The Next Generation Enterprise and Enterprise 2.0

The following is my point of view on a topic that has been getting a lot of attention lately.  There are two camps on Web 2.0 and Enterprise 2.0.  Each one has some very good points of view and relevant experience on the subject matter.  I will discuss briefly Enterprise 2.0 and how it relates to a Next Generation Enterprise.

Enterprise 2.0 is commonly defined as the technology and business practices that promote collaboration and free information sharing.  Enterprise 2.0 makes accessible the collective intelligence of the organization, thus translating this into competitive advantage in the form of increased innovation, productivity and agility.

I agree with all of these concepts.  The increased potential due to self-organization collaborative structures combined with the ease of information flow brings supports the idea of agility, flexibility, productivity and innovation.

When I read about Enterprise 2.0 and Web 2.0 for the most part the emphasis is on the collaboration paradigm, which is one of the main components of this initiative.  But I don’t see much on the integration to the Line of Business applications or Enterprise applications that are ingrained in the organization.  Many enterprises have adopted ERP systems and other enterprise services such as messaging and middleware.  And although they will benefit from the Enterprise 2.0 adoption there is still a gap that must be filled.  Bernard Lunn wrote a thought-provoking article on some of the topics I am describing here.

Let’s be cognizant of the fact that the impact to the enterprise due to the adoption of collaborative technologies will not be significant or even relevant if the underlying systems, where the real business process is implemented, can not be rapidly adapted to support the outcome of the wave of innovation and collaboration brought by Enterprise 2.0.  Most of the investments in IT have been on these Enterprise Systems and Line of Business systems that implement the mission critical business functions.  From Purchase Orders to Manufacturing functions, from inventory to accounting, and on, and on…    In addition to the “core” business functions we can also find systems that support decision making and other relevant supporting functions.

As a case study I will describe a “Global Company” that provides specialized equipment.  The “Global Company” needs to maintain its competitive advantage by providing new products quickly.  Their customer base has become more demanding wanting quick response and shorter product development cycles.  They also experienced more competition in the area as new comes to the market offer similar products.  And on top of that they see that their Research and Development group has been expanding due to recent acquisitions.  Let’s keep this scenario in mind for future reference.  This scenario is not too far from reality as I was involved on a project to assist the organization with the design for a global collaboration platform a few years ago.

This is where the overlooked component of Web 2.0, the technology paradigm, is absolutely necessary in order to transform an organization from a Typical Enterprise to a Next Generation Enterprise.  Even more important is the convergence of the collaborative paradigm with the day to day business functions and underlying systems.

The business logic that implement mission critical business functions is locked into legacy ERP and LOB systems and other supporting systems and workflows.    This is where Service Oriented Architecture provides an important foundation for the NGE.  BPM also adds to the flexibility required to quickly adapt the business processes.   

Going back to the “Global Company” case study.  The globally distributed  R&D group needed to collaborate more and expand their participation to multiple projects at the same time across the globe.  The tools that the R&D used were commercial off the shelf (COTS) tools focused in Mechanical Engineering and electrical systems design.  The new collaboration platform needed to seamlessly integrate the work products and plans produced by the use of the Design Software to a globally available document storage for continued collaboration on the plans and designs.  The intention was to provide ways to capture relevant information as it concerns the product being designed.  All other departments would have the opportunity to collectively participate throughout the product development process, from inception to delivery.  ”Global Company” wanted to identify the changes that needed to be made to the operating model and business processes in place to support the development and release of the new products, and the awareness of the new products throughout the organization will provide multiple points of view on what needs to change internally as the product is being designed and developed.  Eventually the product design had to be broken-down to components that could be sourced to partners and suppliers, but the overall process will continue to be centrally managed in their existing ERP platform.  They also needed to collaborate with their partners during the development of the product.  This is a good example of what I mean by an integrated collaborative platform.

A Next Generation Enterprise is an On-Demand Enterprise.  One that is connected end-to-end and is flexible and responsive to the Economic Pressures and changing markets.  One that is built on a flexible platform where collaboration and Enterprise systems are fully integrated.  One that has the flexibility to source services from the cloud or internally due to a flexible, agile business and technology platform.

Business Involvement, collaboration, technology and business agility,  and the convergence of Business and IT are the imperatives to the Next Generation Enterprise.

Master Data Management in the Service Oriented Enterprise

  With the latest trends in service orientation from an architectural and from business services offering perspective, it has become a high priority for an organization to define and implement a master data management strategy.   The enterprise must look to standardize on management of the transactional, master and transactional data, but often forgotten is the unstructured data and metadata.  A comprehensive MDM strategy must include policies and safeguard for unstructured data and metadata, which often provide invaluable information and enable better decision making.

The following list is intended to provide some high-level guidance and is not intended to be a methodology or end all be all solution.

When I think about an MDM initiative we should at least touch on the following:

• Identify the sources
• Identify the consumers
• Identify the primary (potential secondary sources)
• Collect and analyze metadata
• Select team members to provide stewardship
• Create the master-data model
• Select the toolset
• Retrofit systems based on MDM architecture
• Roll-out and support strategy

In addition to these concerns, we also have to deal with additional complexity if any of our business functions are sourced external to our organization.  For example, we might be using some component from NetSuite or SalesForce, or we might want to try out SAP’s ByDesign. 

When evaluating an MDM Solution we have to keep in mind the distributed nature of the enterprise and service oriented nature of the next generation enterprise.  Some Key aspects we need to evaluate on a potential solution are:

• Technical Architecture
• Compatibility with SOA
• Support for multiple Business Unites/Entities
• Support complex relationships and hierarchies
• Support for regulatory compliance
• Data Governance and Version Management
• Usability, Efficiency
• Security
• Integration with our current Workflow tool

Integrating Web 2.0 Services in the Enterprise

We are in need.

 

Hundreds of new platforms, tools, sites, etc… are available to both the public and the enterprise every day. And all of these are marketed as Web 2.0 or Enterprise 2.0. But do we really need all these?

 

Well, yes, we need it. But we need to bring some sanity to this madness. I think that Web 2.0 for the Enterprise will increase tremendously when we have a platform that brings together the various services of Web 2.0. Of course, only those services that makes sense for the enterprise such as: Search, discussion boards, collaboration (wikis), collective intelligence (wiki/blogs), Contact Management.  We also need to converge these services into a single platform that includes the typical Mail and Calendar services and Instant Messaging, and VoIP.  Only then we will have a truly integrated collaborative platform.

 

Integrating Web 2.0 and typical Enterprise Services in the typical Organization introduce a different challenge that integrating these in the consumer space. Enterprises move a little slower and are always looking for a business case. I believe a compelling reason to adopt a comprehensive integrated collaborative platform is “competitive advantage”.

 

I am starting to see frameworks that will provide a concrete implementation to a strategic roadmap. This will provide a good platform for solution development and thus some clarity on “how” the enterprise can get “there”.

 

Now I turn it over to you. What do you think will be the catalyst for Web 2.0 adoption in the enterprise?

Services on the Cloud

…. or Integration-as-a-Service 

In the last few years or so I have seen more and more vendors entering the SaaS space.   I have also observed an increase in the number of data sources, both internal and external.

Today we can source services such as data extraction Transformation and Load from Informatica and possible from other companies. 

We also have available to us services for Integration-in-the-Cloud from the well establish ESB Platform, CapeClear.

September has been the month for interesting  announcements.  MuleSource announced that they will provide Integration Services on the cloud.  MuleOnDemand is set to compete with CapeClear’s On-Demand Integration (ODI) offering.  The point I would like to make is that organizations are getting more options for solutions that allow to move and manage data regardless of where it resides.  We should see these type of offerings becoming mainstream in the near future.

On the Enterprise Software arena, SAP announced SAP Business By Design (formerly known as AS1).  For small and midsize companies that can not afford the large ERP license and LONG implementation cycles.   This is starting to look like a good option for these companies, just like SalesForce did a few years ago.  This latest is built upon SAP’s NetWeaver service-oriented technology platform and its own database software MaxDB.  They will  price it at $149 per user per month with a minimum of 25 users.

What I want to point out with these announcements is that we are starting to see availability of solutions for what traditionally has been done in-house, inside the organization’s firewall.  This has got to change the game and also shows that even the big giant ERP vendors are taking steps to evolve into what seems to be turning into a Service Oriented World.

Now, let’s assume you are a CIO for a company and you are being pressured to deliver more with less and in a fraction of the time.  Does this sound familiar?  would you consider any of these services?  What is the business impact?

I think that an organization that adopts the SOA paradigm will be able to adapt easier to changing market conditions.  Such organization will have more options to source services and will be able to leverage what the Cloud will offer. 

Web and Enterprise 2.0 – Technology or paradigm (Part 2)

I have been back from vacation for over a week and still trying to catch up with the many things that I placed on-hold during that time.  Finally the time slice goes to finishing the second part of the “web and Enterprise 2.0 technology or paradigm” posting.

To refresh your memory, in part 1 I discussed the two forces in the Web 2.0 space, the paradigm and the technology.  As I continue to explore more on the potential use of web 2.0 in the enterprise it becomes obvious that these two should be identified as two different forces because these must be managed separately if you map these to an organization’s Enterprise Architecture.

So, when it comes to the Enterprise 2.0, the term has been defined as the adoption of Web 2.0 in the enterprise. The adoption of what?  The paradigm and styles I would say.  Enterprise 2.0 is the result of the collaborative paradigm shift. It is the creation and adoption of the architecture of participation.

On the technology front, Enterprise Web 2.0 is the convergence of technology with legacy systems in the Enterprise.  The goal is to create an architecture of partition.

The Enterprise Web 2.0 solutions provide a level of robustness that is not available in the plain Web 2.0 technology enables.  Many of these EW2.0 tools actually build on top of web 2.0 technology approaches such as AJAX and mashups.  But they add real business value to the enterprise.  For example the mashup that the public is familiar with is the typical HTML mashup.  Hundreds of mashups are created every day that bring information from multiple sources and “mash it up” on top of google maps or MS Virtual Earth.  Although I see some of these adding some value to the enterprise, the real value is realized when we can provide a platform for users and developers to create, deploy and manage mashup services as reusable components and compose new applications by aggregating new data sources and existing mashup components.  In the context of the enterprise we have Line of Business applications, Business Intelligence sources, real time feeds, ERP systems, departmental applications, document management solutions, and many other potential sources of information.  Some of these Enterprise Web 2.0 solutions companies are providing the platform to manage innovation via mashup servers.

Some of the players in the EW2.0 area are Active Grid, Nexaweb, Laszlo and JackBe to mention a few.

Another example of Enterprise 2.0 enabled via Enterprise Web 2.0 technologies are convergence portals.  With hundreds of options out there for enterprise messaging, voice, data, collaboration, etc… we end up with a very disparate set of tools that provide a fractured collaboration strategy.  There is not a single place where you can manage and customize your communications and collaboration.  Many vendors are catching on to this.  ISPs are starting to provide a rich user interface to their users to allow them to organize the information they care to read.  Many of these are built on webtop like products that provide a great framework for rich internet applications and even nicer user experience.

As I continue to explore many of the elements in Web 2.0 I will continue posting about how I can see these being used in the enterprise.  I just signed up with my own account for technorati, del.icio.us and twitter. I will be looking at how social tagging and micro-blogging can be used in a work environment.  So far what I can tell you in twitter is that it all depends on the content and integration.  I am also kicking the tires on some of these APIs and their REST style services.  Look for future postings on these.

Web and Enterprise 2.0 – Technology or paradigm? (part 1)

I see a lot of information referencing Web and Enterprise 2.0.  For the most part these reference do not discriminate between technology and human factors.  I wanted to share my ideas on something that I have noticed in this space.  Web 2.0 comprises to facets:  the user-driven collaborative component and the technology enabling component.  Web 2.0 is actually both a paradigm and technology.

 

As I was getting ready to write about this I joined a group in Facebook, and in this group I saw a few interesting diagrams.  These diagrams led me to JackBe’s blog.  There I found that they propose the same thing that I am discussing in this blog entry.  On another note I also saw that JackBe and Nexaweb present themselves as Enterprise Web 2.0 Solutions.  Is Enterprise Web 2.0 different from Enterprise 2.0?  The answer is actually related to the facets that I am describing in this blog entry.  Part 2 of this series will cover that, but today I will focus on Web 2.0. 

 

Web 2.0

Mainly focused on social computing, this is a user driven collaboration paradigm. Users assemble and organize themselves and work in partnership with a common goal in mind.  Wikis, social networking, blogs are the common tools that enable users to participate in the Web 2.0 user-driven paradigm.

 

Web 2.0 technology

Technology that makes possible this user-driven paradigm.  Many of these technologies are not new but are now being accepted by a wider development audience.  Many of these are based on standards such as XML.  In these technologies we can mention Mashups, SOA, Web Services, REST based Services, AJAX among others.

 

In part 2 of this series of I will discuss the Web 2.0 facets in the Enterprise and how I see these enhancing the collaboration and integration possiblities between line of business applications and knowledge workers to create what I call an Enterprise collaboration platform.

Composite Applications

There is a trend that is part of this Web 2.0 wave.  There are quite a few number of companies that are providing ways for users to create their own applications by aggregation.  Many of these new offering are enabled by AJAX and RIA style apps.

New players are starting to appear in the aggregator and manipulator space.  Two players in this space are Pipes and Popfly.  These both share the same concept of allowing anyone to mashup online data.  Online communities along with the service make it easy to collaborate, rate and test components created by other community members.  I will not be long until we see more players in the widget creation space.  This will provide an ecosystem that will provide more options to integrate into online applications.

On the Enterprise side we can not ignore what is happening with the AppExchange which provides for a platform to find, test and install On-Demand applications pre-integrated into Salesforce.

Is this the new way to build applications?  You bet!  The trend can not be ignored.  Software as a Service is and will continue to be seriously considered by the enterprise and composite applications have been build in the enterprise for a few years now. 

Many of the new ways to bulid and share applications guide the users and developers to build discrete services that can be plugged into a larger service or can be used to create a composite application.

Game Changing

Today I was thinking about game changing aspects of the Web 2.0 wave.  I think that there are two aspects to Web 2.0 that are game changing: the way people interact and the underlying technology.  The collaboration culture resulting out of this social computing age is definitely an improvement to what we had last decade.  Lotus Notes and document management tools allowed us to collaborate in a clunky and not too effective way.  We are starting to experience more freedeom in collaboration that allows us to collect structured and unustructured information. 

On the technology aspects I think the Rich Internet Application (RIA) is the most significant and game changing technology aspect of this wave.  it has been attempted in the past but today there are promising technologies that allows for very rich applications to be deployed via the browser.  I have observed the jump from Desktop to the Web and back to the Desktop.  Is this a jump back to the Web?  Well, I think that with RIAs we have real options to deploy on the platform that most makes sense based on the requirements.  It’s about the freedom to collaborate and the freedom to deploy.

Web 2.0mania – Inflated Expectations. What’s next?

I am sure you are familiar with the Hype Cycle graphs .  This graph has been used by Gartner since 1995 to characterize the over-enthusiasm or “hype” and subsequent disappointment that typically happen with the introduction of new technologies.  I have followed multiple technologies thru the cycle and lived through several of these cycles myself.  I lived thru the hype cycles of Client/Server, Data warehouses, and even the internet among other technologies. 

Web 2.0 is no different.  I believe we are currently living in the “Web2.0mania” which is the Peak of Inflated Expectations.  Some of us have probably experienced some disillusionment with some of these Web 2.0 participants such as Wikis.  Honestly, wikis are a good way to collaborate, but in order for these to catch on fire in the enterprise these need to provide sufficient governance without stifling collaboration.  I have heard from multiple IT Managers and Directors that would like to make sense out of all the information contributed by the users by the use of blogs, wikis and other collaboration sites.  They all wish they had provided enough guidance on how to use these platforms in order to harvest the collective intelligence and make it easily accessible to anyone in the organization.  They are now tyring to provide a structure for enterprise collaboration. 

I see us coming out of this disillusionment phase with an enhanced Web 2.0 offering portfolio.  We will go thru the “slope of enlightenment” and finally reap all the benefits of this new wave of technologies and paradigms.  I see wikis being enhanced and better integrated to existing systems, directories and other enterprise resources. Even twitter could be used in a real business scenario and not just to let your coworkers know that you are eating a burrito and the effects that it had on your stomach. 

As we experience these phases in the cycle, we have to look for potential business / enterprise uses for Web 2.0 technologies, services and paradigms. We will see about twitter, but for the most part I agree with the TIC in that many of the Web 2.0 players are worth exploring for potential business use. 

I am looking forward to the last and most important phase of the hype cycle when these technologies will become stable and evolve into a truly integrated enterprise collaboration platform.

The Integrated/Collaborative Enterprise

Web 2.0 is a good proposition for changing the way knowledge workers collaborate. But in order for this to happen Web 2.0 tools must be seamlessly integrated to existing productivity toolsets and furthermore to Enterprise Systems.

The challenges Web 2.0 bring are related the lack of integration to existing tools and systems used in a daily basis in the enterprise. I recently started a collaboration topic with my coworkers at BSG. We started a discussion on what our Wiki platform really needs to be a more robust solution and our collaboration needs. We touched on very specific features, technologies, approaches and even support requirements. What was obvious during this discussion is that a Wiki is a good collaboration platform but is not complete. A Wiki is part of a much bigger integrated collaboration solution. If we want it to change the way we work in the Enterprise we must find ways to better integrate it to existing systems.

In the Enterprise we find ERP systems, custom developed systems, messaging systems and hundreds of little silos of information in the form of documents, spreadsheets, and departmental applications. My opinion is that a collaboration platform will provide advantages to the enterprise if we can use it seamlessly to bring the business processes, decision making information and collective knowledge together in an easy to use well integrated platform. 

In our internal discussion I started a wish list for a collaboration platform and curiously enough I mentioned that I would like to post to my blog using whatever productivity tool (read as Word Processor). In my case I am using MS Word 2007 and recently discovered that I can create a new Blog Post in addition to editing, reviewing, check spelling and doing everything else that I am familiar with on the Word platform.  Most important at the end I can just push the button and publish the entry. As a matter of fact I am creating this blog entry using MS Word 2007. I did not have to spend time learning to use the awkward blog entry editors or get frustrated with the “back” button on the browser and losing all my content. This is a good example on how an integrated collaboration platform can really make a difference. We should be able to leverage what we know how to use in order to make it easier to participate in this new paradigm of collaboration.

In the near future I will explore other Web 2.0 paradigms, technologies and how I envision a well integrated collaborative platform that invovles Web 2.0 and Enterprise Systems.