Each situation offers benefits: an in-house position offers security; a national consulting firm offers training advantages; and the "body shop" offers the variety of local work one receives.

There's a way to experience all of the above situations, however, by working for your local LBP (Lotus Business Partner).

Since many of my clients are LBPs, I know there are many great reasons to work in this venue. But I wanted to be objective in this article, so I interviewed a number of LBPs I had never spoken with before and asked them to tell me why someone would want to work for an LBP. I received a variety of interesting responses, which boil down to the following ten reasons:

1. Training
The number one reason for working with an LBP is the training opportunities.

"A Lotus Partner is vested in using top Lotus technology and advanced products and techniques to solve their customers' problems," said Kim Junker of Michigan-based Blueware. "You must stay current to provide value to the client."

Julie Palen, CEO of InterNoded, a 30-person LBP in Massachusetts, said her administrators have a list of 30 new technologies to investigate. Palen said the Administrators on her hosting team are responsible for building servers, scalability, and reliability, but also they must show the clients new technology, such as iNotes, even before the customers ask for it. These administrators need to become familiar with new technologies as they become available so that they've achieved expert status when it's time for implementation at a client site.

2. Utilize bleeding edge tools
Because of the close relationship an LBP has with Lotus, developers and administrators not only learn about the latest techniques and products, but also they put them to use in their daily work.

Todd Herman of Todd Herman & Associates in North Carolina said working for an LBP gives one the "room to experiment with Lotus' suite of products: Notes, Domino, K-station, and wireless products."

Chris Lewter of Alabama-based MCBA concurs, saying his staff has "the ability to work in an environment with tools on the cutting edge of technology." Developers at firms like these are encouraged to "think outside-the-box" and push the technical envelope, often working in beta code to find solutions for their clients. This is true for both developers and administrators.