"Why does the annoying person on a plane always sit next to me?", I heard the guy sitting next to me say to his wife. It was only a 10 hour flight to Houston, the location of this year’s Microsoft Partner Conference so I don’t think he suffered for too long. Wait a minute I feel an analogy coming on...

The annoying passenger is in many ways how IT has been viewed over the years. Something that is an inconvenience and distraction to what should be a pleasant business flight and if ignored for long enough then might just go away, it is certainly not something that should be talked to as it might communicate in ways that aren’t understood. It is only at the end of the flight that a cursory glance out of the corner of an eye shows that the person had actually been remotely flying the plane, making the onboard meals and looking after all the other passengers.

Analogy over and I’ll do my best to make it the last.

Welcome to the first posting of this blog, I hope that over the next few days you’ll find some of the information here to be valuable.

So why does EACS invest time and money every year to attend this conference?

Well like it or not what happens at Microsoft directly impacts most, if not all, of our businesses. So the messages that the likes of Steve Ballmer and Kevin Turner will deliver are important and if we at EACS are to maintain our position as trusted advisors then it is essential we listen, understand and draw our conclusions so that we can give you the full and wide picture as we see it. Microsoft aren’t the only players but they are probably the most significant.

This is a time of huge change both for Microsoft and the world at large. Whilst the Global Economic signs aren’t great, companies are ever more reliant on reliable, high performance and scalable IT. So with the drive for financial restraint with no performance or business continuity loss then how will our customers achieve this?

It makes sense for businesses to demand more from IT in terms of tangible value and it is testament to IT departments that the perception of IT as one of a hole where money disappears is rapidly changing. So this rod we have made for ourselves is generally a positive one but how can you stay one step ahead and maintain your reputation as a miracle worker?

Virtualisation, Consolidation, Collaboration, Software as a Service, Manageability, Mobility, Training, etc are all important and once the priority has been set then the benefits of partners like EACS who have the most up to date knowledge on the technology that can resolve your business challenges can help you get the best return for your investment, and if this means that the solution is all or partly Microsoft then you can be confident of a smooth deployment with the results aligned to the business goals.

Many of our strong partners who are experts in areas where we are not, come from networking at events like this. This helps us to add value to you as you only have one place to call for the majority of your IT needs. That’s EACS by the way.

As part of our company vision we want all our customers to get the maximum benefit from IT and also that our customers value working with EACS as a long term strategic partner. It is events like the Microsoft World Wide Partner Conference that will help us to do this.

Throughout the week you will hear from a number of contributors, so I hope you will take the time to come back and read our initial thoughts and comments.

I hope that this first entry gives you an insight into why we do this and that you’ll come back and read more through the rest of this week.