2009 SharePoint Featured Speakers

Jim Ferguson | Lake Region Medical 

Jim Ferguson's (PointedMan.com) knowledge spans the End-user, IT Professional, Database Administrator and Developer areas. Currently, he is the SharePoint Administrator at Lake Region Medical where he is architecting their MOSS implementation from the ground up. Previously, he was Benchmark Learning's Senior Educator for SharePoint and authored or co-authored the majority of the curriculum that Benchmark Learning utilizes for SharePoint. He holds multiple certifications in Networking, Data Base Administration, and Programming. He has been in IT fully since 1998, and has worked with technology most of his life (his first computer was a Commodore 64). When not working he rides his Motorcycle, is a PADI DiveMaster, Plays the Harp, Brews his own Beer, Wine, & Mead, with his Wife (Rebekah), two children (Jack and Claire), and Holland Lop Bunny (Autumn).


Eric Kraus | Microsoft Enterprise Services

Eric is a consultant with Microsoft Enterprise Services focusing primarily on SharePoint Products and Technologies. He has over 10 years of IT-related experience ranging from infrastructure/network administration to SharePoint architecture and .NET development. Eric is an active member of the worldwide SharePoint community and frequently presents at conferences and user groups across the country. Find more of his work on his blog: https://blogs.msdn.com/ekraus or follow him on Twitter: http://twitter.com/erickraus.


Greg Moser | Computer Integration Technologies

Greg Moser is a Development Manager and the SharePoint Practice Manager for Computer Integration Technologies in Woodbury, Minnesota, a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner. Since 2001 at CIT Greg has filled the roles of Developer/Analyst, Business Analyst, Trainer, SharePoint Architect, and his current Development Manager role. These days he advises CIT’s customers on how they can best utilize the powerful SharePoint platform in their organizations, and leads the CIT team in designing and implementing the resulting solutions.  


Sarah Haase | Best Buy Inc.

Sarah Haase is an information architect and corporate librarian with more than 10 years of knowledge management and business process re-engineering experience. From building wikis and other online knowledge bases to supporting BestBuy.com's content management strategy, Sarah has focused on using technology to enable efficient information storage/retrieval. In her current role as dotcom's Collaboration Manager, Sarah relies on SharePoint and various Web 2.0 technologies to drive online collaboration and optimize business processes. In 2 years, these efforts have netted more than $450,000 in annual cost savings.


Phil Wicklund | RBA Consulting

Phil Wicklund (MCTS) has years of experience architecting and administering corporate SharePoint environments. He taught Mindsharp’s 2003 and 2007 SharePoint developer course from 2004 to 2007. Today Phil shares real-world insights and in-depth best practices with RBA clients of all varieties. Prior to joining Mindsharp, Phil was the SharePoint Architect and Technical Lead at RSM McGladrey, a Fortune 500 accounting and business consulting firm. Phil provided leadership over McGladrey’s SharePoint environment including all application development, SharePoint administration, and server administration. He was a key player in introducing SharePoint into the firm, and led the effort to upgrade from V2 to V3. Phil maintains an active SharePoint Blog at http://philwicklund.com.


Paul Grafelman | RBA Consulting

Paul Grafelman has seven years experience in information technology, administering SharePoint (2003 and MOSS 2007), Active Directory, SQL Server, and Windows-based servers and systems.  Paul has utilized SharePoint technologies to create applications for clients in the health care, insurance, automotive, and software industries.  His focus is on using SharePoint's out of the box functionality; he accomplishes this by using that functionality in different ways and pushing the limits on what SharePoint can do, without incorporating custom code.


Shikhar Agarwal | Sogeti

Shikhar Agarwal has over 10 years of solution leadership and project management experience. He has worked with various solutions including Social Computing, Collaboration, Enterprise Search, CRM, SaaS, ERP and BI. Recently, Shikhar has been involved in architecting enterprise level SharePoint solutions across multiple industries (Insurance, Non Profit and Healthcare). A National Microsoft Solution Leader with Sogeti, he is also leading efforts to build a team focusing on Microsoft CRM, SharePoint and Microsoft Online. In his spare time, he does public speaking and serves as an advisor on emerging technologies to a MBA program in India.


Deepak Raghavan | Sogeti

Deepak Raghavan has been working as a software consultant mainly focused on web based technologies for the past 8 years and is currently employed with Sogeti Minneapolis. His interests lie in the upcoming Microsoft technologies, Silverlight, SharePoint, Agile Software Development, and Service Oriented Architectures. He holds a Masters degree in Electrical and computer Engineering and MCPD (web technologies) certification.


Neil Iversen | Inetium

Neil thrives on digging into business issues and (ab)using the specific technologies that solve a problem. As Lead Developer for Inetium, Neil gets to create solutions that span multiple technologies including SharePoint, CRM, Office and a variety of platforms. He is also a frequent speaker at the Minnesota SharePoint User Group (MNSPUG) and creator of the Minneapolis Office Developer Interest Group (MODIG).


Wes Preston | Inetium

Wes is a Senior Consultant with Inetium as a SharePoint product specialist and IT Pro. Wes has been a developer, consultant, and technology evangelist for over 10 yrs. He is one of the organizers and a frequent speaker at the Minnesota SharePoint User Group. Wes maintains a blog at www.idubbs.com/blog.


Mike Benkovich | Microsoft

Energy, laughter and a contagious passion for coding, Mike brings it all to the podium. His career has taken him from minion to business owner, and he has been programming since the late 70s, when a friend brought a Commodore CPM home for the summer. He wrote his first software in Basic (including a math game that was shown at the University of Wisconsin in 1982) and later completed a degree in aerospace engineering. In 1994 he started a consulting firm with his brother, focusing on the effective use of relational technologies for scalable, high performance and mission critical applications. Mike has worked in a variety of roles including architect, project manager, developer and technical writer. The coolest part of his job? Running into people who are still using (and liking) his software applications. Mike is a published author with WROX Press and APress Books, writing primarily about getting the most from your SQL Server database. Since appearing in Microsoft's DevCast in 1994, Mike has presented technical information at seminars, conferences and corporate boardrooms across America. This music buff also plays piano, guitar and saxophone - but not at his MSDN Events. For more information visit Mikes website at http://www.benkotips.com.


Connie Wiegel | Computer Integration Technologies

Connie Wiegel is an Information Worker Consultant for Computer Integration Technologies in Woodbury, Minnesota, a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner. Since 2003, Connie has filled the roles of Developer, Trainer, and her current role developing WSS and MOSS intranets and public web sites. She advises and teaches clients on how they can best utilize the powerful SharePoint platform in their organizations, including finding low/no cost out-of-the-box solutions that will integrate with their SharePoint site to meet their specific needs.


Keith Dahlby | Inetium

Keith Dahlby is a .NET developer and language geek from Cedar Rapids, IA. He works as a SharePoint consultant with Inetium and blogs about SharePoint and .NET at Solutionizing.NET and Los Techies. Keith is active in the local INETA chapter and has spoken at community events around the midwest. He is also studying Human-Computer Interaction at Iowa State University.


Raymond Mitchell | Inetium

Raymond Mitchell is a Senior Consultant for Inetium and frequent speaker at the Minnesota SharePoint User Group. He also blogs under the alias IWKID on Information Worker technologies including SharePoint and Office development.

 
 

Jeff Willinger | Right Point

Bio Jeff Willinger has been putting social into social computing for more than 10 years-a true SharePoint and Social Media evangelist, he will be demonstating how companies are leveraging SharePoint within the four walls and outside the 4 walls. Getting more with less.


Larry Christofaro | Digineer

Larry Christofaro is a senior consultant for Digineer, with over 15 years of project management experience. Larry has combined his strengths in EPM architecture and project management to successfully manage EPM and Microsoft Project deployments for clients ranging from 50 – 2000 users.


Don Donais | Benchmark Learning

Don joined Benchmark Learning in 2005 as a Business Applications Educator. Before coming to Benchmark Learning, Don was a high school teacher. His education background serves him well at Benchmark Learning. He quickly became an MCT by picking up his MCSA and MCSE certifications. This allowed him to join the IT staff in December 2006. He teaches core Microsoft Windows 2003, Vista, Windows XP, Exchange 2007, ITIL v2/v3, and SharePoint. He has been a key contributor to the development of many ITIL resources such as our podcasts, v3 Awareness videos, and v3 Foundation class video. He also is the Curriculum Project Manager for Benchmark Learning and has been involved with managing and writing titles for the company.


Matthew Obert | Benchmark Learning

Matthew Obert joined the Benchmark Learning IT Education staff in 2005. He courted us for two years and we finally gave in--and are we glad we did!! Before coming on board with us, he worked for eight years designing numerous solutions for SMS infrastructures. He currently teaches SMS, Server 2003, WMI, VB Scripting, SQL, ITIL, and PowerShell (which he co-authored with another staff instructor, Lu Patrick). Matthew is able to use his prior experiences in the IT trenches to help his students more easily take their classroom education and apply it immediately in their work environments.