Sweat the Small Stuff

Collaboration is the essential ingredient for intelligent “workplace” teams, as studies have told us for decades — yet for many enterprise organizations even today, working together easily still remains elusive.

I can point to a few reasons historically for this failure, but more hopefully, I see multiple trends that will change our future.

Turn Quadrants Upside Down

First, for the past twenty years or more, the team collaboration topic has often been approached with the classic 1970 Boston Consulting mindset: solve the largest problem for the largest gain. In fact, coming at “working together” from an individual user-based perspective is a better strategy in today’s product-as-a-service world.

I would argue that IT apps should eliminate small, frustrating, and painful tasks to create instant user gratification. Doing this repeatedly over time, I believe, earns loyalists who are thrilled to use your collaboration tools and are then highly productive.

Take the common collaboration roadblock of trying to share a file. Fixing this alone might dislodge the majority of pain holding back teamwork in your enterprise.

In a typical scenario, a team working together wants to share a large PowerPoint file, but IT blocks large file sends through email. Instead, IT could enable shared folders with a smart phone app, then allow easily copy/pasted folder links sent in email. Work teams would gain immediate file access, even while traveling, to keep collaboration going.

All it takes is prioritizing the user pain.

Focusing on improving one small productivity task increases the likelihood of it getting solved. Choosing the most frustrating or inhibiting user problems to solve generates rampant user engagement — the number one criteria for enterprise software success in a cloud future.

Similarly, using apps that do one thing well can drive productivity through the roof. Sweating the small stuff that holds users back will pay off in team motivation and their day-to-day ability to work together productively.

Respect Muscle Memory

Second, old yet productive working habits have been outright forsaken for the new. If colleagues are adept with email and use it fluently, incorporate that habit into the newest services you deliver.

Allow teams to continue using email as a sharing mechanism while taking away its inefficiencies. Better yet, give them improvements, such as protection from malicious email attachments.

Habits are embedded in muscle memory. The fewer you have to change, the better. How much are your collaboration apps undoing productivity for the sake of productivity?

Adapt to Users, Not to Initiatives

Finally, rethink what’s causing frustration or creating inefficiencies in your teams in the first place. Does solving the root cause of working together really require a complete technical rearchitecture?

Considering that the tenure of corporate leaders continues to drop, fitting collaboration projects into smaller 1-2 year efforts with rapid iteration cycles is critical. Look for creative and innovative solutions that keeps users productive first.

My favorite example is that you don’t have to reconfigure SAP and change your invoice processing workflow, just to solve getting SOWs signed. We simply incorporated electronic signatures into our file sharing app. If an executive is on the road, no need to print, sign, fax and return a document. Just fingertip sign and click to share, all in one place.

Enterprises have enough company-wide initiatives to drive, and coming at collaboration as an entire reconfiguration can lose steam before it ever delights a single user. Adapt your collaboration services to users first, so approved apps are immediately desirable at the grass roots level. And rethink functionality from the user level to uncover potentially simple, shorter-term solutions.

Why the Future Looks Brighter

Of course, hindsight is 20/20, and there have been valiant attempts to make collaboration better. Recent studies are looking at how to design the smartest teams possible in the first place so they’re predestined to collaborate, for example.

But from a technology perspective, I see several trends that were not pervasive decades ago. These have changed behaviors and laid the groundwork for us to come at collaboration differently. This is why I’m hopeful things will change for the better.

For IT, for example, the ease of delivering incremental software changes to users has greatly improved. Users know how to self-procure apps. They are on the lookout for, and willing to try, better ways of working. IT can take advantage of this new mindset by delivering the best user-loved solutions. IT can lead impactful changes that address strategic organizational needs, like productivity and global collaboration.

Vendors have changed as well, amidst the popularity of smart devices. The constraints of small screen sizes have forced the quality of software to improve. Only the most essential functions can be presented to today’s users, who are constantly swiping and mobile. This mobile design discipline has made it a requirement to do less things very well, rather than delivering distracting or unused feature sets that might slow users down.

These future trends and an understanding of past failures can help us, as leaders, navigate to gain incredible team efficiencies in the present. Start by solving the painful annoyances that hold teamwork back; carry forward learned productivity habits that work; and focus on users, not initiatives.

Sharing is a Necessity

There are things we do innately – check the time, read the news, breathe. For me on the road, it’s second nature to share ideas. Even though I lead a file sharing division (Syncplicity), I’m not the only one who thrives because of sharing, as I learned this week.

By publishing its first Magic Quadrant for Enterprise File Synchronization and Sharing (EFSS), Gartner makes one thing clear: the ability to easily and securely share files in the workplace has become a modern day necessity. The report presents sound guidance for mapping EFSS to your own enterprise organization’s priorities.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This graphic was published by Gartner, Inc. as part of a larger research document and should be evaluated in the context of the entire document. The Gartner document is available upon request from EMC.

While of course I’m thrilled to see that Syncplicity is furthest on the Completeness of Vision axis, we sincerely believe this Magic Quadrant will help customers redefine how work within their organizations gets done. Strategically understanding how EFSS fits into your mobile and social future will yield benefits far beyond making sharing innate:

• EFSS empowers employees to cast off time-consuming tasks to automation and focus instead on breakthrough ideas (see the Gartner report’s comments on Syncplicity ease and speed)

• EFSS thrills IT by providing secure and compliant tools people enjoy, repeatedly use, and will virally transfer to more people without the need for IT support (see report comments on our enhanced user experience, editing docs and integration with mobile apps)

• EFSS connects you to all of your existing infrastructure, bringing you into the modern mobile-social era without sacrificing all you’ve built already, especially storage systems, SharePoint, and office solutions (see report comments on integration strengths)

For EMC, this more frictionless way of working started after the Syncplicity acquisition in 2012. Then we made the leap to 60,000 EFSS users, sharing our lessons learned here.  Over the past two years, we have packed in innovations based on enterprise customer feedback.

The Syncplicity approach, as the report highlights, confirms a belief we’ve held since the beginning: design matters. Build an app that’s amazing to use, functionally and aesthetically, and uptake will occur organically.

It takes functionality that meaningfully impacts all enterprise stakeholders for true ROI.

And now in 2014, Gartner is tracking EFSS and has delivered the Magic Quadrant format to guide all of us on next steps. An ecosystem of file sharing market vendors, scrutinized annually by the likes of Gartner, will only further innovation and expedite this new way of mobile working.

Enterprise File Synchronization and Sharing has arrived in the enterprise.  Check out the full report.

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Gartner does not endorse any vendor, product or service depicted in its research publications, and does not advise technology users to select only those vendors with the highest ratings. Gartner research publications consist of the opinions of Gartner’s research organization and should not be construed as statements of fact. Gartner disclaims all warranties, expressed or implied, with respect to this research, including any warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose.

Productivity Gets Reimagined when Mobile is the Design Baseline

 (Originally published on Reflections Blog)

Why bother with 6AM conference calls and 14-hour flights? Because we are at the early beginnings of an era where imaginative thinkers are changing everything in sight – from thermostats to software.

I’m talking specifically about design shifts in mobile enterprise software, the likes of which one day we will look back upon with awe. These past few weeks, I saw it in spades, as we launched Syncplicity’s mobile apps.

What’s different now?

In the first wave of mobile software development, incremental innovation simply brought old functionality to a new device. In the process, fundamentals were often missed.

How frustrating to see a document for review on your mobile screen, yet be unable to edit it? Design was simply your desktop basic functionality, brought awkwardly to your smart phone.

The second wave brought mobile on par with the desktop. Functionality was refactored amidst the new memory and added capabilities of our favorite gadgets. Less and less R&D teams argued if a mobile version of their software was next.

But such design was still a parallel effort, a passenger alongside the driver of monolithic application development. SharePoint is now in the cloud? Interesting, but it doesn’t solve my problems.

The reality is that mobile itself is the new design baseline, cleanly isolated and independent of any lingering PC notions. Mobile is the superset form factor, under which all functionality must be derived and considered.

This third wave of design is what ignites our imagination and makes us want to drive 24/7 to brilliant new productivity solutions.

Once we unleash imagination, it’s only a matter of time before the way we think about “productivity” will change in thrilling ways. Remember what “taking pictures” used to mean? 

It was a time-consuming and disparate routine of carrying camera equipment with you, buying film, configuring the camera settings, and at last, waiting to process the film.

By rethinking “taking pictures” as “sharing moments,” however, those inefficiencies not only disappeared, but new worlds opened up. Ubiquitous devices brought image capture to the masses. Apps made photos easy and addictive to share. And social created a place where all the people to share photos with are constantly present.

The same thing will occur as we rethink “productivity” from the mobile perspective. Many attributes of mobile are barely tapped today: proximity, location and personalization, for example.

And we already we see new segments quickly embracing the third wave first, as inklings of what’s to come:

• retail workers processing credit card payments without the customer ever waiting in line
• flight attendants logging meal orders as they walk the aisle with their device
• citizens never bothering with the red tape to turn on a “land line”

It’s time to think: how else can we eliminate knowledge workers’ wasted time, speed their transactions, and heighten their ability to share their value?

Yes, mobile itself offers rich new design inspiration. But imaginative designers will rethink it all – the meaning of “productivity” included.

Fewer Silos For The Files: Managing Cloud Data

(Originally published in Data Center Knowledge)

The demand for ubiquitous access to any file, any place on any device has resulted in a wide range of new cloud services over the last five years. While many of these services do deliver to some extent on this promise, they also end up creating entirely new silos of information. Now, when you want to access an important piece of information, you have to remember whether it is on your local hard drive, your shared file system, the document management application or the consumer file sync and share. Or all of the above? These silos exist because there is not just one that satisfies everything you are trying to accomplish.

Vendors don’t necessarily intend to create information silos, but their limited architecture and short-sighted approach forces users to drag and store all content in their system to make it work. This creates significant barriers for users who want to access their files. Where did they save it, is it the most current version and can they even access it from the road?

But wait. What if there was a better way – a method that started to break down all of these silos rather than creating a new one. How would that be? First and foremost, it makes much more sense to open up existing silos than to create new ones that circumvent the infrastructure you’ve already built – and we can now do this.

Bringing Your Data to the Cloud 
An ideal enterprise solution would not copy all the files from the local server and place them in a separate information repository in the cloud as many consumer-centric file sync and share solutions do. Instead, it would simply open up the company’s existing file storage systems, making files and home directories available in the cloud just as they are on the local server. For example, as a tool specifically designed for the enterprise, EMC Syncplicity will be making information from Isilon and many other storage systems accessible automatically via the cloud.

This approach solves a common problem: with so many apps for file sharing, collaboration and productivity, users must often switch between different user interfaces and try to remember where exactly a file is located. This can be a problem if you are just using one file system, and it increases by an order of magnitude with each additional system you use.

As a comparison, think about how much easier your web experience is now that you can log in to consumer apps and sites using Facebook, giving you access to all your Facebook friends and the option to seamlessly share updates from those apps on Facebook. This eliminates steps, saves users time and creates a great user experience.

Unlocking Existing Silos
Furthermore, as the device ecosystem continues to expand and the BYOD trend continues to proliferate, having access to files on every device at all times is becoming less of a perk and more or an expectation. File sharing tools, especially for the enterprise, should unlock existing information silos so they are accessible on all the devices their employees may be using. Documents and files are useless unless they are accessible when, where and how users need them.

Many content management platforms, like Microsoft SharePoint, have thus far only been accessible via PCs connected to an organization’s server due to the lack of a secure, streamlined and cost-effective approach to delivering mobile access. Opening existing document management and file storage infrastructure to mobile, and eventually all connected devices, without requiring a full-scale migration of data is a challenge cloud file sharing services must tackle to truly turn on an increasingly mobile and connected workforce.

Just as files are useless if users can’t access them, a file sync and share solution fails to deliver on its promise when it only mimics the existing experience of yesterday’s technology. Mobile devices have penetrated almost every aspect of consumers’ lives and apps like FlipBoard have redefined how we interact with content, yet most file sharing solutions, like Box and Dropbox, are still simply recreating 20-year-old file trees on a small screen and calling it a mobile app. The companies that are helping move the enterprise into the future, the ones that will ultimately come out on top, are developing truly innovative mobile apps that allow these devices to function as full work platforms that take advantage of contextual elements like location, proximity and social feeds. Features like in-app document editing, simplified folder navigation optimized for the touch interface, and use of mobile-only contextual data such as location and proximity make for a dynamic and powerful user experience on mobile devices.

Breaking down information silos to create a streamlined way for users to interact with their files and get their work done when and where they want is the only way to allow productivity for the evolving workforce. And in the end, it all comes down to how we can be most productive in our work, in the office and everywhere else.

In Enterprise Software, Digital Disruptors Can Be Your Guide

Originally published in InformationWeek on December 19th

I continue to be amazed by the rapid pace of innovation in virtually every technology market. Every time you blink, it seems there’s another startup taking on the old guard.

Conventional wisdom in technology is that you need to abandon the existing order when faced with a new bright and shiny product. However, as someone who has worked with both startups and global leaders, I know it cannot be an either/or approach. Scrapping years or decades of investment in infrastructure is foolish, and the innovators who are winning are building their breakthrough tools on top of proven technologies. Two great examples are products I use and love: Flipboard and Nest Thermostat.

By nature, Nest and Flipboard improve upon existing products instead of trying to replace them. For example, instead of creating its own content from scratch, Flipboard compiles content that already exists into a format based on users’ preferences. By the same token, the Nest Thermostat makes no attempt to re-engineer an entire heating/cooling system. Instead, it offers a smarter thermostat that integrates with the heating/cooling infrastructure that’s already in place.
With the enterprise technology space becoming more competitive by the day, you may be asking how we can apply this model to enterprise technology. Let’s dig a bit deeper into the Flipboard and Nest strategies to find out.

Flipboard reimagines existing content

Flipboard recognized that while there is an almost unlimited quantity of content available online, consumers spend a huge amount of time skimming through dozens of sites and hundreds of pages to get to the content that interests them.
So, Flipboard developed breakthrough mobile apps, a polished user interface, and a curated reader-driven content strategy to pull in readers. This formula allowed the company to continue innovating while adding hundreds of thousands of users along the way.
One issue the company needed to address was content producers’ desire to maintain a distinct brand and form relationships with readers. That’s why Flipboard pays such close attention to format and look and feel with features like customizable layouts and user interfaces that adapt to your device. That way, they can keep both the content producers and the readers happy.

Nest makes the system smarter

Nest had the breakthrough insight that, while the actual delivery mechanisms for residential heating and air conditioning systems were working well, human errors and inefficiencies of traditional thermostats were leading to wasted energy and rising heating and cooling costs.

Nest came up with an elegant and simple solution that worked and has continued to release new versions of the thermostat and its software, improving its simplicity and user friendliness. Nest has also continued to develop products beyond its initial market beachhead, including a smart smoke/carbon monoxide detector, which is a logical extension that naturally appeals to those who own or are interested in the Nest Thermostat.

It’s clear that Nest has made it a priority to know its customer base: the homeowner. Homeowners are making the purchase decision and need to be convinced of the product’s value. So, Nest offers rebates, proof of energy and money savings, and the option to easily control the product through your mobile device.

Enterprise technology: How does it fit the mold?

As Flipboard and Nest show, new technologies don’t need to reinvent the wheel. This is even more important in the enterprise, where companies have invested millions of dollars in their IT systems.

Take Splunk, for example. IT groups need analytics on all the critical systems they manage to better understand how they are performing. Rather than require IT admins to provide logs in a standard format, Splunk designed its system to import files in any format directly from the systems IT manages, and developed a dashboard of insights and alerts. It fundamentally changed IT operations without completely starting from scratch.

On the other hand, most cloud file storage solutions have taken a different approach. Every company has a system for managing its files and information, but new technologies such as cloud, mobile, and social tools have changed the way users share and access data. In response to these major technology trends, popular new tools for file sync and sharing, like Box and Dropbox, are creating new information silos that are not integrated with existing file systems. While these services are easy to use, you must drag the files you want to share into a proprietary cloud one by one.

There is clearly value in these new solutions, but a better approach is the Nest and Flipboard method: Incorporate new capabilities such as user-friendly mobile apps, hybrid cloud storage options, and newsfeed-like streams on file changes, but integrate them with existing corporate file servers, security standards, and compliance regulations.

Continuous innovation has been key for both Flipboard and Nest, whether it’s in well designed mobile apps or a constant cycle of hardware and software updates. Established industries and processes like heating and cooling systems, the publishing industry, and enterprise IT exist for a reason: They are effective solutions to real problems. If new ideas don’t fit within the existing frameworks, they can cause more disruption than they are worth. Instead, be like Nest, Flipboard, and Splunk: Disrupt, but don’t break.