chieftech’s blog

Its not not about the technology | CC-BY

Apple, Windows, Linux... who really cares?

via katecarruthers.com

Yeah, the video is silly and probably NSFW. However, as my colleague Kate writes in her post with this video:

"Many people in the IT industry don’t realise that operating systems are not important to ordinary folks. We don’t want to be bothered with things that live under the surface of our devices.

This is one of the reasons Apple has made such inroads in recent years, they abstract the complexity away from users so nicely. It is also why Linux is starting to get a bit more traction, they’ve finally realised most people don’t want to fiddle with a command line to install things."

I wrote something similar myself.

Review of User Adoption Strategies by Michael Sampson

Michael called his book, User Adoption Strategies, but I think of it more as the User Adoption Strategies Encyclopaedia... :-)

The emphasis of this book is on describing a range of strategies that will work for second wave adopters, rather than a magic formula approach. He does provide a user adoption model to follow that pulls these strategies into a manageable framework, but within this approach there is still room for these different options to be fitted together into what he later describes as the user adoption "jigsaw". This model consists of four steps:

  1. Winning Attention;
  2. Cultivating Basic Concepts;
  3. Enlivening Applicability; and
  4. Making It Real.

However, as Michael points out, this puzzle can be extended to fit complex situations, where different strategies need to be used at different types or with different groups. He also reminds us that this approach can take days or weeks to finalise, but then may take months or years to put into practice. As I said, this isn't a magic formula approach!

I also like the idea of the User Adoption Analyst. Even if this isn't a formal role in your own project, the job description provides some great pointers on the activities that someone in your project should be doing as part of your rollout. I know this because it pretty much reflects my own role in projects I've been involved with in the past, both as a consultant and in my past life at Ernst & Young!

However, it is important to recognise that by covering the breadth of user adoption strategies, this book isn't intended to be an academic report or even a deep management-thinkers text. The essentials of every strategy is covered in terms of what it is, how to use it, when to use it and why it works. In many cases, this should be enough to get you started but of course there is always room to explore the nuances of a particular strategy further or to understand the theory behind it in more detail. I only mention this to manage expectations - no single book can make you an overnight expert. What I mainly like about Michael's book is that he has pulled together a great reference that covers all the major approaches that you should consider.

Its also worth noting that Michael has clearly put a lot of thought into the structure of the book, with the chapters grouped into three main sections:

  • Setting the Scene.
  • The Model and the Strategies.
  • Your Approach to User Adoption.

This is the kind of book that once you've read it, you'll find yourself returning to the core chapters in the The Model and the Strategies section time and time again to sense check your approach and to remind yourself of the most typical approaches you should consider.

Overall, this is another practical book from Michael and I'm happy to recommend it.

Finally, I should give a quick nod of appreciation to Michael for the acknowledgement in Chapter 4, where he quotes the tag line of my blog:

"Its not not about the technology".

BTW I've previously reviewed Michael's earlier book, Seamless Teamwork, over on my old blog.

 

Confluence 3.3 Sneak Peek - new rich text editor features

via blogs.atlassian.com

I was recently asked what is a fairly frequent question... what's the difference between the popular social suite software options, aka enterprise wikis, which includes products like Confluence.

Personally I think one of the stand out features of Confluence is its rich text editor + macro capabilities. In some respects, if you aren't thinking about Confluence with this in mind, then really I'm tempted to ask why are you even considering Confluence. Confluence isn't just a wiki, its an enterprise social swiss army knife. Or as I like to think about it, its the social computing equivalent of the spreadsheet. :-)

However, it can be difficult for novice users to get into using macros and other advanced Confluence features. But this sneak peak of Confluence 3.3 from Matt Hodges really shows how its becoming easier and easier for anyone to become a Confluence wiki ninja and make existing ninjas even more productive.

Flash back to 2003: Low-tech bosses 'wasting' IT investment

Responsibility for this situation is apportioned widely -- from users who lack basic ICT skills, to IT staff who can't or won't connect with the people they serve, to a tech industry which iSociety says is over-hyping its products and failing to deliver on its promises.

But the report gives particular mention to the "lost generation of low-tech managers" who don't understand what technology is about, and therefore fail to make the right strategic decisions.

"Much of UK management make up a 'lost generation' that does not understand ICT, because it did not grow up immersed in technology," the organisation said in a statement. "Technologists, who do have this knowledge, tend to be sidelined in key decision making and are disconnected from the management mainstream. In effect, low-tech managers are forcing the UK economy into a low-tech equilibrium."

via zdnetasia.com

The quote above is from a news story about a 2003 report that was in part the inspiration behind my consulting philosophy. The report, Getting by, not getting on: Technology in UK workplaces, was an output of the UK's Work Foundation's iSociety project but unfortunately it appears to have disappeared from the Web.

The reason I'm mentioning it again now is that I'm reflecting on the comments to my post, Enterprise 2.0: Show me the money (a spreadsheet might help).

Everything this report talks about is still true: Yes, the vendors are over-hyping Enterprise 2.0 and some of the geeks have trouble explaining it. But fundamentally, if you don't want to even try to understand the impact of this technology trend then you too are part of the problem of getting by, not getting on.

Meanwhile there are plenty of organisations that are trying to get on. I've even worked for some of them. And Headshift has its own list of clients as well.

BTW Coincidentally, Lee Bryant from Headshift blogged about this very same report back in 2003 too. :-)

Enterprise 2.0: Show me the money (a spreadsheet might help)

Looking at some of the early reflections on the Enterprise 2.0 conference, the point about return on investment (ROI) and benefits has come up time and time again.

Proponents of Enterprise 2.0 have heralded the shift in the discussion to this issue with offered few answers, but meanwhile the nay sayers continue to point and laugh saying ‘show me the money!’ These critics have pointed out that executives can see the tangible value of three-letter acronym systems, like CRM, ERP, MRP, etc, but not this vague slack sounding Enterprise 2.0 thing. The argument is that they don’t want this vague ‘social’ stuff, they want process specific systems that someone can give a no mucking around bottom line sales pitch business case for, using proper management sounding speak (e.g. speak like we do).

I’m going to step out of that crowd and suggest that perhaps we need to look at this a little differently. For the benefit of the nay sayers, I’ll try to stick with something they should be very familiar with - spreadsheets.

Historically (I’m talking IT years here), spreadsheets have been pretty much ignored by the research community. There is a small clique of researchers interested in spreadsheet risk (a real issue by the way, where financial transactions are concerned) and vendors who are interested in pointing out the problems so they can sell business intelligence solutions. But there is very, very little on the business benefits.

I had trouble finding recent figures, but today there must be absolutely millions of businesses around the world that quite literally run mission critical business processes using spreadsheets. If the City of London is a proxy for other global financial centres (PDF), then I think we can argue that the global economy runs on spreadsheets. In fact, a regulator actually stated:

"Spreadsheets are integral to the function and operation of the global financial system"

Which brings me to this point - the spreadsheet clearly has more than just some passing  value to organisations, it has vital importance.

But if this is true where is the business case for spreadsheets? Further, where is the neatly categorised list of definitive and all encompassing use cases? And I’d like a statement of ROI for each with that too.

Looking back at the history of the spreadsheet, the idea was inspired by observing the frustration and tedious process of a university professor creating a financial model on a blackboard. (hmm, sound like user centred design anyone?) Some people recognised the wider potential - an original review of VisiCalc said this:

“VisiCalc isn't as easy to use as prepackaged home accounting programs, because you're required to design both the layout and the formulas used by the program. Because it is not pre-packaged, however, it's infinitely more powerful and flexible than such programs. You can use VisiCalc to balance your checkbook, keep track of credit card purchases, calculate your net worth, do your taxes - the possibilities arc practically limitless. Using VisiCalc does require a minimum amount of programming skill, but it's far easier to prepare a VisiCalc model than to write an equivalent BASIC program.

Who should buy this program? At $200, it is almost as expensive as an Atari 80OXL. Anyone who has need for more than one accounting package, however, would do well to consider buying VisiCalc instead. With a minimum of effort, you can have VisiCalc performing most functions offered by the home accounting packages, and then some.”

But today, spreadsheets are more than just about numbers. Like cockroaches, spreadsheet have continued to thrive despite the growing (perceived) sophistication of modern enterprise information system. They record data, drive barely repeatable processes, they are spread around by email systems and people use them to address problems that other systems fail to solve. I promise you, the success of every high end TLA system is backed up by spreadsheets. These spreadsheets, often combined with collaboration tools, fill gaps not just in the agility of those TLA systems, but they support more fundamental information sharing and collaboration so that people can actually use and make use of those same systems.

For example, I worked on a strategic IT project for a large, global company where some idealists wanted to push for day 1 reporting from their financial system. But other wise and experienced voices in this field pointed out that day 2 or 3 should be the real aim. Why? Because they needed to collaborate and resolve issues in the data that was coming in from different parts of the organisation first before they committed that data. Note, the point of the argument wasn't that we shouldn't bother with the TLA system and just use spreadsheets, but simply that we should look at the holistic processes and often social/collaborative work practices involved.

Bringing this back to Enterprise 2.0 [or what ever your social software term of choice might be] I’m not suggesting the spreadsheet is an exact analogy. However, there are many similarities worth bearing in mind, particular around the concept of emergence that is at the centre of the Enterprise 2.0 definition:
  • Its what people do with it that adds value;
  • What you can do with it is only limited by your imagination (I’ll let you think about the implications of this);
  • Once you have the software, it doesn’t take a programmer to apply those ideas, although you might need a few superusers; and
  • Implemented incorrectly, it can introduce risks.
If you still don't agree, then I suggest you put your money where your mouth is: Have a go at suggesting to CFO’s that there is no sound evidence-based business case for the spreadsheets and in fact the evidence that does exist creates risk. The only sensible thing to do, and to avoid all this spreadsheet hype of course, is to immediately remove spreadsheets from the corporate network. And think of all that money we’ll save in licensing. That makes good business sense, doesn’t it?

What do you think?

New research from Pew on Social Isolation and New Technology

This Pew Internet Personal Networks and Community survey is the first ever that examines the role of the internet and cell phones in the way that people interact with those in their core social network. Our key findings challenge previous research and commonplace fears about the harmful social impact of new technology
via pewinternet.org

Well worth reading. Its just shows that our relationship with technology is often a lot more complex that it first appears.

Just seen on E2TV - Lesson Learned from the 2.0 Thoroughbreds

This image licensed under Creative Commons BY-NC-ND

Just seen on E2TV. For the record, I've never said otherwise, but good to see evidence supporting this now coming through from the field.

Having said that, the important point to also consider here is that the risks and cost associated with the technology itself have vastly improved. And as RRW comment:

What's striking about asking questions about all of this is the absence of discussions about the monumental waste in IT spending over the years. Hundreds of billions of dollars have been lost to IT projects that have gone hay wire. The new world of enterprise 2.0 technologies are lightweight in comparison and a fraction of the cost.

And we haven't even begun to take into account the actual benefits of organisations that can work more productively, using social computing.

Read the unofficial guide to Google Wave online
via completewaveguide.com

Even if you don't have a Wave account, its well worth having a read to understand the potential and also the challenge of Wave's "Universally Confusing Initial User Experience".

12 knowledge worker profiles matched to appropriate collaboration technologies

via whatmatters.mckinseydigital.com

The authors of this short piece on collaboration propose 12 categories of knowledge worker that they have matched to different collaboration technologies that have defined as being well suited, adequate or ill suited.

I'm a little worried about some of the suggested technologies (they recommend fax machines for some, but why not scan-to-email?) and I think you need to be careful to rule out a tool that is marked as ill suited for collaboration as it might still have application to that knowledge worker *outside* the domain of collaboration itself. However, even thinking about the 12 categories does help to raise awareness that different knowledge workers have different collaboration needs, and that's a good thing!

They also 10 forms of waste in collaboration, which might be a great starting point for putting together a business case to support collaboration with technology.