toronto

10/062016

Social Connections 10 was our biggest North American event, and our third largest ever!

News soccnx, toronto, wrapup by Jan Valdman

I am high in the sky over Atlantic heading back to Europe so I have had several hours to think about a recap of our last event in Toronto. Wow, it was a blast again!

After many weeks of hectic preparations, the two conference days ran as racing horses. Now there is a time to recover, take some breath and shout “Oh my, we did it again!”

First of all, we had a fabulous event with more then 200 attendees, 18 sponsors, 64 sessions, and 70 speakers.

Thank you all so much for coming!

We had all the ingredients that make a good event – a great venue (perhaps the best ever) with a VIEW of the nice city of Toronto, awesome speakers, exciting agenda, some great announcements and especially you – the attendees. All together, it created an atmosphere – as some say – “that no other user group has”.

Let me highlight just few items:

There was exclusive content delivered by IBM product managers and execs such as Luis Benitez, Baan Slavens, Rob Ingram and Chris Crummey.
We had multiple great case studies from big, well-known customers such as Lowes, TD Bank and RBC
Well-known analysts Dion Hinchcliffe and Alan Lepofsky shared their insights
We saw Project Toscana code running live for the first time!
We have seen what’s new and coming in IBM Connections
We practiced Design Thinking once again
Our sponsors announced new products and enhancements (such as ConnectionsExpert from panagenda, our spotlight sponsor)
We had a new mobile app which received a very warm welcome
There was a masterclass on Connections adoption from Luis Suarez
There was a closing “Ask IBM” session moderated by Ed Brill
Over 100 people watched our live stream the first day
And last but not least we had great fun, including a gala event in the Hockey Hall of Fame (where all our attendees could touch the famous Stanley Cup!)

At the moment, we are collecting presentations from our speakers and will publish them on SlideShare over the next week or so. All “official” photos have been already uploaded to Flickr and we hope that some people find a new profile image there 🙂 If you have your own photos or videos that you want to share, then just let us know.

We announced that the next event will take place in Southern Europe late this year, with more details coming in August.

I hope that everybody enjoyed the event as much as the Social Connections team did! Thank you all again for coming, and special thanks to IBM Canada and to our sponsors, as without them we could not run these events.

Enjoy the summer and see you all at Social Connections 11!

Jan, Bill, Christoph, Doug, Femke, Lars, Maria, Martin, Simon and Wannes

06/062016

Missed the Social Connections 10 keynotes? Watch the replays now!

News livestream, replay, soccnx, toronto by Martin Jinoch

We had an excellent first morning at Social Connections 10 event in Toronto today, and for the first time ever, professionally live-streamed the main tent sessions.

If you missed all or part of this broadcast, the first three sessions are now available for replay via our livestream site:

The three sessions currently available are:

The OGS session lead by Simon Vaughan, also featuring Benoit Hardy-Vallée of IBM, followed by the event keynote hosted by Chris Crummey and Luis Benitez of IBM.
A fantastic case study from Lowes, featuring Clarissa Felts and Terry Cartwright.
Pardon the Interruption, hosted by Luis Suarez, with panelists Luis Benitez and Luis Guirigay of IBM.

Head over to the livestream site and watch the sessions now! Please leave a comment or tweet with hashtag #soccnx if you have any feedback or comments to add!

19/052016

2 days, 20 sponsors, 80+ speakers, 18+ IBM Champions and an awesome venue!

News sessions, Social_connections, toronto by Martin Jinoch

The countdown continues to Social Connections 10 in Toronto and the team who organise the event wanted to highlight some of the great things that you will find when you attend this event!

Some of key points that we would like to highlight are:

– This is an event managed by a team of volunteers who are IBM Connections users – it is put on by customers of IBM, for customers!

– One of the key themes of the event is to continue to develop a community, foster team work and share best practices around IBM Connections (Cloud or On Premises)

At the event in Toronto, a selection of our ‘Not to be missed sessions include’:

Alan Lepofsky, VP @Constellation Research will talk to how AI will help us get work done!
Luis Suarez (A World without E-mail) will present a keynote session, be involved in the famous ‘PTI’ session and also host a Social Business Masterclass on Wednesday June 8th
Tony Byrne of the Real Story Group will present a session on the ‘Next Digital Workplace‘
IBM’s take on the future of work and demo – If you saw this at the IBM connect conference, now is the chance to see an updated version of this session!
What is coming to IBM Connections
How IBM design their products – a number of sessions focused on this important topic
Toscana – Come and see what is coming!

– Come and hear how businesses are leveraging the IBM Collaboration platforms to drive business outcomes.

Here is a selection of the great customer case studies:

Lowe’s: will talk to how they enable collaboration and drive diversity of thought through strategic alliance that maximize impact to employees, customers and vendors
A&W: How they changed minds of execs to support adoption
Tuft’s Health: How they created an integrated intranet for communication, collaboration and applications
Waterfront Toronto: ongoing journey to becoming a more Social organization on a collaboration platform that supports all aspects of city buildings, citizen engagement and business ecosystem
TD Bank: Presenting their usage and journey with the adoption of IBM Connections
Verisure Securitas will explain their experience of using IBM Connections cloud
How Telus used Collaboration to change the company culture
The Superior Group will discuss their use of Connections
SES highlight their new way of Knowledge networking
and more….

And last, but not least, our sponsors, without who we could not put on this event!

Come to the event, listen to some great sponsor sessions and visit them on the sponsor floor!

In addition, we have a full program of Social events that will keep you entertained late into the night!

So if you have not registered, do so now before all the tickets are sold! REGISTER HERE

25/042016

Sponsor Spotlight: Kudos

News boston, prague, soccnx, sponsors, stockholm, switzerland, toronto, zurich by Lars Samuelsson

So, Social Connections 10 is approaching at breakneck speed and we’re busy preparing for the event on every free minute we can find.

Today we want to slow things down just a little bit to put the spotlight of one of our core sponsors, they have been with us for many events, for which we are truly grateful.

Our ISW friends from down under brings you Kudos!

Check out http://www.kudosbadges.com for a look at a truly great product that extends IBM Connections to new levels!

Please take your time to see these guys at their booth and listen to what they offer, it’s great.

22/042016

The Heat Is On: The Agenda for Social Connections 10 in Toronto is published!

News 10, agenda, heat, published, socialconnections, toronto by Maria Nordin

The last week have been busy in the team! The weekly run, the dog walk, that extra coffee break or the after work with friends were all cancelled. Our joined forces has been pointed in one direction only. The Agenda!

First, thank you all for submitting such interesting and professional abstracts! Just to read through them all was a treat in itself, and to get to chose from them an even bigger one. I can reveal that our scheduled team meeting where we concluded our votes doubled in time and discussions ran high.

And now we are done! The agenda is published! The mix of sessions is awesome. Both within the different tracks and in total. You will surely recognize some familiar names among our speakers, but also a bunch of new ones. This is what I like most. Our community is constantly growing, moving changing, evolving. To the better!

For example we will give you insight in the very large company Lowe’s journey to become a Collaborative Company. And IBM’s Take on the Future told by Sarah Gibbons, Luis Benitez and Christopher Crummey.

We are also proud to present to you 10 fresh case studies! Learn best practices and listen to those who have solved problems you might struggle with right now.

Or an interesting Case Study: Win, Win, Win: Changing Attitudes, Adopting Socail and Going Green with Graham Acres, Brytek Systems Inc. and Delores Beier, A&W Food Services of Canada Inc. Last but not least Best and worst practices deploying IBM Connections with Christoph Stoettner and Nico Meisenzahl, panagenda.

So now, when we in the team (only momentarily) fold back our desk chairs, stretch our legs and gaze out through the window, you only got one thing to do:

Register for this amazing event which will give you sparking ideas, networking, knowledge sharing and social seeds planting.

/Maria (your friendly Social Connections team member)

P.S. Today we counted 18 IBM Champions who will speak, network and mingle around the conference. That number will most likely change.

11/032016

Social Connections 10 – Social Business Masterclass hosted by Luis Suarez!

News Adaption, adoption, connections, elsua, Enablement, Engagement, masterclass, NoMail, soccnx, SocialBusiness, toronto by Wannes Rams

Social Business Masterclass – ‘From Adoption to Adaptation, From Enablement into Engagement’

Wednesday June 8th – 9am to 15:30pm

Lunch and refreshments included

The Social Connections team are please to announce that as part of our Social Connections 10 event that we are collaborating with Luis Suarez to host an unique event in Toronto – a Social Business Masterclass!

What if instead of “driving” adoption within your organisation, you could inspire and facilitate adaptation instead? What if you would have the means to re-define a new way of working with your fellow colleagues and peers through that very same adaptation to become a successful Socially Integrated Enterprise? What if that methodology, good practices, extensive expertise and know-how would all be at your fingertips, so you could apply it right away? What if you knew the nuts and bolts of getting your management and senior leadership teams all involved right from the start to help facilitate the final social business transformation you have always been looking for? Are you ready?

Come and join us on this one day masterclass to find out and learn how you can get the most out of your IBM Connections deployment to begin, or continue, that transformation journey into becoming a successful Social Business.

What you can learn

You will learn how to

not only install social software, but also make your business into a social business
promote and support new ways of working in your company
get closer together with new forms of communication and collaboration between colleagues and business partners, and accelerate the digital transformation
avoid typical mistakes in the implementation of company-wide social networks and achieve successful results.
convince executives and middle management and may face resistance

Whether you are just getting started with your Social Business Adaptation Journey, or whether you are already a very well seasoned 2.0 knowledge worker, this workshop will provide you an opportunity to learn with other fellow practitioners through plenty of practical, hands-on advice, good practices, lots of hints and tips and, most importantly, all of the necessary knowledge resources available to date.

This session is going to be really focused, packed with value and offer tremendous opportunities to learn from both Luis and the other attendees’ experience. So do not hesitate too long. Places will be allocated in order of registration.

The cost to attend this masterclass is in addition to your attendance at the Social Connections Conference (the event is only open to attendees of the Social Connections conference). We have put together a really attractive rate for the masterclass and if you register before April 1st, you can benefit from a ‘Early bird’ rate!

What are you waiting for – please register now

The View from the Social connections 10 Venue!

07/032016

Social Connections 10 – What a venue we have for you!

News connections, soccnx, StAndrews, toronto, Venue by Simon Vaughan

The Social Connections team are pleased to announce that we have now secured a venue for our event in Toronto on Monday 6th and Tuesday 7th June.

The venue is…………

The St Andrew’s Club and Conference centre in Downtown Toronto!

We have secured the 16th floor for our event and the location offers first class facilities and stunning views of downtown Toronto!

For the convenience of our attendees, the conference centre is located in the heart of Toronto, near all major hotels and connected through the underground path system to all major office towers in the city core as well as sitting atop the St. Andrews subway station. The conference venue is located on the 16th floor of the SunLife Financial tower.

We are sure that this venue will be hosting one of our best events to date.

We have a limit on the number of people that can attend the event, so we would advise that you register and book your place before it is too late! – Register Now!

To find out more about the venue, please visit the following website: http://www.standrewsclub.ca/

We are currently talking to some of the downtown hotels and we hope to announce some discounts for our delegates – stay tuned for a future announcement!

http://www.standrewsclub.ca/

22/022016

Social Connections 10, we will go to Toronto!

News 10, abstracts, canada, event, ibmchampions, ibmcnx, june, registration, soccnx, soccnx10, social, socialconnections, toronto by Wannes Rams

We know we have kept you waiting. Maybe longer than both you and we wanted. But it was for a good reason!

After the great success of our last event in Stuttgart, and because this is our 10th event, we have cooked up something extra.

We won’t release all the details yet, there are much more exciting things to come.

But we can say this: It is with great pleasure that we can announce the dates and location for our next event. This time we will be crossing the Atlantic again, but to a new country for us. We are going to Toronto, Canada! Yes, you heard it right, the beautiful city of Toronto is waiting for us!

So gear up with your biggest smile and join us on June 6 & 7, 2016 in the vibrant capital of Ontario, Canada.

As before we are running a 2 day event filled with good speakers, captivating sessions, lots of IBM Champions, a Gala night you wont forget and of course the amazing Social Connection team.

But we cannot do this without you! So send in your abstract for that session you already have in the back of your mind here, or register here.
And last but not least, there is much more to come. Keep your eyes open here for more details, news and announcements. We will updating you on a regulat basis from now on.