The Users' Community: Your Hidden Treasure and Best Ally (Part 2)
Part 2: Resources Sponsored by Atlassian with Community engagement (including partners)
On the Part 1 of this serie of articles I explain the resources that are solely developed and provided by Atlassian. This article address when Atlassian involve other team members.
If you do some research you will easily find how important your participation is on the success of Atlassian. But let's talk first about their sales effort...
Non traditional Sales Team and success at the same time? How?
I have a personal experience about this. When I recommended the Atlassian suite of products to one company in 2008, one of the stakeholders told me that “she was upset because Atlassian doesn’t have sales team to answer her questions”, I failed trying to explain about experts, team, community and more… . At that time they decided to go with other products supported by a good sales team…(actually just sales team, not experts at all) But 9 years later, the company reconsidered the decision and switched to Atlassian products.
But the question remains, how they can be successful with this type of sales team? Part of the answer is coming and you are part of it and it s based on the company values.
The second one is fundamental for success if "The Team" includes the users, you are part of the Atlassian Team, as you provide feedback, criticize and fight for changes you are making the products better for all of us.
Empowering the Community
Here is where we can start seeing the difference with other standards software companies.
Knowing that the community is a key piece on “the success puzzle”, Atlassian created robust programs to empower their users and increase their engagement on the product development cycle.
Here are some of the programs that are created and sponsored by Atlassian and actively related to the community
Community Website – the gate to more that one million bright minds just a click away…
Atlassian User Groups (AUG) – A place to learn and share and an opportunity to build your network and know other experts in your area
Company User Groups (CUG) - Join other Atlassian customers and increase product adoption and success of your internal teams by starting an Atlassian User Group within your company.
Developer Community - This is your central hub for information on building for the Atlassian platform. You are joining a rich ecosystem of developers, product experts and vendors. Your new hub makes it easier to see who's who and what their expertise is through user profiles. The community is that much richer with you in it - so thanks for participating!
Who are the Community Members?
Users – You are a key player on this Community. Keep always in mind that you can receive and give as well. The main goal is to help to each other.
Community Champions are the top influencers in the Atlassian online community — they are knowledgeable about our products, and eager to share their expertise and enthusiasm and connect with others. They are personally invested in the health of the community and have a desire to help shape its future. Read: How to become a Community Champion
Experts
Product expert: Deep understanding of one or more Atlassian products and its ecosystem
Industry expert: Experience in a particular industry and in using Atlassian and/or its ecosystem in that industry
Partners - a global network of partners with unique services, expertise, and products that help Atlassian’s customers unleash their potential.
The Atlassian User Groups (aug.atlassian.org)
Atlassian supporter my Open Source efforts by donating their licenses to build our open source community site (www.vxvista.org) and since then I had the sense of obligation to thanks for that, the way I decided to do it was by supporting the User's Goup efforts. I was able to be the founder of 5 users group. I am currently running two of them (Palm Beach Count, Florida and Temecula Valley, California), the other AUG are: Orange County, California, Cordoba, Argentina and Buenos Aires, Argentina. I really enjoy every opportunity I have to organize or attend to an AUG meeting, I always learn something new.
Watch this video and learn more about the Atlassian User Groups.
Atlassian User Groups meetings are free, in-person events where Atlassian users get together to connect, share, and learn. Visit aug.atlassian.com to join your local user group today!
If you like the program and would like to learn more about it read my two part articles about User Group leaders: Get Inspired… AUG Leader – A look Under the hood.
Many users would like to be AUG leaders, but there is a misunderstanding about what you need in order to be an AUG Leader.
First of all, you don’t need to be an expert. That is for another program called Champions.
To be a Leader, you need passion and dedication. The time to plan and execute meetings. Find presenters and engage your members. The Atlassian community team will be there to support you as well as other AUG Leaders. We want to be sure you have success and a good story to share. We want to have new friends in our next Atlassian Summit.
Users Group members common projects
In addition to plan meetings you can engage your AUG groups, Atlassian and Partners in common projects that would trigger opportunities for learning and help. In this case I launched the Warfighter Made Project were we decided to help a non profit organization that assist Disabled veterans. With licenses donated by Atlassian, hosting donated by a Partner (Isos Technology) AUG members of two groups Temecula, California and Palm Beach, Florida join forces to develop a collaboration environment and a service desk for the organization.
At the same time we did multiple events on their location, we provided training to new users and generated multiple
If you are interested on learning more about the project please read the series of articles that I published last year. Unleashing the power of Collaboration to overcome the Sadness of 22
Company User Group
The third Atlassian sponsored program is the Atlassian Company User Group (CUG). In this case you will interact with the same Atlassian team that manages the regular AUG, the main difference is that this type of User Group as only for members of your company, but you will get the same level of support like Atlassian User Group.
The Developers Community
The 4th program I would like to introduce is the Atlassian Developers Community. It provides all the information and tools for those developers that are working on products for marketplace or ways of extending the power of Atlassian Products. In this microsite developers will find documentation, blogs, announcements and roadmap of existing products as well as a link to Atlassian own developers. Get support from the experts.
This is your central hub for information on building for the Atlassian platform.
You are joining a rich ecosystem of developers, product experts and vendors. Your new hub makes it easier to see who's who and what their expertise is through user profiles. The community is that much richer with you in it - so thanks for participating!
Full Article
Part 1 of this serie of articles - Resources that are solely developed and provided by Atlassian.
Part 2 I addressed resources that are sponsored or created by Atlassian
Part 3 and Part 4 - Resources that are created by Community members including Atlassian Partners.
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Fabian A. Lopez (Community Leader - Argentina, Florida, California)
About this author
Project Manager Professional/Scrum Master/CTSM/ACP-CA
Document Storage Systems (DSS, Inc.)
Lake Elsinore, California
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