UPDATE: Looking for upcoming dates of where we’ll be? Please check this page instead.
Are you trying to improve the maturity of how Power BI is used in your organization?
Is it difficult to find the right balance between discipline and flexibility?
Does it take a lot of effort to get consensus on decisions that balance control and enablement?
Want to spend a whole day talking about the ‘thorny’ aspects of adopting Power BI?
I’m delighted to be co-presenting a full-day pre-conference session with the one-and-only Matthew Roche [Blog | Twitter | LinkedIn]. We’ll be presenting our all-day session live and in-person in Seattle, Washington on Tuesday, November 15, 2022 at the PASS Data Community Summit.
What’s the session?
The Hitchhiker's Guide to Adopting Power BI in Your Organization
Matthew and I will be your guides…while you’re hitchhiking…on the road…to reach the right destination…using the Power BI Adoption Roadmap.
(I assure you that I got the analogy right away and that Matthew didn’t have to explain it to me. Yep, that’s exactly how it happened.)
What’s the session about?
Smart Power BI architecture decisions are absolutely important – but there’s so much more to a successful Power BI implementation than just the tools and technology. It’s the non-technical barriers, those ‘thorny’ issues related to people and processes, that can be the most challenging. That’s the kind of stuff you can expect us to focus on.
The Power BI Adoption Roadmap is a collection of best practices and suggestions for getting more value from your data and your investment in Power BI. We’ll use it to guide the discussion through each of the key areas.
We promise this won’t be a boring day merely regurgitating what you can read online. We’ll do our very best to make this a highly informative and enjoyable day for you to attend either in-person or virtually.
There will be ample opportunity for Q&A, so you can get your questions answered and hear what challenges that other organizations are facing.
For each of the 10 areas, we are going to pick key points to discuss. There will be a focus on the most impactful things you can do to increase your level of adoption maturity.
Why should you hear from us on this topic?
We are the original authors of the Power BI Adoption Roadmap content. Which means we can help you read between the lines. And we have a lot of opinions on the subject matter.
Both Matthew and I have a deep interest in how to implement, adopt, and govern Power BI in your organization.
As a program manager on the Power BI Customer Advisory Team (CAT), Matthew quite literally talks to customers every day.
As an independent consultant and trainer and Microsoft MVP, I talk to customers frequently as well. In particular, the people who are enrolled in my online course consistently share with me what’s going on in their org.
In this pre-con session, Matthew and I will share lessons learned from customers, what works, what to watch out for, and why.
Who’s the target audience?
To get the most from this pre-conference session:
You need to be familiar with the Power BI Adoption Roadmap and the Power BI Implementation Planning guidance.
You should have professional experience working with Power BI (or other modern self-service BI tools). Preferably at a scope larger than a specific team.
You should have a vested interest in managing and governing Power BI well.
You don’t need deep technical knowledge about Power BI itself. However, the more you know about Power BI and how it can be used, the more you’ll walk away with from this session.
Is it in-person or virtual?
Both! You can attend either in-person or virtually, whichever you’re more comfortable with.
Matthew and I will both be presenting the session live, in person, in Seattle.
A personal note: When Matthew first asked me if I wanted to do this with him, my initial reaction was…I’m not ready for crowds of people. You know, the virus thing. But I thought about it over the course of a few days. My favorite decision-making tactic: “If it’s not a hell yes, it’s a no.” And I realized that if we took the potential for becoming ill, or spreading illness to others, out of the equation that it’s a hell yes. So here we are. I decided that I’ll be as safe as is practical, while living my life and doing things that make me happy. Going to the occasional conference makes me very happy.
Will a recording be available?
Redgate (who runs this conference now that the older PASS organization is dissolved) handles the recordings for pre-cons differently than the general sessions.
The only recording that’ll be available (from the PASS Data Community Summit in November) will be for people who enroll as an online attendee. Virtual attendees will be able to watch some or all of it live, or the recording within 5 days. The pre-con recordings are removed on Sunday, Nov. 20, at 11:59 pm Pacific time.
What’s the cost?
The pricing depends on if you’ll be attending in-person or virtually. Please refer to the pricing page for the authoritative and current pricing. There’s a discount offered through September 14th.
You can attend just the pre-con, or the entire conference.
Pre-cons run on Monday and Tuesday of the week (ours is on Tuesday). The full conference runs on Weds-Friday, the 3 days right after our pre-con.
If you take away a handful of actionable suggestions, it will be time and money well spent.
What should you do to prepare?
Thoroughly review the Power BI Adoption Roadmap. Customize the maturity levels and build your own set of goals and action items.
Check my presentations page for a short <20 minute review of the roadmap.
Follow what’s happening with Power BI Implementation Planning guidance. Soooo much good stuff is coming over the next several months. This blog post explains a bit more.
Check out Matthew Roche’s blog. He has an outstanding series of blog posts and videos on building a data culture.
You can also check out my Power BI Deployment & Governance online course. It follows the Power BI Adoption Roadmap where practical, and has additional content. In addition to the many hours of videos for a wide array of topics, there are customizable templates to save you time. You can jump on a group Q&A call with me every other week, and monthly live workshops.
More info
Also, I had a lovely discussion with Mala and Leslie, from the Data Platform Women in Technology group, about the pre-con. You can check that out that recording here:
We hope to see you there! More details about our pre-con session can be found on the PASS Data Community Summit 2022 website.
