(LAS VEGAS) Lest you be tingling with excitement about the potential enhancements to your less than spectacular content management system, there are two realities for SharePoint 2010: what is promised, and what is hoped for.
Those working with MOSS 2007 can be forgiven for the vacuous deflating sound from their proverbial balloons – those familiar with 2007 promises that don’t materialize as promised (e.g. People Search); others attending the annual SharePoint Conference in Las Vegas can be forgiven for their rapid inhalation of hot air as there is great reason to be optimistic, even excited.
Nonetheless, I’ve been both impressed and underwhelmed with what I’ve seen, but more time is needed for Microsoft to complete the beta testing and final refinements before 2010 ships to customers in the spring of 2010. When I asked SharePoint chief Tom Rizzo to explain how he thought the content management functionality compared with other market leaders, Rizzo – speaking as a proud, if not slightly defensive father – instead turned the question back on me: “I challenge all of the other vendors to offer as comprehensive a platform as SharePoint – nothing comes close.” Touché!
Here are five of the biggest impact, promised improvements to enterprise content management (ECM) that I’ve seen with my own two eyes, and even used (albeit with mixed success as the ‘lab’ demos are not all working as promised, and a demo is in fact just a demo):
1-Publishing platform – the entire publishing platform is, in essence, a wiki. You can choose to lock down wiki or public authoring rights, extend them to some, or extend them to all. However, it is possible to create sites as wikis. The wikis come with complete version control, history and permissions, and the rich editor or “ribbon” functionality (as seen in Word 200).
2-Web content management (WCM) – communications professionals rejoice: publishing news and other static content just got a lot easier. The new publishing includes the new “ribbon” user tool that opens when you click on a page or a document, or you simply hit the edit button at the top of a page. Instead of opening a content ‘template’ the new publishing features in-context editing: click on whatever piece of content you want to “edit”, and edit right there on the page (just as you would a wiki). New image tools allow for better control and manipulation of photos, and you no longer have to make the extra step of uploading a photo to a document library before you input it into the page – you can now pull images right from your hard drive, or a website URL.
3-Records management (RM) – Microsoft has invested a lot of money in improving RM in 2010. Among the many features that have impressed, users or administrators (or someone else that has permission to do so) are able to lock down a document in a document library, as a record. And with a right click, can send that document to a Record Center with confirmation. Additional Life Cycle controls have been added.
4-Digital asset management (DAM) – yes, SP 2010 actually includes DAM – you no longer have to use a third-party option to professionally manage images, video and other multimedia.
5-Taxonomy & meta data – perhaps the single, most impressive upgrade or enhancement to SharePoint is the addition of true taxonomy and meta datacontrols. All content now comes with a Managed Meta Data Service Term set that can be inherited from the global taxonomy (site collection), can be built upon or controlled by an administrator, or open to all users (or a combination). In other words, when content is created, be it a page, document, wiki, meta data can be added on the spot, as determined by the publisher or limited to a pre-determined set or tree of terms that is locked down. End readers and users can ‘tag’ the content as well with term tags, ratings (1-5 starts) and “I like it.” What is most encouraging about the use of meta data is that it can be “forced” or a “mandatory field” for all content (we all know that most organizations have options to input meta tags on content, but most content authors ignore it if given the choice).
Other taxonomy features:
·Term ‘nesting” or “threading”(think of the tree with parent & children categories)
·“Fill-in” choices as an option in locked-down taxonomies
·Different taxonomies at different levels: site collections, sites, libraries, etc.
·Managed meta data service can be consumed by multiple farms
·Multilingual taxonomy support (taxonomies using multiple languages)
·Taxonomy workflow (invite specific people to contribute or review the taxonomy)
·View and filter documents by term:
oGeography
oProduct Category
oVertical Industry
oContent Type
oDeal Size
oFolders
oEtc.
While not all of these promised improvements were working in the hands-on labs in my time spent using MOSS 2010, this is in-fact only the beta version (in fact, one of the MS officials helping me through the hands-on labs told me that some of the tutorials are in fact still alpha versions. In fact, the first time I used the new wiki I was convinced it was the 2007 version as I could see not a single improvement to it). There is still some 6 or 7 months still to pass before Microsoft has to work out all the bugs, kinks, and refinements (planned release to existing MOSS 2007 customers is at the end of April, though I would not expect something for installation much before the summer; new customers will have to wait even longer).
Finally, it’s worth noting that MOSS is a massively complex, and powerful system. It’s to be expected that some of the promised functionality may not work for some time, or without serious additional development and customization. In fact, any organization considering an upgrade may do well to wait until after the first service pack, or simply trial the new SharePoint Online which will have close to feature parity with the installed, on premises version.
An
organization without a 2.0 strategy risks being left behind, or
outright failure (though death may be slow). Employees want to work
for progressive and innovative organizations, and expect 2.0
environments from employers of choice.
561
organizations of all sizes from across the planet participated in the
Intranet 2.0 Global Survey
and the results
reveal rapid adoption of social media on the corporate intranet in
the past year.
Once
a nice-to-have or a future wish, Intranet 2.0 tools such as blogs,
wikis and other vehicles have become mainstream, and are present in
nearly 50% of organizations (regardless of size) in the Western
World.
Intranet
blogs, wikis and discussion forums are quite pervasive, while other
less common tools such as podcasts and mashups remain an
after-thought at most organizations:
47%
have intranet wikis (17% enterprise deployment); 10% have no
plans or interest
45%
have intranet blogs (13% enterprise deployment); 11% have no
plans or interest
46%
have intranet discussion forums (19% enterprise use); 9% have
no plans or interest
46%
have intranet instant messaging (29% enterprise use); 21%
have no plans or interest
19%
have intranet social networking (6% enterprise use); 20% have
no plans or interest
Microsoft
dominance
Microsoft
is leading the 2.0 charge and dominating all competition. For those
organizations that have deployed 2.0 tools inside the firewall, about
half of all organizations have SharePoint (in some shape or form):
48%
of organizations use SharePoint
20%
of organizations use Facebook,17% of organizations use MediaWiki,16%
of organizations use WordPress
Cost
of Intranet 2.0
Intranet
2.0 is cheap. Of those organizations that have implemented 2.0 tools,
almost half have spent $10,000 or less on these tools:
46%
have spent $10,000 or less
35%
have spent between $10,000 and $100,000,19% have spent $100,000 or
more
Poor
execution
Sadly
though, despite the low cost of entry and ease of technology,
satisfaction levels with Intranet 2.0 tools are dangerously low:
Only
29% of organizations rate the tool functionality as good or very
good; 24% rate them as poor or very poor
Satisfaction
rates with executives is dangerously low: only 23% of executives
rate the 2.0 tools as good or very good; 38% rate them as poor or
very poor
To
download a free, summarized version of the report please visit:
36%
come from the U.S; 24% from Europe; 11% from Canada; 11% from
Australia / New Zealand; 10% from UK
61%
have more than 1,000 employees; 32% have 6,000 or more employees;
39% have less than 1000 employees
53%
of organizations have had an intranet for 7 or more years; 17% of
organizations have had an intranet for 2 years or less
13%
of the organizations are government; 13% from technology; 12% from
financial services; 6% from healthcare
The
survey was led by Toby Ward, President, Prescient Digital Media
About
Prescient Digital Media
Prescient
Digital Media is a group of senior intranet and Internet consultants
that provide strategic Internet and intranet consulting, planning and
communications services to organizations of all sizes. Our clients
include: Amgen, Covidien, CBC, CIBC, HSBC, Liberty Mutual, Manulife
Financial, Mastercard, Nintendo, Pepsi, RBC Financial Group, TD, and
more than 100 others. Prescient’s focus includes the
assessment, planning, technology selection, content and launch of
intranets, websites, and web-based tools. For more information please
contact Prescient Digital Media through the website at
www.PrescientDigital.com
or phone 416.926.8800.
Social
media adoption has accelerated on the corporate intranet, led by
blogs, wikis and discussion forums. Despite a low cost of entry—often
below $10,000—adopters are not reporting outstanding satisfaction
with the investment, especially among the executive ranks, driven by
inadequate planning and weak or non-existent business plans.
This
data is contained is contained in the results of the Intranet
2.0 Global Survey,
which included the participation of 561 organizations of all sizes
from across the planet.
Intranet
2.0 Global Survey Results
“Once
a nice-to-have or a future wish, Intranet 2.0 tools such as blogs,
wikis and other vehicles have become mainstream, and are present in
nearly 50% of organizations (regardless of size) in North America,
Europe, and Australia and New Zealand,” says Toby Ward, the study
author, and President, Prescient Digital Media.
The study is the latest in the TechRadar series, Forrester’s research methodology used to predict the success of a set of related technologies over the next decade. The enterprise Web 2.0 analysis provides insight for two roles: Information & Knowledge Management professionals and Vendor Strategy professionals.
"Web 2.0 collaboration technologies solve problems that enterprises have today, but most companies have not used these tools anywhere near their potential" said Gil Yehuda, senior analyst, Forrester Research. "This new research illustrates to enterprise users where the smart money is invested and where to place their strategic bets. In the current economic climate, Forrester believes collaboration tools can save enterprises operation costs by getting people and processes together quickly and efficiently"
"While so much of the buzz around Web 2.0 has focused on the business-to-consumer market, the greatest opportunity today for vendors is in the business-to-business collaboration space" said Oliver Young, analyst, Forrester Research. "Some Web 2.0 collaboration technologies have shown a faster-than-normal life cycle, so it is critical for vendors to take stock of the enterprise tools that have the greatest long-term potential and invest wisely in those technologies"
Forrester previously estimated the enterprise Web 2.0 collaboration market will hit $1.8 billion by 2013. The enterprise Web 2.0 TechRadar study is based upon an analysis of previous research and interviews with industry experts, vendors responsible for building or implementing these technologies, and enterprise customers and users.
Forrester predicts the following Web 2.0 collaboration technologies will continue to experience growth:
o Social networks (cultural resistance exists, but Forrester believes this will eventually break)
o Wikis (users report success with Wiki endeavors, particularly when sponsored by business leaders)
o Blogging (social networks will breathe new life into internal blogs by providing more context to blogged content, but Forrester found that blogging alone does not capture the audience’s attention)
o RSS (underappreciated in the enterprise)
The following Web 2.0 technologies have large and resilient ecosystems, according to Forrester, and can last for several years or even decades, but over time, the markets will become highly consolidated, customer numbers will flatten, and revenues will level off or decline:
o Podcasting is on the decline. Users tell Forrester that podcasts in the context of enterprise productivity and collaboration are neither very engaging nor immersive, and the vendor landscape is shrinking.
o Forums are underused. While forums will continue on as a fundamental enabling technology for collaboration, the marketplace is flat, and forums will become part of larger community-focused packages.
View the full report Enterprise Web 2.0" and "Forrester TechRadar™ For Vendor Strategists: Enterprise Web 2.0" are currently available to Forrester RoleView™ clients and can be purchased directly at forrester.com.
Bill Ives agrees with most of the reports findings, but believes mashups should be listed with the social networking and wikis as “significant” successful technologies:
“In my discussions with vendors, mashups are being increasingly used as the application development platform underlying many tools,” says Ives in his post More from Forrester on the Future of Enterprise 2.0 Technologies. “So it is both getting harder to separate them and they are becoming more pervasive. I think social bookmarks provide a useful utility that is getting integrated into other tools.”
However, Bill cautions organizations who look at all or any of these tools as a stand-alone technology working in isolation.
“I see an increasing movement among vendors to provide integrated platforms that make use of a number of these tools. Even a very focus(ed) tool like Connectbeam combines social networking with social bookmarking and integrates it with search. Broader platforms like Traction make use of blogs, wikis, forums, and, most recently microblogging. Deki Wiki and Central Desktop combine many of these tools with a wiki platform under the covers.”
My study on Intranet 2.0 reveals similar findings about the adoption rate and usefulness of these technologies – and why some companies aren’t bothering to adopt them. If you want a full copy of the findings, you must complete the survey– even if you don’t have Web 2.0 / Intranet 2.0 tools your feedback is invaluable. To that end, make sure you please take 10 minutes to take the Intranet 2.0 Global Survey and you’ll get a copy of the full results including the good, bad and learned lessons.
(AARHUS, DENMARK) “There’s a lot of stories and
expirments about wikis… and misconceptions’ says Dorthe Jespersen, an analyst
with J. Boye, and co-author of author of the report, Wiki in the Enterprise.
Jespersen
cites three major myths (or perceptions) of why organizations choose a wiki:
1-Everyone contributes
2-It’s easy
3-Information at hand
Myth 1: Everyone
contributes
The most
common means or purposes for using a wiki include:
Brainstorming
Project work
Meeting agendas
Encyclopedia
Manual
Documentation
Intranet
Communicating externally
Common
corporate refrains (comments):
·“We didn’t know what to expect and how to communicate at
all in the wiki.”
·“No one wanted to write in the wiki. And those who did,
got offended when others edited their text.”
Unfortunately,
for those that have started using wikis well-know, if you build it, they will
not come.
Myth 2:
It’s easy
Jespersen
points no further than Wikipedia’s editor (editor’s note: if you thought your CMS editor was user unfriendly…).
Myth 3:
Information (will always be) at hand
The wiki
is not necessarily going to give you what you need. Jespersen cites the search
engine in MediaWiki that produces very unruly and confusing results. Like most
technologies, the technology is as only as good as the people involved and
their contributions to the technology (editor’s opinion).
Jespersen
and the J. Boye report Wiki in the Enterprise offer four over-arching
recommendations for deploying wikis on the intranet:
Organisational readiness.
Organisational culture is a critical factor for success in wiki projects.
Organisations must be comfortable with sharing information and debating
openly.
Setting expectations. Before
deploying a wiki organisations should assess the commitment actually
required, both from management and employees.
Getting adoption. Adoption of
the wiki will not happen by itself; rather it can be supported through a
prepared launch followed by training.
Content creation. To tackle
problems with structure running wild and quality of content, employ
training, guidelines and dedicated wiki managers.
As I
highlighted last week in Web
2.0 not a priority for CIOs, the adoption rate of social media is
surprisingly low given the adoption by every day consumers. Here’s the summary:
14% of organizations use
blogs
13% use social tagging
software
11% use wikis
72% of CIOs have no plans to
use blogs in the next 5 years
74% no plans to use wikis
Last year’s
Global
Intranet Survey of 177 global intranet managers (medium to large
organizations with 5,000 to 100,000 employees) found that Intranet 2.0 adoption
is not much better:
Less than 20% of the
respondents that have more than 50,000 employees have established 2.0
strategies
None of the respondents with employees
in the 5,000 – 50,000 employees have 2.0 strategies
About 30% or less have
implemented blogs
About 40% have implemented
wikis
While
Prescient’s Intranet
2.0 Global Survey is an important one, it is focused solely on Intranet
2.0. Jane McConnell has prepared the 2008 Global Intranet Survey
and if you haven’t signed up to participate then don’t hesitate further: your
organization needs this information and you need to participate so you can get
a copy of the 2008 results as soon as possible (THE DEADLINE IS THIS SUNDAY, AUGUST 31). To participate, send an email to Jane specifying:
“Looking for greater flexibility and support for more ad hoc processes, employees have responded with a more bottom-up approach, in some cases circumventing official information systems,” say CMS Watch Founder Tony Byrne and contributing analyst Jarod Gingras, the principal authors of The Enterprise Social Software Report 2008.
CMS Watch's social media vendors matrix.
In other words, if your organization hasn’t embraced and standardized social software, your employees will begin installing it and using it without your permission. I know of what client that only found out recently that 15% of their employee base had voluntarily joined a dedicated company Facebook site. At BT, 4,000 employees formed their own “BT Facebook” site. BT took note and in response built their own social networking site called MyBT (see The power of Intranet 2.0).
If your organization hasn’t already developed an Intranet 2.0 plan (social media plan), you would do well to develop one before employees develop their own. This plan ideally contains the business case for moving to Intranet 2.0. Byrne and Gingras cite a number of business benefits to implementing enterprise social software:
While a plan is a must, an even more difficult task may be the selection of the actual software that will power your Intranet 2.0 – there are now hundreds of solutions on the market. The Enterprise Social Software Report dissects the capabilities of 20 different social software (social media) solutions for Intranet 2.0 (or Web 2.0) including those from:
IBM (Lotus Connections)
SharePoint
Connectbeam
Facebook
Google (Blogger)
MediaWiki
Socialtext
and others
Each of these solutions are reviewed for their business service uses including:
Blog
Wiki
Social Ranking
Project Tracking & Participation
Multimedia
Info Filtering
File Sharing
Web Conferencing
Discussion Forums
Presence / Instant Messaging (IM)
People Finding (e.g. social networking)
All of this is rated according to various Administration & System Services (e.g. security, analytics, etc.) and various corporate scenarios (e.g. Enterprise Collaboration, Project Collaboration, etc.).
Some interesting notes regarding the two big solutions, SharePoint and Lotus Connections / Quickr:
Lotus Connections / Quickr: strong social networking, strong presence and IM tools, excellent integration with Notes and emerging Outlook connectors, and an innovative Blackberry application; “underwhelming blog/wiki” and requires WebSphere Portal for roles and group modules – best for Enterprise Networking; poor for Project Collaboration.
Microsoft SharePoint (MOSS 2007): broad range of third-party plug-ins, lightweight portal services including bundled applications and lightweight document and records management services into social applications, search works well in an all-SharePoint environment; almost all native services are weak compared to competitors, near complete absence of social networking, social tagging & Bookmarking, and surprisingly weak integration with Outlook – best for Project Collaboration (e.g. team sites); poor for Enterprise deployments.
In short, Lotus is a better enterprise solution; SharePoint is a better project or team solution.
Regardless, 20 different products are reviewed in detail (from 10 – 25 pages per product review) and it’s a worthwhile read if you are looking at implementing social media or Intranet 2.0 software. Buy CMS Watch’s Enterprise Social Media Report 2008 (they offer a 30-day, 100% money-back guarantee).
If you’re looking to move to Intranet 2.0, but don’t exactly know how, then have a look at our Intranet 2.0 Blueprint service, or call me at 416.986.2226.
There are a number of reasons why a corporation or a not-for-profit should adopt Intranet 2.0 tools.Enhancing communications and collaboration with employees, and improving employee investment and retention are primary considerations. But there’s another more pressing need: snooze or lose.
While the intranet still plays poor cousin to the all-important website, intranet 2.0 cannot play backseat to any organization looking to differentiate itself from the competition.
“You really have no choice,” says Steve Krol, EVP of Professional Services with Lyons Consulting Group, which has worked with the likes of AON, Porsche and even Playboy. “Social media represents a full-fledge media /communication channel that will evolve with or without you. It’s another accepted form of communications that people want.
2.0 TURNS MAINSTREAM
Nearly 50% of organizations are now using social media and intranet 2.0 tools. 561 organizations of all sizes from across the planet participated in the Intranet 2.0 Global Survey and the results reveal rapid adoption of social media on the corporate intranet in the past year.
Intranet blogs, wikis and discussion forums are quite pervasive, while other less common tools such as podcasts and mashups remain an after-thought at most organizations:
47% have intranet wikis (17% enterprise deployment); 10% have no plans or interest
45% have intranet blogs (13% enterprise deployment); 11% have no plans or interest
46% have intranet discussion forums (19% enterprise use); 9% have no plans or interest
46% have intranet instant messaging (29% enterprise use); 21% have no plans or interest
19% have intranet social networking (6% enterprise use); 20% have no plans or interest
BENEFITS
While there are many benefits that most organizations can reap from employing Enteprise 2.0 tools, Krol cites five over-arching employee benefits:
Engagement
Retention
Productivity
Cost Reduction
Time-to-market
While the softer more ethereal benefits such as “engagement” and “productivity” will not excite too many accountants, there are plenty of case studies that demonstrate real return on investment (ROI) including costs savings and increased revenue.
INTRANET 2.0 CASE STUDIES
T. Rowe Price adds 1,500 workers to work in its call center for each tax season (for approximately 3 months). Training these workers is large, involved exercise, but imperfect. Price’s corporate trainers got smart and transferred the entire training program to a wiki. Price encouraged new employees to take notes during the sessions and then add notes, comments and recommendations to the wiki. As a result, the company estimates that it saves one to two minutes per call at $20 per minute (the net result is in the millions of dollars).
BlueShirt Nation (BSN) is a secure and private social networking site for more than 100,000 Best Buy employees. Established by Best Buy as a means of engaging employees for ideas for innovation and improving the business, the online community encourages discussion about whatever they want to talk about (e.g. pets, sports, etc.).
“In general, they talk about how to make Best Buy a better place,” says founder and sponsor Gary Koelling. “Improve on the things we don't do well, share the things that we do do well, talk about and express the culture that we have, talk about customers- both good and bad.”
Some control was sacrificed to help increase the engagement which among other things encouraged employees to participate in a video contest that promoted their 401k retirement campaign. Employees were encouraged to upload their own videos to the site as part of the contest (see a sample at Best Buy Using Social Media for Employee Engagement). Out of 140,000 Best Buy employees (almost all young), BSN helped increase the number of employees signing up for 401(k) accounts by 30%, and no doubt has contributed to a significant increase in employee retention in a tight staffing market.
At Placemaking, the entire intranet is built on a wiki platform (Intranet case study: Intrawest Placemaking). A Placemaking project manager using the intranet (wiki) created a page about a method of finishing concrete floors that creates an appearance better than tile at a substantially lower cost – saving the company $500,000 and reducing the project timeline. Other project managers in Florida and Nevada posted comments to the page, asking further questions and adding comments. In response, Hartigan posted photos of the finished job and addressed their comments. The other construction managers planned on using this valuable knowledge in future projects, potentially saving the company millions of dollars.
Adopting an intranet wiki or blog however should not be done without the requisite planning and change management. Here are a number of suggestions for proceeding:
Listen - Understand and monitor the social web to see what is being said about you, and ask your customers / employees what they want.
Monitor - Ensure you’re aware of which community websites (e.g. YouTube) your audience and competitors are using
Benchmark - Understand the ingredients of a good blog, wiki or podcast; watch and cherry-pick from the leaders
Leadership – Senior management must set the tone; your executives must be leading the dialogue and controlling the message
Plan - Planning is an essential requisite for success; develop a plan that is based on a thorough assessment and contains key performance indicators (KPIs)
Governance – very tool needs an owner and a policy (terms of use)
Technology - choose your vendors carefully based on business requirements & needs
Refresh – keep your content and tools relevant and fresh, and ensure they cross-promote your latest products and services
Measure - Document the link between social media and the business and develop a set of performance metrics with baselines that are regularly measured
Engage – gather constant feedback and act quickly on necessary changes
Finally, consider an Enterprise 2.0 undertaking as “evolution not revolution” – there’s no need to solve the world on your first attempt; test and pilot solutions and enhance as necessary before trying to conquer the world.
10 INTRANET 2.0 SOLUTIONS TO WATCH:
SocialCast
Yammer
ConnectBeam
SocialText
Google Gadgets
Lotus Connections
Quickr
SharePoint
Confluence
ThoughtFarmer
THE INTRANET 2.0 GLOBAL SURVEY
The findings of the Intranet 2.0 Global Survey are highlighted in the report "Intranet 2.0: social media becomes mainstream on the corporate intranet." 561 organizations took part in the survey.
