Planning versus Adoption

Recently, a Twitter conversation regarding the success or likelihood of success of so-called 'Enterprise 2.0' projects made me consider some of the fundamental differences between Enterprise 2.0 and more traditional corporate software project implementations, like ERP.

Traditional

The planning, testing, and prototyping steps are typically quite lengthy, frequently involving many months to even years, but once the 'go-live' date is reached, you have almost 100% adoption rates right away.

If you were to chart traditional ERP project timelines and user adoption levels it would look something like this:

Think of major system implementations for Core HRIS or Accounting. The 'adoption' of these systems is not 'optional' for the vast majority of end users, it is normally an 'all-or-nothing' proposition. The old systems are turned-off, and all users almost simultaneously 'adopt' the new system on Day 1.

Enterprise 2.0

Contrast that timeline to a typical Enterprise 2.0 deployment, where the software tools themselves are dramatically simpler, the time spent planning prior to deployment is usually significantly less, but achieving higher levels of user adoption can be much more difficult and take much longer.

These projects may be internal social networks, blogs, micro-sharing, wikis or idea markets, but commonly they are presented as 'alternatives' to traditional ways of communication and collaboration. Companies, at least initially, rarely 'force' adoption, rather they try to 'build' adoption through training, word of mouth, a visible internal champion, or small pilot programs.

Companies don't get rid of the e-mail or voice mail systems just because a new wiki is available.

Consequently, the length of time required to achieve full or the desired levels of user adoption could actually be longer for these on the surface 'simple' applications.  Of course 'time' is not the only important factor to consider in any kind of enterprise implementation, but it is certainly an important component.

These large E2.0 projects are probably not going to be any simpler, faster, and less problematic than traditional projects.  But, they will present a whole different set of problems for the organization, the kind of problems that many 'traditional' project managers and organizational leaders may not be prepared to address.

What two or three things can E2.0 project leaders do to try and mitigate these issues?

Technology in 1969

So I was thinking about 1969 today.  No, not really remembering 1969, but just thinking about it, I am not that old.

Why? Well after having yet another discussion on the topic of 'Who owns Enterprise 2.0, IT, HR, or the business?', I started to question why the HR community in particular seems so fixated on this debate.

Could it be simply another effort by HR to gain the elusive 'seat at the table', is it simply a priority of 'social media experts' to define a new market for their services, or perhaps it truly is an important and impactful debate that will have lasting effects on the future of HR and it's role in the enterprise?

For the record, I do think that whatever 'Enterprise 2.0' means, it is critical that HR be one of, if not the sole, driving force behind the selection and deployment of new tools and technologies meant to derive the most value out of the enterprise's human capital. 

And it could be that I am simply getting frustrated with the down economy, the seeming lack of meaningful progress of HR Technology in many organizations, and the overall inability of HR to lead in this area.

In 1969, 40 years ago, man landed on the Moon, the ARPANET was developed, the Concorde was test flown, and the Boeing 747 was put in service.

Forty years ago, almost everything seemed possible.  Forty years later far too many people are wasting their talents pushing paper around, manually typing information into un-integrated systems, and arguing over who 'owns' some new technology that may or may not ever be used.

In 1969 we were celebrating this:

In 2009, at least in HR Technology we can and should be doing better.  I will try my best, from my tiny pedestal to make a difference, to be a better resource, and more of a facilitator for my students and my friends in the use of technology for a better organization, work environment, and life.

We can, and should be doing better.

With great power...

comes great responsibility.

I am a comic book geek.  I remember and still own the first comic book I ever purchased.  It was Amazing Spider-Man #149, in 1977. 

Please keep the 'old fool' jokes to yourself. 

It cost $0.25 and I was so proud of myself for investing the quarter in a comic that I could read over and over, versus buying some candy or gum that I would have enjoyed for five minutes and then would have been gone forever.

Now, I wish I still had every comic that I bought when I was a kid, but the fact that I still have the very first one still means a lot to me, and that I will be able to pass it on to my son is special to me.

The key message of Spider-Man was always, 'With great power, comes great responsibility'.  Peter Parker (Spider-Man's true identity) constantly struggles balancing his 'responsibility' to use his tremendous powers to battle evil with his desire to have a 'normal' life, and be happy and content. Of course throughout the Spider-Man saga, his responsibility to fight crime leads to tragedy and pain in his personal life, and many times he battles the urge to simply walk away from it all, and just live his life as a regular man.

This is an incredibly unsettling time.  Jobs are disappearing, investment portfolios are worth half what they were a year ago, and everyone is looking over their shoulder waiting for some bad news.

If you are a leader or manager of employees, you too have a 'great responsibility', sometimes one that you don't always relish.  Your employees are looking to you more that ever for leadership, guidance, and most importantly, to make the right decisions that may mean the difference in saving their jobs.

It is not easy, it is not fun, it is incredibly hard to hang in there, to give your best day after day under this kind of pressure.  But you have to.  If not you, then who?  You are Peter Parker. You are Spider-Man.

With great power, comes great responsibility.

Can I get a status on that?

How many phone calls, e-mails, and meetings are devoted and dedicated to answering the question:

What's the status of (insert task, project, activity, report, proposal here) Jimbo?Flickr - Foreign and Commonwealth Office

Finding out where an important piece of work stands should not require a formal inquiry or something akin to a press conference.

But the reality is so many of these 'status updates' are deemed necessary because of the typical tools and technologies that still dominate most workplaces today.

Project plans with 'percent complete' notations are done in Microsoft Project, and kept on the project manager's PC, or maybe stored on a shared network drive.  But even on a shared drive, they don't do most team members much good, since the license for MS Project is ridiculous, and most team members don't have the software installed anyway.

Most other important documents are still developed in MS Word, and while pretty much everyone has MS Word, the important documents themselves are being passed around as e-mail attachments and it is almost impossible for 'participants' in the document creation to know they have the latest version. And for interested parties or executive sponsors, not actively involved in the actual creation of the document, well their only hope is to track down the latest version from somewhere, and you had better hope they can get the correct one.

And in many, many organizations, technical support or development requests (bugs, customizations, enhancements) are still tracked in a bizarre stew of Excel worksheets, Access databases, or in some kind of locally installed 'help desk' package that the real users can't access anyway.

Think about all the time you spend either asking or answering the question, 'Can I get a status on that?'

Make a tally of every time and in what situations that question gets asked for a month or so. The topics, processes, and context that generate the most calls for 'status updates' are ripe for the application of technology solutions to reduce these questions, increase visibility (and likely accountability), and improve productivity.

They may be new project tracking tools, wikis for document collaboration, or a web-based technical issue and help desk system, whatever the particular source of pain is in your organization.  But you know that they are needed.

Because every minute someone spends updating 'status' is a minute where the 'status' remains the same.  And in 2009, staying the same for too long could mean putting up a 'Everything Must Go' sign in the window.

Will Employees Use Internal Social Networks?

Easier collaboration, better communication, 'community' building, these are just a few of the anticipated benefits from the deployment of Internal or Corporate Social Networks. 

Lately it seems like every vendor, consultant, and tech publication around is advocating the introduction of some kind of internal social networking capability into the enterprise, either as a stand-alone application, see examples here, and here, or from vendors that are including 'social' capability in existing HR products and processes, examples here and here.

But frequently in these recommendations and 'sales pitches' hard data is lacking to address some of the key questions that HR and business leaders will naturally have about these projects.  Key questions like:

Will my employees actually use the social network?

Will social networking be seen as just a 'Gen Y' thing?

Will the use of the social network improve productivity?

These are just some of the important questions to consider when evaluating the appropriateness of an internal social network for your organization.

In an attempt to shed some more 'real world' data on these key questions, enterprise social networking vendor Socialcast released a report of findings from a pilot enterprise project for NASA, the United States official space agency.

The purpose of the social networking pilot (dubbed NASAsphere), was to determine if NASA knowledge workers would use and apply online social networking in the NASA environment. By purposely inviting a pilot group of users from a wide range of NASA locations and disciplines, NASA was also interested in examining what if any improvements in inter-departmental collaboration would be realized. The pilot would be a two-phase project, with each phase lasting 30 days, (honestly a very short time to make conclusions on the success or failure of a internal social networking pilot).

The key findings (based on surveys of the participants and analysis of the information created on the network) from the 47 page report on the pilot program:

• Almost 90% of the invited participants activated their accounts and participated in the launch of the pilot, a total of 78 NASA staff
• As the pilot moved through to Phase II, the user community grew to 295
• Users were from all Generation groups, and comments from participants indicated that age was not a factor in someone's willingness or unwillingness to participate in the social network
• About 82% of the participants said the platform made open communication easier
• But, only 28% of participants cited improved work productivity in the form of 'saved' time
  • This finding was tempered by numerous comments that indicated the initial narrow user base of the network was a limiting factor for many participants, it can be concluded that as participation across NASA increases, more users would report productivity gains.

The report is extremely detailed and worth a read if you are interested in testing internal social networking in your organization.  In particular interest to HR and HR leaders is the following recommendation from the NASA project team:

The human resource organization in private industry is increasing their role in coordinating,
supporting, and managing tools that enable the workforce to share and transfer knowledge. It is suggested that NASA’s Human Capital organization take the lead on implementing and utilizing NASAsphere as an enabling tool for the NASA workforce, notably taking on the human element.

This is an excellent 'real-world' case study that concludes that the HR organization is in the best position to lead these kinds of internal collaboration and community deployments. 

Hopefully, we will see more and more of these projects and more opportunities for HR to lead.