eCollaboration and Enterprise Content Management

IS 904

Tero PäivärintaUniversity of Agder

10.9.2010

Agenda• Possibility to log-in 8.15 for those needing practice in ”How to read

an academic article in 15 minutes”• ”Wheel of collaboration tools”

– Purpose – to learn think & discuss critically about a ”framework”– A thinking task– Discussion

• Lifecycles of ECM / eCollaboration architectural elements– Purpose – to realize why is this field so challenging? (one explanation)

• and how to put it into pieces of management efforts & relate them to each other

– A thinking task– Discussion

• Starting to work with objectives – ”making a business case”• & Checking the status of group works & starting to work with the

objectives in them!– Concrete agreement for next steps, possible supervision meetings.

Working with academic literature

A lot of materials -> need for a technique to read/utilize it effectively

In General: Focus on the whole / main point(s) instead of details!

DON’T read each article from beginning to end, but have an overview first

The most scientific articles are built according to a standard structure:

abstract, introduction, theory, method, findings, analysis, discussion, summary/conclusion

use this as the starting point to ”chew” the materials

Look for similarities/relations and contrasts/differences of the article at hand in comparison to other articles

Be critical – look for possible shortcomings in method, data basis, context (is this about particular type of technology, organization, culture, etc. – does it claim to be ”universal”…)

Checklist for reading an academic article What type of publication is this? Academic, practical, section from a textbook, consulting literature?...

When and where is it published? (Conference, magazine, journal, etc.?)

What is the main theme / focus in the article (Use the title, abstract/summary, and introduction)

How is it structured? - see the end of Introduction, if not there, have an overview of the subtitles

What type of study is this? (Empirical, conceptual, review, etc.?)

What is the research question which the paper gives answer(s) to? (Abstract & introduction)

What type of research approach and data was chosen? what are the consequences of those for the conclusions? (often explicitly mentioned in a part of

summary/conclusions)

What are the most important conclusions? (Abstract, Conclusions)

What can I learn from the paper relevant for the course/myself?

How does this relate to the rest of the course / the other issues of my interest?

And… now we practice this

• Take Peppard et al. 2007

• Now, use 15 minutes to write down brief answers to the checklist questions to read the paper.

• (that is – if you have 3 papers to read & understand per week -> it is 1 hour work reading)

• Think (15 min)– Locate the

communication ”model” and tools used in this course into the framework

• Do we cover everything – even more?

– To whom would may this kind of framework be useful?

– Does anything lack (in light of your current idea of e-collaboration)?

• …and discuss.

WHEEL OF COLLABORATION TOOLS, STATOIL

Understanding what needs to be changed

Enterprise: ”Willy’s Lamps”

Environment (market, technology, society,…)

Objectives & Strategies Organization Information & Knowledge ICT Infrastructure

Conceptualizations(e.g. expected benefit)

Conceptualizations(e.g. function)

Conceptualizations(e.g. business entities)

Conceptualizations(e.g. software)

Instances(e.g. ’less operationcosts’)

Instances(e.g. ’Sales’)

Instances(e.g. ’order’, ’customer’’product’)

Instances(e.g. ’xxx OrderProcessing Module’)

Enterprise: ”Willy’s Lighting Services”

Environment (market, technology, society,…)

Objectives & Strategies Organization Information & Knowledge ICT Infrastructure

Conceptualizations(e.g. success factors)

Conceptualizations(e.g. business process)

Conceptualizations(e.g. business entities)

Conceptualizations(e.g. software)

Instances(e.g. ’100% customersatisfaction’)

Instances(e.g. ’from Order toCustomer satisfaction’)

Instances(e.g. ’order’, ’product’,’customer’, ’feedback’)

Instances(e.g. ’yyy CRMModule’)

T1

T2

C H A N G C H A N G EE

Examples of conceptualizations

Another picture: The ”Diamond” of ECM

PROCESSES(TASK)

INFORMATION CONTENT

ROLES(STRUCTURE)

INFORMATIONTECHNOLOGY(IN CONTEXT)

Tec

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DATA

GENREREPERTOIRE

GENRESYSTEMGENRE

PEOPLE

DOCUMENT

GOALS(OBJECTIVES)

Environment: INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY (OPPORTUNITIES)

Environment: BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT OF THE ENTERPRISE

CO

NT

EX

T

metadata

metadata

metadata

… remarks about the framework

• Change in one part affects the others– a need for holistic understanding of ECM/eCollab

• Development can start from any viewpoint –> demarcation of the problem!– … but it should sooner or later discuss the others as well

(more than 1 component needed to define an ECM problem properly)

• All components (and understanding of them) change along time– need for enterprise coordination and continuous

development over time, it is not any one-time project

PROCESSES(TASK)

INFORMATION CONTENT

ROLES(STRUCTURE)

INFORMATIONTECHNOLOGY(IN CONTEXT)

Tec

hn

(olo

g)ic

alS

ocio

-or

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izat

ion

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DATA

GENREREPERTOIRE

GENRESYSTEMGENRE

PEOPLE

DOCUMENT

GOALS

Environment: INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY (OPPORTUNITIES)

Environment: BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT OF THE ENTERPRISE

PROCESSES(TASK)

INFORMATION CONTENT

ROLES(STRUCTURE)

INFORMATIONTECHNOLOGY(IN CONTEXT)

Tec

hn

(olo

g)ic

alS

ocio

-or

gan

izat

ion

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DATA

GENREREPERTOIRE

GENRESYSTEMGENRE

PEOPLE

DOCUMENT

GOALS

Environment: INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY (OPPORTUNITIES)

Environment: BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT OF THE ENTERPRISE

PROCESSES(TASK)

INFORMATION CONTENT

ROLES(STRUCTURE)

INFORMATIONTECHNOLOGY(IN CONTEXT)

Tec

hn

(olo

g)ic

alS

ocio

-or

gan

izat

ion

al

DATA

GENREREPERTOIRE

GENRESYSTEMGENRE

PEOPLE

DOCUMENT

GOALS

Environment: INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY (OPPORTUNITIES)

Environment: BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT OF THE ENTERPRISE

PROCESSES(TASK)

INFORMATION CONTENT

ROLES(STRUCTURE)

INFORMATIONTECHNOLOGY(IN CONTEXT)

Tec

hn

(olo

g)ic

alS

ocio

-or

gan

izat

ion

al

DATA

GENREREPERTOIRE

GENRESYSTEMGENRE

PEOPLE

DOCUMENT

GOALS

Environment: INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY (OPPORTUNITIES)

Environment: BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT OF THE ENTERPRISE

T1 T2 Tn…..

… and why it is so challenging to develop wide ECM/eCollaboration

over time?

Different elements have life-cycles of their own, seldom (never) ”perfectly synchronized”! -> ALWAYS problems/challenges incontemporary ECM/eColl system somewhere in big enterprises

Theory: Problems & challenges = gaps in the equilibrium of the elements

• (Leavitt, 1965, Lyytinen & Newman, forthcoming):– development outcomes can be explained how

well different components of the target system (goal, task, structure, information, technology, people) are aligned / in an equilibrium

– change in one (or more) element(s) may cause the equilibrium to ”punctuate”

• -> and a problem is experienced.

Example: conceptualizing ECM / e-Collaboration problems through this

”Class Fronter is not so useful for serving the students who want to join from outside UiA from day 1”

Content & comm:

Infrastructure:Fronter?

Task(s):

New Objective(s):?

Roles:

Vs. Existing situation?

Where can we identifypossible gaps?Where might we needchange in relation to current practices?

Use 5-10 minutes to thinkabout this issue in light ofthe framework.

Example: conceptualizing ECM / e-Collaboration problems through this

”Class Fronter is not so useful for serving the students outside UiA from day 1”

Content & comm:course details,

article materials

Infrastructure:Fronter,

…?

Task(s):market the course,

register,start the course,

…

Objective(s):involve people fromindustry to courses

(EVU)

Roles: Campus student,industry student?,

lecturer, administration

Vs. ?Objective 2 (from before)(Serve (mainly) students

inside UiA,Standardize IT solution)

Where can we identifypossible gaps?Where might we needchange in relation to current practices?

Starting to work with objectives: Why?

60-80% of ECM / eCollaboration developmentefforts needs to be done

around socio-organizational issues.

Starting to work with the objectives:Business case –> Benefits

management -> Benefits realization• Benefits management (Peppard et al., 07)

– THE Mindset for realizing benefits through IT1. ”IT has no inherent value”2. ”Benefits arise when IT enables people to do things differently”

– benefits emerge only when individuals or groups in and between organizations & stakeholders perform their roles in more efficient and effective ways

3. ”Only business managers and users can release business benefits”• i.e., NOT IT / project managers

4. ”All IT projects have outcomes, but not all outcomes are benefits”5. ”Benefits must be actively managed to be obtained”

• Problem- vs. innovation-driven interventions.• Discussion: how has benefits realization taken into account in your

previous projects around ECM / eCollaboration/etc.?– Who has really taken care of that?– …back to the 60-80% statement of ECM / eCollab being socio-

organizational…

Ward (2002), Chapter 9, Page 445

Benefit Dependency Network

Ward (2002), Chapter 9, Page 449

Benefit Dependency Network

Example - Sales and Marketing System

Developing a ”benefits dependency network”

• The (Business) Problem-driven way– Identify performance improvement targets & potential

benefits• objectives -> benefits

– > combinations of IT enablers and business changes which would achieve each of the potential benefits

• -> desired business changes-> enabling changes -> IT enablers

– Iterations to decide the most cost-effective and low-risk ways to do IT and business changes to achieve the performance improvement targets & benefits

Developing a ”benefits dependency network” (2)

• The ”IT”-oriented –innovation way– New capabilities provided by IT?

• IT enablers ->

– What changes needed to ways-of-working?• Enabling changes -> Business changes

– What Benefits can be realized, which objectives achieved

• -> Benefits -> (Investment) Objectives -> Business Drivers

Note!

• the LINE ORGANIZATION / USER ORGANIZATION / MANAGEMENT needs to ”own” each benefit– > i.e., line organization needs to own the

benefits realization process (not the IT project manager, IT infrastructure manager, or CIO..)

Exercise 1

• Make (a very quick) ”IT-oriented” innovation-based benefits dependency path/network of the problem:– how to use our existing eCollaboration tools better?

• name at least one ”IT enabler”• name at least one enabling change needed• name at least one business change made possible• name at least one benefit to be realized from the business

change– Name a person in line org. / top management who wants to

make sure that this is to be realized• name at least one investment objective (strategic objective)

to which the named benefit contributes to– Who would / should own this problem?

Exercise 2

• Name one business problem/objective to be responded by ECM / eColl / (Social computing)– define that objective based on strategy of UiA etc. organization

of your interest– Define a benefit to be reached which contribute to that objective

• ..and a person in line organization / top management who is interested personally to make sure that this objective is reached

– Define a business change required to realize that benefit– Define an enabling change required to realize the business

change– Define an IT enabler to make the enabling/business change

possible in a better way.– Who would / should own this objective / problem?

…Starting the group work

• Make (the first version) of your ”business case” for your group work– i.e. objectives made clear!

• recognize the ”benefits owner” -> strategy how to anchor this to the organization?

– …start from the starting point which is most ”natural” to your group / problem!

• either technical opportunity or org. goal

– …2-3 foils which your group could be able to present the next week?