October 8 Meeting ~ Technical Best Practices

Our October Technology Wizards meeting will be Wednesday, October 8th, 12:00pm – 3:00pm at the Microsoft PacWest office located at 1414 Northrup (in the Pearl district).

Technical Best Practices for Technology Wizards

Throughout our years, we have had some great (and sometimes very lively) discussions at our meetings and via our email list about the best way to implement or do something, all in an effort to raise the knowledge and quality of how we as Technology Wizards care for our clients and their networks.

At this month’s meeting, we are going to begin the process of developing a series of Technical Best Practices (eventually we’ll also develop some Business Best Practices).

One of the goals is to get us talking about some of these things without “critiquing”, “judging” or “putting on the spot” fellow members for whatever policies we/they are currently using, in an effort to increase awareness, while sharpening each other.  I’m sure that there are many things some of us have thought about and considered (or experienced) that others have not.

Once developed, we could distribute the list internally (a benefit of membership), and/or possible post a version of it on our website.

At these meetings, members would throw out a specific topic (i.e. Password Policies) and entertain a discussion on suggested/preferred Password Policies, then write them down and finally vote on a specifically worded Password Policy that we could turn into a “Technology Wizards recommends the following Password Policy….”.

We will do this for a number of Technical topics (i.e. Password Policies, Backup, Number of Domain Admin Accounts, Number of Local Admin Accounts, SSL Certificates (this one sounds familiar), Server Configurations, Antivirus on the Server, eMail Filtering/Scanning offsite/onsite or both, Firewall and UTM Configurations, and many others.  This will NOT be a discussion on brands or specific products, just policies.

I know that many of you have already developed some excellent policies, and perhaps there have been a few that you have not considered yet.  Please come and contribute your ideas, suggestions, experiences, etc., in an effort to improve our community and the services we all provide to all of our clients.

Lunch will be provided for the first few minutes of the meeting, so get there early!

PARKING: Please park in the lot between NW 15th & NW 16th, NW Kearney and NW Lovejoy with the entrance on Kearney Street.  There is a fee to park.  Also, if there is an attendant there, tell him/her you are a Microsoft meeting attendee.  The lot is located underneath I-405.  Plan to arrive early to find parking.

I’m really looking forward to seeing you all and to your active participation in these discussions!

Ken Shafer
Technology Wizards

Reminder: Technology Wizards meetings are intended for current Technology Wizards members or potential members.  Potential members must be owners or employees of a an IT services business whose main purpose is to support small business using Microsoft products and services in some capacity.

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