Tomorrow is the big day! We announce the first inductees into the SharePoint50 Project “Hall of Fame”. If you haven’t gotten your guess in yet, play the game and choose 10 people you think will be on the list. If you are the most accurate, I’ve got a surprise or two waiting for you.

I’m going to play the game a little differently for myself since I happen to know who ALL fifty people are. Instead, I want to tell you the 10 most influential people in my SharePoint career. These are the people that helped me, and continue to help me as I try to get a handle on this SharePoint beast. As always, there’s no particular order.

Chris Quick and Dessie Lunsford

Chris and Dessie were the first people who really took me seriously as I started EndUserSharePoint.com. As Derek Sivers said, they are the people who turned me from being a “lone nut” into a leader. Without their support and contributions at the beginning, I’m not sure if I would have stayed the course.

Paul Grenier

Paul and I met during one of Bob Mixon’s sessions in New York City. We kept in touch and he eventually started writing for me. But mainly Paul’s contribution was starting the first series on jQuery on the site. As his experiments grew, so did the SharePoint audience for jQuery. Sadly, Paul’s not working on it anymore, but he was my main influence when moving the site forward to include presentation layer enhancements.

Christophe Humbert

Even though Christophe is in Shanghai, he is a major voice in following up on the work that Paul started. Christophe’s solutions are elegant and extremely useful. We’ve taught over a dozen workshops together, and each time I came away with a new idea of what can be done with the presentation layer.

Michael Gannotti

My first response to seeing a Michael Gannotti video was “Who is this mad man?” What really drew me in was an hour long screencast of him doing something very basic in SharePoint 2007. It was my first realization that there really was a need for what I was trying to do and how to enhance the existing blogs. There was a long period after that where we put hundreds of screencasts on the site and I attribute that vision to Mike.

Laura Rogers

I laugh when I tell the story of how I ‘discovered’ Laura. I was paging through Stump the Panel one day and saw a string of answers by “Laura Rogers” aka “WonderLaura”. Next day, same thing. “Who the hell is this woman?” I just had to find out. I gave her a call and the rest is history. Laura is now the Queen of the Data View Web Part and has forgotten more than I’ll ever know about DVWPs.

Eric Alexander

What can I say about Eric? Stump the Panel has become his virtual playground. If you’ve participated at all you’ve seen Eric’s name all over the place. I finally gave up and said, “Here, it’s yours!” Without Eric, there would be no Stump the Panel. Enough said.

Michael Lotter

SharePoint Saturday has to be one of the most inspiring things that have come out of the SharePoint Community and I attribute that to Michael. I consider myself one of the very lucky people who started participating in the very first SharePoint Saturday in Virginia Beach, hosted by Susan Lennon. I can say definitively that EUSP would not be as large a community as it is without SharePoint Saturdays. Michael runs a tight ship and keeps things sailing for anyone who wants to become part of the SharePoint speaker community.

Cliff Atkinson and Nancy Duarte

These aren’t SharePoint specific people, mind you, but if you’ve seen any of my presentations in the past few years, I give Cliff and Nancy credit for the simplicity and clarity of the message. Cliff’s “Beyond Bullet Points” and Nancy’s “Slid:ology” sit next to me everytime I create or update a presentation. As a matter of fact, Nancy’s new book “Resonate” just arrived this morning and I’m trying not to open it before finishing this article. I credit them with helping me develop a style of presentation that flows, stays simple and stays on message.

The SharePoint Community, as a whole

I don’t say this lightly. The SharePoint Community is what makes EndUserSharePoint.com what it is. If you look through the articles, you’ll see many authors who step up and contribute content in ways that I can’t even fathom. I look at myself now adays as nothing more than a conduit, making it possible for the community to offer up content and get the exposure it deserves.

Thank you personally to each of you who have influenced me, and EndUserSharePoint.com, to be what we are. As we start to rollout the names of the SharePoint50 Project tomorrow, I hope you’ll think of the people who have influenced you and your work and you’ll find time to acknowledge them in your own way.

Best regards. Looking forward to seeing you tomorrow.
Mark Miller
Founder and Editor, EndUserSharePoint.com
Chief Community Officer and SharePoint Evangelist, Global 360