Thanks, it’s great to be here

You raise a valid question, what about big companies where facebook has yet to tap into the corporate/social dialogue? From what we have seen, Facebook and similar social networks are already a reality in the enterprise world, whether employers are actively promoting it (e.g. Serena) or not. WorkBook would enable these corporations to stay ahead of the game, and join the E2.0 bandwagon.

Just as a reference, a few months ago there was a bit of blog action surrounding Facebook’s penetration into Microsoft. In July, The Sean Blog noted that there were over 17,000 MSFT employees on Facebook. Today, a quick search reveals that there are over 25,000 employees signed on to the social network. That’s a 47% increase in just 5 months. Google’s network has also increased from 5,500 in July to 7,600 employees today, currently making up about 72% of its workforce. This is the reality we observe in corporate America.

Also, in WorkLight products we’ve gone beyond collaboration tools as you noted, enabling Web 2.0 navigation through complex applications such as ERP and CRM to access data in a customized self-service manner. We’ve found that having this capability has real business value for customers.

Best, Yonni

There’s something I’m curious about. In a smaller environment, getting rampup to Facebook might be somewhat minor. In a corporation where upwards of 75% of the resources don’t currently have a Facebook account, the effort would be significant.

If I were in a decision-making role and looking to optimize the effort of the employees, I’d want a solution that would be adding significant value beyond collaboration/interaction and reliance on individual investment in maintaining an identity. Are you now or will you plan to add functions that automate the creation of identity through synthesis of their works (e.g. internal crawls/inventory of content authored by individuals)?

You are absolutely right… it is all about interconnectivity and productivity, not so much the specific technology.
The value of web 2.0 applications in the enterprise lies in the ability to bridge the gap between the consumer experience and the workplace routine. That is the WorkBook premise, relying on the following major trends:

1. People are increasingly adopting cool technology at home (IM, personalized home pages, Facebook, etc.). This is especially true of the younger, more tech-savvy generation.
2. These same folks come to work and are frustrated by their enterprise computing experience. Examples include using arcane application interfaces, being overwhelmed by email sent to too-large distribution lists, finding information, etc. This has been well documented; see for example, an excellent report that quantifies the cost of this frustration – The Hidden Costs of Information Work, Susan Feldman, IDC research report #201334, April 2006.
3. There is a mega-trend (Gartner calls it “irreversible”) around the consumerization of enterprise IT. Certainly a part of this involves employees “bringing” their consumer tools to work. A recent Yankee Group survey found that 86% of corporate end users (not IT executives) already use at least one consumer technology in the workplace (Holbrook, Josh, Yankee Group, Zen and the Art of Rogue Employee Management, 17 October 2007).

When you add it up, what this means is that organizations have to respond to their employees’ desire to use consumer computing tools that are convenient and comfortable for them. The bottom line is that no specific technology is the solution, but rather all technologies are the solution. In other words, WorkBook does not seek to replace any existing means of employee-employee or employee-organization interaction. It brings together employees who are already spending time on Facebook, and helps optimize their interactions, thereby increasing productivity – all within the firewall.

A simple example is a developer team working on an upcoming product upgrade release. Using WorkLight’s WorkBook application, the team can form a group surrounding this project, share relevant news regarding competing technologies, search for relevant experts within the organization, discuss application data, etc. This presents the company with an added level of collaboration among team members over a platform that is naturally appealing to the workers – the social network.

I also agree with you on the saturation of interface – the modern workspace has become quite a cluttered environment. One of our main guidelines is to sidestep the interface and focus on real needs within the organization.

Regards,
Yonni

Yonni Harif | Marketing Manager

WorkLight | T +972.9.961.5225 | M +972.54.250.0767 | yonni@myworklight.com

WorkLight™ – Consumerizing the Enterprise Computing Experience™

I did not mean to pick on Sales and Marketing – just chose that to illustrate my point. The case you lay out in your comment is pretty much what I am saying – focus on a process-driven approach.

For instance: “You’re working on a pursuit and need insight and/or help from someone inside the company with a specific area of expertise. How do you find them, if the entire company isn’t participating in the ‘community’?”

In my mind that’s a classic example of a process that’s critical to the enterprise that I mention above. Using social networking to facilitate such a meaningful and time sensitive discussion suddenly has business justification to it and the dollars will flow to support it.

But, here’s an interesting scenario that illustrates the short-sightedness of this approach. Say you’re in sales at a major technology firm. You’re working on a pursuit and need insight and/or help from someone inside the company with a specific area of expertise. How do you find them, if the entire company isn’t participating in the ‘community’?

This isn’t the same as being part of the conversation or having access to the ’sales community’, it’s whether or not the individual has an identity that’s searchable across the types of attributes that the sales person is looking for.

Most ‘formal’ corporate data stores have pre-defined attributes (you can only select what’s made available). What happens when the needs are attributes that are the evolving things that aren’t in the pre-defined lists?

The distinction here is not so much about sharing conversations as it is finding the right people to have a conversation with in the first place — typically outside of your immediate circle of influence.

I think cherry picking applications based on specific process needs gets you a better chance at succeeding with “social networking”. In the enterprise, its more important to think where ’social’ actually helps an existing technology-enabled process solution. If we break out social networking into discrete pieces and evaluate each against current processes, there’s a better chance at adoption. Social between say sales engineers and sales reps on the same account team is might have legs. Social Networking between Sales people that are competing for the same book of business – not so much. Pick out the pieces that matter to each audience and there’s a treasure of applicability of Socnets capabilities.