As an IBM Champion and IBM customer specializing in mainframe architecture, it’s fairly obvious I have a passion for IBMz, IBM storage and surrounding products. It’s this passion that drives me to find ways to be more aware of products before they become generally available (GA) and to evaluate their relevance to my employer’s business. I also enjoy collaborating with product designers and developers to help shape product direction or to enrich my knowledge within a technical domain.
If this sounds anything like you, you should consider becoming a Sponsor User.
Sponsor Users can be IBM Champions, IBM customer or business partners who provide domain expertise to an IBM product team. Sponsor Users are meant to influence new IBM offerings by providing a real voice, describing real needs and use cases based on your personal or company’s experience. While Sponsor Users don’t replace formal design research and usability studies, every interaction you have with the product team will allow them to close the gap between their assumptions and reality. As a Sponsor User you can leave a significant mark on the product or feature both when it becomes GA or in future releases.
In the past decade I have participated in several Sponsor User programs within the IBMz and storage spectrums. My experience in participating in Sponsor User program has been enjoyable- often collaborating with lead designers, developers and remarkably other customers who share the same perspectives as I. Being a part of this program helps to build relationships with IBM product specialists which can pay dividends later when support is needed. This program has also afforded our company to be early adopters of technologies such as Pervasive Encryption. Being an early adopter and gaining experience from the program helped me to become recognized as a subject matter expert. This has allowed me to demonstrate technology leadership for myself and our company, for example presenting at conferences, IBM communities, sharing experiences with other customers or composing articles.
The commitment on becoming a Sponsor User is small, the most active Sponsor User meetings I’ve been a part of usually met once a month for 1 hour, at most 90 minutes. These meetings were set up by the design team to collaborate, defining real use cases, user roles, providing feedback on function. Some programs will also take you through low level design. The meetings each month would build on feedback that was shared by the prior months, so you knew input was taken seriously.
If you like to interact directly with designers and developers and help shape the future within the technologies you support - definitely consider joining a Sponsor User program! Often at conferences such as Share or TechXchange, presenters will solicit volunteers to become a Sponsor User for a new offering. If you would like to leave your options open to join a Sponsor User program open I would advise you to speak with your IBM team or Business partner.
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