yesterday we agreed you’d make some new images for me.  Headshots actually.  I gave you some photos of me, and for a small fee, you generated new versions of me.

100 versions of me actually.

Several of the new me look reasonably like me me.

Most of your versions of me have really great hair.

A few of me have put on significant weight without even the joy of eating the cookies and drinking the wine.

Some reassemble my sister.

Sometimes I look like my daughter.

You made a younger me, too.

On first glance, she looks reasonable, but she really has no chin.  Directly to neck.

I don’t even know who she is…

Try it yourself.  There are several options, but I do have a referral code for the one I used.  I get rewards.  You get a discount. https://www.aragon.ai?referralCode=202u%2BzFI1Bu9FC4dxVnHD9

I’ve heard so many great things about Scottish Summit but have never been able to attend, until now 😊.

AND I get to deliver a fun workshop there too.  There are limited spots, but you can still sign up here.

The workshop is called My First Day of Power Platform. I just delivered a similar workshop to a room full of beginners.  I surveyed the audience…has anyone made an app or cloud flow?  Has anyone used a Power App?  Not a single hand came up.  After a few more questions, with no hands, I got one!  She had seen a Power BI report before.  These were true beginners.  Exactly who should be there.

My visual evaluation of the workshop attendees put them in the 40s, 50,s even 60s.  All starting something brand new.  (how inspiring is that!!)

By the end of the day….everyone had built a data model, everyone made and customized a canvas Power App, everyone made a custom model-driven Power App and everyone had made a working Power Automate cloud flow.

Yes, all in one day!

Join me in Scotland and launch the career you’ve been looking for, the change you need.  If not now, when?

I’ve tweaked the title and description just a bit to better reflect the day.

My first day of Power Platform (Powered by Copilot)

In "My First Day of Power Platform (Powered by Copilot)," we'll embark on a journey from idea to execution, exploring how Copilot can be your invaluable partner in crafting powerful business solutions. This session is all about making the Power Platform accessible to everyone, regardless of your technical background.  If you’re new and not sure what part of Power Platform is for you?  You’ll practice with several different tools and products and help you find the one that is best for you.

The full event agenda and schedule can be found here.

Are you new to Power Platform and wondering where to begin? This workshop is designed to guide you from the very first step.  We were all new once.  We are a great room full of people who all remember what's it's like to start something new.

Workshop Overview: 

In "My First Day of Power Platform (Powered by Copilot)," we'll embark on a journey from idea to execution, exploring how Copilot can be your invaluable partner in crafting powerful business solutions. This session is all about making the Power Platform accessible to everyone, regardless of your technical background.  If you’re new and not sure what part of Power Platform is for you?  You’ll practice with several different tools and products and help you find the one that is best for you.




Why You Should Attend:

Beginner-Friendly Environment: No prior experience with Power Platform? No problem! This workshop is designed for beginners who are ready to explore something new. We'll walk you through each step, ensuring you feel confident and supported.

Harness the Power of Copilot: Copilot is more than just a tool—it's your guide in the world of Power Platform. Learn how to leverage Copilot to map business problems to solutions, create custom data models, build Power Apps, and design cloud flows, all with ease.

Hands-On Learning: This isn't just a lecture. You'll gain practical experience as we work together to bring your ideas to life. By the end of the session, you'll have a clear vision and a working plan for implementing Power Platform solutions.

Community and Collaboration: Learning is better together! Join like-minded individuals and build connections that will help you grow even after the workshop ends.

Plan Your Perfect Event: We'll even help you navigate the event schedule to make the most out of your time.

Don’t Miss Out—Register Today!

Ready to take the first step into the world of Power Platform? Join us for a day of discovery, learning, and empowerment. Whether you're looking to kickstart your career or simply try something new, this workshop is your gateway to endless possibilities.

Register now and let’s build the future together!  Use my code JYACK100 for a $100 discount for your event registration.  Learn more about the event here.

Since I last wrote about our Ukrainian cohorts the team has continued to be hard at work to support our efforts.  And we’ve expanded a bit.

Our July group started this week with 222 students.  Our March and May groups each had over 200 as well.

Several of our students want to improve their English skills, so we updated our cloud flows and now track their input language and respond in the same language.  Previously we were hard coded to respond in Ukrainian.  (This also means we can support cohorts in additional languages.)

We’ve added more community experts to help with feedback on weekly assignments.  Let me know if you’d like to help.

We’re getting more support from the community in general.  For example, BizApps legend Lisa Crosbie is adding Ukrainian subtitles to her videos for us. You can see her playlist here, and her whole channel here.  Lisa is my go-to when I need to catch up on all things Dynamics and Power Platform.  If you are a content creator and want to do something for our students, let me know.

We’ve spec’d out the next phase of the program.  We need to build it out a little more, but it will be focused on making functional consultants who are Power Platform generalists.  Let me know if you have jobs or apprenticeships for our grads.

The entire program has been run by volunteers, with a budget of $0.  We might be seeking sponsorship of some variety soon to help with the cost of getting licenses for training environments for our students for their continued efforts.

Learn more about the groups, the impact to students and more in their own words here. 

Interested in joining the next cohort?  Apply here.

As I hope you know, we have been running training cohorts for displaced and vulnerable Ukrainians.  We have been very successful.  We built the program around having a core set of day-to-day volunteers who are Ukrainian speakers, but the support team is currently all English speakers.  We’ve used the technology to make it mostly seamless (specifically Microsoft Forms, Power Automate, Dataverse, and Power Apps.).

We are almost done making updates to be able to bring on additional language groups. We now need committed people to lead the day-to-day operation of the new groups.

Don’t worry.  We have a curriculum and proven track record of success for you to follow. 

What would you be committing to?

• No one ever pays to join any of our cohorts.
• This is run by volunteers. The first one will take a little more commitment, but after that, you should likely be able to take a team of two or three and spend fewer than 10 hours a week each.
• You would offer help grading weekly assignments. This happens in English in a simple gradebook Power App that you would be given access to use.  You would be grading assignments from all cohorts, not just your own.
• It’s a six-week cohort. But we are built around being flexible to allow you to succeed, even with all of life’s obligations.  So, often there’s a few people in each cohort who need some extra time.
• The lessons are primarily located on Microsoft Learn. There are a few out-of-the-box translations available. However, beyond the top 5(ish) you would need to help students learn how to navigate and use browser-based translations.
• The expected student commitment is about ten hours per week. Most of this is independent learning with touchpoints.  This means students can learn after their regular job, before dropping the kids off at football practice, etc.  You would need to set up and facilitate a communication channel.  Teams works well if students can easily get to Teams.  Telegram has proven effective for our Ukrainian cohorts.  I could see it working in Slack also.
• There are weekly videos for students. We have them in English to offer you.  You can have students watch them in English, you can create your own subtitles/translations, write a summary in your chosen language, etc. Most of these videos are short (less than 30 mins) and focus on relevant topics that work with the assigned Learn lessons.
• We recommend at least one open mic-style office hours meeting per week. Make it at a reasonable time based on your students’ availability.  This usually lasts about an hour.
• You would interact and get to know your students. We have found that the biggest predictor of success is simple, someone cares about the success of each student.  Get to know their names.  If someone misses an assignment, reach out, see if they need help, offer an extension, etc.

The program is focused on core tech adjacent skills and business applications.  You do not need to be an expert in the entire platform, but working knowledge of the platform is necessary, with expertise in one or two core parts.  If you find yourself with a student super interested in something that you don’t know much about, we’ve got you covered.  We will help facilitate bringing an expert to your groups as needed.

This training is designed for career switchers.  Non-tech people who need that core set of skills that we often take for granted.  “Graduates” of our groups are not job ready.  But they are ready to join already in place training that is widely available.

So, what now?  Let me know if you’re interested.  We’ll sort through the details and help you get started.

I’ve been late to write about conferences coming up.  But, there’s a bunch on the horizon!

First up is DynamicsCon live in Denver.

I’m delivering TWO sessions.  My goal for this event was to support new speakers.  So, both of my sessions I am co-presenting with women who are newer on the event circuit.

Tuesday the 14^th, Meron and I are talking CRM.  Specifically, A Beginner's Guide to Dynamics 365 CE/ CRM Sales. We’ve got a great chat about using CRM and a detailed demo from Meron.

Wednesday the 15^th is Rachel and I with our Unlocking CRM potential with Power Platform Magic session.  This session gives some foundational knowledge about both CRM and Power Platform and then we stitch together the common elements to help you do well on either or both of these technologies.

Also, this is one of those events where both Dave and I are presenting.  On Tuesday the 14^th he’s delivering Architecting business applications in an AI world.  Typical to Dave, it’s a technical talk, but he makes it very approachable for anyone interested in the topic.

After DynamicsCon, we’re doing a few days of vacation on our way to Slovenia for Dynamics Minds. 

And both of us are presenting again.  First up, my sessions.

One of my favorite sessions to deliver is Going from Citizen Developer to Professional App Maker.  This is the session for anyone who has dabbled in app making or automation and you’re ready to take the leap to do it full time, but you’re not sure where to start.  There may be photos of me as a 5-year old in the slides.  This session is on Wednesday the 29^th.

My other session is Tips and tricks for user productivity in Dynamics CRM/Sales.  This session is a bit of demo and a bit of slides.  This session is on Monday the 27^th.

Dynamics Minds is where Dave is much busier than I.  First up is his workshop on Low-code plugins.  Then he’s doing a (refreshed after Build announcements) version of his Architecting business applications in an AI world talk, and finally he’s part of a panel about Power Platform Security.

I’ve also got workshops and sessions pending at several events later in the year.  Keep an eye out here for more.

About a million years ago, we opened a business banking account with Bank ABC. 

At the time, they had two primary types of accounts, personal and business.

So far so good.

Personal accounts had data fields for all the expected pieces of information one might need for a personal account.

The business accounts had all you might need for a business account.  Or so they thought.  Turns out businesses are owned by people.  People have separate information from the business.  No big deal, we can have attachments and notes.  In the note we put the names and details of the business owners and an attachment of their scanned signature cards.

Then Bank ABC merges with Bank DEF.

Then Bank ABCEDF is acquired by Bank XYZ.

Let’s smush the old data model into the new data model.  Great, all done.  Nothing to see here.

A few years later during a random account review it is discovered that a particular business account of a million years has no people associated with it, no authorized users.  There was an attachment of a scanned image with two illegible signatures on it, but no names with the signatures.

Turns out somewhere among the mergers and acquisitions, notes did not come with the business account information from older accounts that were opened when records were mostly analog and a little bit of digital.

A good bank manager found this, found us, and convinced me she wasn’t a scammer and got us to the bank in person to get our personal information appropriately related to the business information.  And then we signed paper copies of signature cards (sigh).

There are a few things to learn here.

Don’t store structured data in an unstructured place.  Build the appropriate relational data structure that you need.

Don’t cut corners when moving to a new system.  It really doesn’t matter that there were mergers and acquisitions along the way, it was a new system.  A simple review of notes on common data tables could have shown there was more data that needed to be dealt with.

At some point this would have become a blocker for access to our own money in our own business account.  Hire good people who can do good work and prevent this from happening and correct it when it does.

If you were in our hands-on lab sessions, we promised links.  Here you go:

Get Started With Copilot in Cloud Flows (Microsoft Documentation)