Why did that particular article come to mind ? In the context of McKinsey’s research summary, for two reasons.
The first because the article started out with several paragraphs that took us back to the 50’s and William H. Whyte’s famous “The Organization Man“, noting that basically organizational structures and basic management techniques haven’t changed much since then, whilst juxtaposing that with the increasingly obvious facts that with the Web, web services and tools and mobile devices many (if not most) knowledge workers are continuously connected and ever-more densely interlinked … today we euphemistically call it ‘networked’.
The second because towards the end of the article The New Organisation McKinsey and Mercer (two high-end blue-ribbon management consulting firms) were cited as demonstrating rapidly growing interest in, and awareness of, the emerging new landscape for networked knowledge work.
So … given the arrival and settling into place of what’s called Web 2.0, I think that the McKinsey summary mirrors what many leading thinkers have been saying for some time about the impact of the interactive participative Web on the workplace. It’s useful, as it offers a fairly concise overview of the core issues associated with the shifts in leadership, management and basic organizational effectiveness management; and because it’s McKinsey, it provides an imprimatur of legitimacy to the ongoing discussion of and refinement of strategic and practical implementation issues related to this massive era-defining shift in the way work is perceived, designed and carried out.
To be fair, people at McKinsey have also been paying attention to knowledge work for quite a while now. Anyone remember the name Brooks Manville – closely associated with McKinsey’s knowledge management practice back in the day ?
To help us all understand even more clearly, here’s a video clip explaining McKinsey’s Six Ways to Make Web 2.0 Work.
I was on an information exchange teleconference last Friday with engineers from one of my clients and engineers from one of their partners. The topic was the generational shift in the workforce and a general knowledge sharing about techniques each is using to support both the newer and the older generations in the shift.
I was struck by a comment made on the call that the anticipated “brain drain” from the retirement of baby boomers (a much discussed topic several years ago) was not as imminent as previously thought. Why? “It’s the economy, stupid.” Having seen their 401Ks cut in half by the recent economic crisis, many workers are opting to stay longer in the workforce.
Curious, I checked in with my friend Dave DeLong, whose seminal 2004 work on the topic, Lost Knowledge, put all the pieces together along with recommendations for companies to prepare themselves for the (at that time thought to be) inevitable exodus. Dave, of course, has been thinking of this himself and describes the phenomenon as “all these retirement-eligible engineers piling up at the door” (nice image). He also offered the following food for thought:
If those engineers (or other types of experts) are not retiring, they probably recognize that their knowledge is their meal ticket, so why should they be sharing it? I would be on the watch out, then, for more knowledge hoarding, which can be done is a variety of discrete ways.
If all these engineers have decided to stick around because the economy is poor, what is to prevent them for all leaving at once, when things do turn around. My argument is the problems we had before this recession are going to come back to hurt us with a vengeance when business becomes strong again and people start feeling they have other options.
I have heard a consistent story of many organizations currently experiencing older workers delaying retirement. But I have also heard growing concerns about this mass exodus when things turn around. If managers have been lulled into a false sense of security by the current delayed retirements, organizations may be hurt even more in the long term.
Equally problematic is in most organizations resources have been cut for knowledge sharing/transfer activities because of the downturn, which makes implementing solutions even more challenging. I argue for the need to balance the short term “snake pit” of budget cuts and layoffs against the longer terms needs to sustain strategic capabilities.
Dave and I would both be interested in hearing more about what is happening on the ground with companies that were planning to lose workers — what has the impact been?
I have covered RightNow, provider of CRM and customer service support systems, on a number of occasions and wrote about their last release (see – RightNow November ‘08 Release Focuses on Call Center Agent Support). Recently, I spoke with Andrew Hull, Director of Product Marketing at RightNow. Andrew said that in the past people generally bought consumer goods from local stores and went back to those stores for support. They had little connection with the product manufacturer. Now the web has opened up many new channels to make purchases, and, at the same time provided consumers with an easy means to reach out to the manufacturer. Feeling less connected to the direct supplier, they more often turn to the manufacturer when they need support.
RightNow heard about this trend from their customers in the consumer products manufacturer space who now faced new customer support needs. When the close connection occurred at the local sales channel, there was a fairly low percentage of people who actually registered their products with the manufacturer. Now manufacturers need this registration information to more cost effectively support their customers. So, in February ’09, RightNow has built in a number of features to help promote self-service production registrations, making the task easier andensuring higher completion rates.
The process starts when a customer first turns to the manufacturer for support. RightNow will enable them to determine if the product has been registered and encourage this registration if it has not yet occurred. The registration will then open up a number of options for customer self-service, as well as a more focused response, regardless of the channel, including email, live chat, web self-service, or phone.
Increased product registration has benefits for both the manufacturer and the consumer. For the manufacturer, they can gain a better understanding of customers and their buying behavior and build a more personalized relationship with customers. In addition, they can gather critical feedback to guide future product development and proactively communicate relevant sales offers such as warranties, accessories, and upgrade offers based on the products customers currently own and ultimately, increase brand loyalty.
The consumer can more easily find the information they are looking for based on the products they’ve registered; create service requests with a single click that will pre-populate the incident with product information; and view a consolidated list of all products registered. Here is a sample product registration screen.
As someone who has struggled at times with product support, I can see the value here. Companies that provide good support are the ones who get repeat customers. Here is a short video on the new product registration capabilities.
I also asked Andrew how RightNow is doing in the down economy. Like many others in the enterprise 2.0 space, they are doing quite well. The last quarter reported, 4Q 2008, was their best quarter ever. Andrew said that they are more recession resistant than other software companies because they offer a solution that targets cost savings while increasing customer loyalty.
I also asked Andrew how they are using Twitter. He said that they are using Twitter to listen to the issues their customers are facing. Many of their customers are, in turn, using Twitter to monitor their customers, uncover issues, offer support, and better serve their customers. Andrew said that while customer service issues are often uncovered through Twitter, their resolution usually requires moving off Twitter to more robust channels. This is where the range of electronic support tools that RightNow provides can come into play. RightNow is continuing to watch the Twitter space closely, especially as it relates to customer service.
“Twitter customer service: It’s the hot new thing that all the kids are doing! Salesforce has added a new application to its “app exchange” so that clients who use its Service Cloud product can better wrangle Twitter for customer service purposes. It’ll be available this summer.
With the app, called Salesforce CRM for Twitter, clients can monitor Twitter messages that pertain to their company, aggregate the replies and conversations around those messages, and then respond to the inquiries and complaints and whatnot.
The research focuses on the key factors that drive, enable and amplify small business innovation. The report is part of the ongoing Intuit Future of Small Business research series and the first of several research briefs on small business innovation.
A key finding of the research is that small businesses have six inherent attributes that make them natural innovators. These are:
Personal passion: Personally invested, most small business owners are willing to try new approaches to make their business more successful.
Customer connection: A deep and direct relationship with the market and customers helps small businesses understand customer needs, identify new opportunities, and fix problems quickly and efficiently.
Agility and adaptation: Unlike large corporations, small businesses can quickly adapt to changing market conditions and implement new business practices.
Experimentation and improvisation: When pursuing new opportunities, many small business owners and managers aren’t afraid to experiment and improvise, accepting failure as part of the path to success.
Resource limitations: Small businesses are adept at doing more with less. And these resource constraints lend to their innovative mindset.
Information sharing and collaboration: Small businesses traditionally rely on strong social networks to share information and inspire innovative thinking. Online social networks extend and amplify this practice.
These attributes provide small businesses with the ability to respond quickly to changing market conditions and identify and exploit new opportunities.
The research also shows that small business innovation is not limited to tech or high growth firms, but used broadly by small businesses of all sizes and in all sectors of the economy.
Interestingly enough, one of the research findings is that small business owners and managers do not consider themselves or their business innovative. Most feel that innovation is something that only large corporations or venture backed companies do.
But despite not describing or seeing themselves this way, most small businesses are natural and continuous innovators who strive to improve their businesses and provide increased value to their customers.
SkillSoft, a eLearning provider, is continuing its strategy of working with other vendors to expand the access to their content and learning management offerings. Last week I spoke with John Ambrose, Senior Vice President of Strategy, Corporate Development and Emerging Business for SkillSoft to learn more about this move. We discussed their integration with SuccessFactors. I have written about both companies before (see SaaS enters e-learning Through SkillSoft and SuccessFactors: Bringing Web 2.0 to Talent Management).
John said that the SkillSoft vision is to allow access to content at the point of need through a single application, whether the application is theirs or one from a partner such as SuccessFactors. The SkillSoft Open Learning Services Architecture (OLSA) allows partners access to their content and the ability to innovate in the delivery options to their clients. It also contains a series of well-documented APIs. Isn’t Web 2.0 great? Here is sample screen from SkillSoft’s SkillPort LMS.
Their SuccessFactors integration helps companies give employees seamless access to learning assets during their normal course of talent management activities. SuccessFactors users can access SkillSoft content from within the Development module after a single sign-on.They can build this content into their career worksheets. They can also engage in knowledge exploration targeted to their career objectives and the competencies they are currently working on. This exploration can look through the courses, videos, and books uploaded fromthe SkillSoft library. Once they find a useful offering, they can launch it right away.Then the results can be documented in their SuccessFactors development plans. Here is a sample screen shot form the SuccessFactors Development module.
This makes great sense to me. When I was with a large consulting company a number of my colleagues were engaged in integrating talent management with the other aspects of employee development, including learning. Here is a concrete example of making that vision possible that is made easier to achieve by integrating two SaaS offerings through open APIs. We have come a long way since the 90s.
As I have been doing with other interviews, I also asked John about how he is using Twitter. He said that he is primarily using it as a personal notetaking tool, creating his personal knowledge management system. When he goes to a conference, for example, he twitters the key points in a session and tags them. Then he can easily go back and find the messages. Many of my FastForward colleagues where doing this at FastForward 09 while I was creating longer blog posts for the same reason. I think this is a good idea and one that others had not explicitly called out.
As you know if you’re a regular reader of this blog, The AppGap last week hosted a discussion called “5 Big Ideas for Getting All That Work Done.” Moderated by AppGap contributor Anita Campbell, who was joined by leading commentators Jonathan Fields and John Jantsch, the webinar explored and shared insights on handling workloads that, in many cases, have only increased and gotten more stressful in these challenging economic times.
The major takeaways the discussion sought to explore:
How to automate what you hate
How going virtual can help
How being “social” at work is good for business
How to reframe what you do
And how to get your head in the cloud, i.e., move more work to the web
See the end of this post to access the recording of the great conversation – hit play to hear it in place or download it as a podcast for later listening.
Be sure to catch Bill Ives' ongoing review series in which he looks at online, sharable database apps. The focus of Bill's reviews: web-based business software that enables companies and individuals to better organize, track, and share information, as well as better manage projects, processes and workflows.
Looking for apps that help you and your team get work done?
Check out the AppGap's Appopedia, an ever-expanding section with reviews of more than 150 of today's best tools to help you better manage projects and collaborate. Reviews are presented in a useful directory that breaks down tools by category and function, e.g., online crm, project management, human resources, security, etc. Check it out here.
The AppGap Webinar Series
The AppGap has hosted a series of discussions with leading thinkers and doers intended to illuminate how new apps and approaches are changing the way we work and help companies and individuals implement better collaboration, project management, and productivity practices and solutions. Access, via the links below, the recordings, each about an hour long, of the discussions.
The AppGap is a blog and resource on the future of work and how new tools are addressing age-old challenges of organization, collaboration, and innovation. But it is also an idea: that there remains a gap between the toolset that exists and what's needed...
Can today's project management software be done better? What can online CRM help companies companies accomplish? Which development platform can help individuals and organizations build better online databases, Web based applications, and HR solutions? And what are the processes and best practices that help organizations large and small achieve success. Find out more.
Thought...
