Last week I wrote about my trip to Canda for the Asigra conference. Below are some other fun memories of our trip!

Our fun night out was a trip to the CN Tower.  The ride to the top takes 58 seconds.  To top that off, there’s a glass floor in the elevator.  Asigra spoiled us at the top with very delicious hors d'oeuvres and beverages.  Three hours later we all pile back into the buses for a trip back to the hotel.  Sitting in front of us is an Asigra partner from Memphis, Tennessee chatting to her colleague about her HTC Incredible.  Leon, being the relentless gadget guru he is, couldn’t resist to strike up a conversation about his experiences with the device.  He gave her a few pointers and ended up striking a great conversation about CEO-type-things and Nebraska Football.  Turns out she has family from Omaha and comes up every year for a game.  Small world!  She gave us her version of the Nebraska fight song.  Good times.

 

For further details on the other antics on our trip such as Trent’s magical quarter-pounder-with-cheese disappearing act and Leon’s philosophies on glassware, look one of us up at the next I.T. Matters or drop me a note.

Leon Thomas (CEO), Trent Williams (Systems Administrator), and I had the opportunity to visit Toronto for Asigra’s 3rd Annual Partner Conference.  The first thing I’ll say is that we had no problems with travel.  Usually I’d have a story to tell you about some screaming child, lost luggage, or a mystery meat food poisoning incident.  Unfortunately (for you), that didn’t happen.  We saw the top of CN Tower, met new friends, and learned how a Stella Artois beer can be a hot (read: hawt) drink… oh, and we also learned a few things about Asigra.

The partner conference was separated into two tracks: Technical and Business.  Our group attended both and swapped notes between sessions.  The business track was a wealth of information on marketing and sales strategies and the technical tracks provided expertise on using and supporting the product.

1. How to stir up interest in our market.  I mostly wear a technical hat but attended the business track to expand my expertise.  I learned a lot of new marketing and sales concepts.  A refreshing reality was that we (Jelecos) are on the right track.  We have the right ideas and are deep in the execution phase of a strategy that was collectively put together by a diverse team at Jelecos.
2. The conference center likes it cold!  The hotel where the conference was located must have thought the conversations were going to be dull because they had the room temperature just below meat-spoiling temperature.  I couldn’t drink the coffee fast enough.  I had to go outside a few times because I felt hypothermia settling in.  Maybe Stella would have helped.
3. The Asigra support staff are superstars.  Trent filled us in on all of the great things Asigra implemented in v10 and features to look forward to in future versions.  We discussed how their support and engineering staff is among the best we’ve ever worked with.  Consider the challenge of supporting a product that interacts with numerous operating system and numerous database platforms:  you need to be an expert in all those platforms to protect and troubleshoot any bumps in the road.  They routinely meet and exceed my expectations on their technical knowledge.
4. Their partner program is one of the best.   Another common theme is they listen to their partners.  They implement ideas from their partners who, in turn, get these ideas from their customers.  Asigra is the only vendor where I have experienced this type of interaction. 

  ***Stay tuned next week for more of Terry's experience at the Asigra Conference!!!!***

The Jelecos Managed Services team held its first annual Managed Services golf outing this year at Indian Creek Golf Course in observance of System Administrator Appreciation Day.  Actually, it wasn't annual until I just made it so, publicly, on our blog.  There's no sense in having such a great event just once!  But, since driving company policy isn't in my job description, this will probably be my last blog post.  We kicked Friday off right by receiving the Professional Services team at our office for some breakfast that they diligently prepared in our honor.  We appreciate their efforts very much and look forward to breakfast again next year (yes, that just became annual too).

We rolled out of the office at approximately 11:30 AM and headed to the course.  Kathy Palmer, our recent addition to the team as a Help Desk Technician, graciously offered to stay behind for the remainder of the afternoon to ensure our customer's needs were met.  We divided the six of us into two tee times.  With most of us being engineers, we decided to over-engineer the golf process.  Since we all wanted to have a chance to play with each other, we decided to rotate a player at every par 3.  Greg Mooney, Angie Mahler, and I were grouped together on the first five holes.  Steve Mills, Eric Karmazin, and Trent Williams made up the other group.

Now, I mentioned this was a golf outing, but it was more of a landscaping convention.  We dug holes in the fairways, tested the density of the water in a few of the ponds, and modified the depth of the bunkers.  Mooney took it upon himself to climb a tree and inspect it for proper trimming.  Ok, that deserves some explaining.  Mooney shot the game of his life.  We'll just call him the Cinderella boy here on out.  After he rotated to the other group on the first par 3, any time I had a chance to see him drive off of the tee box, I let him know I was there and cheering him on with some well placed yells and screams during his down swing.  Let's just say he doesn't do well with pressure and noise.   Finally, on the tee box on the 6th hole of our second nine, the Cinderella boy was lining up for what was sure to be a beautiful 275 yard shot right down the middle.  Eric and I pulled up behind them and sat under a tree, politely waiting our turn.  I was very excited for him and decided to let him see how much I appreciated his stellar golf game by cheering him on, again during his down swing.  Unfortunately, my cheers didn't help his shot.  I couldn't tell you where his ball ended up because I was ducking at the impending doom headed for me in the form of a Callaway driver.  Fortunately for Eric and me, the Cinderella boy's discus-style golf club throwing abilities match his golf game under pressure and instead of wrapping it around my head, the club landed on some branches in the tree we were parked under.  POW!

It turned out to be a great day.  Weather was good, beer was cold, and phones were quiet.