This podcast is presented by Marijn and Steve; two experienced Microsoft 365 and SharePoint consultants. In each podcast you will get a smile or two with a chunk of interesting and practical help in Microsoft 365. Then you get introduced you to what we hope is a Whisky you have not tasted before.
So, this turned out to be fun after the boys could not get excited about a big single subject... except whisky... but being broke after the holidays cheap whisky became a talking point... then Steves's mum joined the call and AI became a talking about along with a M365 Comparison with many things Whisky... But then the boys got serious and talked about some very nice drams all priced around the 30-50 euro mark that taste like things double the price.
1/16/25 • 65:31
Steve and Marijn record this just before Xmas and decide on 4 whiskies as they have a send-off for Viva Goals recently announced to be deprecated by Microsoft.Check out this episode to find out why we think it has disappeared and if a hole has been left that needs filling more importantly laugh as we work through the last episode we recorded before Snow fell and Santa delivered presents.
12/30/24 • 75:36
Six years ago the boys recorded Office365Distilled 001. 6 years and 155 Episodes ago and talked about Ignited 2018.So the opportunity arose to check out what was announced at Ignite 2018 and compare it to Ignite 2024 which has just happened.So enjoy a little reminiscing of the past whilst looking at the future.
12/28/24 • 53:36
The boys are starting to realise that it is time to get practical and talk about how governance has changed and how they approach SharePoint Governance specifically in todays work of SharePoint, MS Teams and OneDrive and how they approach the subject with Clients.Marijn talked about the underlying ABC pyramid approach with A being for ALL = Intranet, B being about Business = SharePoint sites and C being about Collaboration = MS teams and OneDrive as a location for sharing.The describe how these layers work out in reality and how as consultant it is explained to the customer for them to add their local governance to the different layers… and then we finish the last of the Tikit sponsored whiskies.
11/30/24 • 62:52
OK, so MS Teams gets new way to look at Channels and Chats under a Sectional title. Steve and marijn take a look at the value of such change and go to discussing the value today and potential value tomorrow.A very old Teeling gets a tasting after Tikit for MS teams brings their 3 series to a close with a great whisky
11/10/24 • 61:36
The boys talk to Geoff and Adam, from Tikit by Cireson. Tikit is a helpdesk solution build on Microsoft Teams. We talk about planes, journeys, AI (ofcourse) and much more. They are our whisky sponsors for the episode!
10/31/24 • 63:14
OK, the boys finally did it. AI, Copilot, Gemini, etc., get a beating in this very funny episode of O365Distilled. Yes, there was even a little live prompting to see what the phone wanted to say and if it agreed...It started with a very valid article from Computer World Company or a magazine about the slow update of Copilot and ended with the boys checking out if the article was true. Maybe you heard Steve say that he is becoming a bit more of a believer. But anyway check it out yourself and let us know as always what you think... Have fun... but don't forget... The Whisky was truly awesome; Tikit, who sponsored the next episode and supported the show, bought the boys a dram... a first for them... Deanston whisky finished in a Tequila barrel... a very nice dram.
10/25/24 • 61:23
149 episodes of M365 Distilled took place before we arrived at Collabdays Hamburg! All Marijn had to do was get us a room to record in with a few friends. Well, he surpassed himself and got the main hall and a keynote session to record with the truly awesome people of Hamburg CollabDays on 31st August 2024.It was fun with about 100 people, just after the ice cream, the boys talked about AI and specifically Copilot with the awesome title: AI - Bullshit or Hotshit?It is a short episode with guests Sara Fennah and Martin Rovekamp joining Steve and Marijn. The team looks to understand the promise of Copilot and how it might be a little short on delivery.The crowd asks a few questions and Steve goes into lecture mode about how Labels are the way to go about SPO security to get the real value from the Copilot365 licenses.The Whisky, the 150th on the podcast was a lovely scotch distilled in Seattle (the home of great coffee and great technology😊) in the tried and tested scotch methods using Peated barley from Scotland to ensure it is authentic.
9/23/24 • 32:37
Steve and Marijn check out a HBR article (https://hbr.org/2024/08/is-your-organizational-transformation-veering-off-course) that identifies some traits of team that have lost focus and need a little but of a push to move forward.In this podcast they discuss their experiences and drop a few practical ideas of how a team can move forward when energy is low and some ideas on how to motivate the team and have things in place to resolve issues and steps to take to ensure projects move forward in a positive way.When you are rolling out MS teams or Migrating SharePoint sites this podcast might help you spot potential delays or problems with delivery in time to step in and keep momentum to the end results and scope.The boys drink what might become a rare whisky from Mackmara after they recently annouced that they will file for bankrupcy and finding a new buyer to take over the operation... enjoy...
9/8/24 • 54:59
This is the last of the series of podcasts called the apologise series as Steve managed ot catch up with the programs recorded and published so hopefully we are back to 5 days from recording to publishing.Marijn read an article (Microsoft Teams increases collaboration in the modern workplace at Microsoft - Inside Track Blog)… it was not a podcast but real words and it created the idea of a podcast for the duo. Microsoft have been looking at how they can improve collaboration using their own tools and a process that has some alignment with ADKAR. Steve and Marijn talk through the ideas shared in the article and how it can be adopted practically and where it all makes sense. Microsoft use to cool analogies’ that we like and that everyone can use to improve their collaboration in their organisations.And the boys re-christens KevinM as Saint Kevin after drinking this extraordinary Irish whisky the boys take in this episode of M365Distilled
8/19/24 • 48:40
So Marijn talks about indecision and the trouble in deciding on a Twix or not… and missed out on a Peated Yamazaki, depriving Steve of a chance to taste one of his favorite Japanese distilleries. In this second of the Apology series… So Steve, Anouck, and Marijn did Commsverse TV (https://www.youtube.com/@Commsverse/streams ) and in this episode we talk about all the things they learned including the longest and first case of remote working, that FAX is still a big business and ghost calls that Analysing software need to remove to get accurate figures…Speaker bags this year were very funny… and we stole Mark Vale's designer back for the title of this podcast…Check out what the team talked about as the boys look into their bag of Shit and discuss what was the coolest thing for them…
8/12/24 • 60:24
This is the first of a new series of podcasts called the Apology Series… Life has been a little tricky over the last 3 months for Steve with a separation from my long-term partner, not having access to Max all the time and Moving house to the city of Antwerp, so enjoy the catch-up of podcasts in the coming days that we already recorded,,, Welcome to the Apology Series. Make changes Obvious, Easy, and Satisfying from James Clear's book Atomic Habits. The boys are provided with a slide from a conference, and they decide to apply some of James's thinking to a communications project. They then break the gold rule of having 2 subjects per podcast. Will it work? Well, listen in…So James gives us 4 rules and Steve and Marijn want to talk about communications, judge for yourself if you can find all the Golden Nuggets in what turns out to be a very satisfying podcast…We hear about Steve Folding his arms and being all about himself and yes a little cocky, and Marijn being wrong… or is he… only you can judge in this very cool Steve & Marijn discussion…
8/5/24 • 64:08
OK, we talk about SharePoint and a question that Marijn received about Sorting our SharePoint Shit. You know the scenario, what do you do to help a company that Set up an M365 tenant, opened up SharePoint and made it available within 24 hours... recipe for disaster right... and then they call us in to help sort out the shitIn this episode, Marijn has a plan, and Steve helps him think it through as questions arise about what direction to take to sort three terabytes of content on a Tenant and turn it into a solid, stable collaboration platform.But the Shit does stop there as their whisky involves elephants and is a real definition of a Whisky that you might not easily get hold of... but if you can, then you should.
6/2/24 • 65:55
It started when we discussed how mail is still the prevalent business communications tool and how good or bad it is for collaboration.Unusually for the M365 Distilled team of Steve and Marijn, things went a little sideways to start with but eventually got back on track. OK, maybe going sideways is just normal for us, but why change a good thing?In this podcast, the boys talk about the definition of collaboration, check out the list of best practices to include in the collaboration process, take some statistics about communications, look at all the tools we have available and mash them all together...And like all the other 143 podcasts before it, the whisky at the end makes it all worthwhile and helps you understand that it all does hang together into one aligned program of greatness... and this time, it's an Indian Whisky that performs the alignment duty. 😉
5/1/24 • 68:41
Poland was a blast at Collab days a few weeks ago. Steve and Marijn spend time in this podcast looking at Jenga and how they used to consider governance risk in their workshops.Marijn recaps his SMART goals session, and each subject is finished with a Whisky—of course, two Polish whiskies, to be precise!
4/21/24 • 61:06
The Boys talk about the new gameshow “ IT Depends” which you can find here https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCcB3Ba6K6N3HMUbt6yVT1Bg and then.... 🎙️ Ladies and gentlemen, fight fans from around the world, welcome to the podcast showdown of the century! Tonight, we bring you a clash of titans that will shake the very foundations of the digital realm! In the blue corner, hailing from the land of traditionalists, we have the undisputed champion of news dissemination, the Sultan of Press Releases, none other than Marijn "The Publisher"!🥊 Marijn steps into the ring with a steadfast belief that the intranet is nothing more than a digital bulletin board, a platform solely designed for the dissemination of news, announcements, and updates. But will his perspective withstand the ferocious onslaught from his opponent in the red corner?🔥 And in the red corner, we have the challenger, the master of efficiency, the architect of productivity, the one and only Steve "The Gatekeeper"! With a fiery passion burning in his eyes, Steve believes that the intranet is not just a news outlet, but a gateway to unlocking the true potential of workplace synergy and collaboration!💥 Get ready for a battle of ideologies as these two formidable contenders step into the ring, each ready to defend their corner with everything they've got! Will Marijn's traditionalist approach to intranet dominance prevail? Or will Steve's vision of a digital doorway to productivity reign supreme?🔔 The bell is about to ring, the tension is palpable, and the stage is set for an epic clash of perspectives! So grab your popcorn, settle into your seats, and prepare to witness history in the making as Marijn and Steve go head-to-head in the ultimate showdown for intranet supremacy! Let the battle begin!
3/24/24 • 75:16
We have a guest who has been listening to the podcast since Episode One “ Gianni Solito “ Gianni uses SaFe AGILE methods for managing adoption and change as we talk through how this model can be used to improve the process of keeping M365Distilled updated and aligned. You can check him out here https://www.linkedin.com/in/gianni-solito-2221561a3/ The Boys talk about the new gameshow “ IT Depends” which you can find here https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCcB3Ba6K6N3HMUbt6yVT1Bg The boys with Gianni dig down into the roles and process of the SaFe AGILE framework and try to identify the simplicity in what feels like a lot of moving parts.Marijn aligns SaFe Agile to the Fellowship of the Ring headed up by Gandalf in a SaFe role and it Kinda works... all working towards a big picture that they all know about....It seems a long time since we talked about AGILE working and how M365 grows on our podcast as we add in SaFe where we look at Scaling the Agile Framework and finalise the way to look at update adoption and change through the SaFe process. Then we took a breath and drank a whisky from a distillery we had tasted before, but this time it was peated. The Loch Lomond distillery is one of the most beautiful locations for a distillery and the Whisky is the same. Loch Lomond Heavy Peated is a lovely peated dram which Steve does not fully agree with as he takes some time to feel the smoke.Its an area of Scotland that the boys no well and re-live the small road and the experiences with the buses. Driving to Oban along the loch is one of life's pleasures for anyone finding themselves in that area.
3/10/24 • 70:42
As always the start is about our travels and community speaking events was from Miami to Bremen we talk about Tetsi flies and the rule of ‘Don’t look at the Boob’ when Steve knew it was the answer to another memory problem…The Boys talk about the new gameshow “ It Depends” which you can find here https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCcB3Ba6K6N3HMUbt6yVT1Bg After 15 minutes of community talk the boys went around the world… Ami Diamond posted a great LinkedIn article comparing M365 to the new wonders of the world. It was so cool that we decided it required more in-depth expertise from Steve and Marijn.https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:7159248067244765186?updateEntityUrn=urn%3Ali%3Afs_feedUpdate%3A%28V2%2Curn%3Ali%3Aactivity%3A7159248067244765186%29So maybe this is AKA Jules Verne “Around the M365 World in 80 minutes”.So, enjoy the humour of Steve and Marijn as they discuss Ami’s great post… check it out.Listen to Steve try all the tough words from around the world as we describe the output from the post and add a bunch of disrespect and fun…Then eventually the podcast gets technical as we bring in the M365 bits and break down the article from AMI.Enjoy even if the Chat GPT analogies are weak, the humour is good supermarket listening.Then we drank a whisky, I know a surprise right? This was something interesting: a special bottled edition of the Edradour distillery from 1st fill Oloroso casks out of the smallest distillery in Scotland. Dark and a powerhouse of flavour.
3/2/24 • 64:25
Imagine that you have 5 days to migrate a small company to M365 from Google Docs… What would you start with, Apps, Email MS teams, Power platform… when the Boys put together the plan and decided what goes first…And a few things to catch up with... Marijn as a Seamen, Life is about the basics first and complexities later and of course... CoPilot gets everywhere
2/12/24 • 62:12
In Short... the boys look at what is on the roadmap and mix them in with some of their own ideas that might not be true... can you work them out 😊 We look at some of the great new innovations due and a few ideas that maybe should be put in place. Before tasting a whisky we come clean about which are from Microsoft and which are from the awesome imaginations of Steve and MarijnFinally, Brian sent over a great whisky to taste, The Glendronach Parliament, 21 years old, which is a very Sherry Whisky, but from Oloroso and Ximenez barrels; what do you expect? The finish is awesome, and the water drop brings in so much pepper it changes the drink.
1/13/24 • 67:09
Merry Christmas to every listener of M365, although we suspect that you will not listen to this before the 24th Dec, Monday's celebration day... but if you are listening to that, please accept the Best wishes for Xmas that Steve and Marijn sing as Episode 137 of M365Distilled kicks off.The boys give themselves 10 categories to find their best of the best for 2023... Check out what Steve and Marijn decide on the best Conference or speaking location, their best community contributor and, of course, the best Whisky they have drank this year.They discuss episodes, guests, Golden nuggets and the best Microsoft releases and upgrades. Before thinking about their funniest 2023 moments, sessions they have listened to and finally the best titles.Ever wondered how they choose the best title... when listen in and check it out.Finally, Marijn dips into his whisky shelves and selects the Tullibardine 288 to taste on the podcast, and they find it delicious and very mature whisky with depth and satisfaction.
12/22/23 • 61:38
The Boys are back after a hectic time at Lisbon and ESPC where they created 9 podcasts from the CoreView stand @ESPC so this is a kind of recap of the people we met and included on the podcast created from the CoreView standWe talk about AI and how it might be adopted, we talk about working lifestyles and finding time to think and workout strategies and solutions. We talk about 2 great whiskies, yes we break the rules and do 2 whiskies as we have a truly relaxed conversation...
12/17/23 • 53:02
The last episode at #ESPC and we are here once more with Kas! This time we bring Jasper Oosterveld on board as a guest! He talks about business cases for Copilot and the issues of rolling it out just for testing.
11/30/23 • 33:04
Final day at ESPC, which means it is time for a little round up of all the goodness that was spread on day 2. We have Chirag Patel on, the man with many 3letter acronyms on his title and good friend of the pod to talk about all the cool stuff he has seen. We talk community, community and some community!
11/30/23 • 35:42
Last podcast of day 2 at ESPC, and we have Kenneth van Surksum with us. Kenneth is a Security MVP, who has been involved with Simeon Cloud for years, using them for his customers and contributing to the platform as well. The boys also have David Nevins back, and they have a nice chat about Simeon Cloud, and the benefits the platform brings to rolling out baseline tenants.
11/29/23 • 30:42
The best thing about live events is running into very cool people. Karuana Gatimu from Microsoft, famous for all the work she did on Microsoft Teams adoption, is now the driving force behind Copilot user adoption. She joins the pod for an honest conversation about Copilot, the effect it had on her job and how to get the best out of it when you are rolling out for your organization.
11/29/23 • 25:48
Day 2 at ESPC, which means it is time for a little round up of all the goodness that was spread on day 1. We have Kevin McDonnell, Manager at Avanade, MVP and good friend of the pod to talk about all the cool stuff he has seen. We talk SharePoint Embedded, the new headless solution for documents, Copilot adoption and rollout and much more.
11/29/23 • 31:37
In this episode, we have Imre Tholen as a guest, together with princess Kas. Imre is the collaboration expert at Mateco IT and talks about his experience with CoreView and why they made the decision to go to 1 tenant, with tenant separation.
11/29/23 • 38:35
Welcome to the second episode, live from #ESPC! We’ve got a couple of new guests joining us today: Kas Nowicka from CoreView and Ragnar Heil from Rencore.In this episode, we’re going to be dipping our toes into the five pillars of cloud governance: Cost management, Security baseline, Resource consistency, Identity baseline, and Deployment acceleration. Sounds like a lot of fun, right?Our host Steve talks about identity, which is great because he’s been struggling with his own identity for years. We’re hoping that by the end of this episode, he’ll finally figure out who he really is.Marijn, on the other hand, is drawing a blank. We’re not sure if it’s because he’s overwhelmed by all the governance talk or if he’s just having a bad day. Either way, we’re here to support him.And then there’s Kas. She’s our hero, our savior, our knight in shining armor. When Marijn drew a blank, Kas stepped up to the plate with her quick wit and humor. She’s the reason we’re all still here today.Unfortunately, we don’t have any whisky yet. But don’t worry, we’re working on it. In the meantime, sit back, relax, and enjoy the show!
11/28/23 • 31:24
The boys are in Amsterdam at ESPC23 and bring the spectacle of M365Distilled, live from the CoreView booth!Picture this: a room buzzing with energy, the smell of fresh Stroopwafels in the air, and a trio of guests so stellar, you'd think the constellations had realigned just for this event. First up, we had the enigmatic Kas Nowicka from CoreView, who could make even the driest technical details sound as riveting as a Dutch detective novel. Then, there was the charming David Nevins from Simeon Cloud, whose insights were so sharp, they could cut through a Gouda wheel at twenty paces. And hold onto your clogs, because the lineup was crowned by none other than Jeff Teper, the president of Microsoft 365 himself! Our hosts kicked things off with the tale of Simeon Cloud's birth and its journey to being scooped up by the eagle-eyed CoreView. It was like a Silicon Valley fairy tale, except the hero's a cloud and the magic beans are lines of code. Kas and David tag-teamed the mic to unravel the problems SimeonCloud solves, and let me tell you, their solutions are smoother than a well-aged Jenever. It was a deep dive into the nitty-gritty of cloud management, so detailed you could almost see the pixels. But folks, the pièce de résistance was Jeff Teper's first-hand commentary on how Copilot has flipped the Microsoft ecosystem on its head. It's like the wheel, sliced bread, and those little plastic things on the ends of shoelaces all rolled into one. Teper waxed lyrical about Copilot's transformative powers, painting a future so bright, we're going to need shades made of SPF 100.
11/28/23 • 31:18
