The ASPE SDLC Blog

Winter weather got you down?

We’ve had a miserable winter by NC-standards, so we are looking to turn things around.  Lucky for you that translates into saving for you!

Get 25% Off when you register for any of our upcoming February public courses. This is the perfect time to snatch up that training you missed in 2009. The discount applies to all public courses offered this month by any of the ASPE Family of Companies, so if you haven’t looked around our other sites recently see if anything strikes your fancy.

• ASPE-SDLC Training: project management, business analysis, etc.
• ASPE-IT Training: Microsoft, Red Hat, SharePoint, virtualization, etc.
• American Health Sciences Institute: healthcare, life sciences, etc.
• Alexander Hamilton Center: finance, management, accounting, etc.

To take advantage of this offer enter BLOGSAVINGS at checkout or call your ASPE Training Advisor directly and mention the code.

The only thing shorter than a North Carolina winter is this limited time offer only available through our Blog, so act fast!

* Offer good on public courses delivered between February 8th – 28th. Some exclusions apply. Eligible courses are subject to change. For a complete list of courses contact your ASPE Training Advisor.

We have partnered with TenStep to develop a salary survey specifically for the Project Management industry. Your responses will help us shed some light on the perceived need and value of the PM, as well as variables that impact wages & opportunities. After collecting & analyzing the responses to the survey we will present our findings in a future whitepaper and web seminar. We appreciate you time and feedback.

Take Part in the 5-Minute Survey

On January 5th and 6th we held the 2010 Instructor Conference here in Cary, NC. Between the two days of meetings and discussions we took a trip over to Chef Mario’s in Raleigh for some fun and team building.

As a group we prepared a 5 course meal that was fit for a king (not to mention feed 40 people). Menu items included:

• Prosciutto wrapped Shrimp
• Steakhouse Bruschetta
• Orange Glazed Salmon
• Mashed Potato Sweet Potato Swirl
• Pistachio Crusted Chicken Breast
• Berries in Pappillote
• Chocolate Mousse

A great time and meal was had by all. The highlight of evening for me had to be the unveiling of Carrot-Henge, developed by all of us on Team 4 (see below). The event at Chef Mario’s will definitely raise the bar for future conferences. A HUGE thanks to the Chef Mario’s Staff and the ASPE Crew who put the event together.

Pictures from the Event:

A Lil’ Showing Off by Chef Mario himself (video):

We hope you all have a safe and lovely New Years!

Thanks to everyone who helped make 2009 a great year despite the tough economy, and we look forward to what 2010 brings.

We are happy to announce that Katie Cothran has joined our team as a Marketing Specialist, and will be focused on helping improve our direct mail marketing in 2010 and beyond.

If we don’t talk to you before Friday, we’ll see you in 2010. Be safe in your celebrations. Think long and hard about those new year resolutions, and if we can help in any way please let us know.

If the weather here on the East Coast is any indication, we are in the thick of the Holiday Season. All of us here at ASPE want to thank you all for a wonderful year and tell you how much we appreciate your business. Not only has it been great to be successful as a company in these tough economic times, but it has been a thrill to work with so many individuals and have our training help them cover the lose of team members, increase their job security through additional skills, knowledge, and certification, and most importantly help some find employment through training that made the difference in their job hunt.

We wish everyone a wonderful and safe holiday.

I have worked closely with Mark Weinstein for most of my career here at ASPE. Not only is Mark the developer of our extremely successful SharePoint training curriculum, he is quite the character. I was able to keep Mark’s attention long enough to talk him into doing a quick Q&A with me about his new book, Pro Project Management with SharePoint 2010.

Q: Your new book Pro Project Management with SharePoint 2010 is now available for Pre-order on Amazon.com. What can we expect from it?

Mark: The book is specifically going to focus on using SharePoint 2010’s out-of-the-box features for Project Management, including the new integration features that can be found in Microsoft Project 2010. It will cover topics ranging from the basics of SharePoint to the more advanced features and will focus on many of the best practices as they relate to Project Management concepts and methodologies.

Q: What is the biggest improvement to SharePoint 2010 in terms of use with Project Management?

Mark: SharePoint 2010 improves upon many of SharePoint’s features, as well as introduces a few new ones. Integration with Microsoft Project 2010 is now available, which makes the need for 3rd party tools for synchronization unnecessary. In addition, many of the features of SharePoint 2007 such as the user interface, document and data management, and workflows have been greatly improved. Overall, this should make the overall user experience much better with the new version.

Q: SharePoint has become the fastest-growing product in Microsoft’s history. How do you feel the 2010 release will fare?

Mark: I think that SharePoint 2010 is going to solidify SharePoint’s role in the enterprise. SharePoint 2007 was widely adopted by organizations wanting an easy-to-use platform to manage data and documents for the enterprise and I feel that SharePoint 2010 is going to build upon that solid foundation. Many of the new and improved features have been developed based on feedback from SharePoint users, so Microsoft has been listening to the needs and wants of its customers and has delivered with the new SharePoint 2010. Though it may take a little time for much of the user base to upgrade to the new version, I think that based on what it has to offer, most organizations will see a large benefit by upgrading.

Q: What did Microsoft neglect or miss in the 2010 release of SharePoint?

Mark: Though I don’t feel that it is a “miss”, so to speak, SharePoint 2010 has a few requirements that may prove to slow its rapid adoption by many organizations. SharePoint is now going to be offered exclusively as a 64-bit application and requires a 64-bit version of Windows Server 2008 as well as a 64-bit SQL Server 2005 or 2008 installation. Because of this, there is no “upgrade” path to the new version of SharePoint since users will have to install a new operating system on 64-bit capable hardware. Unfortunately, since many organizations may not have an immediate budget for a new server deployment, I feel that many people may have to delay their deployments until their budgets improve. Again, it’s not necessarily a “miss”, but it could prove challenging for the product’s growth.

Q: Where do you see SharePoint heading with future releases?

Mark: I think it’s FAR too early to tell. SharePoint is unique in that its capabilities and its ability to integrate with Microsoft’s other business tools, such as Office, Project Server, and SQL Server makes it the perfect back-end companion for Windows-based organizations. I think that the upcoming industry trends for business Intelligence and Data Management will further change SharePoint’s course and the product will continue to adopt to the needs of both small and large organizations as those needs continue to change.