Enterprise2Open

Bonding the Enterprise 2.0 Community

Archive for June, 2009

enterprise2open 06/30/2009

  • In my conversations during reboot I learned a lot, among many conceptal stuff this nifty little OS project crossed my path.

    May well be a toolbox for (social software enhanced) business intelligence applications, this plus all sorts of “environmental scanning” use cases are on my mind now.

    Must test this out.

    “Picok stands for Personal Information Cockpit and is an enterprise open source application that enables users to build personal information dashboards.

    The users’ content is loaded in small draggable boxes, called portlets, and layed out in a tabbed 3-column interface. The User can add portlets from a selection of portlets the specific installation of picok offers. There are a quite few standard portlets shipped with picok, but since it is an open system, maintainers of picok installations can create portlets of their own.”

    tags: knowledgework, software, tools

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

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  • ROI is famously hard to measure on E2.0

    Unfortunately the processing of this video at the Sevenload site took more time than expected. Anyway, in the following you find a nice fireside discussion with Dion Hinchcliffe - interviewed by Dr. Frank Schönefeld from T-Systems during a press event we made at CeBIT 2009. Mainly they are discussing the latest developments on E2.0 in general, its adoption in the US and Europe as well as how to evaluate the effects of E20 activities. On the last aspect Dion pointed out that “ROI is famously hard to measure on E2.0″ and his urge to put together more case studies in order to evaluate the effects.


    Sevenload Direkt

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    enterprise2open 06/20/2009

    • This is part 2 of the “Tangible Benefits of E 2.0″ series at the Oracle ECM Fusion blog. Must get my hands on the research articles and papers on Enterprise 2.0 RoI the author talks about in here (hey Billy Cripe, working like an academic íncludes linking and naming the sources, only telling us it’s article number 1, 2, and 3 is a bit awkward …)

      tags: enterprise2.0, roi, research

      • Good news comes in two flavors, research (proof/support) and anecdotes.
      • evidence that frequent and open communication enhances team collaboration
    • This is the first part of the “Tangible Benefits of E 2.0″ series at the Oracle ECM Fusion blog.

      Funny, I expected something more suitable for selling Oracle software - the post is down-to-earth and while not telling the Enterprise 2.0 crown anything new I dig the realism (find a problem first, then think about ypur E 2.0 take et al.).

      Shouldn’t be too hard to find some pressing problems in todays organizations, huh?

      tags: roi, enterprise2.0, adoption, implementation

      • Much of the failure is coming from organizations jumping on the band wagon without any idea of where it is going or how to drive it. Simply implementing technology for technology’s sake will never work.
      • If you are only looking to “buy some E2.0″, go home. Study up some more. You are more likely than not to fail and that will make my technology look bad and you wont want to buy any more from me. And therein is the first lesson learned: Purpose is Preeminent. Don’t bother with the technology unless you have a business problem it is designed to solve.
    • via Thomas: Orcale and accenture sponsored some very slick videos - explaining what they mean with “Enterprise 2.0″.

      Besides videos there’s supposed to be case study material - and I found an Oracle ECM blog this way, see http://blogs.oracle.com/fusionecm/

      And as one thing leads to another there is a three-part post there, which dealt with the “Tangible Benefits of E 2.0″:

      Snippet: “In Part 1 of this short Tangible Benefits of E2.0 series, we covered the bad news around E2.0 and ROI and Adoption.
      In Part 2 we covered the good news from the research and theory angle. We saw that scholarly and researched proofs are emerging to prop up the soft benefit claims of better collaboration, increased team efficiency, and increased ability to innovate. These kinds of soft proofs are still emerging as THIS article on 7 ways E20 will cut costs demonstrates.”

      Will add these posts onto the diigo-Linklist as well, see inside then for highligting as usual.

      tags: enterprise2.0, video, oracle, vendors, ecm

    Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

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  • enterprise2open 06/15/2009

    • Measurement isn’t hard, but it requires work - I guess this holds true for getting to know more about the RoI of Enterprise 2.0.

      Snip: “If you’re still saying to me that it’s too hard, that means that you don’t have the mechanisms in place to measure well, or you don’t have a handle on what you should be measuring because your goals aren’t clear, or you don’t know where that information lives inside your company. All of those are NOT an indication that measurement is hard. They’re an indication that you have some work to do to build the foundation for measurement.”

      tags: measurement, metrics, RoI, socialmedia

    Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

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  • enterprise2open 06/14/2009

    • Matt Mullenweg of Wordpress on his style of working - and especially how to manage a successful business where everyone us working from home (yes, we’re talking about how to organize collaboration.

      Well, microblogging is playing a vital part in it, snippet:

      “We all communicate using P2, something we launched that allows users to publish group blogs in WordPress. It’s a bit like Twitter, but the updates come in real time. With P2, we can share code and ideas instantly. There is a dedicated channel for each part of the company, and when there’s a new message, it shows up in red. It may be someone talking about development or what he or she had for breakfast. I also use Skype for one-on-one and mini group chats.”

      tags: microblogging, productivity, collaboration

    Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

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  • enterprise2open 06/11/2009

    • Umair Haque distills learnings and “messy heuristics” for innovators from looking at Twitter, watch out for the very interesting comments too.

      Snippet taken from the comments:
      “twitter is an interesting bug. people claim that they “get it”, but don’t participate. they often cite that they don’t have time.”

      tags: twitter, communication, innovation, collaboration

    • This is Lee Bryant’s post on the future role of RSS in the Enterprise - (here I wrote that it’s a reply to “Steve Gilmor’s dim-witted claim that RSS is dead”, http://blog.enterprise2open.com/2009/06/09/enterprise2open-06092009/).

      Yes, fully agree, RSS is about as dead as http or XMPP. And I really enjoyed this post, best blogpost-intro ever:

      Snip: “One of the most annoying habits of self-appointed technology gurus, sheikhs, czars or experts is that they take their own behaviour as the basis for extrapolation to predict how the rest of the world will/could/should use tools. A side effect of this is an inability to empathise or understand the needs and culture of non-geek workers in non-technology companies.”

      tags: rss, enterprise2.0, trends, future, analysis

    Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

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  • enterprise2open 06/10/2009

    • Dion writes about how to bridge the gap between the social collaboration world outside and classical organizations.

      Strategies and battle plans “how to proceed”, I am with this but have doubts at the same time.

      To me it’s probably about the benefits of aiming high (you might achieve at least a bit) vs. procedding with cautious little steps? We all know it’s about the social dimensions in the first place with Enterprise 2.0, where both approaches have their up- and downsides …

      tags: adoption, enterprise2.0, implementation

      • what’s turning into an increasingly larger gap between what happens in the business world and what happens everywhere else
      • the act of work itself is becoming more of a collective journey instead of a final destination as our individual work experiences become more open, collaborative, participatory, and social
      • This situation creates a delta that, sooner or later, will simply become untenable for many organizations
      • exerts a subversive force on organizations as their workers help themselves to the tools of their own volition, bring their (and arguably better) new behaviors and processes to work, and try to get things done with them, whether that’s crowdsourcing, Enterprise 2.0, online customer communities, etc.
      • constituencies that have a stake in doing things the old way are disrupted by new social models for achieving those same business objectives, whether the replacements are highly collaborative work processes or the network co-creation of product designs and other outputs
      • So what’s an organization to do? Are there strategies that can help mitigate the seemingly growing tension, take advantage of new skills and behaviors of our workers, and avoid potential for sudden and/or unexpected changes in our businesses? In fact, is it even possible to intentionally encourage and adopt bottom-up processes? Fortunately, based on the experiences of those that have adopted them, there do seem to be some general strategies that can help.

    Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

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  • enterprise2open 06/09/2009

    Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

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  • enterprise2open 06/08/2009

    • Another worthwhile analysis of Google Wave, this time by Dennis McDonald who focuses on Wave’s potential to support a more ad-hoc informal (soft and fuzzy) mode of collaboration by helping communication, especially in project management (read this together with Dirk Röhrborns learning of using microblogging oin project communcation)

      tags: collaboration, googlewave, communication, knowledgework

    • Ted Schadler of Forrester analyzing Google Wave, refining four WIMs (What does it mean):

      * WIM #1: Don’t get too stuck on installed email clients — they can’t evolve fast enough. [....]
      * WIM #2: Google Apps Premier Edition is worth keeping a close eye on. [...]
      * WIM #3: Microsoft will have yet another innovation hill to climb (and it will).
      * WIM #4: IBM’s approach to collaboration is looking pretty visionary.

      Entertaining times ahead …

      tags: forrester, googlewave, enterprise2.0, future

    • Dirk Röhrborn does a german-language analysis of Google Wave out of an Enterprise2.0 perspective, to sum it up: “Promising, but questions remain”

      Snip: “Fazit: Es gibt noch viele offene Fragen.

      Mit welchem Geschäftsmodell wird Google das Produkt anbieten? Kostenfreie Nutzung, Premium SaaS, Lizenz oder Appliance - oder alles zusammen?
      Wie können organisatorische Strukturen und Berechtigungen abgebildet werden? Wie kann eine Integration in bestehende IT-Infrastrukturen erfolgen? Für welche Anwendungen ist Wave gut oder weniger gut geeignet? Wird die große Flexibilität von Google Wave befreiend wirken oder noch mehr zur Verwirrung und zum Information Overload der Nutzer beitragen?”

      tags: googlewave, collaboration, enterprise2.0

    • Andrea writes a nice compilation of why Google Wave is cute (and collects some E 2.0 points “en passant”):

      Snip: “rich set of extensions APIs that can let you build pretty much anything from games to collaborative applications inside wave, to integration with other communication systems (like twitter, etc.), to integration of waves into work flows”

      Yes, that’s it.

      tags: googlewave, collaboration, communication

    • Dirk Röhrborn of Communardo is sharing their experiences with using the microblogging tool Communote in project communication (he’s citing previous posts that deal with the mechanisms too).

      Several implications, like e.g.
      # Digitalisation of Micro Information
      # Tool Shift (I like this, showing both the complementary nature of microblogging in the Enterprise **and** that its low barrier of entry is easing communication overall)
      # Information Awareness
      # Efficient Meetings and Fast Reactions
      # Support for Project Managers
      # Knowledge Sharing

      tags: communote, microblogging, projectmanagement, knowledgework, communication

      • Digitalisation of Micro Information
      • Tool Shift
      • Information Awareness
      • Efficient Meetings and Fast Reactions
      • Support for Project Managers
      • Knowledge Sharing
    • Nicole Simon has done an interview with Clay Shirky, talking about social media as a whole but there are some Enterprise 2.0 related learnings in there as well (when Clay was at this years CeBIT webciety it was like that as well, talking about social media is **very** beneficial to Enterprise 2.0 people too).

      Some snippets:
      * 5 word synopsis for Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing Without Organizations: Group action just got easier
      * relevant participation patterns
      * why the product department should adopt these new tools, not marketing
      * we are in the infancy of use of social tools in companies
      * if old organisations will not catch up, startups will do the job for them

      tags: interview, future, trends, collaboration, enterprise2.0, socialmedia

    • German language post covering the use of twitter during a conference - seen from the eyes of the conferemce organizers.

      I am seeing Twitter (and Poken-enabled social networking) as one of the supporting tools for the E20SUMMIT - but what do regular conference attendees are thinking of this? Does it distract you or do you welcome this as an additional layer of conversation and networking?

      Comments welcome.

      tags: no_tag

    • Another post on Google Wave,this time from Burton Group. What triggered me this time - it’s the cumulative insight we get from these Wave posts on 1. the future of collaboration and 2. the strategic reasoning Google employs (yes, supporting ideas like Wave seemed to be worthwhile for them, because it’s about the potentials of better collaboration for performance). Case prooved ;)

      Snip:
      # “Wave is what email would look like if it were invented today” and we are told Google is open sourcing the protocol and software, then this starts looking like a grand plan indeed.

      # The key here will be what and how much of Google’s code will be open sourced. Rasumussen said “We intend to open source the lion share of the code we use to build our system.” This is a good start but what does this really mean in terms of code? To some, “lion share” sounds like Google is hedging its bet.

      tags: googlewave, opensource

      • “Wave is what email would look like if it were invented today” and we are told Google is open sourcing the protocol and software, then this starts looking like a grand plan indeed.
      • The key here will be what and how much of Google’s code will be open sourced. Rasumussen said “We intend to open source the lion share of the code we use to build our system.” This is a good start but what does this really mean in terms of code? To some, “lion share” sounds like Google is hedging its bet.

    Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

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  • Experts profile: James Dellow

    1.) What is your name?

    James Dellow

    2.) Who are you and what are you doing?

    I’m a consultant working in the field of social computing. I work for Headshift, a specialist social media and enterprise social computing consulting company. Headshift was founded in the UK, but has been operating in Australasia since 2008.

    3.) How did you get to the E2.0 topic?

    Many people mistake me for a ‘techie’, but I have never worked in an IT department. During the early part of my career I found myself in the position where I was the person who was the go-between for business and IT. I became interested in Enterprise 2.0 through my experiences in knowledge management (formed at Ernst & Young), and then later as a consultant working with a range large organisations (particularly with CSC) - as a result I have an appreciation for both the organisational and technology challenges that Enterprise 2.0 aims to change.

    I also completed a Master of Business & Technology at the University of New South Wales (Sydney, Australia) in 2005 - so my feet are firmly planted in the grey area between social and computing.

    4.) What is your understanding of the core concept of the Enterprise 2.0 idea?

    I approach Enterprise 2.0 with a management perspective - heavily influenced by systems thinking - that takes into account the relationship between the social and technology aspects of applying Web 2.0 inside an organisation. This means results will vary between organisations because of the complexity of those relationships and the environment where they exist.

    In practice this means I don’t believe simply installing a blog or a wiki makes you ‘Enterprise 2.0’. But equally, without the technology its doesn’t work (at least at the scale we need - Andrew McAfee captured this well in his SLATES model). In my own thinking I’ve tried to distinguish between Enterprise 2.0 and other applications of Web 2.0 inspired information management technologies under the theme of Intranet 2.0.

    Also, despite my background in knowledge management, I don’t treat Enterprise 2.0 as the next iteration of knowledge management although its is very complementary.

    5.) What are the main potentials of the Enterprise 2.0 idea?

    I’ll answer this in a round about way. When we look at the evolution of our modern industrial society (embodied in the classic organisational structure), information and communication technologies (ICT) have been at work in the background supporting and shaping this evolution. Critically they have allowed organisations to scale, while also extending their organisational span of control so they can achieve their objectives in at least a semi-cohesive way.

    However, with this growth and globalisation the actual environment for organisations has become more complex. As a result the command and control approach that ICT supported in the past is failing to keep up.

    To operate effectively, we need systems that allow people to work in a way where social controls direct action and allow problem solving, not fixed hierarchical processes that are inflexible and often out of date. The experience of Web 2.0 on the Internet is already demonstrating that there is a better way for organisations to learn from.

    This doesn’t mean the future won’t be transactional either - Amazon and eBay are all examples at one end of the Web 2.0 spectrum that mix efficient high volume transactions with social controls.

    But as we move towards Enterprise 2.0 we need to remember that its not just about changing technology, at the same time society and the shape of organisations will also be changing. As a result, the workplace might also become a little more fun and interesting because of Enterprise 2.0.

    6.) What are the main challenges, threads and issues of the Enterprise 2.0 idea?

    To quote Clay Shirky,

    “Every story in [Here Comes Everybody] relies on a successful fusion of a plausible promise, an effective tool, and an acceptable bargain with the users”

    This gets back to the point that there are set of complex interactions at work that determine how successful any organisation can be with adopting Enterprise 2.0 as a way of organising. However, many people choose to only focus one aspect. This is a recipe for failure.

    On the organisational side, Enterprise 2.0 is a clear challenge to existing organisational power structures. Information is power only if information access and flow can be controlled - but Enterprise 2.0 changes that rule and some people will be threatened by it.

    On the technology side many of the strengths of the Web 2.0 model are hidden from the average Internet user - however, when we move Web 2.0 into organisations much of that hidden Web 2.0 infrastructure (both technology and people) is missing. Unfortunately, traditional enterprise IT management often works at a tangent to the Web 2.0 approach, so there is some ‘pain’ associated with this change.

    7.) Please give us three tags that describe your person and work best?

    business-and-technology, systems thinking, collaborative

    8.) Please give us three links to articles/contributions that describe your views best?

    You’ll also find more articles here, but three selected are

    9.) Please give us three names of colleagues that you would refer to as brother-in-spirit?

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    E 2.0 links

    Enterprise 2.0 SUMMIT at Facebook