It's about the people, stupid

By Peter Burris

So, if you were given an opportunity to talk about day two of a technology conference attended by hundreds of technology, business, and vendor folk discussing how they're going to work together to solve really interesting problems over the next few years, what would you say?

How about, "Wow!"

While I heard plenty of talk about technology and tools, each of the couple dozen conversations I had quickly moved to a discussion of people and relationships and how to get things done. Here's a sample of the interactions I was lucky enough to participate in

• A director of development at a $3B+ logistics services company has been leading his company through a transition to Agile. He decided to introduce product management practices into his methods and wanted to talk about how best to set up a "customer council" to forge and sustain quality, bi-directional relationships with his users.
• A CIO at a well-known consumer products company recently decided to end IT's habit of trying to stop vendors and business people from speaking to each other independently of IT. By letting go, he got back — courtesy of vendor efforts to educate his executives — a business leadership team that both better understands the challenges and opportunities presented by current tech changes and much better appreciates the work that IT does.
• A marketing executive at a travel services company is implementing an idea — brought to her by her IT organization — for implementing Web 2.0 technologies to garner more business-group travel dollars as the economy changes. What was really interesting here is that she had her IT brainchild in tow the entire time, seeking insights from peers, vendors, and analysts, regarding how to speed and smooth their business transition.

The conference theme was "embracing chaos and delivering business results." Well, based on feedback I got at Forrester’s Business Technology Leadership Forum, I’m pleased to report that business technologists are getting a lot of business results at the cost of pretty modest technology chaos. Everyone noted how hard change can be. But attendees also seem to recognize that when business and technology leaders work together, ideally in concert with vendors, very cool things start happening.

What do you think? Is industry change paralyzing your BT efforts? Or are you successfully working your relationships to deliver business results?

Recap from Forrester’s Business Technology Leadership Forum

By Zach Thomas

Forrester concluded its Business & Technology Leadership Forum yesterday in Orlando, FL. The theme: “Embrace Technology Chaos. Deliver Business Results"

The event was loaded with content from Forrester analysts and industry experts, and included several “roll up you sleeves” sessions where attendees worked hands-on.

Below is just a sampling of some of the content and themes from the event — we look forward to seeing you at BTLF next year.

Chaos? Or Emerging Opportunity?
Sharyn Leaver, Forrester VP and Research Director, kicked off the forum by introducing how chaotic technologies are entering the workplace (e.g. Google apps, personal devices, social networks, and self-generated apps like Sharepoint). She talked about how IT is getting pushed out of the way, and their general response is putting into place new policies. Instead, businesses should embrace these chaotic technologies like Dell’s Ideastorm and Starbucks’ My Partner Career (internal social network) to deliver business results.

Thriving In The Age Of Technology Populism
Matthew Brown, Forrester Principal Analyst and Research Director, explored the idea of Technology Populism — peoples' ability to provision their own technology tools. He segmented the workforce based their propensity to use technology and interest in their career — surprisingly the largest group was neither career intense nor technology enthusiasts. So the key takeaway was to understand the different segments and equip and unlock their value by providing and allowing appropriate technologies.

Smart SOA™ Powers Smarter Business Outcomes
Sandy Carter, VP of SOA and Websphere Strategy, Channels and Marketing, and author of The New Language of Business, presented survey results from over 1,100 CEOs. They said that organizations must: lead with agility, harness the power of data, and reach today’s connected customer through new technologies, to name a few data points.

Business Applications Of 2020: A Three-Role Perspective
Ray Wang, Forrester VP, hosted a panel with Bobby Cameron, Forrester VP, Rob Koplowitz, Forrester VP, and George Lawrie, Principal Analyst predicted what technology would look like in the year 2020. This humorous panel speculated that packaged apps as we know them today will be obsolete and replaced by services in the cloud. They went on to say software development was no longer a code writing exercise, rather they would define processes and someone in the “cloud” would deliver product in the next few hours.

Other key topics discussed were:

• Collaboration strategies that work
• Continuous improvement delivers business value
• How to deliver results via virtual worlds
• How to manage the changing workforce
• Enterprise security and privacy in a Web 2.0 world

Let us know what you thought of the event and what you would like to see at future events.

Meet One-On-One With Forrester Analysts At Our Business & Technology Leadership Forum 2008

Consistently rated as one of the most popular features of Forrester Events, one-on-one meetings give you the opportunity to discuss the unique technology issues facing your organization with Forrester analysts. Business & Technology Leadership Forum attendees may schedule up to two 20-minute one-on-one meetings with the Forrester analysts of their choice, depending on availability. Registered attendees will be able to schedule one-on-one meetings starting on Monday September 15, 2008. Book early!

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B

William Band
Research coverage for Business Process & Applications professionals
Customer relationship management applications, customer experience management, stakeholder alignment, enterprise CRM
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Matthew Brown
Research coverage for Information & Knowledge Management professionals
Marketing and advertising, enterprise portals, intranets and extranets, information and knowledge management
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Peter Burris
Research coverage for Technology Product Management & Marketing professionals
Enterprise marketing platforms, marketing automation, high-tech, application development
See all »

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C

Bobby Cameron
Research coverage for CIOs
IT governance, risk, and compliance; the marketing of IT; serving the business; security and risk
See all »

Marc Cecere
Research coverage for CIOs
Designing IT organizations, changing the culture of an IT organization, IT strategic planning
See all »

Patrick M. Connaughton
Research coverage for Business Process & Applications professionals
Supply chain management services, supply chain management applications, enterprise mobility, RFID
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Alex Cullen
Research coverage for CIOs
IT organization; IT strategy, planning, and governance; organizational design and change management, IT management
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E

Boris Evelson
Research coverage for Information & Knowledge Management professionals
Information and knowledge management, business intelligence, OLAP, data warehousing
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G

Chip Gliedman
Research coverage for Business Process & Applications professionals
Customer relationship management, help desk/service desk, customer service and support, packaged applications
See all »

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H

Paul D. Hamerman
Research coverage for Business Process & Applications professionals
ERP, human capital management, financial management, business performance solutions
See all »

Brian W. Hill
Research coverage for Information & Knowledge Management professionals
eDiscovery, archiving, records and retention management, enterprise content management (ECM)
See all »

Bradford J. Holmes
Research coverage for Vendor Strategy professionals
Tech marketing tools and best practices; government, high-tech, tech marketing strategies
See all »

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K

Rob Karel
Research coverage for Information & Knowledge Management professionals
Information and knowledge management, integration technologies, metadata management, extract
See all »

Rob Koplowitz
Research coverage for Information & Knowledge Management professionals
Information Workplace, collaboration strategy, collaborative platforms, SharePoint
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George Lawrie
Research coverage for Business Process & Applications professionals
Retail information technology; consumer goods supply chain; pricing, promotions, and revenue optimization; collaborative processes such as trade promotions management and sales; and operations planning
See all »

Sharyn Leaver
Research coverage for Business Process & Applications professionals
Packaged applications, business process management, ERP, application strategy and selection
See all »

Craig Le Clair
Research coverage for Information & Knowledge Management professionals
ECM, BPM, output management, document processing services
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M

Pete Marston
Research coverage for Business Process & Applications professionals
Customer relationship management, sales force management, software-as-a-service, outsourcing
See all »

Kyle McNabb
Research coverage for Information & Knowledge Management professionals
Information and knowledge management, document imaging, eForms and information capture, enterprise content management
See all »

Thomas Mendel, Ph.D.
Research coverage for Vendor Strategy professionals
Product portfolio strategies, mobile services, business service management, data center management
See all »

Connie Moore
Research coverage for Information & Knowledge Management professionals
Information and knowledge management, business process optimization, IT organization, enterprise content management
See all »

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Leslie Owens
Research coverage for Information & Knowledge Management professionals
Information and knowledge management, taxonomy and classification, enterprise search platforms, text mining and analytics
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P

Natalie L. Petouhoff, Ph.D.
Research coverage for Business Process & Applications professionals
Customer service and support, customer experience, customer experience management, business strategy for customer experience
See all »

Lisa Pierce
Research coverage for IT Infrastructure & Operations professionals
Voice services, telecommunications services by region, remote access infrastructure, networking
See all »

Tom Pohlmann
Research coverage for CIOs
Business models, high-tech, corporate strategy, tech sector economics, product and solutions strategies
See all »

Stephen Powers
Research coverage for Information & Knowledge Management professionals
Information and knowledge management, digital asset management, enterprise content management, Web content management
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R

Stefan Ried, Ph.D.
Research coverage for Vendor Strategy professionals
Enterprise architecture, Service-oriented architecture, application platforms and programming strategy; application development
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Ted Schadler
Research coverage for Information & Knowledge Management professionals
Real-time collaboration tools (instant messaging, presence, document sharing, etc.), cloud-based collaboration and email, mobile collaboration tools and applications, virtual worlds for the enterprise
See all »

Claire Schooley
Research coverage for Information & Knowledge Management professionals
eLearning, information and knowledge management, videoconferencing, Web conferencing, enterprise collaboration, new workforce, retiring workforce
See all »

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Scott Tiazkun
Research coverage for Business Process & Applications professionals
Financial management; governance, risk, and compliance; financial management applications; security and risk
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Zach Thomas
Research coverage for Business Process & Applications professionals
Human resources management applications, compensation, recruitment strategies, packaged applications
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Tim Walters, Ph.D.
Research coverage for Information & Knowledge Management professionals
Web content management, enterprise content management, digital asset management, information and knowledge management
See all »

R "Ray" Wang
Research coverage for Business Process & Applications professionals
Enterprise apps and ERP, software contract negotiations, software partnerships and ecosystems, customer data integration
See all »

Doug Washburn
Research coverage for IT Infrastructure & Operations professionals
Green IT, IT organization, IT infrastructure and operations, IT management
See all »

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Y

Gil Yehuda
Research coverage for Information & Knowledge Management professionals
Enterprise Web 2.0 and Social Computing; collaboration strategy, tools, and culture; virtual communities of practice; virtual team collaboration
See all »

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Global GS1 Adoption

GS1 offers the opportunity to standardize the attributes that retailers and their suppliers exchange, reducing the need for retailers to maintain on-boarding portals and for manufacturers to publish their item master data to multiple retailers in multiple formats. Yet anecdotal evidence suggests disappointed adoption particularly in Europe where Forrester hears “things are different” and “retailers can’t use GS1 standards without significant modifications”. I would welcome comments from readers. Are the GS1 standards really only appropriate to the allegedly homogeneous market of North America or are they a universally attractive way to simplify new product introduction? If GS1 falls short of European and international requirements or the requirements of smaller firms then what specifically is lacking?

George Lawrie, Principal Analyst
Business Process & Applications
Forrester Research

Beijing's Take On Field Service Management

Just a week ago, after hosting 16 days of much anticipated and closely followed Olympic competition, Beijing passed the baton to London in a dazzling closing ceremony at its National Stadium. The Games of this 29th Olympiad commenced with the dizzying precision and coordination of 14,000 performers and 29,000 fireworks in the now famed Bird's Nest stadium. And in the weeks that followed the world's finest athletes competed head to head for podium spots in 28 sports. From my own living room I watched Michael Phelps swim his way to an unprecedented eight gold medals, Jamaica's Usain Bolt far outpace the competition to secure the title of world's fastest man, and countless other memorable performances.

It's only natural to wonder how they -- the athletes -- do it. Is it just pure genetics? Lots of gym time? New stretching techniques? Performance-enhancing substances? But if you're a telecommunications aficionado you might wonder how did they –- Beijing –- pull off non-stop coverage throughout the games, and seemingly without a hitch? After all, had Beijing been unable to deliver uninterrupted comprehensive telecom service at crucial moments, an entire world could have missed out on so many of the historic moments made this summer.

As a starting point, CNC Beijing was selected as an official telecommunications partner for the Olympics, and was tasked with delivering fixed line, broadband, video transmission, and internet service for the Olympics and entire city of Beijing. Given the protracted time frame, record magnitude of the games (athletes from 205 countries/regions competing across 37 venues), and shear volume of people to prepare for (the Olympics brought an additional 7 million people to Beijing's existing 15 million); CNC needed a field service management strategy and supporting technology that was scalable, functionally sophisticated, centrally focused, real time, and SLA driven.

To help ensure that telecommunication service and network management met the Olympic Committee's high expectations, CNC selected ClickSoftware's technology to schedule, monitor, and manage field engineers across all tasks and venues during the Olympics. Integrated with a centralized control center and connected to SMS-enabled cell phones, the complete solution was able to satisfy the major needs for the committee.

• Optimally managing field workers. To maximize uptime, 1,000+ field service technicians divided across 14 specialties were optimally scheduled based on their skills, tools, locations, venue security clearance, and availability.
• Meeting stringent SLA requirements. Every second counts when meeting tight SLA windows. The Olympics were no exception; the final solution and process had to be effective and streamlined enough to schedule all calls to a field technician within 5 minutes. Followed by allotting technicians with small windows to resolve the issue –- in the instance of a level A call just 30 minutes.
• Managing all operations in real time. Every task was pushed to engineers and received in real time, and engineer status was reported back centrally in real time. This enabled the central call, scheduling, and network monitoring center to manage every venue, engineer, and task in real-time through Web-based interfaces equipped with alerting functionality and KPI status reporting to manage by exception.

What have we learned? More traditional field service organizations can apply CNC's approach to improve their own operations in a few key ways:

• Shortening the scheduling cycle. Most repair and maintenance tasks can only be executed so quickly by field engineers. In addition, to ensure that engineers effectively resolve jobs the first time around and to make sure safety is taken into consideration, firms probably don't want their techs approaching their work hastily. Instead, reexamine the scheduling process for process steps that can be collapsed, streamlined, or entirely automated to make up ground.
• More discretely managing tasks. Dare I say micromanage? As service tickets were scheduled to engineers automatically, SMS messages went to engineers and venue managers. And while engineers accepted jobs they reported their status back to the control center also via SMS. Constant reporting allowed for accurate, more real-time status updates and in turn a better view into which tasks were in jeopardy and required manual intervention.
• Making appropriate technology simplifications. Although ClickSoftware, a best-of-breed optimization field service management vendor was selected as the heart of this system, the mobile hardware selected was a cell phone enabled with SMS. These weren't tablet PCs, ruggedized laptops, or blackberries for that matter. By simplifying the technology that the engineers had to operate CNC eased communication and cut down the time some mobile operations take to officially accept, run through, and close jobs.

Elisse Gaynor
Researcher, Business Process & Applications

Forrester's Business & Technology Leadership Forum 2008

Forrester's Business & Technology Leadership Forum 2008 is coming up soon — September 23-24 in Orlando, Fla. This event is designed to arm technology and business leaders with emerging organizational, process, and technology practices that balance chaos and control to drive new business value. We have a great speaker lineup this year, with keynotes from:

Guest Speakers

• Boyd Beasley, Senior Director, Customer Support, Electronic Arts
• Sandy Carter, Vice President, SOA & WebSphere Strategy, Channels and Marketing, IBM
• Karla Gill, Vice President, Enterprise Workplace Solutions, Marriott International
• Oliver Goh, Business Development Executive, Implenia
• Bob Pearson, Vice President of Communities and Conversations, Dell
• Gene Rawls, Vice President, Continuous Improvement, Wells Fargo Financial
• Donald Toland, Senior Director of Product Strategy, Qwest Communications
• Kenneth Washington, Ph.D., Vice President and Chief Privacy Leader, Lockheed Martin

Forrester Speakers

• Matthew Brown, Principal Analyst, Research Director
• Bobby Cameron, Vice President, Principal Analyst
• Rob Koplowitz, Principal Analyst
• George Lawrie, Principal Analyst
• Sharyn Leaver, Vice President, Research Director
• Connie Moore, Vice President, Research Director
• R "Ray" Wang, Vice President

Of course, the best way to fully benefit from the event is to attend; you can visit Forrester for all of the relevant information. If you're attending, here are some great ways to maximize your experience:

• Check this blog for our in-depth updates from keynotes and track sessions
• RSVP on our Facebook Event page, and network with attendees
• Follow us on Twitter as we plan and launch the event

If you can't be there, you can still stay connected with these platforms. But hopefully we'll see you in Orlando!