Mastering the Power Platform: Essential Tips to Level Up Your Skills
Take Your Power Platform Skills to the Next Level: Expert Guidance and Essential Resources.
Introduction
Maybe you click to open this article to find out how you can learn Power Platform to skill up or you wanted to have a good read just to find out what the article contains. No matter the reason; time they say it’s money, give me a few minutes of your valuable time to share my truth.
The Microsoft Power Platform has evolved over the years with the initial release of Power BI in 2011 which serves as a powerful tool for data visualization and business intelligence capabilities for users. Microsoft went further to release Power Apps a low-code application development in 2016 together with Power Automate which was initially called Flow for creating workflows to streamline business processes.
Microsoft thought it wise to integrate and expand these tools. In 2017, Microsoft Integrated Power BI, Power Apps, and Power Automate under a unified umbrella known as the Microsoft Power Platform.
What if businesses can build and deploy chatbots without writing complex lines of code or even if code should be written it should be low code? Microsoft introduced Power Virtual Agents (PVA) in 2019 to come and demystify chatbot development.
Until recently, the new kid on the block, Power Pages, which provides rich, customizable templates, a fluid user experience through the design studio, and an integrated learning hub to quickly build sites for your unique needs.
Through these years low-code languages like Power Fx were introduced to provide developers superpowers to build applications in Excel-like syntax.
🤝 Getting Started
It was estimated that 500 million apps will be created in the next in next five years.
There simply aren’t enough professional pro code developers to go around the volume of work ahead to modernize businesses. But the good news is that low-code platforms like the Power Platform are here to empower more people regardless of their coding ability to create apps.
As a Power Platform developer, myself, I have devised 4 tips to help us to continue to skill up and stay updated in the tool we have purposed in our hearts to learn.
Here are the four powerful tips to help you learn the Microsoft Power Platform.
Four Tips to Help You Learn the Microsoft Power Platform
💡 Documentation
We have heard the phrase “Read the docs”. How these three words could save us from a lot of frustration and waste of precious pearls of time. I remember my first workflow I built in Power Automate during a Microsoft Student Ambassador event by then-a Gold Student Ambassador, Shadrack Inusah who gave a demo. I re-watched the recording repeatedly just to fully build and run my first flow.
I was a novice who had heard of how amazing the Microsoft Power Platform is. The fact is I didn’t read the documentation of Power Automate and it went on for months, always trying to build workflows but the thought of looking up the docs didn’t come up my mind.
I remember, pausing learning the Power Platform because I didn’t know how to use certain connectors. So, I paused, until the 4th quarter of 2022 when I started to explore Power Automate again.
But this time, I started reading the Power Automate documentation, and I realize Microsoft has all the connectors documented. So, I started to explore and learn to build workflows.
How can one learn a tool without reading the documentation of its usage?
Documentation refers to the written information, instructions, and explanations that accompany a software, product, service, or process.
It provides comprehensive details about how to use, configure, troubleshoot, and maintain a particular item or system.
Documentation serves as a valuable resource for users, developers, administrators, and other stakeholders involved in the use or implementation of a product or service.
To us developers, Documentation provides developers with insights into the purpose, features, and functionality of a software, library, or API. It helps us gain a comprehensive understanding of how to effectively use the tool or framework.
To conclude on this point, I say just Read the Docs. It can’t be overemphasized.
Links to the various Documentation of the Power Platform
🔸Power Virtual Agents Documentation
💡Community
Each one of us comes from a community. A community is a group of individuals who share common interests, goals, or characteristics and come together to interact, support, and collaborate with one another.
To developers, the community holds significant importance and offers several benefits. Here are what community means to developers:
Learning and Knowledge Sharing: community provides an environment for developers to learn from one another, exchange ideas, and share knowledge. It also offers opportunities to expand technical skills, stay updated with the latest industry trends, and explore new technologies. Developers can ask questions, and seek guidance from experienced members of the community.
Career Growth and Opportunities: Engaging in a developer community can present career growth opportunities, such as attending conferences, participating in hackathons, or coding challenges.
When you check the documentation pages of the various Power Platform tools, you will see “Community” on the navigation bar. Microsoft Power Platform has community forums for all the tools. Do you have a question you want to ask, a bug that has been troubling you for days or even weeks? Check the Power Platform community, it could be that your issue has been fixed.
Apart from the Community forums, there are Microsoft Power Platform User groups depending on where you find yourself. Do you even know that all the Microsoft User Groups can be found on the community page of the Power Platform website? Learn more.
💡Resources from Microsoft Cloud Advocates and MVPs
Microsoft MVPs are part of the driving force to help Microsoft to continue fulfill its mission which is “to empower every individual and organization on the planet to achieve more”.
It cannot be overstressed; Microsoft MVPs are doing the most to promote the Microsoft Technologies their MVPs for.
Microsoft MVPs (Most Valuable Professionals) are individuals who are recognized by Microsoft for their exceptional contributions to the technical community.
MVPs demonstrate expertise, community engagement, and willingness to share knowledge and experience with others.
Microsoft has tons of technologies you may not even know, but there are MVPs for all technology categories in Microsoft.
These professionals have YouTube Channels, and blog websites, some even go to the extent to produce tutorials to sell on either their own platforms or paid platforms like Udemy.
They contribute to the body of knowledge and without them, you may even guess the disadvantage.
Overall, Microsoft MVPs are highly respected and influential community leaders who make significant contributions to the technical community by sharing their expertise, promoting Microsoft technologies, and fostering collaboration and knowledge-sharing among developers, IT professionals, and other technology enthusiasts.
On the other side, we have Microsoft employees. Microsoft Cloud advocates are technical evangelists who work closely with developers, IT professionals, and even students and the broader technical community to drive the adoption and provide guidance on Microsoft’s cloud technologies.
Cloud Advocates are passionate about empowering individuals and organizations to leverage the full potential of Microsoft Azure, Power Platform, and other cloud services.
If you’re truly within the Microsoft ecosystem, you may have seen some on LinkedIn and Twitter
I can’t end this point without mentioning Microsoft Learn Student Ambassadors. At this moment you’re reading a blog post written by a Gold Student Ambassador. We also help promote Microsoft Technologies on our various campuses across the globe. We are on-campus student ambassadors helping our peers to leverage the opportunities Microsoft has to offer to students.
📚 Resources by Microsoft Cloud Advocates
📚 Resources by Microsoft MVPs
🔸 Thomas Festus (FestMan Learning Hub)
💡 Build Projects and Document
From time to time, we are told by Microsoft Cloud Advocates, MVPs, and even student ambassadors to learn in public. You don’t know it all, don’t hide what you’re learning. For this one, we will continue to over-emphasize it. 😂
Some people secured job offers by learning and sharing in public. They utilize LinkedIn and Twitter to share their learning.
We are encouraged to document our journey into Tech, and this is one of the ways to achieve that.
Whenever you build a project no matter how small it is, document it. As you continue to do this you will have good memories to fall back on later in the future.
I can’t make this point lengthy, so I will cut it short.
🙏 Let's Conclude
Microsoft Power Platform will continue to evolve and even expand to include more services. You may not know how well-integrated the Microsoft Power Platform is unless you follow the first tip. Which is to read the docs.
Documentation will save you a lot more time and effort which otherwise would have been wasted in over-brainstorming and saying to yourself “why”.
Create an account on the community page of Power Platform there are tons of information over there. How much more can we say about Microsoft MVPs, Cloud Advocates, and Microsoft Learn Student Ambassadors who help in the adoption of Microsoft Technologies?
If you’re a student engage with the Student Ambassadors communities on your campus and if there is none. Why don’t you become a Microsoft Learn Student Ambassador?
Continue to learn and build your skills in the Power Platform by utilizing the resources and tips to help you skill up.
If you have been able to make it this far, thank you.