Hype, hype, hype

Maybe I just need a longer vacation. Right now, I would just settle for an epiphany. I’m working on project about Enterprise 2.0 (who isn’t, in the software business these days?) and I’m still confused. After all, what is Enterprise 2.0?

One school of thought is that it is just the Web 2.0 (and what is that, you ask?) just slapped into the corporate enterprise. Man, I know it’s more than that. The problem here is that corporations are not the internet. Most of the collaboration that occurs on the internet is because groups of like-minded people got together and wanted to work on something. My work environment is not the same thing at all.

So I thought I would just nose around and see what other people think about Enterprise 2.0. I am underwhelmed. Or overwhelmed. Why? Because most of what’s out this is a lot of hype. One discussion topic seemed pretty useful so I’ll list it here and that’s from the JackBe guys.

I like their discussion so I’m going to let it lead me for a while. My sense of the overall issue is that most people think they can just slap Web 2.0 technologies together in the corporate business place and collaboration will occur. I doubt it will be quite that easy. Not everyone in a corporation is trying to collaborate – most people are just trying to get their work done so they can go home. Trying to add value to the corporations’ knowledge base is not in most people’s quarterly bonus objectives. And management teams are not trained to support people to foster this kind of environment. IT staff will worry about how to control the information.  That sort of thing.
The issue here is that we are dealing with people, not technology.

I know the technology is cool, but that’s not the problem. People have to want to do this. And that’s the primary difference between the web environment and the enterprise.

From another site:Top 10 Management Fears About Enterprise Web 2.0 you can see a pretty good list of what I’m talking about. I’ll quote it here:

“What are some of the questions that organizational leaders are apt to be asking and any vendor who hopes to succeed will need to answer. This is by no means a comprehensive list and I welcome your additions and thoughts.

Technological Barriers

1. How can I be certain that the information that is gathered and shared behind the firewall stays behind the firewall?

2. How do I control who has access to particular levels of information and databases?

3. How do I protect the integrity of the information from malicious tampering by disgrunted employees or managers?

4. How can I be sure that information is being “tagged” properly for efficient retrieval later?

5. What kind of training do employees need before they can effectively use the technology?

Cultural Barriers

6. How can I monitor the system to make certain that what individuals are saying and sharing reflects company policy?

7. What are the legal dangers in saving and sharing so much loosely supervised input?

8. How do I distinguish “productive” use of the technology from horsing around?

9. How do I “manage” the gathering and disseminating of so much unstructured information?

10. How do I know if I’m getting my money’s worth out of the investment in technology?”

Well, I’ll have to continue this tomorrow.