Today’s blog is from guest contributor Elsa Reyes, Global Partner Enablement Lead for Microsoft Business Applications.

Microsoft Business Applications can help your organization modernize processes, reveal valuable insights, and create customized business apps that assist in managing everything from sales and customer service to operations and human resources.

To help our partners and their employees understand how to use Business Applications to benefit their enterprise, we’re offering Business Applications Cloud Week for Partners for technical learners on Sept. 12-16, 2022. This training event will be held concurrently with our Business Applications Sales Bootcamp, running Sept. 12-14, 2022, geared toward sales learners. We hope both these events give our partners in-demand technical and sales training on how Microsoft Dynamics 365 and Power Platform can improve daily business operations.

Helping to increase skills on value apps

Our Business Applications Cloud Week for Partners is part of our continuing effort to provide Microsoft partners with a range of training resources and events to address skills gaps that affect competitiveness and innovation across the industry. IDC has estimated that IT skills gaps now cost the industry more than $700 billion, up from just more than $300 Billion in 2019.

Additionally, our own Microsoft Partner Research Panel survey found 71 percent of respondents said having Microsoft-certified staff is valuable to their business. Knowledge of Microsoft Business Applications goes well beyond basic IT skills, though. Understanding how to successfully deliver solutions with Microsoft Dynamics 365 and Power Platform can help you accelerate business growth, solve customer challenges, and expand practices through an industry-leading platform that offers unified, customizable, and intelligent business applications.

Learning how to best use Business Applications tools and resources can benefit businesses of any size and lift the overall expertise of your IT workforce, especially as they work toward certification. As with our other Cloud Week for Partners, this virtual event will include instructor-led training, Q&A sessions, and certification exam preparation.

Work toward certifications and Solutions Partner designations

By attending our Cloud Week for Partners training events or participating in the self-paced learning courses Microsoft offers to partners, your staff members can work toward individual role-based certifications that will enhance their careers. At the same time, it can help your organization prepare to meet the skilling requirements for a Business Applications Solutions Partner designation in the new Microsoft Cloud Partner Program which launches in October 2022.

The new Solutions Partner designations, also launching in October, will help identify partners’ broad technical capabilities and experience in high-demand Microsoft cloud solution areas. The designations also will note your demonstrated ability to deliver successful outcomes for customers. Solutions Partner designations measure the following partner capabilities via the partner capability score:

• Performance: the ability of partners to expand their customer base as measured by Net Customer Adds.
• Skilling: the capabilities and skills acquired as partner organization employees earn Microsoft technical certifications.
• Customer success: the ability to enable growth through the use of Microsoft products or in the expansion of Microsoft services and workloads used by customers.

These new programs invest further in our partners’ success by encouraging business development through product benefits and new cloud services subscriptions, increasing customer reach with go-to-market services, and expanding technical skilling and enablement through continued access to training, enablement guides, and technical support from world-class Microsoft experts.

Register now for Business Applications Cloud Week and Sales Bootcamp

Business Applications Cloud Week for Partners and Business Applications Sales Bootcamp each offer our partners’ IT professionals a prime opportunity to understand how to harness Microsoft Dynamics 365 and Power Platform to improve your operations.

Cloud Week for Partners attendees can prepare for advanced role-based certifications while improving their technical capabilities. This virtual event also will help partner organizations to meet Microsoft Cloud Partner Program skilling requirements.

Sales Bootcamp attendees can improve their sales skills with in-depth training sessions. Led by Microsoft sales specialists, this virtual event provides advanced knowledge for selling Microsoft solutions.

Business Applications Cloud Week for Partners and Business Applications Sales Bootcamp each offer our partners’ IT professionals a prime opportunity to understand how to harness Microsoft Dynamics 365 and Power Platform to improve your operations.

Cloud Week for Partners attendees can prepare for advanced role-based certifications while improving their technical capabilities. This virtual event also will help partner organizations to meet Microsoft Cloud Partner Program skilling requirements. 

Sales Bootcamp attendees can improve their sales skills with in-depth training sessions. Led by Microsoft sales specialists, this virtual event provides advanced knowledge for selling Microsoft solutions.

Visit the Business Applications Cloud Weeks for Partners website or the Business Applications Sales Bootcamp website to register for these partner events and learn more details. Additional Cloud Week for Partners and Sales Bootcamp events related to Microsoft Business Applications will be held in the coming months; make sure to check back to see what new tracks are available and participate if you weren’t able to before. You can also discover other upcoming events that focus on additional sales and technical skilling areas.