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About KKU
Kraft Kennedy University (KKU) is a daylong conference dedicated to sharing successful strategies across multiple technical disciplines. Technology and business professionals will learn from experts in their fields, who will discuss solutions to meet current and future challenges facing the industry. KKU seminars represent a culmination of knowledge gathered by leading IT professionals and are carefully reviewed by a committee of peers.
20 years of learning
Kraft Kennedy’s core value of Continuous Learning has us always evolving, looking ahead, and searching for ways to share knowledge through events like KKU, which was born out of an annual company-wide educational conference that we’ve held for twenty years. Realizing the immense value we receive from the event, we decided that it wouldn’t be fair to keep it all to ourselves. Today we are thrilled to offer our Chicago-area clients the unique opportunity to participate.
We are pleased to offer a limited number of free tickets this year in honor of expanding KKU to the Chicago community. Request registration to reserve your spot now.
Welcome, business leaders
KKU offers access to vital knowledge that will help you lay the groundwork for success in 2018 and the years ahead. The schedule of the conference is designed to offer attendees the chance to learn from industry-leading technology experts as well as from fellow C-level leaders and managing partners. Plan your cloud, security, and management initiatives with confidence based on the findings of IT experts and the triumphs and challenges of your peers.
For the IT innovator
You’ve put out the fires. Now what? Find out how to take it to the next level from the IT pros who are leading their fields. Join us for penetrating discussions on the viability of relying on the cloud and delve into the intricacies of Exchange with Microsoft Certified Master Joe Hoegler. This year’s conference will have a special focus on security—learn about the latest recommendations in cybersecurity, how to manage patching in light of Microsoft’s unprecedented new update model for Windows 10, and more.
What attendees had to say about KKU New York
“I found the sessions educational, informative and very well presented.” – Manager of IT Training, New York City, Am Law 100 Firm |
“It was a great event and I got a – Alan Azouri, Desktop Systems Director, Paul, Weiss, |
Session Schedule
Instructors
 Joe Hoegler Chief Technology Innovation Officer Microsoft Certified Master: Exchange 2010, Microsoft Certified Master: Office 365 Exchange Online, Microsoft Certified Solutions Master: Messaging 13 Years with Kraft KennedyJoe is the Chief Technology Innovation Officer and heads technology services delivery and solution development at Kraft Kennedy, as well as manages all project practice groups. He is an expert in messaging systems and unified communications, directory services, server virtualization, storage area networking, network infrastructure, high availability and disaster recovery, and data center design. Joe is a Microsoft Certified Solutions Master: Messaging, one of only 22 people worldwide to achieve this certification. |
 Chris Owens Chief Technology Officer Citrix CCA, VMware VCP, Interwoven CSA, OpenText CHP, 17 Years with Kraft KennedyChris is the Chief Technology Officer at Kraft Kennedy and Practice Group Leader for the Enterprise Client Systems Group. With over 20 years of consulting and technology management experience, Chris has helped leading firms with desktop design and management, server and storage consolidation and collocation, DR/BC, email messaging design and migration, document management, and hybrid\thin-client architecture. |
 Jeff Silverman Infrastructure and Enterprise Systems – Practice Architect Citrix Certified Expert – Virtualization, Citrix Certified Professional – Networking, Mobility, VMware Certified Professional – Data Center Virtualization 7 Years with Kraft KennedyJeff, Practice Architect, is a virtualization and infrastructure specialist. He is a Citrix Certified Integration Architect (CCIA) and a VMware Certified Professional (VCP), and provides technical leadership on engagements involving a broad range of virtualization, messaging, storage, and back-office technologies. |
 Sulabh Upadhyaya Enterprise Client Systems – Operations Manager; PMP, MCITP; 10 Years with Kraft KennedySulabh is a Practice Manager at Kraft Kennedy. He specializes in desktop operations and provides technical leadership on engagements involving a range of law firm technologies such as Microsoft Office, Windows 8.x, Windows 10 and Server 2016, Virtualization, Citrix XenApp, document management systems, software life cycle management and deployment tools. |
 John KoganChief Information Security Officer 5 Years with Kraft KennedyJohn is the Director of Managed Services with a special focus on cybersecurity. His team provides ongoing help desk support, monitoring, and technology planning to organizations. He has an extensive background in IT and business developed over 35 years working in financial services, consulting, and Fortune 100 corporations. |
 Charles Ottenweller Management Consultant 18 Years with Kraft KennedyCharles is a Management Consultant in Kraft Kennedy’s Houston office. Over the last 25 years, he has become deeply familiar with the challenges that law firms face in their operations and how they use technology to address them. Charles combines his technical abilities, knowledge of law firm operations, and management skills to help firms complete successful IT infrastructure and user-facing initiatives as well as process improvement and collaboration projects. As both a lead technical person and management consultant, Charles assists clients in addressing both non-technical issues and decisions that relate to any IT initiative. |
Session Descriptions
| Budgeting for the Win 10:00am – 11:00am |
Do your technology priorities and budget align with your firm’s success? Kraft Kennedy management consultants have found that many lawyers are dissatisfied with their firm’s technology and they are confident it can be more helpful with the pressures they face. The leaders at these firms (in IT or otherwise), don’t get consistent engagement and direction from partners and management stakeholders. To bridge this communication gap and set everyone up for success, leaders must articulate how plans focus on the business interests of the firm.
In this session we will talk about the pressures facing the business of law and emerging technology in 2018 and explain spending (CapEx versus OpEx), benchmarking, and total costs. Learn how you can offload thankless chores to specialists, shift the dynamics of discussions, and make winning proposals. (Spoiler alert: firm managers often underappreciate that meeting basic needs well is only incrementally more expensive than half-assed measures and that adequate up-front investments have a far bigger impact on productivity.) |
| Exchange 2016 for Law Firms 10:00am – 11:00am |
The clock ticking for Exchange 2010 as the end of its support lifecycle draws near. What does this mean for the IT industry? While some firms have already completed their designs for or even implemented Exchange 2016, more have yet to begin. Some are wondering whether Exchange Online is the best next step for their enterprise messaging environment while others are waiting to see product maturity, budget cycles, etc. Join Joe Hoegler to discuss the future of misaligning, including upgrade scenarios, important considerations for full or hybrid Exchange Online migrations, new features, and more. |
| Today’s Application Lifecycle Management, See What ALM is All About! 11:10am – 12:10pm |
Join us for a deep dive into application management while touching base with integration of Windows 10 in-place upgrades. Sulabh Upadhyaya will draw on notes from the field to discuss requirements management, application ownership, project planning, QA testing, and implementation tracking. Consider the relationship between agile and traditional application deployment and find out how to use Microsoft System Center Configuration Manager (SCCM) to support your business goals. |
| Security Foundation for Law Firms 11:10am – 12:10pm |
This talk will focus on the Center for Internet Security’s 5 Critical Controls as the essential cornerstone of a security program. John Kogan will begin by showing how proper asset management of hardware and software can make significant progress towards better security. Secure configurations and vulnerability and patch management are the next, often-overlooked steps. We will conclude with a discussion of the role of admirative privileges in a security program. |
| Build a More Secure Workspace with Windows 10 1:30pm – 2:30pm |
Join us for a comprehensive discussion of the lessons learned from adopting the Windows-as-a-Service model as well as new productivity and security features included with Windows 10 Enterprise. We will discuss features such as Device Guard, Credential Guard, Windows Defender Advance Threat Protection, Windows Hello, BitLocker to Go, Edge Browser, and Windows Information Protection to demonstrate which features provide good value for your firm, and which might not be worth implementing. In addition, we will review common pitfalls and obstacles law firms face when transitioning to Windows-as-a-Service approaches and discuss the techniques Kraft Kennedy have leveraged to overcome these challenges. |
| Keeping Out the Bad Guys! – Security 101 1:30pm – 2:30pm |
Ransomware, phishing, and other forms of cybercrime are thriving. Are you prepared? Join Security Analyst John Kogan as he provides an overview of critical security technologies and topics including email targeted threat protection, web filtering, log review, policy change management threat protection, end-point modeling and threat protection, vulnerability scanning, and intrusion protection. |
| Patching Changes: How To Manage the New Windows 10 and Office Updates 2:40pm – 3:40pm |
In this session, we will review how Microsoft has modified its patching strategy to incorporate the new Feature Updates for Windows 10. After an overview of the branch model and how MS has positioned the various offerings of Windows 10, we will dive into patching strategy and what works best at firms deploying these new upgrades. A discussion of task sequence best practices within SCCM will be followed by specific examples of how firms can leverage this functionality as part of their patching strategy in Windows 10. We will also discuss configuration and deployment of Windows 10 and Office cumulative updates, and what these changes mean for law firms. |
| Next Generation Desktop Delivery with Citrix XenApp and XenDesktop 2:40pm – 3:40pm |
Citrix has been busy! The latest releases of XenApp and XenDesktop include user experience improvements via Enlightened Data Transport (next gen ICA/HDX) and application delivery improvements via Citrix Layering (acquired from Unidesk). Join Kraft Kennedy consultant Jeff Silverman for a review of these technologies and how they can be leveraged to support your next generation virtual desktops. |
| Ask the Experts – Open Topics 3:50pm – 4:50pm |
Join us for a panel Q&A session where we will gather a number of Kraft Kennedy experts to discuss all aspects of law firm technology. This moderator-led discussion will include conversations about Windows 10, Exchange, Office 365, application management, document management systems, Citrix, security, and much more. Over the course of an hour we will discuss a variety of ‘real-world’ legal answers for firms of all sizes to provide unique insight into these technologies. |