The SharePoint Community around the world is made up of a lot of passionate, hard-working people. I've been lucky enough to meet my fair share of these people over the years. One of the most visible signs of this community are the various User Groups focussed on the SharePoint platform. Here in Australia you can find one in most State capitals at http://www.sharepointusers.org.au.
Well, now there is a world-wide group set up to support and share experiences between these User Groups – the International SharePoint Professionals Association (ISPA). This will help strengthen and grow the existing groups here in Australia, and help any new SharePoint User Groups get up and running.
If you'd like to read more about this organisation, drop by their website at http://www.sharepointpros.org. As a User Group leader, I'm looking forward to sharing experiences with others and learning what else we can do for our members. I've also signed up as an ISPA Regional Evangelist. This means that I'm making myself available to anyone out there interested in setting up a new SharePoint focused user group within Australia. Thankfully, I'm not the only one – Ed Richards in Melbourne and Ivan Brebner in Brisbane are also ISPA Regional Evangelists – it is a rather large country after all. I have yet to find out whether we get any badges or hats.
