 Hey everybody, it's Christian Buckley doing another MVP Buzz Chat. And I'm here today with Kevin Brand spanking new MVP congratulations. Thank you very much. Yeah, very fresh, very excited about it all still. I'm sure you're still excited about being an MVP. Of course I am. All those awards but excited about the renewals. Like, yeah, no, I finally this like the first time this just was like a month ago. Finally put these things up on the wall. It's they've been in brilliant up there in the closet and stuff that yeah, that's nice. Well, so why not for people that don't know who you are, where you are, what you do, why don't you give us that grand introduction? Absolutely. So I'm Kevin McDonald. I'm a solutions architect for a company called CPS based in the UK, another gold partner from Microsoft doing all things Microsoft 365. I focus on the modern workplace arena within that. So lots of going out listening to clients working out what they want and helping them get that with Microsoft 365, which is lots of fun. Also, a co host of the grey hat beard podcast. So another competing podcast. I hope it's okay to mention that there's no competing podcast. It's all asynchronous. That's right. Absolutely. So yeah, a couple of well one one former colleague now and another colleague. We talk about all things Microsoft 365 talk about the latest news and then we try and get a guest on or talk about particular subjects and waffle on for about 45 minutes and hope people listen to the end at some point. You know, so I had years ago had an argument with a young man who was actually in visiting Helsinki speaking at the user group there was in town for another event. And you know, an argument about search, we argue about a couple different things, but he was of the belief and I've had this argument with other people too that like, once like the the penultimate article is written on a topic, there's no need for anyone to go in and blog in that content. Again, so it's similar to like the podcast. I'm like, no, we can be speaking on the same topic and have completely different life experiences and examples and industries and geographies in the world and the nuances around that. It's especially the US view, the European view, the Asian views always got slightly different. I always love speaking to people in Germany and the the ultra secure view and the sort of people's council things on there, but a completely different spin on things. So yeah, some people like it. Some people don't, but it's a great thing about podcasts. You don't have to listen to if you don't like it. So Well, it's another reason I and you're a long time collab talk tweet jam purchased bed. So thank you for that. It's always great to have the voice. But one of the reasons I've been doing that I mean, that was launched in January of 2012. Like that launched the month I became an MVP. I know it's it's a long time. But with that is that I just made this comment another recording interview recording this week that I'm always surprised every single month. It's a monthly event. It's Twitter based so anybody can participate if you're watching if you see collab tack the hashtag collab talk and see whatever we're talking about. But is that every single time somebody shares an opinion or an experience that is like the opposite of what I thought on that topic like I never thought of that. It's fantastic, especially for those of us that talk and blog and it's it's blog fodder as I like to call it. Absolutely. And I think it's very easy. The Microsoft bubble to kind of get sucked along by what Microsoft says is all kind of agreeing with that and seeing that pretty view and you know, as a freshly invented MVP, I shouldn't shout too much against what Microsoft do. But it's good to have those competing voices. It's good to see that alternatives because it it structures and makes you think and we do need to carry on thinking all the time. And I would like to point out that Microsoft does like to stress that they don't want people that are just pure drinking the Kool-Aid, you know, the pure marketing speech, unless they're paying for the travel that's associated with that. But they but the differences with MVPs is that and for the majority of MVPs is the constructive way that you provide the feedback back to Microsoft. That's a huge difference. You can be very negative on a technology yet is still constructive in your feedback of why you think this and it's you don't have to hook, line and sinker, you know, swallow everything that Microsoft throws at you sometimes. I'm sorry. I used to say this in the SharePoint in the migration like don't migrate if the next version of the value of the new features of the next version are not there that the cost of moving is greater than the benefits that you'll receive. They're like, stay where you are. If you're productive, you're effective, like don't migrate, don't upgrade that until it makes sense for you to do that. Yeah. And I think it's always that challenge is that why and if you're going to complain about something, don't always have to have a solution. That's nice if you've got an idea for how it can be better, but say why you don't like it, get into that detail and it helps people improve things. And Gary Trinders co-host on Greyhawk Beard. It loves Simon Sinek. Start with why? Start with that answer. So why you're doing things and, you know, talk about migrations going through a lovely one at the moment that's been dragging on far longer than it should do. But it's why you're doing it. Are you just wanting that functionality? Are you looking to shut down old technology? Are you worried about things being end of life and things on there? All very good reasons to move off and make sure you're supporting that. If you're going just because someone else is on new shiny things, it's not always the nicest thing to do. Although I do like new shiny stuff as well. So I just say, have you seen the show Ted Lasso? Did you know, funny, I've watched the first few and loved it. And my wife loved it as well, which is really annoying because we now have to align and make sure we're in the right frame of mind to watch it rather than I can just blast through it. So I've got the last few to watch on that. But yeah, love it. It reminds me of my local club. For people that haven't seen it. I mean, it is, you know, so I've heard from other people, I've tried to get my kids to watch it. And they're like, yeah, I don't like soccer. Like, it's not about soccer. It's not about football. You know, UK football, it's so that's not the point. I said, you it's, it's hilarious. But it is also one of the more optimistic, you know, television shows that I've ever seen. I mean, it's just yeah, it's not syrupy. I mean, he's hilarious. Like, but he it's it's done with it's just so genuine the way that he does it. Anyway, my point, we do a lot about change and adoption. And there's so many stories in that you can take that change and adoption story. How, how do you convert people to wanting to do things the right way? And I think against their will, they will like me. Yeah. No, but the story that I was going to read that you kind of mentioned that I love was when he's in the bar with his bosses, the owner of the team's ex-husband, and they're playing darts. And he tells a little story about being underestimated. And so he anyway, so he I guess it's like a Walt Whitman quote that he mentions that he saw in his sons on the paint on the wall of his elementary school that said, like, be curious. And there's probably more to the quote. It was that was central yet. And he says, he says, I looked around at all the people that would shut me down. I'm going back to what I was saying about the people that are so negative on certain, you know, and how you provide the feedback. But he says, I was really as I saw that and I really thought about my life about how the people, the bullies in my life, how they weren't curious. They didn't ask questions. They just didn't care. Like he says, like, for example, like, you know, if you had asked me, like, Ted, have you ever played darts before? I would have said, yes, yes, I have every Sunday with my dad, since I was 10 years old, you know, and he then hits like a bull's eye, you know. So it's awesome. But that's, that's like my approach to community. Like you have to be not overly optimistic about the technology. There are some things that I'm genuinely excited and passionate about. There's other things where I'm just like, no, I've been very vocal about it. I'm like, and I and why I've not been passionate about it, you know, vocal about it, like sayings like, like, I just, there's a number of things I won't go into details. But where I've said like, you would tend to bear for a minute. I am. I was like where I need to understand is that I'm holding my feedback because I don't yet understand the administrative experience. I don't yet understand the architecture of the solution. Well, a great example that I will publicly talk about was private channels. And remember all the discussion that happened around private channels and people can do that. And I kept saying like, until I see how you actually architect it, because they did share at the MVP summit years ago, when they were talking to they said we could go like three or four different ways. And here's what we're doing. Let's get your feedback. And three of the ways were really, really bad, you know, kind of thing. And, you know, and so we all try to work out with spy by tongue. This was the good way. Okay, interesting. But but that's but it does make sense. People are Microsoft are much more responsive to constructive their feedback than they are to just bashing them shocking. Exactly. They're human beings. I think it also gives me the opportunity. I think it's fair to say when Viva first came out, there was a lot of people went, oh, hang on, this is just four different things, what three different things that were out there plus learning. And it's just repending. What is the point of this? Well, the learning was out there with the learning pathways. There was something. Yeah, that's true. Yeah. There was stuff out there. But I think it Microsoft's gone a lot better at persuading people are saying actually putting this common thing to stuff. Yep, the story might not be there now, but run with us a little bit. Give us a little bit of leeway. We'll fill in these gaps. And I think to where I've been following a lot of the event, loving what things I've loved cortex from when it was first announced, seeing the topic, seeing that capability come out and seeing people get that ease of use. I think they've done a pretty good job about making available that kind of add on license. So it's not just about E5s and have people the choice and justify that. And then by plugging in all these different bits, plugging in the work lab, if people haven't seen it, Microsoft.com slash work lab with the science and evidence and data behind it. I love to come that thing. Great. I think it's a fantastic one. Yeah, really nice. And it's it's going to come to you for isn't it? Yeah, sorry. I didn't say that work lab.com if you're not if you're not seeing that new blog, but it's just it's part of what you mentioned is it's the in depth of the research that they've been doing. And it's kind of like the story behind what they're building around the work life balance, the wellness, you know, stuff is that employee engagement experience. It's that it's that brand of Eva. And once you kind of flip your head to that initial reaction as you talked about that can quite often be there. This is the same old stuff gradually trying to put that cynicism slightly to one side of people who've been around the industry for a while and something like actually if you throw this as a brand and the amount that people are now talking about it, I think it says that they've done the right thing of saying, you know, we don't just have to talk about technology, we can sometimes talk about things as a wrap around that technology that is that brand because it lands with the right people. And I think it's it's good for us as some people have been there for a little while to kind of have that pause and go, OK, yeah, I see where you go with this a bit now. Well, another example is Yammer. And I mean, again, you have all the haters out there for a long time. And now when you look at it from the Viva perspective where Microsoft is going Microsoft has always said it's an important part of our roadmap and the things that we're working on. And now that you see how Yammer helps light up both connections and topics, like if you're anti Yammer, you are behind, you know, on the on the cycles around what's happening with Viva and Microsoft direction. And there are still quite a few haters out there, but you know, they gradually listing and I think as you said, don't just hate, say what you hate and there's some valid reasons. We have a few clients that have real issues with that single feeds and I like Yammer for that single feed. But if you've got three different pillars to the organization that wants three different focuses on that or your kind of combination of organizations, doesn't work quite so well for you. So I think that's funny. There is some valid stuff. Isn't that funny how Yammer also falls into the it depends category and that's another one in the square box. It depends. Yeah, that's the I, you know, I don't know why I don't have like an it's depend t-shirt or sticker. I think that needs to be my next community sticker that I go and create for people. You know, I have been looking to get I saw Louise Fries had a square box that every time she says it depends. Some money goes in there. And so that's funny. Maybe that's what we should get all the VPs who are consultants to have that. And let's get a charity every year. The millions of dollars we could raise every year. We could raise a lot. Do you know, that's a new I might actually strip of that idea is one to pick out. That's that's a funny idea. Yeah, there would. I can't afford to participate in that. Yeah, but yeah. But so what else? What else are you kind of passionate about? What are you writing about talking about right now? So I think Viva in search of big things have been out there talking about. I love Microsoft search. It's funny as kind of going out and being a speaker, you kind of create a set of talks that you try and reuse as much as possible. And some ones you might not expect suddenly become more and more popular and Microsoft search and talking about that has kind of filled a gap, which is great. And I think there's a lot of unheralded stuff within there that people just think it's SharePoint search on there. For me, the capability to upload your office for those who remember what those things called offices are to put your desk in there and have that desk locator is all included in your license. And I spent tens of that. I think it got to hundreds of thousands of pounds on a project a few years back to try and implement the same thing. So to have that there in your license, it's amazing. And all the different bits in there that get included, the AI goodness. Do I think it's fully there yet? No. Do I wish it had been a little bit quicker? Do I wish Teams was using Microsoft search? Yes, it's all coming soon. It's all getting together. And I think it has taken a while, but the story that's coming off the back of it is more than people expect. And I love that. So I just had somebody may have been like four or six weeks ago, but somebody that reached out, I wrote something and they responded like, yeah, but, you know, it's too bad that there's nothing happening with search. I'm like, there's tons that are happening with search. And then I had to pause. That's how I responded via Twitter. And then I paused and I thought, OK, a lot of what I know is NDA. I can't talk about that. And so I ended up just direct messaging the person saying, hey, you need to go pay attention to what this team is doing, what like Bill Bear, what Naomi Money and her team, like, like what's happening around there. That's because search, the story for search is integrated in a few different areas and there's still the consumer end of things and what's happened with Bing and that all these teams are talking and working. Like there's a lot going on. And so we just saw some of that some of the latest updates via build. And there's going to be more news and more, you know, showing of the next steps that ignite and going on. So there's there's constantly things that are happening, but it's just it's striped across other solutions, other platforms. It's not not with the Microsoft search. Oh, here's what's happening with search. Don't see integrated in. It just appears under. It's like that. The phrase has kind of gone out, but that every day I I am quite glad it's gone, because it's really hard to say. I'm just remembering on there, but it's that surfacing of content, getting things in front of you that you didn't know you needed before you before you know you need it, which was kind of what Del was. Del. Yeah. And so it's a lot of it is. What's wrong? Yeah. So Del is an app. I mean, one way, but that is that's the new search experience of Microsoft. You said like that, like an R&D effort and it was going to be integrated into the other other applications. So it's not so much about your one location, your one destination for search, but it's about how that's picked up across the various applications and having a consistent experience. And I think what I love about Microsoft Search is it's consistent, but context aware as well. So it knows where you are. If you're looking at SharePoint to show you SharePoint content, if you're searching in a document library, it will show you that SharePoint view like a document library in the search results. So you kind of has that little tweaks that are really small things, but make a huge difference. And I think people often don't notice some of those tweaks that go in there as well. They just slide in nicely and people don't complain about them. They just fit what it does. And I feel Microsoft Search suffers a little bit from that in that it just worked in many cases. A little bit. And that's that I guess that is also part of the problem with the new, you know, release model where we see incremental, incremental, incremental. And so you think you don't think about what is actually what it's adding up to be. Occasionally you get like the the the more major release and feature sets in there. And things are kind of bundled away where you pay attention to that and forget it's past six to eight weeks. We've seen little tiny things. That's why, again, it's it's hard to go in there and just create a filter for anything search related. You could go with me. I've tried. Yeah, yeah. So you could go in there, but then you're watching so many items because it's striped across all those workloads. But it's it's you know, but you can you can do that. And the part of the recommendations always and like, I don't know who kind of your go to people that you listen to, the podcast, the blogs, things are out there, but find the community members, you know, that are your most active that are the resident experts on that topic. And absolutely. He talks about Bill Bear. I love what Bill Bear is doing, sharing. He's got this kind of his official stuff that comes through the tech community blogs. He's got his own blogs where he says some amazing stuff and Mark Cashman as well. He put a recent post up about Viva that was his use of Viva within Microsoft. And I love that. We're showing the real side of it and how it actually makes a difference. So yeah, there's lots of good people around there who are trying to pick stuff up. And it's it's funny. You talk about that release cycle. I was chatting somewhere the other day about Bill's. And it was rubbish. There was so much that they've been announced already that come out. And and it's easy to forget when you do stay on top of everything so much that a lot of people don't because they have a day job to do and a real job to do is rather than just listening to people and regurgitating stuff, which is important, but they don't have the time to do that. So to have those regular conferences where they actually do reiterate what has been available and just remind people because we all miss things and people who aren't doing it day in, day out, need those reminders and kind of wrap up with stuff as well. It's really important. And as you say, great, great podcast, the intro zone. Love listening staff, the guys from the Microsoft Cloud show always wrap things up and have a nice chatter and bit of banter around it as well, which is good to listen to. And you talked about those different view of things. There are different ways you like to consume content, whether it's people being very formal and dictating what's out there and saying here is the latest release, here is the latest stuff, or you like to listen to people. I'm in a bit of a chat about things and on there or whether you like to listen to tweet jams and hear lots of amazing experts talk about things there and there, which I love and I love going back afterwards and seeing all the bits of mist as well. Yeah, that's one of my favorite things too, is no matter because no matter how many times you hit refresh on the screen, it's Twitter, it's flying by. And I have multiple channels open, but you've got to refresh. Man, I wish that Twitter would do one good thing for the world, which is allow the feed API, the list feed to be renewed again so that I could create like one view that's a hashtag based and just follow it in real time, like we used to do before they shelled with no plans to ever reopen that up. No, we know how to do things better. Yeah, of course. Yeah, I should give a shout out and people see it when the happy hour etiquette is our big one. So myself and the other two from Great Hatbeard, so Al-Erdli and Gary Trinder are joined by Marene Summers, Carolina Kettikari and Louise Freese and every other month or two months, we've been a bit busy, so spread it out to every two months at the moment. We have a session we talk about the etiquette of Microsoft 365 and we do it in a style if anyone from the UK has listened to BBC Radio Fives fighting talk, we have a set of questions. Eat person stands up there and kind of debates their own little thing and they get points and if they say something I don't like or the host doesn't like, they lose points on there and it can get a bit brutal at times, but it's very light hearted. We do call it happy hour and certainly most of us try and bring an alcoholic drink along as well. Cups of tea are allowed too for those who want it. And then we finish up with defending the indefensible. And on that we ask someone to take something absolutely awful. Like I think the wiki should remain there in teams for everyone. Who's crazy enough to make that statement? Who defended that? Come on. Yeah, it was a struggle that one. There was a lot of sarcasm with the answers on those. So it's always a bit of a hilarity. And for those of us who are drinking by the end, it gets a little bit more fighting talk as well. And we encourage it. It's all done by teams. So we do ask people to sort of say what they think and similar to the club talk, we ask people to come and say, bring their views as well where they want to speak out, where they want to put chat in there. It's great fun. And I think etiquette is such an important subject when it comes to Microsoft 365. So the things you have to do, but these are things you can do to make life easier for everyone and just do things in a nicer way. And that's what we see is the etiquette that we talk about as well. Well, one of the things too, I think you've kind of mentioned this too, but whether you're watching a show but you'll get involved. So maybe we wrap up the discussion talking about kind of your path into MVP. I love Jeremy Fakes' comment about how he looked at, so Jeremy Fakes, so former MVPs now at Microsoft. So he's within the product teams saw that, hey, your name came through as potential MVPs. And his response was, I thought he already was an MVP. That's a common refrain for a lot of people. Like I got that a lot before I got earned my MVP. And I think that about other people too. And I've submitted other names of people that just like, why are you not an MVP? And thought to get some people in that were doing the work for years and why are they getting, you're not being added in there. But part of it is getting involved. So you're wondering where to get start. I'd say like get involved, like participate in the, the Tweet Jam is a great one. Like you've been involved for years and participating in those. I'd say I've gone through a long slow, you know, you have those pop stars that appear out of nowhere and there's others that have been fighting for years and pushing through it. And it was always my, I wouldn't say my aim was to become an MVP. My aim is to be, get involved community, get to know, share the things I've learned over there. Because I've seen people like yourself sharing or people like Jeremy who shared over the years. Mark Anderson used to love what he did with SP Services. And he's seen that there's a comment. That's maybe, maybe it's a difference between the two of us. Yeah, I do still love it. In fact, we had, I know you were talking about with Emily Mancini. We had Simon Doyle and Simon Hudson have been working with the maturity model for Microsoft 365 and loving the stuff that Mark's doing that. But it was seeing people over the years who sort of helped and shared and have gradually gone to that. Start with a collab talk. Probably shout out to the collab 365 team and the conferences they did there when I was more on the client. I started off very much in financial services on the client side before moving to consultancy and try to get involved in the community. But it's hard to find the time gradually on that and gradually working for different organizations who wanna support you more and more and trying to find people as well. I've got three small boys. So finding the time to get out, I can't jump around all the time and go to community events left, right, and center. It's got family. COVID has helped me in that way massively because all these things are online. So many user groups have all moved online, right? Yeah. Absolutely. And you can kind of get involved as something I could do things. Unfortunately, I also was then suddenly doing things every night of the week which became a bit more of a challenge if my wife's listening. Yeah, you still have to manage that but it becomes easier. I mean, even for the local user group, like we just had here like two weeks ago, our first in-person in over a year and a half. Yeah, so just happened things opened back up here but I dialed in. Why? Because I was just too busy. I had meetings before and after but I was able to participate. Tom Duff and I are presenting to the Minneapolis user group next week where I've presented to different user groups in India and the UK and things like online. It's great for that. There are more opportunities now that have actually opened up. And I love that. I think as things get back to real life, that hybrid way of doing things, I think we'll become the norm as well. So I think we need that in person. I remember seeing you at ESPC very briefly and things on there. Meeting people does make a difference but you can't always do that. So getting that blend of both of those is nice and it also means you can get that small community of people know each other face to face supported by a lot more, a lot of others as well. I think it's the way to go things. It's that experience that people want from it. And yeah, I've loved that. So looking forward, we've got our first big conference in the UK, this comms verse in the South Coast Summit coming up in September, October. Very much looking forward to get- Back in person? Yeah. Back in real life. Touch wood, as we say in the UK. Mine is in August. Yeah, we get the North American Clab Summit. So Mark Rackley's event. Are you going along to that one? I will be there in person. And then this fall, I'll be back in Vegas in December for the Microsoft 365 Collaboration Conference, formerly the SharePoint Conference. So that's back in Las Vegas. So yeah, I'm looking forward to things opening back up, but anyway, well, Kevin, really appreciate your time today. One more time, people want to find you. What are the best paths to get your attention to get in front of you? So on Twitter, at kevmcdonk, do you follow me there? On most things, at kevmcdonk, that's K-E-V-M-C-D-O-N-K. Up above his head. On there, yeah, actually up there. And at Greyhatbead, so follow the podcast on there. We do it for the fun and joy of community and sharing. And if anyone wants to appear on there, always good to have guests talking about subjects as well. We're pretty open on the subjects. Don't be shy, like volunteer yourself. Worst thing that'll happen is they'll say, you know, now that doesn't really fit our model, but yeah, people volunteering is awesome. Yeah, absolutely. No, we'd love to. And I think, I don't want to say it's too much, but quite a few people who've appeared on the show have become MVPs. So, you know, if you're thinking about doing that. Kevin claims the golden touch. Yeah, I'm lucky to say that. It's like, yeah, if you've got the numbers to back it up, then yeah, hey, make the claim. Just putting it out there, so. We'll really appreciate your time. It's great to talk. And we'll, you know, we've got another tweet jam happening late this month. So we'll see you later this month. Definitely. And thank you for all you do in the community as well. Yeah, no worries. Talk to you soon. Cheers.