I had the privilege of spending the past few days at Microsoft for a set of sessions and meetings for IT execs, and while I can't comment about any specifics of what was presented there, I can say that it was a worthwhile venture. Nice to see that even a massive company of 52,000+ employees can make a real effort to be customer-focused and to reach out to the hands that feed it.

I also had a chance to catch up with a few “Microsoft-ies” that I had not seen for awhile, and for whom I hold a great deal of respect. One thing that always amazes me (given the size of the company) is the fact that Microsoft hires a lot of really smart, quality people. From my local rep (who is a truly good guy) on up to the big-wigs I get to speak with from time to time, it's a consistently high-caliber bunch of people who have a contagious passion for what they do.

Nothing earth-shattering to report, but I can say that it's always good to meet others in the field, to get out and see how other companies do their jobs, and to take that information and mold it into a useful tool you can use to critically review the way you do things. It's entirely too easy to fall into proverbial ruts in this business, and doing so means either falling behind in your career technically, or becoming careless and risking career damage as a result. A job like mine - where you're responsible for maintaining systems at a consistent state of high-availability, ensuring the network is fully secured, and making sure people have what they need to do their jobs, all while keeping costs as low as possible while at the same time improving services - is stressful enough. In my case, our company's employees, those who are shareholders, our customers, and about 25% of the online banking population in the United States all count (either directly or indirectly) on our company doing a good job in these areas. No need to hammer nails into our own coffins, and so a continual, honest review of the state of things ensures we stay out of that rut.

One really cool thing I got to do was paying a visit was the Center for Information Work's Office of the Future - a conceptual office if you will, where they showcase some of the ideas they are working on for placement in the market over the next five or so years. It's all cool stuff, has been publicized in the media quite a bit in the past, and it's a lot like the concept cars you see at the auto shows (the actual car never makes the streets and chances are it doesn't even run, but parts of it show up in other real vehicles down the road). It was a fun, interesting and eye-opening hands-on experience. One thing's for sure - we still have a long way to go in the world of computing!