by Shiv Singh
January 21, 2008 at 8:30 am
· Filed under Enterprise 2.0, Web 2.0
I thought I’d begin my posting to the AppGap by listing some themes that I thinking about. As our conversation on the future of work evolves, I will revisit these themes. Do you agree with these? Have these always mattered? Are these important? You tell me.
1. Organizations are becoming more porous than we could have ever imagined. We’re learning much more from our customers than ever before. As a result, collaboration tools within organizations are often about connecting employees with customers and not just to other employees. In a sense, an enterprise solution doesn’t just include the enterprise anymore as the definition of an enterprise is broadening.
2. We’ve finally realized human insights are more valuable than anything that an encyclopedia or a library can offer. Within enterprises, we’re now focusing more attention on connecting with one another versus simply trying to get connected to information. This is because we use each other as filters through which we understand information. Information is free and accessible but knowing what is important is harder. This is why social networks within and outside the enterprise matter more than ever.
3. The consumer and enterprise worlds continue to collide. Design philosophies that drive consumer experiences matter increasingly in the enterprise too. Just look at the number of organizations that have successfully launched mini-wikis within their organizations borrowing the Wikipedia model. Our next challenge? To make our enterprise solutions so compelling that the consumer world can learn from them.
4. Enterprises want to focus on their core competencies again. Delivering solutions as a service over the web is gaining more momentum everyday (software as a service). Companies want to simplify their IT infrastructures and want consulting firms to help them figure out how they should be working in the future. These companies like light, hosted web applications that don’t require huge server investments. More enterprise solutions whether they be intranets, extranets or digital dashboards will be delivered as services. That’s why Microsoft is investing so heavily in its hosting business. Clients don’t want the infrastructure in house.
5. And finally the desktop and the web are finally blurring. We’re reaching a point where every computer interaction you have will be an Internet component to it. This doesn’t mean you’ll be using a browser all the time. It means that you maybe working in Microsoft Office or in Excel or with a blackberry but pulling data from the web or pushing data to the web in real time. As an office worker, you will choose the interface that you’re most comfortable with and through that you’ll interact with the Internet and other people on it - whether they be co-workers, business partners or your customers.
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Annette wrote @ January 21st, 2008 at 11:54 am
Regarding point number 4 above “Enterprises want to focus on their core competencies again,” forward-thinking Microsoft partners are already making great strides in the hosted application space. Software-as-a-Service needs to become more than one-off applications accessible via a particular web interface. Customers want everything in one place, just as if running the entire network and suite of applications in-house. Only they don’t want the headache of managing their network and applications in-house, nor do they want the unexpected capital expenses of owning their own infrastructural hardware.
This is where companies like ITonCommand come in, delivering the entire Microsoft Suite of applications, including Outlook and Exchange, and delivers them through terminal services. But unlike most hosting companies, ITonCommand provides a hosted Windows desktop that looks, feels and operates like the Windows desktops users are already running. So instead of learning a new web-interface, users login to a standard Windows desktop and find applications, email, calendars, contacts, etc. right where they’d expect them to be. In addition, the platform provides a completed hosted corporate network, so companies not only get the hosted applications they need, but the network structure they need to store and share files.
Microsoft is investing heavily in hosted models, because it’s what customers want. For too long, companies have had to put time and money into running their own IT, which has taken away from their focus on core competencies. Hosted solutions like ITonCommand deliver an entire Virtual IT Department; applications, network, expertise and all. Microsoft has recognized ITonCommand’s solution with awards for innovation and excellence in infrastructure and security.
Hi, Shiv, this list is a good starting point. In a way, all these themes are about the breaking down of boundaries, which is I think the why the term “Enterprise 2.0″ sounds somewhat ironic.
Regarding (1), it’s not just customers who are part of the expansion of the enterprise. It’s suppliers, competitors, and intellectual property partners as well. It’s also the acknowledgment that what people bring into the enterprise is not just their personal capital, but their social capital as well. Hence, for (2), we can perhaps say that the applications enable ourselves and our connections into the workplace. But I would not imply that good old information (”content”) is not important, it’s just that we are realizing that human experience gives information context.
I’m not entirely sure what you mean by (3). The innovations that constitute Enterprise 2.0 have come from the Internet and are seeping into organizations. Do you mean that developers who are building enterprise applications may have the opportunity to create innovations that will seep outward? Do we look to product vendors (IBM, Microsoft) or to solutions companies?
(4) brings up a host of interesting questions with respect to the role of IT. I’m glad you put this one on the table.
As a follow on to (5) I might suggest that mobility is at the heart of what you are talking about. We want to be able to access information, people, processes, activities, from wherever we are at any point in time. And we are getting there.
You’ve prompted me to think of my own themes, which I need a bit more time to ponder, but I will throw out at least two: the interplay of generations and the role of leadership. More anon.
/patti
Hi Shiv, like it!
Re 1. about organisations becoming more porous - I agree with Patti that the collaboration extends to suppliers and other partners but also that the web has meant that organisation are less impermeable to any type of conversation to do with their business, especially negative PR.
Re 2. Are you saying that because access to information is so easy now we are becoming more reliant on each other to vet the quality of the information that we access? Eg google’s rankings based on popularity and relevance and Del.icio.us being a step up from google as it is an extended social network of people saying this information is “good”? If so then yes I agree, if not help me out 
Re 4. Organisations wanting to focus on their core competencies again, I can vouch for this from the small organisations end of the spectrum (20-50 person companies), working in a web development team that needed collaboration tools, it is cheaper for us to get hosted applications (eg Basecamp) rather than develop our own so that we can focus on serving our customers.However the big downside is that you often end up with a number of applications that really should work together, but don’t and this ends up potentially costing more in the long run. IN or instance FogBugz ( a bug/ task tracker), Basecamp (an intranet style collaboration tool) and Quickbooks (financial software) don’t talk to each other that well, (improvements to APIs will help this in the future but we are not there yet)… So In a large enterprise where the economies of scale differ is it not better to have custom made applications that all integrate perfectly? is it cheaper and better to make your own when you have 10,000+ employees using a system everyday? Or Is it a better use of the IT departments time to source off-the-shelf apps and then integrate these with other apps within the company and then play the role of educating and assisting the internal teams who use this apps and providing feedback from to the exernal app suppliers?
Re. 5. Bring on the blur! But do you reckon there will need to be some catering to the offline world? For example Google Docs is awesome as a collaboration tool, but when I am on a plane I can’t access my docs, so do i need an offline version. Or do you think it wont be long before I can get (or more to the point.. afford to get!) internet literally everywhere which means offline is a redundant concept?
Look forward to the ensuing discussion.
(love the idea of the blog btw!)
Jim Ware wrote @ January 22nd, 2008 at 7:42 pm
This is my first comment/post on the AppGap - am working on my own main post too. I’m looking forward to a stimulating and provocative conversation here!
Just a quick personal “right on” to your last point, Shiv - the blurring of the desktop and the Internet. I remember a few years ago when I bought a new desktop. It took me a couple of days to get my basic core applications up and running, and for some reason I’ve long since forgotten, it took even longer to figure out how to set up my accounts with my ISP. Point is, I basically didn’t even use the machine until I could get online. It just wasn’t worth the trouble.
and a more recent story: last month I bought a new MacBook Pro (my desktop is a Windows PC, so I am now struggling to live in two worlds - sort of a left brain/right brain thing). Anyway, the very first thingI did with the laptop was to open Safari and use it to download Firefox, which I have been using ever since. And the first thing I did after I had Firefox up was to download the Foxmarks Add-On so I could synschronize my Bookmarks with the desktop version. That level of integration and use of the web is sooo much more powerful than it was just a few short years ago.
Finally, I recently ordered some new financial management software and was stunned to discover that, while ordering online was easy, I had to order a CD that will be mailed to me. How 2oth Century! It really was striking - it will be the first time in eons that I’ve had to load software off a disk!.
Shiv, Much to think about here thank you. It did occur to me reading your post that when one works with technology focused companies it’s important to remember that experience can provide a distorted lens on the extent to which change is really happening in enterprises. For example, I wonder what the company sending Jim the CD looks like organizationally and in “porousness”. I also think about the reports of companies blocking Facebook because they don’t trust their employees to use their time wisely or participate in such environments appropriately. There’s the early adopting companies paving the way but in my experience companies vary widely on their progress on the principles you outline. Please feel free to tell me my experience is unusual.
Thank you for the great feedback. Patti, you’re absolutely right. Enterprise 2.0 as a term is a little ironic. The biggest change is the breaking down of the organizational boundaries and its not just about the enterprise anymore. That’s what’s most important. The intellectual partners question is a tricky one as intellectual property laws are hurting innovation too. But that’s a whole debate in of itself. Yes, regarding point 3, I believe there is opportunity for enterprise vendors to bring innovations into the consumer space. For example, some of the rich and dynamic interfaces that we see in niche financial services applications can make their way into the consumer domain.
Phil, regarding your question about custom made applications in large organizations integrating better, I believe that you can have dozens of off the shelf applications (or rather applications served via the cloud) that all integrate seamlessly if they are built on industry standards. I think that’s the future. Integration will be a breeze because industry standards, standard driven APIs and web services will link everything together. Just look at how Salesforce integrates with other enterprise applications to see what I mean. To your last question, I think the onlineand the offline are blurring. You will be able to have a non Internet version of Google docs soon. At the same time, it is going to get easier to be connected 24/7.
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