Okay so not all technology is a good thing

Yeah yeah I know better than to jump onto any new product bandwagon. However after being an evangelist for Groove over the last several months I finally got vindication today for all my ranting about Groove. A dear colleague at IAMCP, John Payes, asked our v-team to make sure they checked our IAMCP CDN team site for all the documentation for all divisions of our team.

Let me explain first that John is "mother hen" of our group and people are constantly after him and keeping on top of everything and the hundreds of sub projects he keeps track of has to be a logistical nightmare at best. John is a master of this (teach me John please). John is stepping down soon so he was smart enough to realize he could disseminate this information in millions of ways but Groove was his obvious choice for several reasons:
1) seconds to establish the workspace and load documents into logical order
2) easily secured so that just members of IAMCP Canada can access it
3) updates are uploaded right form our desktops
4) everyone is immediately alerted to changes and if alerts aren't invoked then they are easily seen when you open Groove.
5) WE DON'T HAVE TO KEEP EMAILING EVERYONE FOR EVERY LITTLE THING

and that's my point. With Groove you put the information there and people know that when they want to catch up they only have to open Groove to know exactly what they need to take a look at.

Moreover, as John put it, it takes some strain off the Exchange server! I never thought about that but it makes a good point for "load balancing". I was so wrapped up in other value points I never put any thought to that. We all know the traffic that takes place in our inboxes so Groove allows you to segregate communication on projects or groups you deem important and then know you can collaborate easily without searching your inbox for docs or files to go back and forth on.

There are a million value points for Groove. I'll get to many of them in this blog along with some technical items so that you can easily do things like synch docs with Sharepoint. I'll also make a business case for the use of Groove in the SMB market. Here's a great extension to the Office product line.

Hmmm I see a message from John. He thinks 5 women is already more than enough for a panel. Methinks he has no idea how quickly we women can talk. If they had a radar gun pointed at my lips I'd be locked up for too many "speeding tickets"

Groove is just Groovy

If you haven't had a chance to use Microsoft's Groove then you're missing out on a great piece of technology that is perfect for someone like myself who is not only an SMB but just about as "all over the place" as one can get. I'll be introducing you to this life saver and as some of the hundreds of people in my 8 workspaces have already found out, this is one piece of software any right minded entrepreneur should not be without.