E L S U A ~ A KM Blog Thinking Outside The Inbox by Luis Suarez

LotusLive Engage – Collaboration with Customers Just Got a Whole Lot Easier

As you may have noticed, the last couple of days I have been a little bit quiet on the blogging front, trying to catch up my breath after having gone through some of the busiest couple of weeks I have experienced in a little while. And mostly due to a good number of exciting news that have been going on in the area of Enterprise 2.0, specially related to IBM. A couple of them I may not be able to comment on just yet (Once I get the clearance to go ahead I shall do, not to worry), but I can certainly share a couple of insights on all the others.

And now that I am enjoying a couple of days off at work (Happy Easter to everyone out there who may be celebrating it!!), I thought I would get back into the full swing of things and share with you a couple of blog posts I have been working on in the last few hours.

If last week I shared a whole bunch of links to some rather educational and enlightening presentation materials around the subject of social computing within the enterprise, this week I shall be sharing a few links to some very interesting video clips, but around the very same subject. They come from various different contexts, but they are all very relevant to the topics I get to talk on this blog, so let’s get things going. Without much further ado, here is the first one…

Remember that blog post I put together a little while ago around the subject of "How to Collaborate with Customers without Using e-mail", where I was talked about the super fine Lotus Greenhouse? Well, it looks like collaboration with customers just got a little bit easier! Earlier on this week you may have seen some of the various announcements on how IBM’s LotusLive Engage is now out of beta and available to everyone out there.

I am pretty excited about this announcement and about LotusLive Engage itself (Formerly known, while in beta, as Bluehouse) for multiple various reasons, which I will be talking about over time, but for now just want to follow up on that blog post I mentioned above where now that it is live, up and running and out of beta, it’s probably going to become one of the collaboration and knowledge sharing tools I’m going to consistently keep using, specially when reaching out and getting in touch with customers, helping me continue living "A World Without Email" (Pretty funny that it has got a sheer amount of great features and email is not one of them, eh?!).

Like I said already, over time I will be sharing plenty more details on how LotusLive Engage works and everything, but to give you folks a taster of what to expect check out this video clip (From the IBMLotusLive YouTube channel, and a bit over 3 minutes long):

Oh, and if you want to watch another video that explains what it can do, but with a touch of humour, check out LotusLive.com – Collaborating just got a whole lot easier… (A bit over 3 minutes as well)

And now you have gone through those two videos, let me share with you a couple of follow up links, if you would want to find out more about LotusLive Engage. First, the very helpful wiki that has been put together around the offering itself and which can be found over here. Then, finally, the LotusLive Blog that the fine folks from Collaboration Matters (a.k.a. Stu McIntyre) have put together and where you will be able to find out more details on the overall launch and some of its most compelling features.

Yes, indeed, like I mentioned on the title of this blog post, Collaboration with customers just got a whole lot easier…

Tags: Enterprise 2.0, Social Software, Social Networking, Social Computing, Social Media, Collaboration, Communities, Learning, Knowledge Sharing, KM, Knowledge Management, Remote Collaboration, Innovation, IBM, Networking, Social Networks, Conversations, Dialogue, Communication, Connections, Relationships, email, Productivity, Re-purposing Email, No-Email, Challenge Your Inbox, Progress Reports, Thinking Outside the Inbox, Information Overload, Easter, Happy Easter, Holidays, Vacation, Lotus Greenhouse, Greenhouse, Customers, Clients, LotusLive Engage, LotusLive, Lotus, IBM SWG, Bluehouse, A World Without Email, LotusLive Blog, Collaboration Matters, Stu McIntyre, LotusLive Engage Wiki, Wikis

A World Without Email – Year 2, Week 8 (A Moment of Weakness)

Back again into another week at work, on what promises to be a rather intense, but short, one (Seeing that Easter is just around the corner), here is that time again where I get to share with you folks over here some further details on the progress report from my new reality of "A World Without Email".

This time around from Year 2, Week 8, where there have been some really shocking updates, at least, from the perspective of the follow up challenge I established at the beginning of the year. I am not very happy with the whole situation, but, before I go further, here is a snap shot of what the report looks like for last week, so you can see where I am coming from with this discontent:

Goodness!! Yes, that was, indeed, my first reaction after I finished adding up all of the different emails I have received last week at work: 47!! The highest number of emails since I got started with the follow up challenge on 20 emails, or less, a week from the beginning of the second year. So last week didn’t look good! Don’t you think? No, not good at all! I know! In fact, it’s been the week with the highest number of incoming emails since beginning of the year! I guess it’s not bad since that’s already over two months, but still not very happy with the whole situation.

Why? Because for both Monday and Tuesday the main reason why I got such a high number of incoming emails was just … myself! Yes, yours truly! And that’s why I am not very happy about it. It was me, and a moment of weakness, by which I allowed those emails to come through my way with some lovely (NOT!!) "Reply To All" ones, as well as offering my email address to receive information I knew I could have gotten from somewhere else in the first place, but decided to go ahead with it anyway. After all, it is just another email! *beep* No, it is not! It’s when you lose control of your Inbox. Once again!

It was that moment of weakness, where I gave in just a tiny bit, that showed me again what it was like not having the control of my own productivity; of seeing emails flocking my way in an unstoppable way, because I told folks it was ok; of seeing how plenty of people thought they could get away with sending just that one more email (Which, in the end turned out to be quite a few!); of feeling that if I give in, people will not change their habits, even if they know there are better ways of sharing information and collaborating with other peers; of experiencing corporate spam first hand as well as that Diogenes Syndrome that Cristina Castro put together rather nicely under "Y el síndrome de Diógenes llegó al ordenador" (Article in Spanish) when stating that our Inboxes are those places where we collect the garbage and we don’t seem to be able to get out of the loop. Or even want to get out of it!

Yes, indeed, that’s how it felt throughout last week! Not pretty, I know! In fact, I realised that it is probably a good thing for me to have such weeks every so often, because they would be a constant reminder that there is plenty of work to get done still! And, most importantly, they will be an incentive for me to keep me going; to keep persevering; to show people there is a better way; to demonstrate you can be as productive as ever, if not more!, using social software tools vs. traditional ones like email while still respecting each other’s productivity; to finally shake the ground strong and hard enough that it will provoke a change of habits in how people connect, reach out and collaborate with others!

Thus last week will mark the beginning. The beginning of something really exciting that I am hoping to be able to share during the course of this week, because today it has started pretty similar to last week, and I surely wouldn’t want to make a habit out of it! So in an upcoming blog post I’m going to be sharing with everyone a new strategy I have thought about which I am going to implement and be as strict as I possibly can to make it work. It is not going to be pretty; it will probably get a few folks upset; it may be even getting me into trouble; but one thing I know is that if I don’t do something about it now, it will be too late! I will be going back to square one and that’s something I mentioned a long while ago I am not going to do again any time soon. The waters are lovely right where I am.

Tags: Enterprise 2.0, Social Software, Social Networking, Social Computing, Social Media, Collaboration, Communities, Learning, Knowledge Sharing, KM, Knowledge Management, Remote Collaboration, Innovation, IBM, Networking, Social Networks, Conversations, Dialogue, Communication, Connections, Relationships, email, Productivity, Re-purposing Email, No-Email, Challenge Your Inbox, Progress Reports, Thinking Outside the Inbox, Information Overload, A World Without Email, Weakness, Giving up, Giving in, Diogenes Syndrome, Cristina Castro, El Pais, Collecting Garbage

The Social Media Experiment Is Over by Adam Christensen

And it looks like I will keep flooding you folks this week (Perhaps just this one more time!) with interesting presentations I have bumped into, or that other people have forwarded to me as they come right along my areas of interest and focus, specially in the area of Social Computing within the Enterprise (a.k.a. Enterprise 2.0). Thus here is the last one, at least, for this week, and perhaps for the next few days as well, to give everyone out there a short break.

The next presentation I am going to talk to you about though is eventually one that I have enjoyed myself quite a bit as it puts together some interesting slides on how IBM is making extensive and good use of social software, both internal and external, at the same time that it details as well how social software is influencing IBM’s involvement with A Smarter Planet (An initiative I am sure most of you have heard about already).

For some background information on the presentation, check out this blog post from my good friend (And fellow IBMer) Adam Christensen under the title: Berlin presentation: The experiment is over (now it’s time to get real value out of social media). It’s a deck he just used this week to go and present in Berlin at the fine and always interesting re:publica and which he introduces in that blog post with thought-provoking quotes such as this one: "[...]Which is why I think we are at a point where experimentation for the sake of experimentation is over [...]"

Adam talks as well, both in that post, as well as in the slide deck, on the topic of Jams (In particular, the InnovationJam) as the originator of much of what has been happening with A Smarter Planet (In case you would want further background information on that topic) and I can certainly confirm that it makes up for some interesting reading.

Either way, I want to keep this blog post short, so with that introduction, and without much further ado, here you have got the direct link to the slides (In Slideshare) and also the embedded version (Check out slide #11, if you are interested in further details on IBM’s adoption of social software, both inside and outside the firewall):

And if after going through that slide deck from Adam you would still want to learn and find out more, check out this 4:51 minute long video interview where Adam gives a bit more background on the main purpose of what he tried to achieve with such thought-provoking proposal: it is now the perfect time for us to terminate with the social media experiment and about time to get down to business! What do you think? Are you ready?

Tags: Enterprise 2.0, Social Software, Social Networking, Social Computing, Social Media, Collaboration, Communities, Learning, Knowledge Sharing, KM, Knowledge Management, Remote Collaboration, Innovation, IBM, Networking, Social Networks, Conversations, Dialogue, Communication, Connections, Relationships, Productivity, A Smarter Planet, SmarterPlanet, Adam Christensen, Berlin, Germany, re:publica, re:publica09, Pilots, Experiments, InnovationJam, Jams, Slideshare, YouTube, Video, Interviews, Presentations, Events