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

Lotus Knows IdeaJam Still Under Way!

As you may have noticed already, the last few hours I have been relatively quiet over here in my blog and it is not that I have gone missing again with another business trip. No, not yet. Things have been rather busy at work, just like every other day, but the interesting thing is that those free moments I would usually dedicate to hang out in various social software spaces I have then dedicated to participating in an online massive idea generation event that IBM Lotus has organised and which started on Wednesday already. Yes, indeed, check out Lotus Knows IdeaJam.

This massive, indeed, event, is well under way already since it got started already on Wednesday, has been going on today and will be finishing off tomorrow. Yes, the usual 72 hours for these kind of online collaborative events where thousands of people flock into a single online space to share their ideas on how to do things better around a specific set of topics that have been predefined before.

There are lots and lots of things that I could say about the event itself, but instead I would just spare you and suggest you check out the lovely blog posts that other fellow IBM colleagues like Ed Brill, Todd Watson, or Luis Benitez, or other folks like Mitch Cohen or Bruce Elgort (Bruce has already shared tons of materials on the IdeaJam itself!) have been putting together over the last few hours.

Alternatively, you could also check out what other people have been saying both on the Internet Blogosphere and Twitter streams, for example. Or take a look as well into PlanetLotus, before you move on … Yes, I know! Lots of stuff going on!

Either way, Lotus Knows IdeaJam has been enjoying a tremendous success! The latest statistics, as I get to write this are as follows: 745 ideas | voted 11623 times | 1546 comments, which you would have to agree with me are rather impressive, not being even half way through the event itself!

So to give you a little bit of a glimpse of where I have been hanging out over the last few hours, and where you could go yourself by registering in a matter of seconds, and getting involved as well!, here you have got a couple of snap shots from the tags participants have been using so far and the Top 10 ideas under What’s Hot?

That’s not too bad. Quite the opposite! But if you would want to get a more in-depth look into some of the contents of those ideas that are being discuss in this IdeaJam event set up by IBM Lotus have a look into the following embedded snap shots I have put together below from some of the tags that would match closely the interests of this blog from all along.

You will be able to find plenty of really nice surprises all over the place and it would surely be quite exciting to see how things develop from here till the end of the IdeaJam event itself and, much more importantly, the outcome of the online event itself… Remember IBM’s InnovationJam and the kind of impact it had all around?

Yes, indeed, I can’t wait to go back, keep jamming along, share ideas, comment on other people’s ideas, vote, promote, vote and promote again and have an overall good fun knowing I am contributing, just like anyone else, into something larger. Something good. Here you have got another teaser on what you are missing …

Not to worry, there is still plenty of time for you to chime in! Come and join us. TODAY!!! We are waiting for you to come along with us to help shape and co-create the company as we know it for the 21st century. Your company! 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, IBM Lotus, Lotus, Lotus Knows, Lotus Knows IdeaJam, LotusKnows, Idea Generation, Online Collaboration, Ed Brill, Todd Watson, Luis Benitez, Mitch Cohen, Bruce Elgort, Blogosphere, Twitter, PlanetLotus, Innovation Jam, Jams

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

Giving up on Work e-mail – Status Reports from Week 31 through to Week 35

After a superb business trip to Mechelen, Belgium, last week where not only did I have a great time, but also learned quite a bit!, it is now time to get back into the swing of things at work. Well, not really! Friday was the day of a massive catchup with everything and, like I was mentioning in Twitter, it was the first time in over five years that I spent it talking more on the phone than through online interactions! Goodness! I almost forgot how fast & easy it is to catch up while you talk, as opposed to when you write! I should be doing that much more often, for sure!

Anyway, you would expect I would be having time to get things back in order with my regular blogging and other work related activities, right? Humm, not likely! I am already preparing, during the course of today, for another business trip I will be doing this week, once again. Leaving tomorrow and going to Madrid to participate in a very special event which I will be blogging about shortly. Stay tuned, because it is going to be quite an interesting one!

For now, though, I think I will go with this blog post where I will try to catch up with those weekly progress reports I have been sharing all along since I started giving up on e-mail at work and which I have been neglecting for a little bit due to the holidays to both Barcelona and London, then the business trip to Mechelen and a week here and there. So I thought I share with you folks what has happened during those weeks.

To start with, I will not be commenting on other interesting links I have bumped into or the conference events I have been to during all of this time, since I will be blogging about them separately and I would also want to keep this blog post on the short side. So, what I will do, without much further ado is to share with you folks the actual progress reports and I will comment, right afterwards, with a couple of thoughts for each of them, so you can get a glimpse of what’s been happening all around. Thus, let’s get started!

As you would be able to see, lots of things have happened during the last few weeks, while I have been preparing for my vacation, during my vacation, on the first business trip after the vacation and so forth! To get things going, it looks like I hit my new challenge twice in that period of time! Yes, that is right! On my new challenge, I proposed to keep that incoming number of e-mails even lower, 20 or less! And to my amazement, since I didn’t expect it to happen so soon, there have been two times that I have done it, as you can see on those weekly reports. One with a hit of 20 and another one, the one I am incredibly excited about, which is 13 e-mails! Yes, that’s right! 13 e-mails in a single week!!! That’s exactly what I am looking forward to with this second part of the challenge of giving up on e-mail at work!

Too bad that after I came back, and while I was in Mechelen, Belgium, that count went sky high, with one of the highest from the entire nine months I have been doing this! But not to worry, it is all an exception, from what I can see. That really high count of e-mails was eventually due to three different factors:

- InnovationJam 2008: I managed to put together and share a number of different ideas, despite the poor conditions regarding my connectivity during that time, and a couple of them picked up a nice momentum, which developed in several private 1:1 conversations, too! I am trying to put together some of the thoughts exchanged throughout the Jam conversations so that you folks can have a look at some of the amazing stuff that happened throughout!

- Calendaring & Scheduling: This is something I have blogged about already in the past, and it is probably the number #1 issue that still keeps me making use of e-mail at odd weeks, like week 35, for instance. Two days in that week registered really high peaks of incoming e-mails, because I was discussing with a few folks the final logistics for a couple of events I will be attending from here till end of the year! If calendaring and scheduling is an issue, imagine it even worse when people send you e-mail after e-mail to finalise details that could have been done in a very simple, yet very effective manner: a phone call! (Or through Activities!). I need to work more on this one, before it kills me. Or, worse, something else that is starting to take some shape and which would need some further thinking before I share it across. We shall see.

- 1:1 conversations: As more and more folks realise how I still use e-mail for 1:1 conversations of a confidential / sensitive nature, sometimes I do get a few of these, yes!, they come in batches!, of folks wanting to detail stuff in a personal private conversation. And like I have been saying all along, more than happy to accommodate those coming through e-mail. The rest will be going OUTSIDE the Inbox!

Thus there you go. In a single blog post the weekly progress reports from the five weeks I haven’t been able to detail before, due to vacation preparations, the time away on holidays, and the business trip to Mechelen. Oh, and there was something else that sparked two very nasty blog posts while I was on the road, but, not to worry, I will not be sharing them over here. Far too negative! I will be putting together a rather softer one on the topic, which has surely influenced as well some of the high numbers on concrete days. Here is a hint on what it will be about: connectivity or, better said, the lack of!

But that will be the subject for another blog post. For now, time to leave things here. Hope you enjoy the massive catch up on all of those progress reports from the last few weeks and off to the next blog post that will contain a lovely surprise for those faithful readers that despite my somewhat irregular blogging activities, they still keep up with this blog eventually. Hang in there, lovely surprise coming up for you shortly!

Tags: IBM, Collaboration, Remote Collaboration, e-mail, email, Social Software, Social Networking, Social Media, Social Computing, Web 2.0, Enterprise 2.0, Innovation, Productivity, Knowledge Sharing, KM, Knowledge Management, Collaboration 2.0, Communication, Re-purposing E-mail, No-Email, Challenge Your Inbox, Shape Your Future, Travelling, Business Trips, Mechelen, Belgium, Madrid, Spain, Progress Reports, Thinking Outside the Inbox, Twitter, Shapeyourfuture, Social Innovation, InnovationJam 2008, IJam08, IJam 2008, InnovationJam, Calendaring & Scheduling, Calendaring, Scheduling, Confidentiality, Sensitive