HorizonWatching

Horizonwatching has moved to www.billchamberlin.com

After 6 years on Typepad, the HorizonWatching blog has been moved to http://www.billchamberlin.com/ 

See you over there!!

 

Questions Community Managers Have…And Potential Actions They Would Take If They Had Answers

Online Community Managers typically wrestle with the problem of how to encourage more participation in online community platforms.   The secret is to figure out what the community members value and deliver more of that good stuff to them.

As a long time Community Manager, I have always been a proponent of more dashboard tools designed to help the Community Manager solve this problem.   Sophisticated analytical tools can help managers understand their membership demographics and behavior as well as help managers do a better job of delivering content and activities that the community members will respond to. 

Community Managers who focus on delivering content and activities that members value will see increased participation on the community platform.

Below I provide a list of questions a typical Community Manager might have about the community they lead along with a description of the types of actions the Community Manager might take if they had the answers to those questions.

Question 1) What are the other communities that my members belong to?

Potential Actions: 

• Partner up with other community leaders on community activities (e.g. conference calls, brainstorming exercises, etc.)
• If there's a great number of members in one community, it might make sense to merge communities.

Question 2)  Who from my community is also a member of the xyz community?

Potential Actions:

• Partner up with other community leaders on community activities (e.g. conference calls, brainstorming exercises, etc.)

Question 3) Who has not signed into the community in the last 6 months? Last 12 months?

Potential Actions:

• Send them a personal email inviting them back into the community space and asking them what could be done to make the community more valuable to them.
• Post a message on their Profile board.
• For very inactive users, let them know how to leave the community.

Question 4)  Who has never posted anything to the community?

Potential Actions:

• See actions for question 3. 

Question 5) Who has posted something to the community more than 5 times?

Potential Actions:

• These are active community members. I'd like to contact these people and get their feedback, suggestions, etc. on what they want out of the community in the future.
• I may want to invite a few of these people to help me manage the community.

Question 6)  Who were the top ten most active community members in 2011? so far in 2012?

Potential Actions:

• I'd like to send these people a Thank you card. 
• Invite them to a special conference call where I can get feedback and suggestion from them on community activities planned for the future.

Question 7)  As a community manager, it would be helpful to know the percentage of people who have posted more than 10 times, between 5-9 times, between 1-4 times, once, and never. And it would be interesting to compare my community's stats against all communities

Potential Actions:

• Benchmarking my community against others can help me understand how I am doing as a community manager in the area of getting my community members to engage and participate. I might want to contact other community managers who have higher rates of engagement / posting than I do to get some ideas on how to improve participation rates.

Question 8)  Who from Asia/Pacific (or any specific region or country) is the most active in my community over the last 6 months?

Potential Actions:

• I might want to reach out to a specific geographic region and tailor specific community activities to that region. If I know who in the community is most active, I can contact them and ask them for advice or help in planning out the activities.

Question 9)  Who from _______  (insert organization or department name) has participated in a discussion forum the past year?

Potential Actions:

• I might want to tailor community conference calls or other community activities to a specific organization or department.  
• I know who from that organization is most active, I can reach out to them and ask them for advice on how to tailor activities and content.

Question 10)  What types of job roles do my community members have?   Consultants? Sales Reps? Technical Sales? Managers? Lawyers? Marketing Professionals? etc.

Potential Actions:

• I might want to tailor community conference calls or other community activities to a specific job role. If I know what members is in a specific job role, I can contact them and ask them for advice

Question 11)  How does my community compare to other active communities?

• Number of Bookmarks?
• Number of Blog Posts
• Number of Comments on Blog Posts?
• Number of Recommended Blog Posts
• Number of Discussion Forums
• Number of Replies to Discussion Forums
• Number of Hits

Potential Actions:

As a community manager, I'd like to benchmark my community against other active communities.  Where does  my community rank?  I’d like to see the above stats computed as a percentage of total members and I’d like to see a graph of the above stats viewed as a 30,60,90, 120 day trend line.

• Knowing this information helps me understand how well I am doing to engage my community members.  And it will help me understand where I can improve.
• This exercise would also identify the top performing communities…and allow us all to learn from those community managers that are doing a great job.

Global Online Collaboration Event “World Tech Jam” to be held June 5-7

IBM and the World Congress on Information Technology  is co-hosting a Global Online Collaboration Event called the World Tech Jam online for 72 hours from June 5 to 7. 

The Jam will present five forums to encourage discussions, suggestions and debate around policies impacting the IT industry's growth and development - specifically opportunities and challenges effecting the digital society.  The output of the World Tech Jam will be used to help create a Digital Society Action Plan which will help guide decision makers and the agenda/discussions at the WCIT 2012 Conference, which is being held in October 2012

The five collaboration forums to be explored during the World Tech Jam will be:

1. Collaborative Healthcare:  Hosts:  Sean Hogan, IBM Vice President, Global Healthcare Delivery Systems and Richard Alvarez, CEO, Canada Health Infoway
2. Closing the Global Skills Gap:  Hosts:  Mike King, Global Education Industry Executive, IBM  and David Ticoll, Executive Director, CareerMash
3. Smart Cities and Transportation:  Hosts:  Gerry Mooney, General Manager, Global Smarter Cities, IBM and Jeb Brugmann, Author and Consultant, Welcome to the Urban Revolution:  How Cities Are Changing the World
4. Energy, the Environment & Sustainability:  Hosts:  Sharon Nunes, Vice President, Global Government & Smarter Cities Strategy and Solutions, IBM  and Dr. Peter Williams, Chief Technology Officer, "Big Green" Innovations, IBM
5. Media, Arts & Culture in the Digital Age:  Hosts:  Saul Berman, Global Strategy Consulting Leader, IBM and Anthony Williams, Author, Wikinomics

Check out the jam schedule at this page http://www.wcit2012.org/en/program-a-schedule/world-tech-jam    To register for the World Tech Jam, go to  https://www.collaborationjam.com/jam4/techjam/registration/  Prior to and after the Jam, you can engage in related conversation via Social Media:    

• Join the WCIT Linked In Group: http://www.linkedin.com/groups/WCIT2012-4064666
• Follow WCIT2012 on Twitter:  @WCIT2012mtl
• Follow WorldTechJam hashtag on Twitter   #WorldTechJam 

Index to All HorizonWatching 2012 Trend Reports

With 2012 well underway, I wanted to make sure you had seen the full list of 2012 Trend Reports I published earlier this year. Below you will find links to the reports I developed. Feel free to download and share.

OVERALL REPORT:    Top Eleven Technology Trends For 2012

INDIVIDUAL TREND REPORTS:

• Cloud Computing
• Virtualization
• Social Business
• Mobile Computing
• Big Data
• Analytics
• IBM’s Watson Technology
• Human & Computer Interaction
• Security
• Sustainability & Green IT
• Consumerization

Enjoy!!

Accenture: Annual Technology Vision 2012 Trends Report

Accenture publishes an annual technology trends report that identifies the information technology trends it feels will significantly influence enterprises over the next three to five years. 

The 2012 report was released a few weeks ago and it identifies six trends enterprise IT organizations need to understand.

Here’s my summary of the six trends identified in the 2012 annual report.

• Context-based services.  A combination of technology trends (Mobile Devices  Location Based Services, Cloud, Social, Personalization, Analytics) will enable new and innovative digital services that are delivered to you based on where you are, what you are doing, and your personal profile.

• Converging data architectures. This is all about how IT teams respond to the “Big Data” trend.  New ways of designing and managing structured and unstructured databases will be critical if enterprises hope to analyze all that data that is streaming into the storage infrastructure.

• Industrialized data services.  Business leaders sometime get frustrated because they know the data necessary for decisions exists somewhere in the company.  Accenture says that standardized enterprise-wide Information management technology and policies that enable the free sharing of information across the entire enterprise are needed.  

• Social-driven IT.   Accenture says that most enterprises have yet to realize the power of embedding social and collaboration capabilities into all their business processes.  It’s not just about social media marketing, it is about enabling a new era of social business. 

• PaaS-enabled agility.   Accenture points out that PaaS implementations are maturing.   The focus going forward will be less on the cost benefits of PaaS and more on the business innovation benefits.   PaaS allows enterprises to become more agile and respond quickly to changes in their environment.

• Orchestrated analytical security.   Accenture points out that the never ending march of new emerging technologies has increased the risks for enterprise data security.  Accenture promotes the concept of analytics-driven security to help combat the risks. 

For more information:

• To download the summary:  Accenture Technology Vision 2012 (Summary) Report
• To download the full report:  Accenture Technology Vision 2012 (Full) Report

HorizonWatching 2012 Trend Report: Consumerization

I’ve posted a trend report on Consumerization (as it relates to the Information Technology Industry) to Slideshare and embedded that deck at the bottom of this post.

The Consumerization trend is all about employees wanting to use the same technologies for business as they use in their personal lives.

Another name that’s being popularized in the media and on social networks right now is "Bring Your Own Device“ or BYOD. This refers to the desire of employees to use their favorite device of their choosing as the one they want to bring to work. However, I believe it is more than just “Bring your own device”. Consumerization is happening to technologies other than just mobile devices.

The reality is, in 2012 IT managers are feeling pressure to open their networks to all employee devices, but still manage to enterprise security and compliance levels. CIOs must develop new strategies to be able to handle all types of consumer devices, from smartphones to tablets. Often, the pressure being placed on the IT department first comes from executives and board members who love that new tablet they just got and want to be able to use it on the job.

The slides (embedded below) provide an overview and introduction to the Consumerization IT trend.  Summary information is provided along with many links to additional resources.   The slides are meant to be read/studied and the links are there for you to continue your learning.  You may want to view the slides in slideshow mode so you can easily follow the links.

For other HorizonWatching 2012 Trend reports, check out my posts the last few days.

Consumerization - A HorizonWatching Trend Report

View more presentations from Bill Chamberlin

HorizonWatching 2012 Trend Report: Sustainability & Green IT

I’ve posted a trend report on Sustainability & Green IT (as it relates to the Information Technology Industry) to Slideshare and embedded that deck at the bottom of this post.

Green computing and energy-efficient IT has morphed from an appealing idea into an essential practice. Skyrocketing energy costs and tight budgets, coupled with growing public and government pressure, have forced companies to put this issue on the front burner.

Energy and climate change related issues and what to do about them are being discussed today in corporate boardrooms. Business leaders wanting to find ways to reduce costs by minimizing energy usage, water usage, carbon emissions and waste. Technology can play a big part in the solutions to these great challenges.

In 2012, the focus continues to be improving utilization rates of the existing infrastructure and reducing energy usage of not only information technology resources, all corporate resources.  Also, increasingly, leading enterprises are realizing that a focus on sustainability can lead to competitive advantages.

The slides (embedded below) provide an overview and introduction to the Sustainability & Green IT trend.  Summary information is provided along with many links to additional resources.   The slides are meant to be read/studied and the links are there for you to continue your learning.  You may want to view the slides in slideshow mode so you can easily follow the links.

For other HorizonWatching 2012 Trend reports, check out my posts the last few days.

Sustainability & Green IT - A HorizonWatching Trend Report

View more presentations from Bill Chamberlin

HorizonWatching 2012 Trend Report: Security

I’ve posted a trend report on Security (as it relates to the Information Technology Industry) to Slideshare and embedded that deck at the bottom of this post.

Our world's infrastructure is both more sophisticated and more interconnected than ever before - linking vast amounts of information and services in new ways, but also introducing more security complexities and challenges in roughly equal proportion. For this reason, it is no longer enough for organizations, or even entire governments, to try to address security strictly within their own enterprises.

Today’s CIOs have security on their mind 24x7. Security is a long term trend that just continues to grow in importance and size. Information security professionals face the challenge of detecting an ever increasing number of threats.

As new technologies like cloud, mobile and social take the IT landscape by storm, security risks grow exponentially. The data center is more vulnerable than ever. New threats emerge daily and even hourly.

The slides (embedded below) provide an overview and introduction to the Security technology trend.  Summary information is provided along with many links to additional resources.   The slides are meant to be read/studied and the links are there for you to continue your learning.  You may want to view the slides in slideshow mode so you can easily follow the links.

For other HorizonWatching 2012 Trend reports, check out my posts the last few days.

Security - A HorizonWatching Trend Report

View more presentations from Bill Chamberlin

HorizonWatching 2012 Trend Report: Human & Computer Interaction

I’ve posted a trend report on Human & Computer Interaction to Slideshare and embedded that deck at the bottom of this post.

40-50 years ago the way you interacted with most computers was by throwing a stack of cards into a hopper and then you waited for a printout. Flash forward to today and most of us today are sitting in front of laptops that only have a keyboard and mouse to allow us to fully interact with our computers. Sure we have microphones, speakers, and webcams, but we are not fully exploiting those technologies. We have been content for the most part with our keyboard and mouse for about 20 years.

We are now entering a new era where the way we communicate with computers will be different and more natural. Smartphones, and their touch technology, started this trend a couple of years ago.

Apple’s iPad Multi-touch capability has already changed the way we expect to interact with computers in the future. Multi-touch represents a brand new way of interacting with information that is displayed on screens. You can expect that developers will need to incorporate touch and multi-touch as way for users to interact with enterprise applications in the future.

Apple Siri uses your voice as input. It allows you to ask simple questions on your Iphone and then the Siri technology attempts to answer those questions back to you verbally. Just imagine how the intersection of this technology and IBM Watson might play out.

Microsoft’s Kinect technology recognizes gestures and hand movements of users. Today it is being applied to gaming technology.

Tomorrow I expect us to use gestures and hand movements to control our laptops the way we use the mouse today.
Just like multi-touch, you can expect that developers will need to incorporate gesture and speech into future enterprise applications

The slides (embedded below) provide an overview and introduction to the Human & Computer Interaction technology trend.  Summary information is provided along with many links to additional resources.   The slides are meant to be read/studied and the links are there for you to continue your learning.  You may want to view the slides in slideshow mode so you can easily follow the links.

For other HorizonWatching 2012 Trend reports, check out my posts the last few days. 

Human Computer Interaction - A HorizonWatching Trend Report

View more presentations from Bill Chamberlin

HorizonWatching 2012 Trend Report: IBM’s Watson Technology

I’ve posted a trend report on IBM’s Watson Technology to Slideshare and embedded that deck at the bottom of this post.

IBM’s Watson is an emerging technology at the intersection of Big Data, Analytics and Human / Computer Interaction trends.
The key enabling technology areas are:

• Natural Language Processing
• Semantic Analysis
• Information Retrieval
• Automated Reasoning
• Machine Learning

Watson made a big splash last year on Jeopardy as we all know. While the Jeopardy game was a huge media event and exposure, this technology area has the capability to totally transform decision making.

Watson can sift through an equivalent of about 1 million books or roughly 200 million pages of data, and analyze this information and provide precise responses in less than three seconds.

Watson's ability to understand the meaning and context of human language, and rapidly process information to find precise answers to complex questions, holds enormous potential to transform how computers help people accomplish tasks in business and their personal lives.

The slides (embedded below) provide an overview on the IBM Watson technology trend.  Summary information is provided along with many links to additional resources.   The slides are meant to be read/studied and the links are there for you to continue your learning.  You may want to view the slides in slideshow mode so you can easily follow the links.

For other HorizonWatching 2012 Trend reports, check out my posts the last few days.  Also, come back over the next week. I have a few more to post about.

IBM Watson - A HorizonWatching Trend Report

View more presentations from Bill Chamberlin