United States | Citrix Summit 2020 – Reflecting on my Adventure

John Gallacher - 26.02.202020200226

Citrix Summit 2020 – Reflecting on my Adventure

United States | Citrix Summit 2020 – Reflecting on my Adventure

I’ve just about caught up and recovered since attending Citrix Summit 2020, which took place in Orlando, Florida last month. Being a Summit first timer, I was nothing short of amazed at the quality of the conference. It had great content, sessions, keynotes and hospitality, presented and delivered in an awesome venue and beautiful location. Plus, spending time in a warm climate and escaping the clutches of the harsh Scottish January is always welcome!

The Insentra crew had an amazing time and I’d like to share a summary of my experience and valued take-aways.

PTEC (Partner Technical Expert Council)

I arrived in Orlando a little earlier than most having been given the opportunity to represent Insentra for PTEC duties (Partner Technical Expert Council). PTEC took place on the Saturday and Sunday before Citrix Summit running from 8am til 6pm and it was pretty intense! PTEC is an invitation-only, NDA event which runs twice per year, it’s where Citrix product managers, architects, developers and engineers run interactive sessions around the Citrix product portfolio. Citrix sends a strong message and encourages all participants to be as vocal, honest and critical as possible. This makes the sessions very interactive and triggers lots of conversation between the hosts and participants which ultimately leads to valuable feedback and insights Citrix can use for future product development and technology roadmaps. As the event is under strict NDA, I can’t go into any detail around features and updates but 2020 is sure to be an exciting year for those using Citrix. That said, I’ve gotta give you something, right?! Here’s a photo of all PTEC attendees. I’m privileged to be in amongst this group of experts who were a pleasure to spend time and collaborate with!

United States | Citrix Summit 2020 – Reflecting on my Adventure

Insentron’s Assemble!

The Insentra crew were there in force with 9 of us (Insentrons!) assembling from the US, UK and Australia. Each team made their way to the regional partner welcome celebrations on Sunday evening to kick things off. Being the only Insentron from the UK meant I would catch up with the rest of the crew later in the evening but I wasn’t short on company… many of our UK partners were in attendance and fired up for the week ahead (I’m sure the beer helped raise the buzz).

A big thanks to Citrix for looking after us with great food and entertainment. A special shout out to Alison Flynn, the Citrix Partner Account Manager for Scotland and Ireland for her magic patter, keeping me a seat, and introducing me to lots of great people!

After dinner, I hopped in a cab and headed back to the Dolphin resort to sync up with the team. As we are spread out across the globe, it’s pretty exciting to have a proper catch-up in person with the crew, and the energy on arrival was phenomenal. I work pretty closely with our Global Head of Managed Services Sales, Gary Cohen, and it was 5 years since we last had some facetime so it was an absolute pleasure as always! And… here we are! #UkuleleHeros

United States | Citrix Summit 2020 – Reflecting on my Adventure

The Keynotes

The keynote talks were delivered well by the Citrix leadership team and there were great vibes and energy in the room. They recapped on the 2019 company performance and highlights before detailing the opportunities that lie ahead for Citrix and their partners in 2020.

It was also amazing to see ‘Woman in Tech’ in action with many of the talks and live demos (which went flawlessly) being delivered by females. This was nicely topped off by a highly motivational talk from Carey Lohrenz (US Navy 1st Female F14 Pilot). The presentation was nothing short of compelling, providing insight into the importance of teamwork, leadership, and communication, aided with entertaining video and image content.

‘How planes fly’ was a favourite:

United States | Citrix Summit 2020 – Reflecting on my Adventure

Consistent messaging was woven through the keynote sessions which were very impactful…

Key messages

  • User Experience is key to a successful organization. Citrix delivers the best UX with their Workspace bolstered by MicroApps service and Performance Analytics
  • The landscape is too large to know everything. Solutions should be looked at holistically and partnering is key in enabling an excellent employee experience
  • Value propositions are no longer just for business outcomes and objectives. They also have to cater for employee engagement
  • “Good enough” in Enterprise IT, is no longer good enough…

Partner Obsessed

As Citrix Summit is a partner focused conference it’s a great opportunity for us to catch up with our partners from around the globe to discuss the plans for 2020 and collaborate on how we can leverage new Citrix technologies to enable success and deliver a world-class experience to our users.

The week was jam packed with meetings with our partners from APAC, EMEA and the US and we even forged some new partnerships whilst we were there.

Gary Cohen (Insentra) and Bobbie Jones (Thin Client Computing)

United States | Citrix Summit 2020 – Reflecting on my Adventure

Kevin Howell and Graham Wight from HTG

United States | Citrix Summit 2020 – Reflecting on my Adventure

Forging a new partnership with Choice Solutions

United States | Citrix Summit 2020 – Reflecting on my Adventure

My session takeaways…

Workspace with Intelligence – Microapps Service

I’m very excited about the capabilities and what can be achieved with the Microapps service. This is a real differentiator between Citrix Cloud and the traditional on-premises offerings. There’s so much potential to improve user workflows and increase productivity whilst providing a modern look and feel – similar to the social media platforms users are familiar with where they don’t even have to think about how they interact with an application. The good news is any application with an API can be transformed without going through the costly process of heavy development or refactoring.

More info on the service here:

https://docs.citrix.com/en-us/tech-zone/learn/tech-briefs/workspace-microapps.html

If this is of interest, Citrix Converge would be a nice conference to head to:

https://www.citrix.com/events/2020/citrix-converge-prague.html

The Future of Work Developer program is also a great place to start:

https://www.citrix.com/blogs/2020/01/13/citrix-introduces-first-developer-program-to-build-the-future-of-work/

Design thinking & Value engineering

It’s critical to put the user experience at the center of IT projects, particularly those in the EUC space. I attended a session on design thinking and value engineering which was excellent. I intend in writing more about this in the near future, but it drove the point of deeply understanding the customer needs and how the adequate amount of time should be scheduled in defining and assessing the requirements before starting on any design. These early phases are critical to the successful and smooth delivery of the solution.

The following Experience Design Model provides a nice overview:

United States | Citrix Summit 2020 – Reflecting on my Adventure

Citrix & WVD

There’s lots of buzz and excitement in the Windows Virtual Desktop (WVD) space with a steady flow of new, associated features and products such as MSIX app attach. However, it’s important to remember where Citrix fits in with all of this. Windows Virtual Desktop should not be compared with traditional VDI solutions, it’s more a set of APIs and license entitlements that can be utilized in Azure…

Citrix brings a ton of value to the table when deployed in conjunction with WVD:

United States | Citrix Summit 2020 – Reflecting on my Adventure

That’s a wrap!

Citrix Summit 2020 was an outstanding event which I gained a lot from. It was great to spend time in person with my colleagues from around the world, our partners, ‘Citrites’, and the many friends I’ve made from the outstanding Citrix community. Citrix perfectly framed the direction of the business and how their partners and new technologies will play a part in achieving the ultimate employee experience for all.  We look forward to seeing you at Synergy in May!

https://www.citrixsynergy.com/

THANK YOU FOR YOUR SUBMISSION!

United States | Citrix Summit 2020 – Reflecting on my Adventure

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United States | Citrix Summit 2020 – Reflecting on my Adventure

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