Laura’s New Company!
Yes, the Rackspace adventure has ended, and my next life adventure has begun! I’ve started my own company!
Yes, here’s the story..
A couple of months ago, about 15 of us were basically told that our whole department, SharePoint Professional Services at Rackspace, was being eliminated. So the team of SharePoint project managers, myself, and my team of seven SharePoint (rock star) consultants… was all dissolved. (Rackspace still does sell hosted SharePoint, though.) We were told that we weren’t being fired or laid off, we could just get a different job at Rackspace.
After spending the past seven years or so in building my own brand, and doing all of my blogging, videos, and social media, I figured I would just go and and give it a shot and start my own company. So I did! A lot of my friends in the SharePoint community also own their own companies, and a lot of you have reached out and offered information and suggestions regarding the business side of getting a company up and running. Thank you all! You have all been super supportive in all of this, and I appreciate it tremendously! Special thanks to Shane Young at Bold Zebras, for advice and social media / SEO important tips, and help with my website and messaging!
So, what exactly am I doing now?
I started a new company. The official business name is LC Rogers Technologies, LLC.
My training company is IW Mentor. Information Worker Mentor.
What do we do at IW Mentor?
SharePoint training! SharePoint 2013, SharePoint 2016, and SharePoint Online with Office 365. There are virtual instructor-led classes, and there will soon be self-paced online classes as well.
What kind of training?
There are three different types of classes:
Beginners – Absolute beginners, end users. Learn fundamentals about how to get around in your SharePoint site, and how to work in libraries and lists.
Power Users – Learn how to organize lists and libraries, how to manage your site, permissions, and a lot more. Not for beginners.
Workflows and Forms – Deep dive class, but still no-code. Learn how to create and troubleshoot SharePoint Designer workflows, and how to build complete business solutions with lists, lookup relationships, and web parts. Not for beginners.
There is a lot more information, such as dates and FAQs on the site, www.iwmentor.com
After teaching a SharePoint Power User class for several years, it became apparent that there were three distinct groups of people that took the class. Although it was not meant for beginners, people who were brand new to SharePoint signed up for the class mainly because we did not have a beginner class offering. By the second day, they typically had difficulty keeping up. The second distinct group were the intended audience. These were people who had been using SharePoint for at least a few months, and needed to learn more about managing sites, organizing libraries, and managing permissions. The third group were people who were already advanced users, and wanted to learn more, specifically about building business solutions in SharePoint using forms and workflows. Because of this experience and these typical audiences of people, this training is structured the way it is, now with separate classes for the three groups of “SharePointers”.
Please check out my new site and follow iwMentor on twitter. Let me know what you think. Oh, and spread the word! 
Congratulations on the new company! I have followed you on Twitter for a while for my SharePoint news, I am sure that iwMentor will excel as the need is there for all manner of training and such for SharePoint in its many iterations. Best of luck to you again in your new endeavor!
I echo Justin. Congratulations.
Good Luck! YOu are an amazing woman; I’m sure this will work out. Save all your receipts for EVERYTHING!
Congrats!
Congratulations and Good luck! I wish best for your company. I know you by YouTube tutorials. Thank you for your effort.
All the very best… Congrats !!! I am sure you will be more successful…
Sharing this in all my social networks profiles. Thanks for all the knwoledge you have shared so far! All the best in your new venture Laura!
Congratulations Laura.. Like to part of your company..:)
Congratulations Laura! I know your business will be very successful!
Congratulations and the best of luck, Laura! I will be watching you as you take this thing to every level you want!
Congrats. That’s exiting.
You are a role model for SharePoint consultants and wish you all the best with iwmentor
Congratuliations !
Congratulations!! You’re an awesome SharePoint trainer and mentor and this is going to be an exciting new chapter for you!
Congratulations Laura and best wishes to you and your company?
Sorry, the last comment is supposed to have an exclamation mark and not a question mark at the end 🙂
Congratulations! I just got a go ahead today to (finally, after 2 years) get some formal training so the time is just right!
Congrats! I have been following your posts for many years. Although the business changes to iwMentor, do not change your approach to teaching us non-developers. Here’s to the future.
Congratulations! Your blog has helped me countless times and is/was a wealth of information. And I’m sure this adventure will be just as great!
Congratulations Laura, I wish you lots of success and many satisfied clients!
Exciting News! Best of everything Good Laura!
I wish you all the best in this challenging world
Wow, that’s crazy… silly Rackspace/biz decision! Big fan of your efforts over the years and best of luck!
Wow Laura. I just want to thank you for all the videos your team did on Youtube. I basically learned how to do my job watching your videos. You are incredible at teaching and I am sure you will find nothing but success.
I just heard the news on the Todd Klindt weekly podcast. I have enjoyed your books and was fortunate enough to see and listen to you at the Atlanta SharePoint Saturday. You have been a great a resource. You will be very successful on your own. You are very disciplined, organized and professional.
Congratulations Laura!!! You’re turning Rackspace’s u-turn into the best thing that’s happened in an already-storied career. 🙂 It’s a scary and exciting passage.speaking from personal experience. What goes around comes around. You’ve been a huge contributor to the community for many years. A lot’s coming back your way. My sense: you can bank on it. Best success!
Congratulations, Laura! How awesome! I agree with Brian Kinsella, you have been a major contributor to the SharePoint community for many years and I have followed your advice, instructions and best practices religiously. Why? Because you are on target! You know exactly what you are talking about. Enjoy your success and the freedom that comes with owning your company despite all the hard work and long hours it brings. Best wishes for your amazing future!
Congratulations from the UK – I have your books and vids. You just put stuff over so understandably and enthusiastically. I shall miss the Power Hours! All the best
Laura, you will do great! Be strong because every business has its up and down days. I’ve been a developer for SharePoint since it was SharePoint Team Services hidden on a FrontPage disk. I still have gone to your sites and blog, as a quiet sleeper, learning all the time. Thanks for all you do.
Congratulations Laura, I love your job! Good luck!
Congratulations, you are amazing at SharePoint.
Congrats! All the best. I am a SharePoint no-coder myself, only thousands of miles behind you in terms of abilities. 🙂
Congratulations. I am a coder who loves what you do. Keep at it!
I’m a huge fan and have followed you for years Laura. Best of luck!
Everything happens for a reason!! 🙂 This a amazing and congrats to you!!! You have gotten me out of a number of jams in my SharePoint journey. I am still learning from you.
Thanks for you and your team for giving such an awesome package of “POWER HOUR” session , which will definitely guide SharePoint community to a greater extend. Special thanks from me which help me personally to train from nowhere to good extend.
Best of luck, Laura. I’ve only just discovered the PowerHour videos on YouTube and was hoping to start watching them live 🙁
Thanks for the great content!
Congrats Laura..
Congratulations Laura and much success in mastering your new endeavors. From the list of people congratulating you and my experience with your well written tutorials, your exodus from Rackspace was a blessing in disguise. I would like to have a conversation with you regarding the Microsoft’s plan to replace InfoPath with something else!
The new product is PowerApps, in Office 365. I’ve written several blog posts about it, and I teach a whole 4 day training class about it. iwmentor.com