January 26, 2022
Alex Woody
If you’re longing to reconnect in person with your IBM i colleagues this year, we have good news for you: in-person events will make a comeback in 2022. COMMON’s annual POWERUp conference in May in New Orleans tops the list. but many other groups are also celebrating their physical comebacks.
COMMON President Gordon Leary is committed to physically reuniting the world’s largest IBM i user group beginning May 23 when the POWERUp 2022 conference begins at the New Orleans Marriott. So are many COMMON members who haven’t seen each other in two years.
“We knew there was a backlog of training and face-to-face events from potential attendees, exhibit partners, volunteers and the speaker community,” Leary tells IT Jungle. “COMMON is known for our in-person conference events as the place where this IBM i community connects, so we knew we had to bring that value back in a safe and responsible way. As we see more and more industry events returning to face-to-face events, albeit slightly different than ‘normal’, we are cautiously optimistic that we will return to face-to-face events as well.”
The last two years have been tough for COMMON. In March 2020, the Chicago-based organization canceled POWERUp 2020 less than a month before it was scheduled to begin in Atlanta, Georgia. It quickly moved what would have been the group’s 60th birthday event to late summer in Tampa, Florida. But about a month before that event was due to take place, COMMON had to cancel it as well, thanks to a late summer COVID spike. The group quickly turned and held it as a virtual event.
Quite the optimists, the COMMON leadership has boldly scheduled POWERUp 2021 for last October in Virginia Beach, Virginia. But thanks to the Delta variant, the group was forced to cancel this event and hold it again virtually.
As the recent Omicron surge begins to fade, Leary is confident COMMON doesn’t need to take POWERUp 2022 to Zoom school.
“No, we never thought of making POWERUp a virtual event,” he said. “We have numerous virtual training courses and events planned for 2022. Our upcoming FOCUS conference will be a virtual workshop-only conference and our fall NAViGATE conference is planned as a hybrid event.”
It’s not clear at this point if masks and social distancing will apply to the show. COMMON is following New Orleans City guidelines on this matter, Leary says, and is in close contact with city officials. Currently, these policies require masks and proof of vaccinations or a negative COVID test to gain entry to indoor events.
Leary hopes that the POWERUp participants will understand the situation. “Like everyone else in the events industry, they remain cautiously optimistic, knowing that sometimes the decision is out of their hands, and follow company policy when it comes to travel,” he says. “The same goes for the speakers and our exhibiting partners, who are probably even more excited and anxious to return to the in-person conferences and speak to attendees.”
COMMON isn’t the only midrange user group venturing back out into the world. The Wisconsin Midrange Computer Professional Association (WMCPA) is jumping into 2022 with both legs by committing to an in-person conference in March. It will hold its annual spring conference March 15-17 at the Lake Lawn Resort. WMCPA also holds its monthly meetings in person.
The Southern California OCEAN user group has several face-to-face meetings planned, including an event in March with IBM i security expert Carol Woodbury. (February’s meeting with IBM’s Tim Rowe will be held online.) The group usually meets at a Costa Mesa university. The group’s annual summer shindig will be a hybrid event held physically and virtually.
The Omni User Group is also venturing into the real world. Last week, the Chicago-based organization held its first in-person meeting in two years at a local restaurant. IBM’s Scott Forstie was the guest speaker. A little further east, the Midrange Meetup of Michigan is also planned again with face-to-face meetings in 2022. The next meeting will be on February 8th at a restaurant in Grand Rapids. Meanwhile, in Nashville, Tennessee, the IBM Midrange User Group is holding a meeting at a restaurant tomorrow with Dan Magid as the guest speaker.
Like many other local user groups, the Mid-Atlantic Group of IBM i Collaborators (MAGiC) is keeping its monthly meetings online for the time being. However, the group plans to hold a two-day in-person event this June. MAGiC also hosts an annual conference in Virginia Beach, Virginia, usually in the fall; Last October’s conference was a hybrid event.
The North East User Group Conference (NEUGC) is bringing back its traditional spring two-and-a-half day conference. According to their website, the 30th annual conference will take place on April 11-13 this year.
Our IBM i colleagues across the pond are also preparing to meet again in person. i-UG, the UK’s largest IBM i user group, will hold its i-UG Conference North on February 3rd at a hotel outside Manchester. COMMON Europe is also preparing to host an event from June 13th to 16th in Alicante, Spain.
If you have IBM i-related events planned – in person or not – let us know by leaving us a message on Dandy IT Jungle’s handy contact page.
SIMILAR POSTS
COMMON cancels the personal POWERUp again and conducts the conference virtually
IBM shares COVID-19 success stories at POWERUp 2021
Coronavirus is taking its toll on the middle class
Comments are closed.