Two days ago, I had a networking coffee meeting with a colleague from IT. One of the topics was the question between “all-in-one” versus “best-of-breed” solution for social media. Unsurprisingly, our views differed: I advocate the best-of-breed approach, while he prefers a more standardized option.

But we also found some common ground on this topic: We both agreed that free software solutions can be very beneficial to the company. So why not introduce the following policy?

“Any organizational entity may introduce new applications on their own, as long as

• they are free,
• they have an API
• and the organizational entity takes responsibility for their support.”

This guideline counters three major arguments against a best-of-breed approach: 1) Organizational entities should be kept from buying expensive software on their own, 2) organizations should avoid lock-in with proprietary software that can’t be linked into the existing IT environment, and 3) supporting applications is expensive.

What do you think? Is this something both a CIO and a social media pioneer can live with?

In my last post, I have been asked what I would prefer for our internal social media solutions: An all-in-one approach, or a best-of-breed approach. This is essentially a question on centralization or decentralization of internal IT applications, and one I have a strong opinion on.

When it comes to social media, a decentralized approach beats a centralized approach: A collection of seperate tools capable of talking to each other is better than a monolithic all-in-one portal. Why? Let me count the reasons:

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A friend of mine used to work in a call center for some time. He told me an interesting and counterintuitive fact: Some call centers don’t service their callers in the classical queue order (first-come, first-served); as strange as it sounds, those call centers take callers who have been waiting for longer than 20 seconds and downgrade their priority, while callers who have been less than 20 seconds on the move up in the priority of calls.

Now why would they do that? Because it increases the overall average customer satisfaction!

Customer satisfaction decreases progressively in relation to waiting time, and 20 seconds is a critical threshold: If your call is not being answered within that time, you’re not going to be satisfied anyhow, and it doesn’t make much difference if you wait 30, 40 or 60 seconds. On the other hand, if your call is answered within a very short time (less than 20 seconds), your satisfaction is going to be quite high (if your problem gets solved of course, but that doesn’t have anything to do with your waiting time).

For this reason, catching as many callers before the 20-second threshold is much more important to have a good average customer satisfaction than treating them in the “fair order” of first-come, first-served: It’s the statistical choice between the average of 1) moderately annoyed and very annoyed people, and 2) very satisfied and very annoyed people.

This concept poses an interesting ethical dilemma, which an utilitarist might enjoy. Some consequences, off the top of my head:

• The same principle is probably valid for e-mail responses (whereas the threshold is different)
• Getting positive responses from very satisfied customers will be more motivating than getting average responses from moderately dissatisfied customers
• However, you will have to deal with the accusation of favoritism or unfairness
• Your statistical quality average might be higher, but your boss might not judge you using statistical means (especially if he or she is prone to fall for halo effects – positive or negative)
• The next time you are stuck in a phone loop, hang up after 20 seconds and call again

A year ago, I had an interesting discussion with a colleague about evaluating performance in the context of external constraints. The question was: “If you are leading a team of people whose lives are under differing amounts of non-work demands, should you evaluate their performance in light of these demands?”

Example: There are two people in a team – a single guy and a divorced father with two kids. They both deliver the same results. Should they both get the same rating, or should the person who manages to deliver results despite high non-work demands (i.e. the single father) be evaluated more favorably?

My colleague’s answer was that the two should be treated differently, because it’s harder for the lone parent to deliver the same results than for the single guy (for whom it is easier to stay longer hours or work without interruptions).

My answer was no, the evaluation should solely depend upon the set goals in the beginning of the year. If a person reaches his set goals, he should be evaluated and incentivized accordingly. Certainly, a single parent is likely to have less capacity than a single guy without kids; however, if this difference in capacity influences anything, it should be the respective goals, not the evaluation. The outcome may be the same (the single guy having to work harder than the widower), with one important difference: They both know what is expected of them, and how to reach or exceed those expectations.

And even the differently set goals might be unfair: What if the single guy pursues a promising career in amateur swimming (consuming most of his weekends), or spends a lot of time volunteering in a center for disabled people? Does it matter for your evaluation if you spend your off-work time raising children, volunteering, doing sports, persuing hobbies, or just hanging out in front of the TV? Isn’t work-life balance something individual that it is impossible to use it as a frame of reference for performance evaluation?

What do you think?

In a brilliant contrarian blog post, titled provocatively “Should you lose the n00bs?”, Seth Godin asks how simply should applications be designed, and what kind of prerequisites a programmer should expect from its users. For years, the standard approach was to design any application with an ignorant user in mind (which German speaking programmers not so affectionately call the DAU approach, for “dümmster annehmbarer User” = “stupidest user possible”). Godins objects:

“The problem with this approach is that you can never be simple enough. And of course, the bigger problem: Once you dumb it down so every single person gets it, you bake out the magic and the mystery and the elegance. (…) At the symphony, should there be big applause signs so that people don’t clap at the wrong time?”

The great idea behind this short post is that it disconnects intuitiveness from usability:

• Intuitiveness refers to how easy it is for new users to catch on – and this depends upon prior knowledge. Connecting tables in Access is intuitive, if you know how a relational database works. Using Google Reader is intuitive if you know what an RSS feed is.
• Usability refers to principles of efficiency and predictability in using a tool. A link on a website should stand out of non-linked text, preferrably underlined. The “File” menu should be the first in any windows application. A user should be able to correct errors with Undo. Usability applies to every kind of user, regardless of his knowledge about the application.

Instead of making applications idiot-proof, Godin suggest to either accept confusion and encourage questions, or to respectfully shut newbies out:

“Why not consider making it easy for the confused to ask for help? And treat them with respect when they do. If you don’t create a little confusion, it’s unlikely you’ve built something remarkable.

And to go one step further: sometimes it’s okay to lose the n00bs. Not in an arrogant way (except for some brands) but in a way that says, ‘this might just not be for you…’”

[Link: Seth's Blog: "Should You Lose the N00bs?"]

I’m observing an odd backlash phenomenon among early adopters of social media. Many high profile bloggers start posting articles describing fatigue of blogging, blog content, social media hype, and level of innovation in web apps. It’s curious (or maybe obvious) that just as the big web masses are slowly catching onto Social Media, the earlier enthusiasts of Twitter, Friendfeed, and other services drift into a post-modern stage of Web 2.0, where nothing is new and everything is re-invented again.

Here are some examples:

• She-Geeks: “The Repetition of the Blogosphere”
• Scobleizer: “Why Tech Blogging has Failed You”
• ProBlogger: “Has Blogging Lost Its Relational Focus?”

However, there are other voices as well:

• Regular Geek: “Passion, Early Adopters and the Mainstream”
• The Inquisitr: “The Changing Blogosphere and Blogging 2.0″
• ReadWriteWeb: “Mixed Messages in the Blogosphere”

In his blog, Cognitive Edge, knowledge management guru Dave Snowden makes an excellent point about the importance of diversity of IT systems:

“IT departments are simply deciding to go with a single procurement from a dominant player, rather than allowing locally contextual solutions to emerge.  They don’t even have the excuse of cost saving (…). One software package cannot replicate the richness of the web, and your employees deserve that richness as does your organisation if it is to be effective and successful.”

This quote reflects quite well my frustration with intranets (and to some extent with HR transactional systems approach). Instead of waiting years for the hailed individualized Über-portal or the One HR Process Management System(tm), why can’t we allow units to build simple local solutions, learn deeply about our processes when implementing them, and then connect or even integrate them?

Link: Cognitive Edge: The Shire Hall and Sharepoint

In a recent post, the ReadWriteWeb blog discusses “Brandstreaming“. This term is a reference to the term “Lifestreaming”, or the online record of a person’s daily activities. Web applications such as Friendfeed, Tumblr or, catching up, FaceBook allow people to connect all of their online activities onto a publishing platform, collecting everything he wishes to share with the world about himself. For example, my own lifestream – I use both Facebook and Friendfeed – includes

• my (private) blog posts
• my tweets (Twitter updates)
• my latest Flickr photos
• the videos I put on YouTube
• the music I like on last.fm
• and my latest del.icio.us links.

It allows my friends to stay up to date with what I’m doing. And since I’m doing these activities (such as posting videos) anyway, there is no extra effort in posting an update, because the feed is generated automatically.Brandstreaming is the same concept, but for brands. The RWW blog thinks that this approach would be suitable only for brands with a strong lifestyle appeal; I disagree: Speciality products with strong customer loyalty – for example medications – could benefit of it as well (if regulations allows, of course).

Link: ReadWriteWeb: Brandstreaming – what is it and who’s doing it?

The Signal vs. Noise blog has an interesting post on why Pixar, the animation company behind Toy Story, Monsters inc., Finding Nemo, and the upcoming Wall-E, produces much better quality movies than its competition. I especially liked the following statement:

Thanks to Pixar University, employees learn to see the company’s work (and their colleagues) in a new light. “The skills we develop are skills we need everywhere in the organization,” Nelson said. “Why teach drawing to accountants? Because drawing class doesn’t just teach people to draw. It teaches them to be more observant. There’s no company on earth that wouldn’t benefit from having people become more observant.”

Link to “Pixar’s tightknit culture is its edge” via Signal vs. Noise and Readburner

Fresh off the CommsNetwork mailing list comes a discussion about how to best encourage an audience to ask questions. It’s a common problem, and there probably is no simple soluation – still, there are lots of good ideas. Here’s my summary:

Various forms of “planting” questions

• Plant 1-3 pre-defined questions in the audience beforehand
• Encourage specific people you know to prepare a question of their own choosing
• Put pre-formulated questions or topics on certain seats as encouragement

Collect questions off-line

• Prepare a wall for post-it questions to stick on (both gives passive questions and lowers the threshold of a topic being brought up)
• Put blank question cards on the seats, collect them during the event
• Generate questions per table over lunch
• Collect questions beforehand, draw prizes among submitters
• Contact “High Potentials” for questions beforehand
• “Snowball” questions: Have the audience write them on paper, crumple and throw them to the front
• Make sure the first question asked is a significant one – one that management can answer in a way to demonstrate openness for frank discussions – as it sets the baseline for others

Small Group Interaction

• Localize the call for questions or group the audience around tables
• Have a facilitator or a familiar name to generate / ask questions
• Sit the speakers amongst the audience to encourage micro-feedback
• Make short breaks and have managers wander around actively asking questions

Large Group Interaction

• Encourage questions during (as opposed to after) presentations
• Have presenters ask simple, non-scary questions to the audience (“How many of you…” – followed by question to someone who raises (or doesn’t raise) his hand)
• Distribute small prizes (car wash coupons, movie tickets) for the first people who ask a question

Meeting Technology

• Use a question submission technology like Crystal Interactive
• Use interactive voting systems