Ignite 2019 - BRK3040 - Optimal network connectivity for Office 365 performance: What is it and how to get there

Presented by: Konstantin Ryvkin

Session summary:
Optimal network connectivity is critical for great user experience in Office 365. Is your company on the path of changing its network for the cloud? Are you wondering if your network has minimal possible latency to Office 365 for your users and will remain future proof as the cloud continues to evolve? Then this session is for you. Hear directly from the Office 365 product group about principles of optimal connectivity for SaaS, review reference architecture for networking, and learn how various industry network solutions integrate with Office 365. You’ll leave with an understanding of optimizations as well as common pitfalls that stand between your users and delightful productivity cloud experiences!

My Notes:

Networking in the cloud is challenging for many organizations.

The type of the workload you want to consume is deciding the optimal way to connect.

SaaS disrupts traditional connectivity models

 

Slow is the new broken - help your users coming closer to Office 365

The Microsoft Global Network (AS8075) and Office 365 is constantly evolving to get closer to your users.

Zero trust - trust is earned, not given, trusted applications put less requirements on the network. Security control must be done at the Application, Identity, Device and Data levels.

Microsoft Teams have a media stack that is changing with network conditions, this gives better media but is not suitable for network inspection.

Please use the Office 365 REST API to open up for Office 365 - http://aka.ms/ipurlws - use a device that supports this API.

Office 365 will add front doors depending on the number of users accessing Office 365 in a certain location. Exchange Online will also move a mailbox as close as possible to where the user is located, but not over compliance borders. Use local breakouts as much as possible.

Deeper integration between network devices and application is coming. In the future the Office 365 applications will be able to send an "experience signal" to the networking equipment making it, for example, switch ISPs. This will start with Cisco SD-WAN.

Experience signals - more than a ping

Network Insights are coming to the Office 365 Portal, to show that connectivity, detect issues and make recommendations - even compare your performance to others in the same area.

Sign up for a private preview at http://aka.ms/netpreview

This session was even better than last years! Ignite 2018 - BRK3000 - Strategies for building effective, optimal and future proof connectivity to Office 365 that will delight your users

Ignite 2019 - THR3061 - Your own Direct Routing SBC in Azure in 20 minutes

Presented by: Ståle Hansen and Mårten Hellebro

Session summary:
Telephony in Microsoft Teams is on many organizations’ wish list. You can bring your own SIP trunk and use Direct Routing, and for that you need a certified Session Border Controller (SBC). Even with no hardware or any of the required on-premise infrastructure pieces in place, you can still have your own SBC, in Azure. During this session, MVP Marten Hellebro and MVP Stale Hansen will share their best practices from real-world deployments and at the same time, demonstrates how to set up a SBC for Direct Routing in Azure in literally no time.

My Notes:

You can now bring your own SIP trunk to the cloud using the cloud.

Pre-requisites

1. Azure Subscribtion
2. Access to create Routing groups
3. Plan the Azure networking (public IP, lock down)
4. Understand Direct Routing Networking (open ports)
5. A public certificate (* is ok)
6. New-CsOnlinePSTNGateway

A demo followed that showed how to install a Mediant VE Session Border Controller from Audiocodes, there are also SBCs from Ribbon and Anynode available in Azure.

Deploy the SBC in Azure, get the public IP to be used, update DNS records

At https://directrouting.guide Shane Hoey have created a form that will simplify the process of creating an initialization/configuration file to be used with the Audiocodes SBC.

Login to the web interface of the SBC, upload the configuration file and "reset" the SBC.

Login again after a reboot and configure the network card to be used and the certificate to be used for the TLS connection. Import a Root certificate from Microsoft to make the SBC trust Office 365.

Check in the Teams Admin portal if the options ping / heartbeat is going or not, start making calls!

Your own SBC in Azure - no hardware needed

Ignite 2019 - VCE50 - Contact centers and Microsoft Teams

Presented by: Andrew Bybee

Session summary:
Learn about the latest developments for Contact Center integrations to Microsoft Teams and get a glimpse of our plans for the coming year.

My Notes:

The presentation started with discussing what a Contact center is and how to use it.

Contact Center functions

Teams can be a hub for both internal and external customer connections and be tailored with business tools and workflows. Inside the Office 365 Phone System there are apps such as IVR, auto-attendant and call queues. Coming soon are call queue reporting and shared voice mail.

A demo of the Genesys Pure Cloud Contact center using Graph API followed.

Graph APIs for presence will be available in beta later this month.

A video about Tonys Chocolonely using a solution from Anywhere 365, Vodafone and Salesforce receiving customer calls in Teams was shown.

Screenshots of Enghouse Contact Center BI Dashboard, Luware Stratus and Computer Talks Ice for Teams were used as examples; some of these solutions are already running in Azure.

A "Certified for Microsoft Teams program" for contact centers is coming next year.

Good to see the Swedish Tendfor among the partners already using
the new Graph APIs in beta.

Ignite 2019 - BRK3232 - Plan and implement a successful upgrade from Skype for Business to Microsoft Teams

Presented by: Debbie Arbeeny, László Somi

Session summary:

Explore the end-to-end Skype for Business to Teams upgrade experience, inclusive of technical and user readiness considerations. This session offers guidance for a successful upgrade as well as shares best practices and tips for avoiding common pitfalls when planning your upgrade. Hear from a customer who successfully completed their upgrade leveraging change management fundamentals and adoption resources to enable their users to embrace new ways of working.

My Notes:

Shadow IT is something that needs to be handled. No one will go out to get their own operating system or their own email system, but for communications they will. This will create a disparate communications environment in the organization.

Often a technology migration is either or - you can be on Windows 7 or Windows 10, you can use Office 2013 or 2019 - with Skype to Teams it is different in the way that you can run both clients side-by-side.

Setup a team in Teams to plan your upgrade, eat your own dogfood!

https://aka.ms/SkypeToTeams

Pilot your helpdesk by simply calling them up asking them questions.

Set good measurable goals, for example measure the current usage in Skype and set the goal to be more usage in Teams.

When deciding the path to take think about feature overlap (or not) between SfB and Teams, moving all users at once or in smaller groups (affects interoperability) the speed of the moving operations.

Teams side-by-side with SfB (Islands mode) is recommended for SfB Online users, SfB on-premises users could consider some of the other modes separating some features (meetings, collaboration.)

PSTN calling is only available once the user is in Teams only mode.

For the actual move use Move-CsUser -MoveToTeams if you have SfB 2019 or SfB 2015 CU8, this will move the user to Teams and convert all meetings to Teams meetings.

Three steps to build a user-readiness plan

1. Understand the end-user - how will Teams help them?
   Business goals are not necessarily user goals.
2. Assess users propensity to change - how much other change is ongoing?
3. Identify the relevant readiness channels - awareness, training and support - communicate!

FedEx came on stage and talked about their journey to Teams. FedEx moved from SfB on-prem and migrated 90,000 users over 8 weeks. "Teams is a platform" that FedEx is now continuing to build on.

Ignite 2019 - THR2078 - Embrace your Microsoft Teams champions and arm them with these five power tools

Presented by: Mårten Hellebro

Session summary:

Come on, let’s find your Teams champions, embrace them and give them what they need so they can level-up and help you deliver a successful Teams implementation project with high adoption and happy users. So, how do you find the right users and what exactly do they need? In this session, MVP Marten Hellebro shares his real-world experiences working with Teams champions. Come to this session and get your Teams toolbox filled.

My Notes:

700 people signed up to this session - not all of the showed up.

User adoption is key to a successful Teams rollout. There is a difference between early adopters and ambassadors, ambassadors want to share knowledge with others. An ambassador can become a champion. A champion can be recruited by simply asking for candidates or look in the usage reports in the Teams admin center and you will find who is using Teams the most. Do not use IT people!

Five tools to give to your Champions

1. Keep your champions in the loop (involved = motivated)
   https://aka.ms/O365Champions
2. Special training
   Coffe in the cloud
   Teams Adoption Flipbook - https://aka.ms/TeamsToolkit
   Microsoft 365 Learning pathways
   End User Training - https://aka.ms/TeamsLiveTraining
   IT Pro Training - Microsoft Service Adoption Specialist
   https://aka.ms/AdoptionCert
   IT Pro Training - Enabling Teamwork with Microsoft Teams
   https://aka.ms/edx-cld267x-about
3. Numbers talk - track the usage of Teams and inform the Champions.
4. Well equipped - give your Champions the right devices and let them test different types of devices. https://aka.ms/TeamsDevices
5. Swag - free promotional items / stylish confidence
   (I think this was when Mårten danced a bit and showed examples of swag - it was not recorded - someone please send me a recording!)

 

Give shameless recognition to your Teams Champions! 

Ignite 2019 - TMS30 - Designing your path from Skype for Business to Teams: Start Here!

Presented by: Bindu Pillai, Debbie Arbeeny

Session summary:

Are you a Skype for Business customer starting your transition to Teams? Understand how adopting Teams expands opportunities for your organization to communicate and collaborate effectively and efficiently. Learn about the Skype for Business to Teams upgrade experience, best practices and resources for a successful upgrade.

My Notes:

 

This presentation is part of a 3-session series
TMS30, BRK3232, BRK3217

Takeaways

• How Teams can benefit your organization
• The framework for a successful transition
• Best practices and guidance

Skype for Business Online will be retired on July 31, 2021.

A video about how Tesco moved to Teams in six months were shown.

Teams is both a people change and a technology change

Shadow IT is something that needs to be handled. No one will go out to get their own operating system or their own email system, but for communications they will. This will create a disparate communications environment in the organization.

Start with creating a strategic plan

Support available

• Upgrade Workshops - https://aka.ms/SkypeToTeamsPlanning
• Upgrade Success Kit - https://aka.ms/UpgradeSuccessKit
• Upgrade Guidance - https://aka.ms/SkypeToTeams 

• End User Training - https://aka.ms/TeamsLiveTraining
• End User Training - https://aka.ms/TeamsOnDeman

Key points to remember

QnA

How do we replace the Lync Attendant client?

Use a third-party solution.

Is there integration between Skype for business on-premises and Teams?

Yes.

What technical issues did Tesco face in the transition?

Some issues with understanding the modes at first, changing back and forth testing. Many users started doing video quicker than expected, QoS was implemented and bandwidth increased.