Tribal Knowledge - Profiles in Courage

New technology renders existing products, services and training obsolete on a daily basis. Some will tell you that this wipes the slate clean - well, think again. I'm here to tell you that all that you know - you need to remember. This is a monthly column dedicated to dispelling hi tech myths and sharing life's lessons.

As some of you reading this column must have observed, I have had some fun pointing out the eccentricities and foibles of the often maligned – and occasionally endangered – species we call “the enterprise technology supplier.” As anyone would know who has visited our home page recently, The Gilbane Report has kicked off an industry initiative under the banner “Gilbane Content Technology Works.” What may not be apparent is that this program is the culmination of a personal quest that this writer began over one year ago and I want to use this forum to thank eight of these special “creatures” who have helped make this possible; Software AG, Sun Microsystems, Artesia Technologies, Atomz, Convera, Context Media, Vignette and Webware.

You see, each technology supplier typically lives in a carefully contrived world where they, paradoxically, each sit at the center of a universe that has – a la Soviet Union – all of its competitors (and defectors) somewhat clumsily airbrushed out of the picture. These are not the enterprise consumers’ worlds. Consumers visit only when they must and take all information from these sources with a heavy dose of skepticism. The savvy enterprise has become quite practiced at reading between the lines of “official communiqués” in an attempt to infer what is really going on. For an example of this, see my October, 2002 column, Tribal Knowledge - Meaningful Ambiguity: Reading Corporate Press Releases 101 - http://www.gilbane.com/columns.pl?view=7.

This chasm between enterprise technology supplier and consumer has only grown wider and wider as the economy has gone from bad to worse. The result is that, in my view, there has never been a more perilous time to undertake an ambitious and life-altering technology-inspired project.

1. The credibility of suppliers is low and so IT and the truly endangered species – the executive champion - are left with virtually no political cover and must personally assume the full burden (risk) of any project they might be tempted to propose.
2. The perceived near-term value of emerging best practices and technology is even lower making the economic hurdles higher so that only the bravest of souls in the most obvious of projects dare proceed.
3. The availability of best practices to ensure a positive outcome is lower still so that the few brave troops that venture forth are left to feel their way along mostly in the dark hoping not to hit a wall or fall off of a cliff.

What we have here is a failure to communicate!

By simply turning this picture upside down, an entirely new and much sunnier picture emerges.

3. If there were battle tested best practices that were well understood and independently verified…

2. The projected impact (value) of a “technology-inspired” project could be predicted with a fairly high degree of confidence…

1. Creating the validation and incentive to move forward with deliberate speed.

We can finally move from a posture of “avoiding risk” to an attitude of “missing a plane” – doing nothing means being left behind.

This of course led me to think long and hard on exactly what would a “best practice” have to include to begin this trickle down effect? How could one amass enough of them to make a difference in our current climate? And how could these be disseminated once defined and collected? (if a best practice is documented in a vacuum and no one listens does it have an ROI?)

What has become obvious to me when studying how ROI and other value metrics are measured is that changes in behavior result in measurable value, not deployments of technology. The adoption of new behaviors and the abandonment of old behaviors is where the action is – so that in addition to technology recipes, a best practice had to include operational tactics for securing funding, social strategies to drive adoption and behavioral metrics to measure success.

The only one stop shop for an enterprise best practice is another enterprise.

This kind of a best practice is not trivial and probably requires the skills of a technician, a business analyst, a lawyer and perhaps even a psychoanalyst – this will take time, money and a good deal of effort to create one – if not many – best practices.

This effort cannot be borne alone – a collective of some sort is required to fund and support the level and breadth of effort that will be required.

The final piece of this seemingly impossible puzzle is how to get the word out. Where does this kind of information get effectively communicated and assimilated? Duhh!

Conferences, journals and online knowledge bases (archives) have to be leveraged to circulate and disseminate this information so that it takes hold inside the broadest cross section of enterprises in the shortest period of time.

…and so a plan emerged…

If I could get the funding, resources and contacts to pursue a content development project focused on enterprise best practices and an organization able to influence conferences, portals and publications – then there was a fighting chance to make a real difference.

For me, the latter part of the problem was a fairly straightforward one – Frank Gilbane has been a long time friend and colleague – always open to new ideas and passionate about content technology – and who has clearly developed a strong following online, in print and in conferences across the globe - but I know that if I go any further into praising Frank, he will simply reject the entire column – so lets focus on the hard bit – where were we going to find a source of funding that would share our vision?

Clearly, vendors have the highest stake in turning this picture right-side up again – but who would have the vision to support an initiative that

• Was chartered to document best practices without a preference for one technology supplier over another?
• Would tell its stories in an enterprise’s voice with all of the strong opinions that naturally flow and without the jargon/worldview du jour? and
• Whose approval process did NOT include their lawyers and marketing staff?

I will tell you who.

Vendors that were passionate about and committed to content technology as a game changing force in the markets that they served and secure in the value of the products and services that they offered. Vendors who know that public, open and unfettered access to successful enterprise would only benefit their own commercial aspirations.

This plan was presented for the first time to a vendor for consideration in mid-July. In just over seven weeks, we were able to get the financial and resource commitment from eight leading vendors in the middle of a budget cycle for what was a completely unplanned event. When I was asked how many founding partners was I looking for, my answer was 4 to 6 with an upper limit of 8. Given the short time frames, I can tell you that no one thought I could find eight vendors who would move this quickly. I will conclude in the same fashion that I began – by thanking and naming the eight vendors that have demonstrated their courage once again.

Thank you Software AG, Sun Microsystems, Artesia Technologies, Atomz, Convera, Context Media, Vignette and Webware for having the vision to co-found this ambitious initiative.

Readers, if you are interested in learning more about this project and receiving (or contributing to) this content as it is developed (since these good companies are supporting the project – the content will be free!!! -), visit www.gilbane.com/technology_works.html - if you are interested in learning more about this group of innovative technology suppliers – visit their respective web sites (now).