An insightful article by CIO Dive on how companies are prioritizing skills over degrees for many IT roles. Studies are finding many of the critical technical knowledge needed for certain IT roles is not covered in the classroom.

As part of the Community Response Series: There are drawbacks to working remotely, and you might find you have a hard time staying productive through the day when you aren’t in a traditional office setting. But there are strategies you can lean on to stay productive no matter where you spend your workday. With planning and dedication to doing your best work, your days away from the office can be some of your most productive. I want to give you 6 ways to stay motivated and how you can tell your employees to stay motivated during these trying times.

In this Community Response Series webinar, Vish Walia of the Customer Success team at Microsoft Canada will share 3-D Action plan to drive business continuity and growth during these chaotic times. The webinar will focus on identifying new ways of productivity and leverage new solutions to complement Dynamics 365 Capabilities.  

This BizTech article by Doug Bonderud addresses multiple areas of cloud encryption that you need to be cognizant of in your cloud strategy. Some take cloud security for granted based on assumptions, but making sure your data is secure from end to end is vital.

Stream this Cloud Wars Live podcast episode for my conversation about business, data and more with BMC President and CEO Ayman Sayed.

Hello BC|NAV Members! I know you have been waiting and time has come for to announce a Global initiative for BC|NAV Chapters in 2021. Several Chapter Leaders and Programming Committee members came together to create some 2021 excitement and allow all of us to Learn, Connect, and Network while we wait for Summit 2021 in October, Face-to-Face. Every BC|NAV Member is welcome and we encourage you to tell other members and colleagues to join us. We will create our content based on all of our requests and what is new in our BC|NAV community and companies.Let’s see the schedule so you can Mark Your Calendars!Now that you can see the 2021 Calendar look for announcements to register. Below Meeting on 2/23:https://www.navug.com/events/event-description?CalendarEventKey=98e04228-b3b0-4ea0-9618-eb66d02cc8c4&CommunityKey=d56524ef-b109-4410-80f1-c25c3ee327f0&Home=%2fcommunities%2fcommunity-homeWe are very excited to hold this Global event in 2021 and I hope you feel the same way. If you have questions feel free to reach out. I expect to see everyone at these meetings so we can inspire, design, empower, and achieve what all of us expect from our Local User Groups and Chapter Meeting. Most importantly, we will have fun.Thanks,Steven Chinsky

On Feb 23 from 11:30am to 1:30pm ET, this Finance Function Roundtable event will be joined by Kerry (Rosvold) Peters, CEO of New View Strategies and BC/NAVUG All-Star, and Kim Dallefeld, Senior Trainer & Implementation Consultant for Dallefeld Consulting.

Extending its year-long run as the world’s fastest-growing major cloud vendor, Google Cloud Q4 revenue soared to $3.83 billion.

Want to stay current with the state of cloud computing? Read this article by Paul Gillin to hear about edge computing, distributed cloud, and the now-mainstream use of software containers. Paul Gillin is the Senior Editor for Wikibon’s micro-analysis team; he has 23 years experience in tech journalism, including his time as founding editor-in-chief of B2B technology publisher TechTarget as well as editor-in-chief and executive editor of the technology weekly Computerworld. 

This article by Srini Vasan, CEO of eShipGlobal, an on demand transportation management solution provider, discusses the many benefits of Big Data and its analysis to supply chain companies wanting to increase efficiency and profitability in supply chain execution.

Read a blog post from January 2021 about Google’s alternative to third-party cookies, FLoC (Federated Learning of Cohorts), which will be open for advertiser testing in Q2 2021. Learn how FLoC will protect the privacy of users while providing advertisers with needed attribution data.

A Custom Rating Control for Power App. fully configurable with the option to use any icon/image as a ratingDownload Custom Control:https://github.com/DeepakS22/DPowerApps/blob/master/Rating-ControlV1_20210202043731.zip

BC/NAV Chapter – MARK YOUR CALENDARS!Through collaboration we grow. The first united D365UG meeting for BC/NAV Chapters will be hosted by the Great Lakes Chapter. Please use this link to register: protect-us.mimecast.com/s/… Or head to the Great Lakes Chapter page to register. Each month a different Local Chapter will coordinate an informative virtual meeting. Look for additional postings in your particular Chapter to learn about these virtual events. With DynamicsCon headlining March and Summit promising the return of in person meetings in October, we won’t be scheduling united Chapter Meetings in those months.  For those who want to save the dates, the following Chapters will be providing the content for the next 6 months: April 22nd – Andrea Riviezzo (Denver)May 20th – Jessie/Traci (Houston)June 22nd – Steve Chinsky (Boston)July 22nd – Greg Alford (Chicago)Aug 20th – Cliff/Suzanne (Baton Rouge)Sep 23rd – Kim Dallefeld (Dallas)All are welcome! Please join and help create content and topics to discuss on future meetings. We will collaborate and grow together :)See you there.Thanks,Steve

Join Andrea Riviezzo, Sales Tax Guru, where she and others will discuss MRP within NAV/BC or using external software, and what you need to know before implementing MRP.

January 2021 saw some major cloud database developments in a fast-moving, fast-growing, customer-demand-driven market.

Two days ago, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella and CFO Amy Hood revealed to the world in unmistakably clear language why Microsoft has become, without question, the world’s largest and most-influential enterprise-cloud provider.

According to AccountingToday, tax prep and finance companies are saving massive hours in tax prep leveraging RPA — 2,500 to 3,200 hours per year on average. CPAs are leveraging RPA to augment their roles, not be replaced by them, to focus on higher-value work.

Interesting analysis from Computerworld (careful for the ads) outlining what employees are entitled to in this work from home reality we have all gotten very used to. The seven rights are outlined as “articles” that include employers paying for business equipment, flexible work hours and much more.

Many users may have heard that Microsoft isn’t investing heavily in Dynamics GP. So, does support for Dynamics GP still matter? Well, if you have made the decision to stay on GP, it probably does. Whether you plan to stay on for another year or for the foreseeable future, you will need to keep your Dynamics GP system up to date. Tap here for details on how we can support you now and into the future, or go to our profile to schedule a demo or discovery call with our team–yes, we do in fact have live experts at the ready to have a Teams meeting with you to discuss your needs!

With a 32% jump in subscription revenue, ServiceNow set a fast pace early on with its SaaS approach to streamlining IT department operations–but with their expansion into productive digital workflows to simplify HR, customer service and cybersecurity this next wave of growth is very worth paying attention to.

On the Cloud Wars Live podcast, Bonnie Tinder says that if you know your why, you can achieve biz transformation thru digital transformation.

California’s new groundbreaking law, Prop 24, is the first US government watchdog law targeting data protection and privacy. This law will become effective in 2023 and protect nearly 40 million people. California Prop 24 is just the start of potential federal privacy regulations. Use this piece to future-proof your company for a National Privacy Law.

Edge computing is not just something to keep at the edge of your digital transformation conversation. The combination of AI and IoT can be powerful in the transportation, HVAC, and manufacturing industries. What does this mean for you? Start with small, non-critical apps to get a handle on the details and pros/cons. This will help you down the road on larger, critical needs.

On the heels of the DAC “Digital Acceleration Binge” last week, it is great to see Proximo 3 enter the market with a promise to deliver a better way of managing organisational change. The group combines over forty years’ experience delivering impactful transformation programmes to clients and their customers.

ServiceNow has jumped two spots on the weekly Cloud Wars Top 10 rankings to the #7 slot, knocking IBM down to #9.

Curious about how Hackathons can benefit our society? Check out this blog post on Charitynavigator.org for a quick intro! Charity Navigator is one of the larger and more trusted non-profit assessment organizations in the U.S. PC World says, “Consider it [Charity Navigator] the Consumer Reports of the nonprofit world.”

In the spirit of the DAC Digital Acceleration Binge, we have been on the lookout for other great virtual programs that tell real world stories about transformation and growth! Great list of speakers at this event and a topic near and dear to our hearts; digital velocity!