>> I'm so grateful that in this quite crazy and disruptive time,
that you've taken the time out to join us for
this virtual broadcast of Microsoft Inspire.
The past six months has changed our world forever.
In February of this year,
in a matter of days,
our lives at home and at work were disrupted,
twice, really, at least here in the US.
The first was the pandemic,
and most recently, the questions around social justice in the US.
We've been sent into a tailspin that's
impacted our responsibilities in all aspects of our lives.
As humans, as family members, business leaders,
and global citizens, the world seem to stop turning.
People stayed home from work sheltering in
place and the result was this;
empty streets, deserted cities.
I remember my first drive after the stay at home order.
I drove down the street to the grocery store,
passed the parking lot of
the shopping mall not five minutes from my house,
and it was empty, completely empty.
It's usually packed with cars every single day of
the year and it was suddenly a ghost town.
That image has been seared into my memory forever.
Seeing deserted businesses is both alarming and sad
combined with everything we
hear on the news and everything we see,
it's devastating to think about the impact
this global pandemic will have on all of us.
So where do we turn?
Where do we find hope?
How do we anchor on some level of certainty?
We all process this differently but certainty for me
comes from my beliefs in
this single truth; Through human connection,
technology, innovation, and partnership,
we will overcome this health and social crisis and
the challenges that we face together.
I really believe that.
Look at what we're already seeing today.
Healthcare workers who don't stay home,
the first responders who continue protecting our communities,
and the grocery store workers who stay
open for us, their customers.
Those are the people who know
the importance of the human connection.
Those first responders are the heroes helping us survive.
But you know what else I see?
You, all of you, right behind them.
You are the digital first responders,
the unsung heroes supporting and lifting
the frontline workers up as they respond to this crisis,
and your speed has been remarkable.
As quickly as the streets emptied,
my inbox filled with ideas and innovations
from Microsoft partners working on solutions to respond.
I have so many examples,
I just wanted to share a few.
Like Quisitive, who quickly
turned around a mobile app that delivered
immediate COVID-19 test results and
patient care analysis using Azure AI.
Or Spark Beyond who pivoted
their AI and analytics solution from predicting
business profitability into helping
detect where the virus was likely to spread next.
Protiviti, who in just three days
built a life-saving solutions that connected survivors with
specific blood donation centers so
they could donate plasma to help others
recover using Microsoft 365 and SharePoint.
As those on the frontlines work to protect us,
you were right behind them innovating with
solutions that didn't even exist at the beginning of the year.
When our world started to change around us,
partners did what you do best,
innovate and problem-solve using technology to help customers just
figure stuff out regardless of
the complexity or how big the challenge ahead is.
Now,, we all know we're not out of the woods yet.
Like all of you,
I've struggled over the last several months and
no doubt the next year is going to continue challenging all of us.
We don't have the control in our lives that we're accustomed to.
Without that ability to plan or feel like you're making progress,
it's easy to feel hopeless,
especially since the biggest thing you can do to help is stay
home and move from one part of your house to the other.
So you may laugh at
my analytical mind when I approach something like this,
but some of you may be able to relate.
When all of this started,
I sat back, observed, assessed,
and I asked myself,
how is this going to play out and how do
I help my team, our partners?
What does this mean for me and how do I do my job differently?
You may be asking yourself these same questions.
I realized this is like change management.
I know none of you watching this are strangers to change.
So in my analytical mind,
I went to the most foundational concepts of change management,
knowing your outcomes and celebrating your milestones.
Two partners did that really well, NTT and Presidio.
NTT helped PPD, a
pharmaceutical research company testing
treatments for the [inaudible] ,
get 26,000 employees up and running across 46 countries.
NTT made it happen,
that was their outcome and they did
it in a matter of days with Teams.
Or the New York City Department of Education,
when the schools closed,
Presidio worked day and night to deploy Windows
virtual desktops to 20,000 faculty members.
That was a great outcome.
They followed up with ongoing technical support so that
teachers could keep teaching and the students could keep learning.
An incredible milestone we're celebrating.
When there's uncertainty all around,
you manage it by creating certainty wherever you can.
The truth is the Microsoft partner ecosystem,
you were built for this moment in time,
you are the certainty.
We were ready because
the solutions we've been building together over
the last 18 months are the same ones our customers need right now.
Solutions and services around remote work,
business continuity, security, and cloud migrations.
That is how we respond,
recover, and reimagine the future together.
We're going to be spending quite a bit of time on
those areas both today and tomorrow.
So I want you to think about what those customer needs might
mean to you and your organization in the coming year.
Coming up in just a bit,
I'll be back with some specific examples and strategies that may
just change the way you're thinking about the next 12 months.
But first, I'd like to send it over to Judson.