Seven Aspirations for Enterprise Software
Just because, Here’s my wish-list for Enterprise 2.0 solutions:
1. Openness
Early enterprise solutions focused on the best way to secure information from prying eyes, but I think it’s time that systems took a more trusting attitude to governance. After all, people are willing to share their personal information voluntarily with the world via MySpace and Facebook. Shouldn’t you be able to trust the people that you work with more than random Internet surfers?
Information Hoarders inhibit the scalability of organizations. The disconnected silos of information they build represent knowledge that the organization can’t exploit. We need to discourage this practice.
2. Connectedness
Older solutions focused on individual computer independence, as if everyone worked in a vacuum. Contributing to the enterprise repository is akin to dropping a letter in the mail chute. The prevalence of data mining and business analysis tools comes from our existing solutions’ data being hard to interpret and largely disconnected from us. The divide between the people and their content leads to an organization where silence can thrive. New solutions should presume two way connections — and not just between content and people, but between colleagues and between concepts and content. After all, nobody actually wants to plug computers together. It’s the knowledge exchange that counts, right?
3. Emergence
Enterprise software is frequently forced upon knowledge workers. That’s why consultants tend to spend so much time talking about “adoption” and “change management” and training plans. That’s why phrases like “project champion” and “senior-level sponsor” get thrown around during the implementation phase. Corporateware is designed to be force-fed to employees by some “thou shalt” memo handed down by the boss and implemented in the back office by the IT team.
Instead, we need to build software that can grow organically within an organization, one user at a time. That means it needs to deliver benefits to individuals and small teams at the outset, and not just the organization as a whole once the solution is fully deployed. People should want to use their enterprise software.
4. Adaptability
To paraphrase Tim O’Reilly, Web 2.0 in three words goes something like this: “Users Add Value”.
This is true for any computer application, enterprise software included. It would be nice if our systems reflected that fact. The data in them needs to be able to be reused — and not by some SOA process architect, but by the end users themselves. Content should be able to be easily re-purposed, re-evaluated and shared.
5. Personalization
Traditional enterprise solutions haven’t been about the individual — they’ve been about the role that the individual was performing. People are different; they have feelings. It would be nice if Enterprise Software could allow their users’ personal preferences to be reflected, and broadcast to their peers — promoting better engagement, and community.
6. Community
Treating a user as a mere box in an org chart forgoes the notion that work is fundamentally a social activity. Improving relations between people is a key aspect of ensuring a smooth-running enterprise. This social-ness is at the core of what we do. We aren’t fleshy work-robots. How come our enterprise software seems to treat us like we are?
7. Reckless Capture
Previously, entering information into a computer was a formal activity. It was parsed, validated, organized and systematized. But Enterprise 2.0 solutions deemphasize structured data entry in favor of capturing loose collections of stuff on the off-chance that it will be useful. As storage becomes cheaper and more readily available, and as search techniques improve, the idea that humans need to scrub and condense data until it’s fit for machine consumption will go out of fashion. The Google index is filled with pages that no data technician ever entered and no analyst has ever seen.
Sometimes a golden needle hides in the haystack of unfiltered, unvetted information. Each enterprise should be comfortable with its own long tail.
Related Posts
- Two Kinds of Enterprise Software
- Enterprise 2.0: The Software Social
- Enterprise Software. *sigh*
- What is Emergent Software?
- How Enterprise Search Sabotages Itself
Gordon,
All great points. Regarding information hoarding, it definitely needs to be stopped. There are some things you can do technologically, but mostly it’s culture change, and that’s the really hard work of management.
Thanks for the link!
Mike