ECM Briefs

This week we’ve been talking about the importance of creating online communities within the walls of your enterprise content management system. I discussed in a podcast we just posted that users need an outlet to ask opinions, share ideas with their peers and generally get a sense that someone cares about what they’re dealing with on a day-to-day basis with their deployments – thus creating a sense of “community.”

Now, you might think that just because you’ve got the software installed, your users will have instant access to a world of utopian kinship, however it might not be that easy. We’ve learned from creating our own community that you have to put a lot of thought behind what it is you really want to accomplish before users begin chatting away and sharing information. Here are a few of the lessons we’ve learned to help you out:

• Business user support communities must have clear and unique goals and objectives, and should be specifically designed and managed to address them.
• Most users look for materials that help them do their jobs, but very few users contribute. This phenomenon is well recognized for consumer sites on the web, but seems to be even truer for business sites that people access during their working hours.
• Support communities must have critical mass. Anecdotally, more than a thousand members are required to create any sense of visible activity to casual participants.
• Resist the temptation to create specialty, topic-based communities if these cannot quickly achieve critical mass and/or they will duplicate other communities.
• Given the membership volumes required, automated membership (adding new members and providing password reminders), as well as rights and roles administration is essential for cost-effective operation and timely response to user requests.
• Up-to-date content, such as documents and videos, have the most value in driving user satisfaction and return visits.
• Collaborative tools are initially less important as most users may read forums, blogs, and discussion groups, but only a very small portion will contribute. It’s important to note however, that over time these tools will build up a useful base of searchable knowledge, even if there are relatively few contributors.
• Forum and blog authors naturally look for feedback as validation of their efforts and are generally disappointed by the low participation rates. Be sure to show authors audit logs that often indicate that dozens users are reading their posts, even though no one posted a response or gave a rating.
• Users will only read and subscribe to a limited number of forums, blogs, and discussion groups. Resist the temptation to create many forums on a range of specific topics. Instead, create one primary or general forum initially and then branch off once volumes increase for specific subjects.
• Many visitors come to find specific content. URLs included with event materials and newsletters can facilitate this and improve the user experience.

I hope this helps you get started in planning your own corporate community. If you’d like more information on our communities software, get it here.

A while back, Information Week reporter Charles Babcock put together an interesting piece on the greatest software ever written. He of course focused on software that has long-term impact broadly across the computer industry such as the Excel spreadsheet, BSD Unix 4.3 and the Java programming language.

If the job is to select the best software across the entire computing landscape, it makes sense that infrastructure software that everyone uses would jump out as the most significant. But such an approach, for obvious reasons, doesn’t capture the profound value that software brings to individual companies and employees in specific industries.

One example, as detailed in our latest Open Text News Podcast, is the legal industry which has seen tremendous benefit from LegalKEY® software applications developed specifically for law firms. The podcast features interviews with Mohit Thawani, Business Development Manager of the Open Text Legal Solutions Group, and Steven Burchell, Director of Client Management for Sedgwick, Detert, Moran & Arnold.

One example of how industry-specific software has helped law firms, highlighted in the podcast, is with new business intake and conflicts management processes. For law firms, particularly large firms and those in merger situations, one of the most important steps before taking on new business is conducting a thorough conflict of interest check. In the past, firms would route paper forms around to dozens of people to ensure that a potential new client wouldn’t present a conflict with current clients. It could take days or even weeks before a firm could open a new matter. Now thanks to this software, a partner can find out if there is a conflict within a couple hours. With the whole process handled online, conflicts checks can even get done after hours from a BlackBerry.

When it comes to great software, a key ingredient is whether it actually makes a difference in people’s lives and helps companies to improve productivity. If we look around we can find plenty examples of “great” software. Stay tuned – we plan to bring you many more examples of software in action.

It seems environmental concerns have people making lifestyle changes big and small – whether people are opting for canvas bags over plastic, or trading in Hummers for Smart Cars; many have joined the quest to ensure the world is intact for our children’s children.

Organizations like South East Water, however, have been working towards environmental sustainability for decades. Providing water and sewerage services to more than a million people across 3,500 square kilometers in Melbourne, Australia, one of the organization’s goals is to secure a long-term water future in a world of changing climate.

In order to focus on this goal, South East Water had to get its documents and records in order. With five million documents in storage and a requirement to comply with Australia’s Public Records Act, the company knew it needed to switch its outdated and unsupported records system to a solution that would address the growing concern of electronic records.

The company was already using an enterprise content management system that provided enterprise-wide document and quality management, and an interface to the company’s billing, customer relationship management (CRM), contracts management, and GIS/Maps systems.

To address its requirements, South East Water added a records management component, which has helped it create a corporate document classification scheme to identify and group all records for retention and disposal, as well as detailed quality procedures to transfer records for permanent retention by the Public Records Office of Victoria. It also helped the company form a Vital Records Register and establish procedures for recording, maintenance and disposal of documents lodged under the Freedom of Information Act and the Whistleblowers Protection Act.

With its updated enterprise content management solution, South East Water is well on its way to successfully managing its records and information, giving the organization more time to focus on what’s most important: working to create new relationships between the community and water through its sustainability initiatives.

Read more about South East Water’s records management success here.

Kids today are growing up in an “on-demand” world. The typical high school or college student couldn’t imagine a world without computers, and cell phones, without being connected full time and communicating instantly with text messaging, instant messaging, and email.

Technology has defined the culture of youth in how they communicate, socialize, and interact with each other. As such, it is no surprise that kids have flocked to Internet-based social networking sites as a way to express themselves and share their thoughts, interests, pictures, and music with their peers. Of course, social networking sites have a much-publicized downside: They’re freely accessible to anyone with an Internet connection. Such an unmonitored environment can lead to problems with Internet predators, cyber-bullying, and students unwittingly revealing personal information.

Schools districts are beginning to examine whether they can leverage the popularity and promise of social networking as an effective learning tool, while helping to ensure the same safety and security provided to students in a brick and mortar classroom. The concept of social networking in a school environment is a good one, enabling students to widen their circle of friends, enhance technology skills, and promote communication and collaboration.

A relatively new trend for school districts is to deploy technology within the school environment that provides many of the standard social networking features, without leaving students exposed to the dangers of the open Internet. The FirstClass solution from Open Text, for example, enables school districts to create online communities that connect students, teachers, parents, and administration within a secure networked environment. This type of solution takes advantage of the way today’s students prefer to communicate with each other and access information. Students can create personal profiles or pages which outline their thoughts, interests, extra-curricular activities, and any other information they wish others to know. Students and teachers can communicate via email, instant messages, blogs, or podcasts to share content and exchange information.

The popularity of the freely available social networking sites is not likely to lose momentum anytime soon. While school districts can’t expect to replace these sites, they can offer a safer alternative designed for education that appeals to the way today’s students want to learn, collaborate and communicate.