Hans Reutter, Principal Service Engineering Manager, and Elke Bregler, Principal Service Engineer, (both of Microsoft IT) share how Microsoft IT is optimizing its SAP implementations through cloud adoption and virtualization. They discuss cloud architecture, modern engineering processes, and agile methods that Microsoft IT uses to reduce risk to SAP business processes while optimizing costs, providing high service availability, and maintaining a resilient infrastructure. This information — and more — is discussed during this session: [2:11] Microsoft IT mission[3:57] Microsoft IT organization[5:09] Agility through modern engineering[8:31] SAP SESIT applications at Microsoft[9:54] SAP ERP by the numbers[15:15] Current SAP ERP production system[20:35] SAP disaster recovery[24:08] Azure and virtualization strategy[28:13] Our cloud adoption approach[30:02] The road to virtualization and Azure[33:00] Microsoft SAP system landscape – Q2 FY17[40:05] SQL Server 2016 compression[43:06] Change control and risk mitigation[48:00] Agile monthly/quarterly release schedule[49:53] SAP ERP landscape[54:35] Microsoft IT – SAP Big TrendsAccess additional technical content, discover new and exciting career opportunities in IT, and much more: Microsoft IT ShowcaseMicrosoft IT CareersLinkedInGet the IT Showcase Windows Phone App

Prabhu Jayaraman, Principal Software Engineering Lead, talks about how modern engineering, agile methods, and cloud computing have contributed to digital transformation in IT roles—enabling teams to release product updates quickly and intensify their focus on meeting customer needs. He shares how his team made a cultural shift from working in traditional six-month waterfall development cycles to short sprints with fast release cycles—helping the team realize value more quickly and increasing customer satisfaction. Access additional technical content, discover new and exciting career opportunities in IT, and much more: Microsoft IT ShowcaseMicrosoft IT CareersLinkedInGet the IT Showcase Windows Phone App

As an early adopter of SQL Server 2016, Microsoft IT identified four features and enhancements that have the potential to increase productivity for people who design, develop, and maintain critical data storage systems. In this webinar, Anubhuti Varshney, Senior Program Manager, talks about how Microsoft IT evaluated these features and created business intelligence solutions that support advanced analytics within databases for deeper data insights. This information is presented during this session: [1:20] Agenda[2:32] SQL Server 2016 – new features[4:46] Microsoft IT project context – Microsoft Enterprise Services Business Intelligence team uses SQL Server 2016 new features[9:09] Microsoft IT project architecture[12:05] Improvements in in-memory online transaction processing (OLTP)[23:31] Improvements in ColumnStore indexes[34:35] Temporal data[43:14] Row-level security[54:09] Key takeawaysAccess additional technical content, discover new and exciting career opportunities in IT, and much more: Microsoft IT ShowcaseMicrosoft IT CareersLinkedInGet the IT Showcase Windows Phone App

IT Showcase brought together subject matter experts from our Cloud at Microsoft course to answer questions about how Microsoft IT designs, develops, implements, and monitors cloud solutions at Microsoft. In this session, they discuss cloud security, choosing between software as a service and platform as a service, Azure, the Internet of Things, and trends in cloud adoption. These questions — and more — are discussed during this session: [2:52] What is Microsoft doing to ensure you are secure in the cloud? [9:02] What kinds of things do we look at for instrumentation for our apps? [11:41] What are you monitoring? [17:41] How do you decide when to use SaaS versus PaaS? [33:40] How does Microsoft IT maintain compliance and pass audits with Office 365 offerings? [36:38] What major trends do you see from Microsoft's cloud adoption? [42:34] Talking about Internet of Things scenarios, how does Azure help with those scenarios? [46:27] How did we at Microsoft get people to adopt the cloud? [52:24] What is the one tip you would like to leave our audience with today? Access additional technical content, discover new and exciting career opportunities in IT, and much more: Microsoft IT ShowcaseMicrosoft IT CareersLinkedInGet the IT Showcase Windows Phone App

Patrick Graff, Senior IT Service Manager with the Software Licensing Service, shares how Microsoft IT cut costs by using data analytics and System Center to understand, analyze, and report on third-party software within Microsoft. Learn how Microsoft IT developed the infrastructure, processes, and reporting to effectively manage, control, and use third-party software licenses within the company. These questions — and more — are discussed during this session: [3:04] Analytics spectrum of data[4:18] Shifting role of IT[6:58] Software optimization model and lifecycle[8:14] Third-party software spending challenges[11:29] Third-party software spending solutions[18:17] Third-party Software Licensing Service demo[29:09] If you're not using System Center, can you still use Power BI to do visualizations using third party software?[31:11] How does it make your day-to-day life easier using BI to create these visualizations? How has it made the business customer, the end user, more productive because of these visualizations that you've given to them?[32:45] How do we qualify the savings by reviewing the data after it's normalized?Access additional technical content, discover new and exciting career opportunities in IT, and much more: Microsoft IT ShowcaseMicrosoft IT CareersLinkedInGet the IT Showcase Windows Phone App

With the transition to Microsoft Office 365, Microsoft IT migrated mailboxes from on-premises Exchange servers to Exchange Online. This shift changed responsibilities for the Exchange service management team, releasing the team from server maintenance tasks such as applying patches or defining server policies. Andrew Kim, IT Service Manager for the Exchange email and calendaring service, shares how the team refocused roles to improve the end-to-end service experience across client devices and applications. These questions — and more — are discussed during this session: [3:03] Shift in control and responsibilities[4:57] Example of end-to-end experience[7:04] Specific things to consider to help understand the end-to-end experience[9:38] Protocols that let applications and devices access Exchange[10:27] Validating and enabling features[11:33] Methodologies used to determine what features are enabled for users[15:21] Team roles[22:10] SCRUM process flow example[22:56] Metrics[27:43] Developing a useful toolset[29:40] Example of key report used for the service[31:55] Benefits[34:11] Biggest challenge faced during migration to Office 365Access additional technical content, discover new and exciting career opportunities in IT, and much more: Microsoft IT ShowcaseMicrosoft IT CareersLinkedInGet the IT Showcase Windows Phone App

IT Showcase brought together subject matter experts from our SharePoint at Microsoft course to answer questions about how Microsoft IT designs, develops, implements, governs, upgrades, and supports SharePoint at Microsoft. In this session, they discuss Microsoft Azure, SharePoint governance, permissions, site archival and auditing, and much more. These questions — and more — are discussed during this session: [2:35] What new things can we expect from Azure that we plan to leverage?[3:58] How do we make sure that everyone at Microsoft can access SharePoint Online from their first day?[4:52] What technologies did we use for licensing?[5:31] How do you make sure that unused sites are removed to keep them from getting too big or stale?[8:22] Can you explain how Office 365 root permissions and SharePoint site permissions will interact once sites are automatically created for an Office 365 group? Will they be managed separately or together?[9:48] If you have critical workflow applications that use email, how do you ensure that no workflow is in an error state too long, and that the customer knows what to do about it?[11:59] How do you handle change management for new features that are coming out rapidly, and how do you inform employees of those changes?[14:07] How are you controlling the approval process for the new Office 365 groups and team sites?[16:14] What is the best practice for SharePoint app developers to properly test their apps on SharePoint Online, focusing specifically on performance and load testing?[19:17] Do we have critical apps in SharePoint that require the business logic to be monitored? What do you advise if a customer requests such monitoring?[21:09] What is our current online vs. on-premises mix?[22:05] When a site expires, where do you archive sites and how?[24:15] Have you ever considered implementing a workflow event receiver that would forward the exception stack trace to an administrator?[26:05] How can you access unified logging service (ULS)

IT Showcase brought together subject matter experts to answer questions about how Microsoft IT designs, implements, manages, and supports the network at Microsoft. In this session, they discuss Microsoft Azure, hybrid environments, network security, multifactor authentication, network traffic, virtual networks, and much more. These questions — and more — are discussed during this session: [2:31] How many sites or locations does Microsoft IT support, what happens at the sites, and how are they connected to the network?[4:30] How many Azure subscriptions does Microsoft IT manage?[5:27] What's the best way to set up a hybrid environment where you're looking for a very secure situation for something like finance?[7:50] What information can you provide about your ticketing system?[9:39] What are some of the benefits of managing cloud migrations internally versus outsourcing that effort?[13:24] Has cloud adoption caused significant changes in traffic patterns on the Microsoft network?[16:44] How does Microsoft IT configure virtual networks within subscriptions?[18:14] How has the combination of DevOps and the cloud changed the approach to network security at Microsoft?[22:07] What have you done to ensure your cloud migration team is managing costs effectively?[24:36] Is there a new thing that you're excited to see in the network security space?[29:21] How do you ensure multifactor authentication using MIM for legacy applications? (So that IE applications cannot be accessed by the browser.)[31:24] How do you see how network topologies changing or evolving in the next 24 months?[36:48] As more and more services are moving to the Internet, do you see shift from traditional MPLS to SD WAN-based solutions?[37:46] Are hybrid application architectures changing?[44:01] With all of our devices being Wi-Fi enabled, how do we optimize the user's Wi-Fi experience with the latest hardware and Windows OS?[47:22] Have we got a wireless network that can support continued growth?[49:00] H

IT Showcase brings together subject matter experts from our Skype for Business at Microsoft course to answer your questions about how Microsoft IT implements, maintains, and supports Skype for Business at Microsoft. In this session, they discuss hybrid deployment, user sentiment, video features, connection issues, user provisioning, and much more. These questions — and more — are discussed during this session: [2:42] What's next for Skype for Business and the hybrid deployment?[3:57] How does Microsoft IT measure user sentiment for Skype for Business?[6:40] Do we track Sentiment Analysis on social channels?[7:12] How does Microsoft manage least-cost routing?[8:43] Is there a way to disable video for Skype for Business but allow messaging?[9:22] Is it better to hard-code your IP addresses when federating with Microsoft?[10:20] It's impossible to capture logs in real-time calls from front-end servers. How do you monitor or troubleshoot real-time calls?[12:44] Can I search or talk with my Skype Consumer contacts?[13:50] What are some improvement areas in the Skype Get to Green service improvement?[18:17] How do you handle the external factors, such as users using their phone or home network connection? For example, when end users have issues in this area, will they still blame the Skype service experience?[25:11] How stable is your iOS client for Skype for Business?[25:18] What happens when our partners or our customers have an issue?[26:54] Are all of your users based on-premises, in-cloud, or in-hybrid mode?[27:00] How many front-end servers and locations do you currently have deployed?[31:58] If policies can be changed on the server side to turn off video or throttle video, which server would the changes need to be made on?[37:19] Is it possible to bulk import regular Skype contacts into Skype for Business?[39:34] Do you have mandatory training for Skype before you issue accounts?[44:44] How do you provision the users to be on the best suitable Skype pool geographic

Gain insight into best practices Microsoft IT has used to plan, deploy, and manage Office 365 ProPlus 2016, as well as how System Center Configuration Manager streamlined the upgrade process. These questions — and more — are discussed during this session: [2:26] How are the various updated channels being used within Microsoft?[3:58] How do you provide your clients with support, especially in this new world of constant product updates and new features?[4:53] How does Microsoft benefit from early adopters during the deployment?[5:46] How do we use early adopters from a feedback perspective?[6:39] How is Office 365 ProPlus integrated into the Windows images within Microsoft?[12:35] How does Click-to-Run integrate into System Center Configuration Manager instead of an MSI approach?[15:16] How did you handle licensing at such a large scale?[17:03] What are some of the pain points felt during the deployment of Office ProPlus 2016?[24:13] How does Microsoft IT tackle application compatibility?[25:25] Did many Microsoft users utilize the side-by-side options to run both versions of Office while they test out all their applications?[26:21] What were the main reasons for some of our users running MSI?[26:45] Before deploying, did you perform any silent pre-deployment compatibility audit (pertaining to the Office telemetry dashboard)?[27:46] How are Office updates handled?[31:25] How do you train your users and keep up with the rapid release of features?[35:55] Is there any change to how we manage MSI updates?[38:40] Is there a group policy object (GPO) or control method similar to System Center maintenance windows that will trim or only download Office updates after working hours?[41:05] Can you deploy via removable media?[43:40] How does a user roll back to a previous update via website?[47:38] What is one key takeaway that you'd each like our customers to leave with today? Access additional technical content, discover new and exciting career opportunities in IT, and much m