Justin Morris on UC

Just a quick one to let you know that yesterday I had one of my Interview with a UC Pro series posts published on Microsoft TechNet’s NextHop blog yesterday. This one was about Lync MVP Randy Wintle and now makes seven UC Pros interviewed since I started it mid last year. Check out the post here.

I’m really excited about being published on a TechNet blog, expect to see more contributions from me there in 2012.

This week I’m interviewing one of the legends of the Microsoft UC community, Tom Laciano of Microsoft.
His blog has been a resource I’ve called on time and time again over the years to help me out with a sticky problem or explain something. He’s always provided great LCS/OCS/Lync technical content for as long as I’ve been playing with the product since the LCS 2005 days.

I had the pleasure of meeting Tom at Wave 14 Airlift in Seattle last year and thought it was time I pulled him aside and asked him some questions about his UC career.

• What’s your technical background? How did you end up where you are today?
  My father worked at IBM which influenced me and my brother and sister. The Commodore 64 was the first family computer and then various IBM PC’s. I recall taking a BASIC class at the community college and my Dad even quizzed me at one time to add numbers in Hex. I chose Business Administration in College and thanks to a roommate and my wife then girlfriend I put my resume in for Microsoft starting with DOS 5.x and Windows 3.1 support. I moved over to the Messaging team when Exchange 4.0 was in beta, a short stint in training and back to support when LCS 2003 was first released. I moved to the Product Group working with key customers facing unique deployments or significant challenges and just recently moved to a new team I’ll describe in the next question.

• Can you tell us what part of Microsoft you work for and what your position entails?
  I am now in the Office 365 group with Lync Online in the dedicated space as an Operations Manager. The role is very much a Project Management skillset. My current role is working with existing customers who want to deploy the Enterprise Voice feature set with either a SIP Trunk or On-Premise SBC. While I have a technical background in the product which can help with customer dialogs, I am the person who is responsible for managing the project towards completion.
  

  Tom with his wife and 3 kids

• What first made you get into UC and specialising in Lync?
  It was a bit of luck as when I moved back to support from training, I moved to the Windows Networking team. My first day on the team was a morale event cookout and the guy who was returning from beta was in desperate need of folks he could train on this new product. I mentioned being new with no real work load yet and it sounded like another “verb” application as Exchange Conferencing was, so how hard could that be? J

• What’s your favourite thing about Lync?
  As a remote worker I have two things. First is the integration of presence in websites and Office which helps me maintain a really small contact list. The second thing I like is how easy it is to join a meeting and have video and shared content.

• What was the most challenging LCS/OCS/Lync problem you ever solved?
  I will choose one of the earliest calls I took because it really helped me gain an expertise. I helped the IT Admin for one of the State Supreme Courts setting up LCS 2003 with TLS so the judge could have a secure wireless dialog with his team. The woman I assisted was sharp and patient and through that issue I learned firsthand that documentation can be a great start, but the truth is in the actual behavior of the product.

• If you could think of one feature you’d like included in the next version of Lync, what would it be?
  Having worked with customers in this area for some time I would have to say having Group Chat becoming a first class experience.
  

  Tom with his son at the Speedway

• What do you feel is your area of expertise, where you’d consider yourself a bit of a rockstar?
  I still believe I possess significant knowledge in the area of certificates for the product.

• Your blog is known for being a insightful, consistent resource across the entire lifespan of the LCS/OCS/Lync product. When did you start it and what direction has it taken?
  I started in 2004 and other than just the subsequent versions of the product, I would say the one change has been the inclusion of a few off-topic posts. I still find this one hilarious

• Whereabouts in the USA are you from and what do you think makes your hometown/city great?
  I am from Concord, NC. The Tourism folks would love for me to say Lowe’s Motor Speedway or Concord Mills Mall but I like the older part of the town with its small shops and restaurants. While this is in Charlotte and not Concord, my favorite BBQ restaurant is Old Hickory House BBQ on N. Tryon Street. They have an antique telephone switchboard in the front of the restaurant which I find funny given my work with the next generation of voice technology.

• When you’re not dishing out quality technical know-how, what do you do on weekends for fun?
  My wife and I have 4 kids so most of our time involves coaching their sports and this summer was my first year having “ownership” of her Mom’s garden. Turns out you don’t buy 2 flats of tomato plants or squash and certainly 1 hot pepper plant and not 10 is enough. This meant that this was the first year I learned how to can tomatoes.
  

  Tom's 1st batch of garden tomatoes

  Also, I met my wife in college as she helped start the Women’s Club Soccer team and I was their first coach. This was our first year back playing adult co-ed soccer in about 7 years. I play both goalie and defense, she plays mid-field and forward.

This time around, we’ve got one of the Microsoft UC community’s great pillars of technical excellence. He’s come up in the first two results in basically every OCS search term I’ve ever put into Google and helps countless techs in need on the TechNet forums.
He hails from Chicago, USA, love his beer and knows the score when it comes to Polycom. Please welcome to the Interview with a UC Pro series, Lync MVP Jeff Schertz.

• What’s your technical background? How did you end up where you are today
  I had exposure to computers at a young age, back when very few people had any personal computers at home.  My father was a teacher and was able to bring home Apple computers over the long summer breaks, until we could afford to get one of the original Apple //e systems.  From there I grew up using the entire Apple platform through many generations of Macs, moving into the educational workforce operating both Macs and PCs.  I eventually moved into PCs full-time with Windows NT and advanced from helpdesk jobs into networking and systems administrations positions for Enterprise-level organizations.  After a 5 year stint as an enterprise consultant at PointBridge I decided to join a friend over at Polycom to work in the exciting growth area of video conferencing and its integration into the Microsoft Lync platform.
• You’re our first interviewee from Polycom. Can you tell us what part of the company you work for what your position entails?
  I work in our sales organization although on a daily basis also interface with both support and engineering teams on current issues and future solutions.  As a Microsoft Solutions Architect I help customers, partners and even employees understand how our solutions integrate within Microsoft’s UC platform; from feature capabilities  and end-user experience to low-level architecture and design. I also assist engineering personnel with troubleshooting advanced integration scenarios, as well as maintain a Microsoft environment used to demonstrate product integration to customers and partners alike.  In short anytime anything from Polycom interacts with a Microsoft product then our group is typically involved in some way or another.
• What first made you get into UC and specialising in Lync?
  After joining PointBridge and seeing the amazing level of talent among my peers I looked for ways to move away from being an overall solutions generalist and instead try to attain advanced knowledge in a specific Microsoft product.  By joining the UC team there was already a wide-range of expertise in AD and Exchange but OCS 2007 had just been released so I saw an opportunity there to start on the same page as most everyone else in the industry.
• What’s your favourite thing about Lync?
  The way it simplifies business communication and allows me to work from home, a hotel, or just about anywhere else that is outside a traditional office with the same (and something even better) level of efficiency.
• If you could think of one feature you’d like included in the next version of Lync, what would it be?
  A full-featured mobile client that supports video and content sharing
• What do you feel is your area of expertise, where you’d consider yourself a bit of a rockstar?
  Since moving to Polycom I’ve fine-tuned by skill set even more specifically within the Communications Server and Lync products into the audio, video, and content sharing modalities and moved away from the traditional telephony-only scenarios that were more popular with traditional consulting projects.  But regardless of the topic it seems that my value to the community stems from an inherent ability to clearly and thoroughly explain concepts in ways that readers easily understand them.
• Your blog is known for being a great resource for address book and Phone Edition issues among other areas. When did you start it and what direction has it taken?
  I started blogging at PointBridge as way to meet quarterly goals and to provide another outlet for my documentation skills outside of customer-only content that was not always read very much (or sometimes at all!).  As the articles are a reflection of what I do in my day-to-day work the blog content has transitioned primarily over to the audio and video collaboration topics.  I still try to find topics not already addressed or things that may not be covered in much detail within the actual product documentation.
• Whereabouts in the USA are you from and what do you think makes your hometown/city great?
  Born and raised in the Chicago suburbs and although I’ve travelled a lot I’ve never found anywhere I’d want to move to permanently (within the U.S.).  The Midwest offers a nice mix of everything from weather to activities, with Chicago itself a great destination city rooted in history.
• When you’re not dishing out quality technical know-how, what do you do on weekends for fun?
  Since it depends on the seasons around here, lately it has been weekend trips with my fiancée to local farms and orchards to pick our own produce for home cooking or visiting local breweries and beer festivals in the Midwest.

This week I’ve chosen to interview Lync MVP, Adam Jacobs. Adam is my first English guest, and him and I run the Microsoft UC User Group London together along with Tom Arbuthnot and John Lamb.
Adam has a wealth of UC knowledge in areas such as business value, strategy and voice integration scenarios. He was one of the first people to get Skype to talk to OCS via Asterisk, so you can tell he likes to push the envelope to see what’s possible.
I first met him at the quarterly #ucomsldn drinks I run in London, so I decided it was time to see what his story is.

• What’s your technical background? How did you end up where you are today?
  It’s pretty much my dad’s fault. He’s a software developer and from a young age he and I tinkered with technology. I recall our first breakthrough, a custom built ZX Spectrum – it featured a whole 1K of RAM (this was cool back then) and a keyboard that was embedded into a plastic lunch box!

• Can you tell us what your position entails?
  I’m the Head of IT at a leading UK foreign exchange. My responsibilities are fairly broad, from in-house e-commerce development to capacity management within our three data centres.Strategically I have to ensure that I’m thinking ahead, especially in the current economic climate, where technology investments typically have a life expectancy of 5 years+. Fixed-line and mobile voice technology is definitely an area whereby intellectual investment can be made with big cost savings and increased business agility benefits.

• What first made you get into UC and working with Lync?
  Previously I worked for a company that specialised in B2C SIP-to-PSTN services, it was run extremely badly and it wasn’t the most pleasant of workplaces – but I learnt a lot there. I started looking at Open Source VoIP technology, specifically Asterisk and as a consequence I fell in love with the capability of voice-to-desktop integration – which we now all know as UC.When the opportunity arose to put this into practice at my present workplace we chose OCS. We’re a “Microsoft shop” and this solution ticked all our boxes – we even identified an integration path for our Nortel CS1000. Next steps for us are to rip-and-replace our existing PBX with Lync and, fingers crossed, we’re hoping to pull this off later this year.

• What’s your favourite thing about Lync?
  Probably the intuitive interface. Rolling out Lync (or OCS) has not only been huge hit within my workplace, but there has been little or no need for end user training. It’s the most successful technology implementation I have made to date. I recall one end-user saying, “Instant Messaging at work is great, I reckon you could use it for business use too!” – this made me chuckle

• If you could think of one feature you’d like included in the next version of Lync, what would it be?
  Call pickup, in the UK (and Europe for that matter) this is a commonly adopted piece of traditional telephony functionality – team call-group doesn’t quite tick the box for all scenarios.

• What do you feel is your area of expertise, where you’d consider yourself a bit of a rockstar?
  I’m not sure this makes me a “rockstar” as such, but here goes…I’d say I have both a strong technical background and grounded business acumen, this means I can engage in both areas. Often resulting in solutions that are not only cost efficient but also well aligned with the needs of the business.

• Your blog is known for taking a different look at OCS and Lync, providing some more flexible solutions in the past. When did you start it and what direction has it taken?
  I started “I’m a UC Blog” back in early 2009, it used to be a fairly broad Microsoft technology site until I made the decision to focus primarily on UC, since then I see an average of 700+ visitors daily. The most popular articles are focussed around interoperability – I even got a mention in the Microsoft Lync 2010 resource kit chapter on “Interoperability with Asterisk and Skype” J

• Whereabouts in the UK are you from and what do you think makes your hometown/city great?
  I’m from London and even withstanding the recent rioting and looting I still feel proud of my home town, especially when I commute in and around the City of London. The beauty and history can be quite breath-taking. As a Londoner, sometimes you just have to pause and be a tourist in your own city. That said, I love travelling (probably not as much as you Justin) and wouldn’t rule out re-locating if the right opportunity became available.

• When you’re not dishing out quality technical know-how, what do you do on weekends for fun?
  It’s not always “fun”, but probably being a father to twin boys – it has its moments I can tell you!

Thanks a lot for participating Adam, it’s great to hear from another UC Pro in London. Make sure you check out his blog here and follow him on Twitter.

Chris Norman has for a long time been a guru when it comes to Microsoft UC. His blog VoIPNorm’s Unified Communications Blog has helped me and I’m sure many other people understand OCS/Lync and the voice side of things for years. I’ll tell you what, this guy knows his stuff when it comes every which way possible that Microsoft and Cisco talk to each other. He’s an Aussie like me, but has been living in Seattle for the last couple of years, so I decided to steal a bit of his time for my Interview with a UC Pro series.

• What’s your technical background? 
  I started out as a electrician working on industrial electric motors and starters which was rather an unpleasant dirty job but it did introduce me to a whole bunch of different industries. I was only 18 when I started and by the time I finished my apprenticeship I was pretty bored so I joined the military. I was in the military for about 7 years working on variety of stuff from Lotus Notes, Exchange, Cisco/Nortel network equipment and Cisco IPT. I ended up leaving the military and working for a defense contractor that also made those big white things that fly in the sky and eventually moved to Seattle after doing a international training exchange.

• How did you end up where you are today?
  Luck. I knew someone that knew someone and the next thing I knew I was working for Microsoft.

• You’re our first interviewee from Microsoft. Can you tell us what part of the company you work for what your position entails? 
  I work in sales as a Lync technology specialist. Its mainly presales engineering although a lot of the companies I spend time with quite often say they want to give me desk if I want to come around and help them deploy.

• What first made you get into UC and specializing in Lync?
  At my previous employer I was asked if I wanted to help integrate our current telephony platform (Cisco) with this new stuff coming out from Microsoft (LCS at the time) for a trial. Being one of the few people on the telecom team with Microsoft technical experience I said “sure sounds great” and it went from there.

• What’s your favourite thing about Lync? 
  The end user experience. Its really changed they way I work and I love that. I don’t need multiple applications to get my work done and Microsoft has done a great job of bringing focus to one application rather than having a whole bunch of applications that all do something a little differently.

• If you could think of one feature you’d like included in the next version of Lync, what would it be? 
  This is a really simple feature add but for an end user perspective I love the tabbed conversation application. Having all my conversation in one window is really handy so getting that rolled into the product rather than a separate application would be great. The person that came up with the idea for the tabbed conversation application has my gratitude, I really love it.

• What do you feel is your area of expertise, where you’d consider yourself a bit of a rockstar? 
  Hard question. If I were to pick a area of technical knowledge I would have to say Cisco & Lync interoperability. I have been working with both platforms for a long time now and although I don’t know everything about it, it is a area I understand well. If I were to pick something I was passionate about it’s the technical community. Over the course of the last few years I have helped get four user groups up and running. This includes the Seattle chapter of CIPTUG (Cisco IPT User Group) before I joined Microsoft where I served as chapter president. Since then I have have had a hand in either reviving or starting three more Microsoft UC User Groups here in the Pacific Northwest.

• Your blog is known for being a great resource for voice integration related issues. When did you start it and what direction has it taken? 
  It started in late 2008 as a way for me to get more involved in the technical community. I had friend at Microsoft who wanted to help me get my MVP and he suggested it would be a great way to grow and show that I was MVP worthy. Besides the other things I was already doing, like presenting at conferences and running the Seattle CIPTUG chapter the blog really helped me get to MVP. Now when I go back and read some of my first post I know that the content has stayed the same theme of Cisco Microsoft interop but I try to pick stuff to post about you may not see on a whole lot of other blogs. I also try to focus on issues that I see in my daily work that people ask me about. A good example is my last post on Exchange UM secondary dial plans. Not a lot of information out there as it relates to Cisco Microsoft interop so hopefully posts like that help folks out.

• You’re a fellow Australian. How did you end up in the US? 
  I was part of an international exchange program at my former employer and originally came to the US as trainee of sorts from a subsidiary company. The parent company here in the US ended up wanting me to comeback after I went home to Australia as a full time employee and offered me a spot, so I came back.

• Whereabouts in Australia are you from and what do you think makes your hometown/city great? 
  I am originally from Brisbane area in Queensland. Brisbane really has great weather and is only an hour away from the Gold Coast which really has some of the best beaches in the world. Its one things I really miss about Australia besides family.

• When you’re not dishing out quality technical know-how, what do you do on weekends for fun?
  I love to garden. I really enjoy growing our own food and have over 50 different varieties of edible plants in our backyard even though we live on a pretty small lot. Urban farming has really started to take off again in the US since the economy took a dive and its really great to see people getting back their food independence and making healthier organic food choices.

Many thanks for participating Chris. You can check out Chris’ blog here, and be sure to follow him on Twitter at @voipnorm as well for news and updates on UC.

I think what makes the UC Pro community so valuable is the strength of its members and contributors. From around the world we have a plethora of very capable people who live, breathe and love Unified Communications, and love helping others realise the value.

I thought it was time we brought these guys forward and found out more about them. To work out why they’re helping drive the adoption of Unified Communications and why they’re some of the most sort after, go-to guys in the industry.

Kicking off the first of what will be a continuing interview series, I’ve got Alex Lewis in the hot seat.
He’s a stalwart of the UC community and a long time twitter compadre of mine. Here’s what he had to say:

• What’s your technical background?
  I started out in aerospace (satellite design), so communications in general but a bit different than what I do now. I moved on to working for a CLEC on the east coast as a network architect and was responsible for building out the first VoIP network in the US and one of the first DSL rollouts.

• What organisation do you work for and what’s your position?
  I am the UC practice lead and principal consultant for Convergent Computing in Oakland, CA (USA).http://www.cco.com

• What first made you get into UC and specialising in Lync?
  I first got into Lync with Exchange 2000 IM server but didn’t take it on as my main focus until just before the launch of OCS 2007 and became an MVP for LCS/OCS. Since then, I’ve spent my time evangelizing UC and doing UC projects cradle to grave. I really enjoy doing a design for a customer then sticking around for the implementation and deployment. There’s something really special about that moment when you see the light go off and they “get it”.

• What’s your favourite thing about Lync?
  This may sound strange from a guy who spends all his time working on the back end servers but I love the client! One client for everything from IM to telephony to conferencing. My big pet peeve is vendors who claim a “unified” solution then band-aid everything together.

• If you could think of one feature you’d like included in the next version of Lync, what would it be?
  That’s an easy question!! Mobile clients for all major platforms with voice and video over the data channel. Now that tablets are prevalent, they become a great communication and collaboration endpoint.

• What do you feel is your area of expertise, where you’d consider yourself a bit of a rockstar?
  I think the biggest value I bring is the ability to mate technology to business goals. UC isn’t cool because it’s new and shiny, it’s cool because it solves a myriad of real business problems with positive results in lowered costs and increased business revenue.

• Tell me about your blog. When did you start it and what direction has it taken? After being a rather prolific blogger, running hyperconnectivity.com for Nortel and being on point for MS UC blogging for Network World, I’m on a bit of a hiatus. I would be open to returning to blogging if the right opportunity came up.

• Lastly on a bit more of a personal note, where are you from and what do you think makes your city great?
  I’m from the bay area in California, in the US. One of the few places you can surf and snow ski in the same day. I love all the outdoor activities and the fact we have gorgeous weather 300+ days a year. I’m an avid scuba diver, motorcycle enthusiast and re-learning rock climbing.

Many thanks for the contribution Alex! You can find Alex on twitter at @alexlewis.

Stay tuned to hear from another UC Pro from the blogosphere in the next few weeks.