MSDW is one of the true OGs in the Microsoft business applications space. People who have been following the Dynamics CRM and ERP ecosystem will likely have come across the news, articles and events published on MSDynamicsWorld.com.

My collaboration with MSDW goes back all the way to 2012, when I started publishing blog posts there. Today I looked back on the announcement post I made back then. Not only did it bring back precious memories but also helped me realize that the things I was passionate about over a decade ago are still close to my heart. As well as the way I sought to express my thoughts. There’s a certain quiet joy and a sense of pride in staying true to who you are.

It’s been far too many years since I last talked with Jason Gumpert, the editor of MSDW. When he recently invited me to be a guest in the MSDW podcast, I knew we would have a lot of catching up to do. So, we hit the record button and started talking about what’s been going on:

You can listen to the episode on Spotify, Apple, YouTube, and several other podcast platforms, in addition to MSDW’s podcast page.

To give you some more context beyond the show notes on the podcast services, here are the five main themes we talked about.

1 - Pivot from CRM to Power Platform

If it weren’t for CRM, I wouldn’t be here, doing what I do. I started from the customer’s side of the table, working hands-on with not just the technology but also supporting practical customer relationship management activities. What got me hooked on XRM was the adaptability offered by these tools to the admin persona - not just the consultants and developers.

As the Dynamics business grew bigger, it was difficult to let go of this malleability of the platform and focus on bigger D365 apps aimed at enterprise scenarios. Lucky for me, Power Platform became a thing of its own. The business model of low-code wasn’t (and still isn’t) obvious for the MS partners, compared to how the CRM project business worked. That hasn’t stopped me from pursuing those opportunities that best allow me to help the many citizen developers out there - meaning people like me.

I still do love CRM, though. No matter how the software business around it has evolved, no one has “solved” CRM in the sense that it would have lost its importance. Today, I’m happy to advocate for solutions like RapidStart Apps that offer a solid foundation to build your digital processes on. The faster we can get to value with these tools, the less likely it is for the CRM development initiatives to stall. Less talk, more action!

2 - Life after the MVP program

Right at this moment, it’s the week of the Global MVP Summit held in Redmond. I’ve found myself embracing the joy of missing out. Because once you get to admit to yourself that you don’t have to keep doing what you’ve always done before, it becomes so much easier to look ahead and see opportunities rather than obligations.

I’ve written earlier about the reasons I decided to step out from the MVP program. Despite the unique possibilities that the program offered for connecting with very smart people in this ecosystem, it never became business as usual. The “always on” mindset got me paying too much attention to every message, making it hard to set healthy limits on this lil’ hobby that was often indistinguishable from work. In the end, I knew that the only surefire way was to enforce the limits by cutting something away from my life entirely. It was a fun ride, but it was also time to let go.

3 - The taboo of licensing

If there’s one special quirk that makes me stand out from others in the community, it’s my passion for studying and writing about Microsoft licensing. As Jason mentioned, it is often considered a taboo that people in the community aren’t comfortable talking about in public. Well, I’ve found that this combination of technical features and written contractual terms is the kind of rabbit hole I’m oddly proud to explore and explain.

In May, I’ll be attending the DynamicsMinds conference in Slovenia for the first time. I get to talk about my favorite topic in the session titled “Facing Your Power Platform Licensing Demons”. MSDW happens to be an official media partner of the event, so keep an eye on their site for more coverage closer to May.

4 - Copilot & AI agents: reality & hype

Another thing I’m sort of famous for is pointing out the gaps in the marketing story for Copilot powered solutions. I keep finding myself adding the disclaimer of “hey, I use AI every day for many things” when talking about the issues with how tech vendors, Microsoft included, are including GenAI into absolutely everything. A lot of it is a solution in search of a problem - taking the focus away from hard problems that aren’t shiny enough features worth promoting.

It would be terrible if the GenAI capabilities would be taken away from us. I use ChatGPT for all kinds of low-stakes research and “explain this to me like I’m not a developer” type of tasks. It makes things possible that were too tedious to bother with before. Technology like this does truly augment our capabilities as humans.

But that’s not enough for the stock markets. The claims made especially on AI agents that are supposed to replace everyone from customer service reps to software developers are what’s fueling the valuation of tech companies. The way I see it, these are not based on anything that is possible today. In some ways, they are a part of the big GenAI con.

This duality of how some AI capabilities already feel magical and the others feel like pure vaporware is what forms the strange reality of business technology today. We’re being told that apps will be replaced by Copilots, through a “seamless experience MS has built”. Then I look at what the actual product capabilities are and can’t help but to post another meme pic with a snarky comment about AI. Rinse & repeat…

5 - (Lack of) security in the age of AI

I don’t have many qualifications to be talking about cybersecurity in the traditional world of enterprise IT. Yet I find that in this new age of GenAI tools being injected into every system, I have at least the ability to identify how things can go horribly wrong.

My natural skepticism towards the reliability of IT solutions serves me well when exploring the weaknesses of any scenario that aims to replace a human user with an AI agent user. I like to punch holes into things, to understand how they work and where they break. That has led me to study subjects like the OWASP Top 10 risks for low-code/now-code and LLM applications.

How the many LLM exploits may be used by malicious actors out there is hard to determine - until something big hits the news. The fundamental weaknesses of LLMs are in my mind a big blocker for letting the AI agents autonomously act on business application data and processes that may involve money or sensitive customer data. Before we get verified horror stories of prompt injection being used to exfiltrate data from M365 Copilot customers in real life, I try to spread awareness of these risks by illustrating the way our AI tools fail today.

This external threat of criminals finding their way inside Power Platform environments and data is uncharted territory for many of us MS BizApps professionals. We used to think that someone else is in charge of the hard security barriers - be it customer IT or Microsoft. Now, when Copilot and its many agents increasingly consume data that may originate from outside the customer tenant, this is no longer a valid excuse for us in the age of AI.

Audio + summarized transcript

As mentioned, the audio podcast is available via Spotify, Apple, YouTube etc. so please add it to your playlist.

For the subscribers of Perspectives Plus premium newsletter, you can find an edited transcript that covers the main discussion points in text format below:

Subscribe to Plus to read the rest.