TakingAIIM

Forget Enterprise Search - Now You're Getting Personal

As reported in a Market IQ last year, Enterprise Search, as part of a findability strategy, is a paramount  concern for many knowledge workers.  The ability and rate with which organizations are amassing content has left many corporate users frustrated and mumbling, "If only we knew what we know", referring to an inability to retrieve and glean value from captured content.

But the same technologies that allow enterprises to amass content are moving downstream to the personal user.  In a recent article in FAST Company,  holographic memory was introduced, technology which will store 1 terabyte of content (about 61 billion books) on a standard disc, you know one that you might just pop into your laptop.  Now also consider that the Kindle, a "simple book reader", allows you to carry around approximately 1500 books - quite a "personal library." Using Twitter you can be bombarded with the thougts, ramblings and perhaps deep meaningful insights of literally thousands of people, on a continuous basis.

Personal and highly portable content collections have reached unfathomable heights, and will only increase as our ability to send, capture and store at the personal level increases.

The market for personalized search tools that are as portable and user-centric as today's hand-helds, is a market that will likely explode in the coming years. As I have pontificated at the enterprise level for years, content without search is useless. Well, forget Enterprise Search, people are going to take search very personal. Investors in all this personal technology and content will soon realize, "What good are all my investments in content if I cannot locate what I have?".

I cannot help but recall Professor Matt Kohl, who was the founder of PLS (Personal Library Software), and a professor at Syracuse University. I met Matt back in the days when my career in ECM was just beginning, back in the early 1980s.  Matt shared with me that he would often ask his students "What if we had infinite storage capabilities, the ability to store literally everything ever learned. What problems would still exist?", (Or something like that, my own memory and retrieval systems are a bit flawed.)  His point was that storage technology was moving much more quickly than search. Search as we envisioned back in the early 1980s was still predominately limited to keyword Boolean word-based approaches. 

With capture and storage capabilities at a personal, hand-held level growing so rapidly, Matt's challenge is perhaps now even more relevant - taking on a very personal nature. 

The market for search technology will certainly blossom in the coming years, but forget enterprise search. Search tools at a very personalized level, as portable as the devices used to carry personal and vast libraries, finely tuned to their "owners" ways, preferences, opinions and communities - highly personalized and contextual search tools, that is the more exciting search market to watch in coming years.

Research on Research - Top 10 ECM resources

It’s that time of year.  The new year has begun, a time to reflect on the past 12 months and develop those Top 10  lists for 2008. And so AIIM did earlier this week, with its Top 10 Most-read content items from the AIIM Website, published in its Infonomics online Magazine.

I am proud to report that among the Top 5, the work done by myself and Dan Keldsen placed 3 times, Numbers 1,  3 and  5 (Hmm how odd - pun intended).  OK - thanks for giving me that moment of blatant pride.

That said, there is more here to talk about than our success in creating valuable content. This ranking of the most popular content actually sheds light on the ECM market.   All things being equal – and for the most part they were (I'll explain that further in just a moment), the #1 download was the Market IQ report on Findability.  One of the findings in that report was a pent-up user demand for "findability" within the corporate Intranet, as good as that experienced on the commercial Internet.  This pent-up need is apparently a "most" compelling need, given the popularity of the download over all other AIIM content (not just Market IQs), and there was much to pick from in format and topic.

Speaking of other topics, #3 was the Market IQ on Enterprise 2.0.  What I find interesting here is the fact that this seemingly hot and edgy topic did not pull as great an interest level as the more basic "Findability".  Despite the market buzz surrounding Enterprise 2.0, it may still seem more of a future direction, or area of experimentation, versus a more compelling need to get search and navigation done right.  Indeed, as we pointed out in the Findability report, Findability is fundamental to all content, including Enterprise 2.0 content. If you do not get your information architecture right, and cannot provide intuitive and effective access paths to the content, the content is rendered virtually useless, Enterprise 2.0 or otherwise. 

Before I move onto #5, lets talk a bit about #2 - not something written by Dan and me.  The #2 most popular piece of content was the AIIM Buyers Guide. Hmmm - potential good news for the ECM software market. Although just a single data point, it is at least one indication that organizations are still looking into potential investments in ECM this year. Indeed, I have had a few colleagues share with me recently their intentions to make purchases in software that can demonstrate significant savings - i.e. by replacing aging ECM solutions/architectures and by short circuiting processes and thus maintaining productivity levels with less staff (including potential outsourcing models.)

OK - as my narcissistic friend in New Hampshire likes to say, "Back to me."  #5 was the Market IQ report on Business Process Management. Here is a technology that is as practical, if not more so than "findability", and in direct alignment with buying intentions AIIMed (I couldn't resist that pun) at short circuiting processes.  This is undoubtedly why it ranked in the top 5.  But you have to wonder, given its tactical nature and relevancy to current buying intentions, why did it not rank higher?  Perhaps here is a case in which not all things were not equal.  This Market IQ was not released until October, and thus  there has been far less time for "Googlers" to find it, perhaps.

Indeed, this may also account for why the Market IQ on On Ramps and Off Ramps did not make the top 10 list. It was not published until the end of the third week of December.

So as the Red Socks (used to) say – "Maybe next year."

By the way, all four reports are still available for free download, so if you have not yet, you may want to grab a copy.

Web 2.0 – You say Tomato I say ...

As announced in my last post, Dan Keldsen and I just started a new company – Information Architected.  Obviously we get along …. and agree on everything,why else would we agree to be joined at the hip -  Right? … WRONG.  Like any good partnership (in my definition anyway), Dan and I often have differing perspectives and debate the merits of many things.  Debate is good – without differing opinions one of us is redundant.

Take for example Web 2.0, and its extension inside the firewall, Enterprise 2.0.  Earlier this year we published a Market IQ on Enterprise 2.0, (representing many months of research), and keynoted at the Enterprise 2.0 conference – together.  So surely we agree on that topic.  Well, we agree on much that relates to Enterprise 2.0 – but not everything. 

Take Twitter as an example. I subscribe to Twitter.  Dan subscribes to Twitter.  I use Twitter casually.  Dan uses Twitter extensively.  Dan thinks Twitter is GREAT.  I think Twitter is, well, OK I guess.

Dan is probably too often subjected to my complaining over the abuse of Twitter. I mean really, why do people on Twitter feel there is value in sharing with “the world” that: “enjoying a coffee right now- mmmm”, or “–just waking up, not showered yet.” For those unfamiliar – I am not making these quoted messages up, and they can get worse.

But as annoyed as I get, as I stated, I use Twitter. "Why then?" you ask.   Because I also see the very positive and valuable side to collaborative social technologies. I do get value out of Twitter.

This value statement was clearly brought to the world’s attention during the recent terrorist attack in Mumbai, India.  The event was covered in a timely manner by “human journalists”, also known as "citizen Journalists”.  Within minutes of the first attacks, many “ordinary citizens”, social networkers, were sharing news and video of the event, using hand-helds and the power of social networks.  A very dramatic example of leveraging the power of social computing, to communicate important and relevant content, to educate from eye-witness accounts, in a timely manner.

But such value does not have to be linked to such dramatic content, that’s not my point. I was recently listening to NPR, and heard a great story, a lighter story about the powers of social computing. 
Muscians around the world are finding one another and having interactive jam sessions – online. Real and valuable content (of course art and music’s value is in the eye and ear of the beholder), being collaboratively developed by a geographically diverse but like minded and intentioned groups of people.  This is, in my opinion,  a very creative and powerful example of creating new “realities” using the power of social computing and collaboration.

Ah, both examples are still outside the firewall, part of the Internet social web – so where is the tie to Enterprise 2.0.  More importantly – what is the lesson learned.  First, the tie.   I am amazed at the rate at which the Internet is now driving user expectations. You may recall, that in the Findability IQ Dan and I wrote for AIIM, we found that experience with search on the Internet is the single greatest influence on increasing user expectations for enterprise search.

As for the the lesson learned.  I still say that there is much abuse of social computing, but among the crap there are the jewels, new business models and valuable content.  Enterprises should take heed from these and other examples of Web 2.0.  Watch, learn, adapt and innovate. Look at the potential of the technology and model and shape it to advance the corporate mission and goals. 

A recent article in the Harvard Business Review, entitled “Which Kind of Collaboration is Right For You?”, by Gary Pisano and Roberto Verganti, said it well.  They point out that too many people who look at collaboration via platforms such as  Twitter and Facebook think that social collaboration, by definition, must be completely open and free forming.  Not so say Pisano and Verganti, and I agree. Within the firewall you can restrict access, impose governance and perhaps “ensure relevancy” – without necessarily squashing the dynamic creative capabilities of social computing.

OK – maybe I am just part of the graying workforce and my opinions are prejudiced by my age.  But – to end this blog I want to share a video on YouTube that takes a comical but poignant look on the question – “Real Life Facebook.”  WATCH IT – Its entertaining – and thought provoking.

BPM- Its Here and Its Real

We’ve blogged about it, we’ve had a webinar on it, and now it is finally available.  I am speaking about the AIIM Market IQ on BPM.  The report is available for download, and contains over 20 charts and 20 pages of commentary. 

Most major among these findings, in my opinion, is the fact that 52% of the organizations we surveyed achieved a positive ROI in three years or less.  Another 15% achieved ROI in five years of less. This is in stark contrast to AIIM Market Intelligence ROI findings concerning functionality like Content Security, Enterprise 2.0 and Findability. While such technologies have their upsides, they are often “soft” benefits, difficult to measure in hard dollars. In the case of BPM, the benefits can be far more tangible, and directly impact the heart of an organization – the process. A full 70% of those who reported executing an ROI, indicated direct cost savings as an achieved benefit.

Lastly, reader’s of past Market IQs will undoubtedly notice the difference in scale.  Based on some market feedback, we have decided to re-architect the IQs into smaller, easier to read reports. I hope these reports continue to provide value and insight.

Let me know what you think - please, comments are welcomed.

[As always, I would also like to thank IBM, Risetime and EMC, who partially underwrote the production of this report, making our ability to provide it to the market at no cost possible.]

Audio and Photos and Videos - OH MY

Those of you who trace your ECM roots back to the pre-internet days, like myself, have a unique appreciation for the impact that the internet has on on ECM.  My ECM career started in the mid-80s.  At that time the ECM-savvy community was very small.  Although we understood the powers of full-text retrieval and text management systems (2 of the terms we used to describe what today we call Findability), and online unstructured content, most business people did not.  My previous company, Delphi Group, made a significant amount of revenue simply educating business and technology professionals  on these concepts in the late 80s and early 90s.

Then along came the internet, the word wide web, and all that quickly changed.  Suddenly there was a universal issue: a universal body of content (ever growing) whose value was only leveraged if you could intuitively and quickly mine that content.  Search became the killer app of the web.

I mention this because, we old-timers learned a valuable lesson.  Experience has shown us that the internet will likely foreshadow or usher in trends within the firewall. We have seen this with Web 2.0 preceding the emergence of Enterprise 2.0.  History is about to repeat itself. 

Way back in the mid 80's, we ECMers were touting the availability and powers of multimedia content and multimedia search.  These pearls of wisdom fell on ears more deaf than those listening about text retrieval.

This is likely to change.  Recently Google announced face search, a tool for sorting and retrieving facial images (photos).  Today You-tube reports 13 hours of video loaded every minute, and has recently provided a video specific search engine, in context.  Both of these multimedia search tools are based on technology we ECMers talked about and demoed decades ago.  But the market was not ready.  All too many business professionals, with some minor exceptions in key verticals, had difficulty  understanding how and why video, photo, and audio recognition and retrieval would be valuable to their organization.

It is likely that recent developments on the internet will once again usher in a new era of enterprise awakening.  This is the focus of our upcoming Market IQ report - The On-ramps and Off-ramps of ECM. (You can register to receive the report now.)  My guess is that when we run our survey, we will find that most  organizations have a very small percentage of their enterprise content existing in the form of photographs, audio and video, and those that do will likely be using rudimentary tagging to search and retrieve those files. But what will be interesting to see the degree to which they are envisioning a near-term increase in usage of such content types.

Stay tuned ...

BPM & ECM - Don't Do One Without the Other

For many, the worlds of Business Process Management (BPM), and Enterprise Content Management (ECM) are separate and distinct disciplines.  While clearly focused on different entities, process and content respectively, the two are so intertwined in my mind, that it is negligent to discuss one without at least mentioning the other, and so I did during our webinar last Friday, in which Dan Keldsen and I introduced the findings from our recent research into BPM. (If you missed the webinar, it has been archived.)

Several hundred people, representing virtually every vertical industry were in attendance - testament to the universal applicability of BPM.  The slide presentation is posted here:

BPM Market IQ

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: workflow bpm)

The presentation can also be accessed at Slideshare.

Early in the presentation,I presented a simple diagram that illustrates the overlapping nature of ECM and BPM.  Sure, when the process is about the creation of content (e.g. SOP authoring, contract creation), most, if not all participants understand that both ECM and BPM are required, the former to manage the revisions of content, the latter to manage the authoring/approval/publishing process. But, ECM should play a role in virtually every process, as processes typically use and/or output content.  While a process owner may not feel the need to concern herself specifically with the content inputs and outputs of the process, to do so is reckless. For example, if a process provides access to images of invoices, and no quality control is exercised on the image quality, process participants may find themselves unable to proceed due to illegibility.  Fault may lie with those who manage the capture process, but the process (and process manager) will likely find themselves the focus of complaints  as well.  The BPM initiative fails despite the fact that the fault lies with the ECM system. 

As is the case with all of the webinars I conduct, I will be posting the questions asked that went unanswered, with answers.  I want to repeat one of the questions I did have time to answer, however, as I believe it illustrates another important intersection between BPM and ECM.   The question was "What role, if any do records managers have in BPM?"  Ah perfect - I am guessing this question was asked by a records manager who was indeed wondering if they can play a role.  My answer was - two potential roles.  First, records managers should be involved in the process definition phase.  If at any point of the process the content reaches the point in its life cycle that it becomes an official record, then the task of declaration can become automated under the BPM tool. Although perhaps outside the scope of the process itself, incorporating this functionality should be considered a best practice, providing integrity and  consistency to the records management sub-process, compliance and a potential increase in productivity. Second, for the process-centric organization, the process definitions themselves may be considered a business record, thus requiring the application of RIM.  This may especially e the case for organizations seeking ISO 9000 certification. 

Both of these uses of records management within a BPM or workflow implementation would likely be overlooked if ECM and RM specialists are not included in the process engineering and definition.

Stay tuned, as over the next week I will be posting the questions from the webinar that went unanswered, along with answers.  In the meantime, if you are interested in obtaining a copy of the Market IQ when it is published in early October, you can reserve a copy now.

OK - lest I begin to pigeon hole myself into the world of BPM, let me add a musing on another ECM related topic - let's get back to Content Security. 

If you were paying attention to the news earlier this week than you know that poor management of online content got United Airlines in trouble again, although not their fault this time.  Apparently the South Florida Sun-Sentinel accidentally (with content security these accidents are far less likely to occur), re-ran a six year old Chicago Tribune article about United filing bankruptcy. There was no date associated with the story (simple thing to catch using simple Content Security tools), and Bloomberg picked it up and reported it as new information this Monday (again with content security this could have been avoided). The story was pulled, but not until after United stock went into a tail spin. 

Yeah - real serious things can happen when content is mishandled.  This is a powerful testament to the power of content, albeit a negative one in this case. It's frightening to observe how quickly misuse of content, even accidentally, can cause damage.  The speed of content management (including security) has got to keep pace with the speed of content creation and publication. All of the accidental events that occurred this week could have easily been avoided had the involved parties used some simple technologies and tenets of Content Security, the focus of an earlier Market IQ on Content Security. 

BTW - I stated earlier  "that poor management of online content got United airlines in trouble again." I was referring to the incident several years ago (2005?), when United themselves accidentally posted the wrong airfares to their website.  Do any of you remember that one?  The lessons learned keep piling up, trouble is I wonder who is doing the learning?

BPM - Hey How You Doin?

OK - I have been blogging quite a bit about BPM lately.  Much is going on - the AIIM BPM Seminar, the upcoming BPM webinar, the upcoming Market IQ on BPM.  But there is more - and something that YOU may immediately find valuable. 

In our BPM market research efforts we uncovered that one of the biggest obstacles to initiating BPM in the organization is getting senior management to understand BPM. So, Dan Keldsen and I, in an effort to assist in this regard, have created a BPM self assessment tool.  The assessment is a much scaled-downed version of the Market IQ BPM survey, 14 questions to be exact.  But 14 questions that very much relate to organizational readiness and aptitude for BPM.  More importantly, this version provides an immediate "spotlight report", a series of 14 charts that benchmark your answers against those of the hundreds of other organizations that have already taken the survey. 

So find out "how you're doin" compared to other organizations, and maybe pick up a few key insights to help better position BPM within your organization.

You can access the tool at http://aiimroadshow.questionpro.com/

Forget Process Excellence ...

Most organizations are still struggling for process betterment.  Dan Keldsen and I are finalizing the analysis of our BPM survey data.  The report will be available in early October, but you can place an order now, and we will send it to you upon publication.  It promises to be a great read.  We are uncovering many eye-opening facts about the market.

Here's a glimpse:  Despite the fact that the ECM industry has been touting the benefits of  workflow and BPM for over 2 decades, the spread of process excellence from the manufacturing industry into the world of the knowledge workers has been a long, slow journey. When presented with a BPM maturity model:

Level 1: Initial
Enterprise lacks consistent practices and management is reactive. Little to no BPM strategy, process redesign is ad-hoc at best.

Level 2: Managed
Stabilization of local work through department-level expertise, control, and metrics. Processes are repeatable and documented.

Level 3: Standardized
Enterprise-wide process improvement competencies with product and service orientation. Best practices are standardized and documented.

Level 4: Predictable
The enterprise has established common, integrated assets and processes with measurement and predictability. Variations of process performance are minimal, and processes are stable.

Level 5: Optimizing
Process excellence and re-engineering is fully integrated into the organization. Emphasis is now on the continuous pro-active improvement of processes, narrowing the gaps between objectives and capabilities.

Nearly HALF of respondents placed their organization at Level 1 (Enterprise lacks consistent practices and management is reactive. Little to no BPM strategy, process redesign is ad-hoc at best) and only 3% placed their organization at Level 5 (Optimizing Process excellence and re-engineering is fully integrated into the organization. Emphasis is now on the continuous pro-active improvement of processes, narrowing the gaps between objectives and capabilities).

One reason for this or perhaps symptomatic to the condition is the fact that for many companies, despite lip service to process efficiency, no specific group is responsible for BPM initiatives, and the reporting structure of those that exist are spread amongst IT (primarily), and everyone from the Financial Department, to Operations, to nearly every conceivable department. There lacks a focus and thus true commitment to process improvement.

A host of benefits ranging from cost savings to increased customer responsiveness were identified by those that have embarked on BPM initiatives, and yet uptake is still slow.  The report goes on to identify the hurdles and surprises encountered in BPM initiatives.  More to come....

In the interim, if you are interested you can:

Order a copy of the report now.
Register for the 9/26 webinar when we overview the report findings
Attend the AIIM seminar on BPM, at which myself and/or my AIIM colleagues further discuss the report
Enroll in our BPM training course.

Stay tuned...

BPM - Its Just Around the Corner

I am surrounded by Business Process Management lately – figuratively and literally. 

Staring tomorrow AIIM starts its seminar series on BPM.  I will be speaking in DC tomorrow, September 10 on a variety of issues concerning Business Process Management.

As many of you may already be aware, Dan Keldsen and I have recently completed our survey of the BPM market, and will be publishing the AIIM Market IQ on BPM in early October, and holding a webinar on the report's findings on 9/26/08 (register for webinar). We are covering over 80 data points our research uncovered concerning how organizations are addressing process efficiency and outsourcing through workflow and BPM software.

But I am also truly surrounded by BPM – physically just around the corner – from our offices here in Post Office Square, Boston. There is a construction site here in which a 10,000 square foot office space is going to be completed in just 15 days. (read article).  The construction site is marked by a sign heralding and tracking the event, along with workers wearing T shirts urging the project on.  Why the big deal?  Typically, such a project would take 10 - 12 weeks to complete.  But, this construction team has promised to complete the work (or process in BPM speak) in a fraction of that time.  The significance to the general public is the green side of the project.  By collapsing this project to 15 days the team is reportedly consuming far less energy resources. As a "green thinking American" I find this laudable, but as a BPMer, I am also interested in how this team claims they are accomplishing this feat, as an exercise in process efficiency.  According to the article, the team expended much more time and effort executing front-end planning, leading to careful orchestration and a rigid, well-timed work schedule.  Ah - interesting I thought, this is very much what I will be discussing at the seminar, and in the Market IQ webinar.  While BPM software is an enabler it is only an enabler.  BPM projects  require a significant up-front planning effort, which should lead to a rule-based carefully timed and orchestrated process cycle (in the words of the construction team "work schedules"). This is true apparently of any type process, whether building an office complex or processing a loan request.  Why the effort, because the end results potentially bring about many benefits, including reduced costs and "greener" processes.  (A listing of the benefits targeted and achieved by over 300 companies is forthcoming at the seminar, webinar and in the Market IQ.)

While the technology components of a BPM solution may not be applicable to every process, the basic tenets of BPM, the re-engineering and process analysis methodologies, are universally applicable. Those that are BPM and workflow practitioners are undoubtedly already aware of this.  Those who are new to the discipline, take heed.

So if you find yourself in any of the seminar locations on the seminar date, please drop by and discuss this with me, and learn more.  And, if you happen to be in Post Office Square Boston, come cheer the construction team on as a fellow BPM enthusiast.