Over the past few years, we’ve all watched Microsoft change focus from on premise solutions to building and strengthening their portfolio in the cloud. This year, with the release of hybrid-friendly SharePoint Server 2016, it appears as if the time has never been more right for businesses to make the shift towards the cloud as well!

At least, this is what NBCUniversal’s Sr. Director of Service Strategy and Collaboration Engineering thought when I spoke with him at Ignite this year. Watch our interview to hear about his thoughts on the “new Microsoft” and his plan to transform NBCUniversal’s SharePoint from a document management platform to an information management solution.

Join us for a Live Q&A on Lessons Learned at Ignite 2016!

More from Dux Quax:

• Microsoft’s Julia White Talks Innovation and Transformation
• Microsoft’s Jeff Teper Rounds Up the Top 8 Innovations Added to SharePoint in 2016
• Microsoft’s Bill Baer Talks SharePoint Announcements at Microsoft Ignite
• Microsoft’s Chrisophe Fiessinger Shares the Elevator Pitch for Office 365 Groups
• Microsoft’s Mike McLean Gives the Scoop on Office 365 Planner
• Microsoft’s Rachel Braunstein Gives Insight into the Microsoft Partner Network
• Microsoft’s Jeremy Thake on Why Azure is More than Just Infrastructure as a Service
• NBCUniversal’s Charles Williams on Transforming a Deployment in the New Age of Microsoft
• Microsoft’s Dan Holme Shares Customer Feedback on SharePoint’s Comeback
• Microsoft’s Anna Chu Connects IT Pros Through the Microsoft Tech Community
• Constellation Research’s Alan Lepofsky on How Microsoft AI Will Change the Way We Work
• SharePoint Consultant Susan Hanley on Sustainable Adoption and the Future of Microsoft

Video Transcript: Dux Raymond Sy (@meetdux) and Charles Williams (@cewilliamsii)

Dux: Hey, everyone, welcome to day two of Ignite. This is Dux for Dux Quax. What a phenomenal event, a lot of energy, a lot of buzz. With me, this is Charles Williams. Charles, why don’t you introduce yourself and tell everybody who you are and why you’re here.

Charles Williams: Sure. Hello everyone, I’m Charles Williams, I’m a Service, Strategy, and Collaboration Leader for NBC Universal. I’m here to learn about everything Microsoft has to offer, and all the new Microsoft.

Dux: Now, Charles, speaking about the new Microsoft, and being a longtime customer, what do you think of the new Microsoft? I mean, you’ve seen all these large enterprises transform through the years, but what do you think of Microsoft?

Charles Williams: I think the new Microsoft is awesome. They are going from this closed-net, you know, it’s all ours, to an open platform and an open stack, which is something they have to do to evolve in the digital transformation age.

Dux: I mean, I can’t imagine the day came where Red Hat is on Azure, Linux’s on Azure.

Charles Williams: That’s incredible, that’s incredible.

Dux: It’s awesome, and yesterday, they announced Adobe sitting on Azure too.

Charles Williams: I missed that announcement. That is awesome, wow.

Dux: So…

Charles Williams: They’re doing an awesome way of evolving themselves, an awesome thing to evolve themselves.

Dux: Now, speaking of the change and transformation, what’s going on at NBC Universal? What’re you guys doing with relations to technology, Cloud, and more importantly, around Microsoft technologies?

Charles Williams: Sure, we’re actually doing a lot of things, I mean, one of the big things that I’m personally involved with is a SharePoint platform. We’re looking to bring that to the next level, not have it just about document management, but more information management, so we’re looking to bring in a hybrid model, on prem and off prem, to the SharePoint. We’re also bringing in a development strategy around Office 365. We’re Cloud, Cloud, Cloud right now.

Dux: Got it. So I suspect you guys have Azure too, you’re invested in it…

Charles Williams: We’re invested in Azure as well, yeah, I mean the whole stack. We’re definitely a Microsoft shop.

Dux: And you also run your DevOps, right, at some point?

Charles Williams: Yes, yes, so at my previous, I was more hands-on, but now I do more of the strategy for DevOps, which does mean I can get involved in, you know, Microsoft TFS, and all those things. So yeah, I’m involved in DevOps as well.

Dux: So what do you want to walk away with this week here at Ignite?

Charles Williams: I want to walk away just understanding more about what they’re gonna do with their product line. I know they have a lot of products, but what’s important to me is to understand the roadmap, and how they all congeal together and add business value to my business.

Dux: Phenomenal. Now, before I let you go, Charles, if you were a Microsoft product, what would you be and why?

Charles Williams: You know, I think I would probably be, like, Outlook.

Dux: Outlook?

Charles Williams: Outlook because, you know, communication, and touching out and reaching out to folks, I think that’s my fit.

Dux: And reminding people…

Charles Williams: And reminding, that’s right.

Dux: That’s good, good.

Charles Williams: Reminding people, yeah.

Dux: Well, Charles, thank you, I appreciate you stopping by.

Charles Williams: No problem.

Dux: Make sure you check out NBC Universal, check out Charles, he has a session here today. But other than that, I’ll see you on the next episode.

Charles Williams: Bye, guys.

What else did you miss at Ignite?

Join our panel of experts for our Lessons Learned at Microsoft Ignite webinar to recap announcements from the conference and a deeper discussion about what it all means for you.