Highly Competitive - software industry insights

MDM – Speaking the “Language” of Business

 

Part 5 of a six part series on the "New Age of Master Data Management"

 

Data management continues to take on an ever-growing range of activities as the role of data has evolved and expanded for many organizations. Business agility and real-time insight are inherent requirements for many organizations. To meet such requirements organizations need right-time data on a continuous basis, where master data management initiatives are integral to processing business-ready data.

MDM software solutions are evolving as well, to better meet business needs. The new directions of MDM software obviously carry a heavy package of sophisticated technology. Analytics processes now utilize numerous disparate data sources that need context and relationship information that comes from trustworthy and relevant master data. Some MDM solutions are utilizing technologies like graph databases to take advantage of multi-dimensional capabilities to more expansively and agilely handle relationships across all data types. More analytics processes are now providing information and insight primarily for business users who aren't necessarily highly adept at hands-on technology or data management, which opens up new challenges and opportunities for MDM vendors.

The value of these solutions is heavily tied to business needs and objectives. And this value must be clearly and honestly communicated to a growing array of business roles -- in the language of those business users.

In the 'New Age of MDM', with greater business participation, should IT and data management team members utilize more of the language of less technical business roles when in discussions related to MDM purchases, implementations and usages?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The "Languages" of MDM

Often conversations regarding master data management have been among IT and data management professionals, including more tech-savvy business roles involved in data management. The "language" of MDM started off primarily related to the worlds of IT and data management teams – in other words "techy talk".

But it's likely that this original "language" of MDM is now insufficient for meeting current business objectives and requirements, with the increased (and necessary) involvement of business roles, and the importance of selling the value of MDM to business managers and non-IT decision-makers. A growing lineup of business roles are increasingly involved in data governance discussions regarding practices, policies, cultural changes, and processes, as well as how to develop cross-functional teams and remediate silos for systems and data. Discussions with business roles also focus on the many ways that MDM can underpin important business initiatives and desired outcomes for objectives.

Conversations about the purchase of MDM software solutions can involve less technical roles. High level managers and C-level roles may be part of the decision-making processes: deciding if master data management itself should be adopted; understanding how MDM supports business requirements and goals; choosing which MDM software technologies to utilize; determining metrics and assessing outcomes related to MDM initiatives. Obviously these conversations also involve IT and data management teams, who now must be prepared to communicate well with different business roles.

 

Communicating in Customer Business Language

Those of us who work with software vendors (no matter which "side") are clearly aware that marketing and sales efforts for software solutions can deviate linguistically from technical terminology when communicating with less technical business users. But with the recent evolutionary changes for MDM software offerings, there is an increasing need for software vendors and practitioners of MDM to speak the language of the business.

When marketing and selling their MDM software to business roles, some vendors are dropping the use of the term "master data management" in order to bypass the "negative baggage" of traditional MDM solutions. Software vendors with new approaches to MDM are utilizing 'new language' to better describe what these new approaches really do, and how they better align the value with Business. Beyond simply being marketing efforts, most changes in 'language' are fairly honest attempts to more clearly connect MDM practices and solutions to real business needs, desired outcomes and advantage – in terminology that conveys realistic meaning to business users and decision-makers.

Business roles involved in buying decisions may not know what MDM is, can get confused or lost in the terminology and technology, can see it as too complicated – all of which can interfere with the prospective customer's understanding of why MDM is important for making competitive use of data. It's legitimate for vendors to focus on the high level of what MDM contributes to improve data and business processes, and what the business benefits are for each organization. Focus should also cover how the MDM solution handles business needs relative to existing organizational infrastructure, along with business practices and processes – and ultimately business objectives and desired outcomes.

If MDM software vendors demonstrate clearly how the technologies connect to achieving business objectives and outcomes, it better enlightens prospective customers on the benefits and essential nature of master data management – both in terms of the MDM practice and the supporting technologies. And very importantly, business language is essential to uncover business problems to be solved and how data management fits into overall business strategies.

Obviously there is a danger of over-simplification. MDM implementations can take time, both for setting up the technologies, and to institute cultural changes, data governance practices and new cross-functional processes. These aspects of MDM practices and solutions must be honestly communicated. Fortunately we are seeing great advances by different vendors to more quickly get MDM implementations up-and-running, and to take new approaches to how MDM programs are run in order to more clearly show the benefits of MDM and to produce them in a timely manner.

 

How MDM Software Vendors Speak the Language of Business

Often the "buyers" of enterprise software consist of multiple roles in an organization. No longer is software purchasing solely the domain of IT or other technical teams. There is frequently a composite "buyer" that draws on both influencers and decision-makers. Obviously technical teams perform a very important role in the purchase of software, more often as influencers rather than the final decision-makers. Business roles involved in enterprise software purchases can include: mid-level managers and business unit managers whose teams will be impacted by the use of the software; VPs who approve purchases; CEOs and CFOs who influence or dictate purchase decisions; and even staff in accounts payable who enact purchase transactions.

There are numerous software vendors with various flavors of MDM solutions who are leaning further into the language of business to conduct marketing and sales activities, and discussions about implementations and usage. Here are a couple of examples:

Enabling Content Management and Digital Interactions

Data and analytics have become essential components of the marketing efforts of most organizations. As a natural evolution, certain marketing technologies have embedded master data management capabilities to provide a more seamless application for business users. Some vendors of such marketing technologies don't call out MDM per se as a component of the solution.

A company that started as a traditional PIM vendor evolved its software into a solution for managing complex product information and multichannel content, for multiple roles in the information supply chain. For the user, the MDM / PIM part is "invisible". Prospective customers see this solution as an application that supports multichannel interactions, sophisticated content management and digital communications / marketing. The vendor places a strong emphasis on business user access to solution capabilities which further encompasses the business user perspective and language.

The solution provides a means to help resolve the "information fragmentation" that plagues organizational efforts to address the complexities of content management and usage, including highly variable sources (user-generated content, outside experts, brand) and diverse distribution channels (corporate website, mobile, social). The solution supports efforts to reconcile brand consistency and customer experience requirements that are necessary for successful digital marketing.

These are all very much business problems that are being addressed by business teams: digital marketing, ecommerce, content management, product strategy, and so on. The vendor reveals the value of the solution in the language of both business buyers and users. In marketing the solution, the software vendor focus isn't on data / information per se, but on what business users need to do with information and content, and how solution capabilities help them manage these activities in support of digital business needs.

 

Breaking Free from Traditional MDM through Data-Driven Business Applications

A vendor has introduced a relatively new "master data management" platform that is designed to break away from the traditional aspects of MDM software solutions. Instead of basing MDM and other data-related capabilities on relational databases, which has been a common choice until recently, this vendor loads combined and curated data into a NoSQL graph database. This allows the vendor to provide a scalable multi-tenant platform-as-a-service to innovate the creation of 'data applications' that are frequently closely tied to business functions and initiatives.  

On the technical side, this approach supports oversized datasets and accommodates rapidly evolving schema, something most relational databases find difficult. Graph databases provide a greatly improved method to delineate relationships between people, data, and things.  

For business users, this data management solution provides the means to build data-driven business applications that align with the goals and functions of the business. Business users can construct applications that are industry-specific to perform exactly the processes that are needed.

Business users don't need to know that the platform is based on an MDM infrastructure. This vendor wants to give business users the equivalent of "consumer apps" that produce information and analytics results quickly and easily. The vendor frequently speaks "business language" to help business users grasp these concepts.

For business users to successfully take advantage of this platform, the software capabilities and processes will have to be couched in the language of the business. The platform will have to carefully manage business user access based on guidelines and activities that make sense to less-technical business roles. As with any data management software solution that strives to support usage by business roles, IT and data management teams must be partners with the business to ensure successful outcomes. Collaborative capabilities enable such partnerships. So it will be interesting to see how successfully this vendor empowers and protects business usage of its MDM-based platform.

 

Going Beyond the "Traditional Language" of MDM

In the 'New Age of MDM', we are seeing great diversity as to how vendors, practitioners and organizations talk about MDM. Changes in language are essential to better connect MDM practices and solutions to real business needs, desired outcomes and value – in terminology that conveys real meaning to business management and decision-makers.

We'll continue to see a broadening variety of solutions that build on MDM, while deviating from traditional MDM implementations, in order to offer more business-relevant capabilities. Realistically, even the term "master data management" can be confusing for business roles in many organizations that could benefit from implementing MDM practices and technologies. It can be advantageous and helpful when vendors use new but honest terminology to better demonstrate business value and help prospective customers understand the 'why' and 'how' of implementing master data management initiatives.

It seems that the more innovative the MDM-related software solution, the greater the need for new ways to work directly with business roles and to communicate in the language of business. One of the stumbling blocks for such innovation of software and language comes from analyst firms that cover MDM software solutions. Increasingly certain analyst firms have become trapped by their inexact definitions of what kind of solution constitutes an "MDM offering", when evaluating MDM vendors for benchmark reports. Many vendors with MDM-related offerings are trailblazing new directions for MDM, but are excluded from certain industry benchmarks because of the narrow definition held by these firms. Analyst firms following such a path are performing a disservice to buyers who are interested in the right approach to MDM for their organizations, or who are in need of an MDM-based offering that provides business applications tailored for immediate needs.

 

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About the author: Julie is an independent consultant and industry analyst for B2B software solutions, providing services to vendors to improve strategies for customers and target markets, products and solutions, and future direction. Julie has expertise in several solution spaces including: data integration and data quality; analytics and BI; business process, workflow and collaboration; digital marketing, WCM and social media; and the pivotal importance of user and customer experiences. Julie shares her takes on the software industry via her blog Highly Competitive and on Twitter: @juliebhunt For more information: Julie Hunt Consulting – Strategies for B2B Software Solutions: Working from the Customer Perspective

 

Interoperating Services are the Heart of Cloud Data Integration

 

Most SaaS offerings started with a business user focus, providing applications that zero in on solving specific business problems. It's become an everyday occurrence for businesses of all sizes to migrate many of their needs to SaaS.

There are also SaaS applications that serve as components of a comprehensive IT landscape. But when we look at creating and maintaining the overall technology infrastructure in an organization, a single SaaS application really isn't able to provide full-on IT services. So IT has been finding more usefulness in the world of cloud services that have their roots in supporting IT and developers. IT is able to take advantage of cloud-based platforms, such Infrastructure as a Service, for core technology tools.

Obviously, in terms of data and technology interoperability, SaaS and cloud services must integrate with the entire IT world, much of which is still on-premises. Business processes and data-flows now run from cloud to on premises and back. Businesses need agile technology tools to handle the increasing hybrid infrastructures of many organizations.

The overlapping of data and application integration has been accelerating, particularly with the growth of cloud-based integration solutions. Out of this convergence has emerged the cloud integration platform iPaaS (Integration Platform as a Service). iPaaS is evolving into a new class of technology that supports hybrid infrastructures, and both business and IT users.

IPaaS has its origins in Data Integration as a Service targeting business users, and in data integration solutions for the proliferating silos of data in the cloud. It has been growing into a platform that also offers services for IT and developers, to more deftly handle multiple integration scenarios. iPaaS often functions as an orchestration hub for complex integration processes. And it is increasingly taking on more "traditional" data integration scenarios.

With iPaaS, business users can handle more of the basic integration tasks through self-service data integration, taking the load from IT and data management teams. And IT is becoming more in tune with the self-service economy, by taking advantage of pre-built, reusable services that speed up the creation of more complex data integration processes. Through a services approach to data and application integration, IT can more quickly keep up with business demands.

For the service economy, iPaaS has to be more than just another development platform for the tech savvy. The ultimate outcome of iPaaS should always be the creation of services – iPaaS itself is a means to an end. The services created contribute to iPaaS serving as an orchestration platform that can accomplish a great deal for organizations:

• Continue to grow the IT-Business partnership by using iPaaS as the means for business users to plan, design and execute integration processes; and by using iPaaS as a collaboration platform for IT and Business to improve any and all integration processes to more quickly meet dynamic business needs
• Utilize iPaaS services to streamline management of integrations and API environments from beginning to end
• Create a single environment where numerous technologies converge and interoperate with centralized management
• Engender the growth of transparency and insight for improved operational intelligence

While iPaaS solutions have evolved tremendously over the past few years, there are still miles to go. Several vendors have realized that with the disparate variety of data and business usage for integrations, critical functions like data quality, data governance and master data management must be added as core services for iPaaS. API management is another critical component, particularly since cloud services have a tight relationship to the development and usage of mobile apps that create and consume large volumes of data.

 

Image source: http://www.wunderground.com/wximage/canon30dguy/19

 

This post was brought to you by IBM for MSPs and opinions are my own. To read more on this topic, visit IBM's PivotPoint. Dedicated to providing valuable insight from industry thought leaders, PivotPoint offers expertise to help you develop, differentiate and scale your business.

 

About the author: Julie Hunt understands the overlap and convergence of many business processes and software solutions that once were thought of as "separate" – and how this impacts software Vendors and Buyers, as well as the strategies that enterprises implement for how technology supports the business and its customers. Julie shares her takes on the software industry via her blog Highly Competitive and on Twitter: @juliebhunt For more information: Julie Hunt Consulting

 

Data Integration Services Evolution

 

 

With the increased usage of data analytics to help solve business problems and improve strategies, data integration has come more to the forefront as a critical component of overall technologies for data-savvy organizations. New approaches and technologies for data integration are coming into play to better meet what organizations need, especially to support increased business user access to data management itself.

Over the past several years, data integration services have continued to grow and evolve, thanks largely to the cloud. Tapping into SaaS approaches, the early entrants were data integration as a service and purpose-built or pre-built data integrations.

 

Data Integration -- as a Service

Data Integration-as-a-service (IaaS) became possible as more organizations made use of SaaS, cloud services and even B2B data exchanges. Business ecosystems began growing in size and complexity thanks to online connectivity, promoting ease-of-access for B2B relationships and interactions. As more data flowed in the cloud, the need and demand for integration picked up momentum. Originally IaaS functioned as an IT-oriented service, mostly in stand-alone instances. But IaaS instances were soon embedded in other cloud services and applications, as well as cloud infrastructure platforms.

The ability to quickly move data to where it is needed must evolve beyond cloud services that only provide basic APIs and web services that still require users to build connections. While leveraging APIs and web services for loosely-coupled integration processes, IaaS rapidly added more sophisticated capabilities such as virtualized data services, governance, REST-ful services, and agile interoperability at multiple levels.

Cloud-based IaaS has since progressed into Integration Platform as a Service (iPaaS). The data integration services evolution now involves comprehensive platforms that leverage cloud services for the creation and execution of integration processes or flows that connect to systems in the cloud and on premises -- within a single entity or across multiple organizations. Services include critical capabilities: data governance and management, metadata discovery, data quality, transformation rules, agile access to data sources – all delivered with automation and ease-of-deployment as important aspects of the overall platform.

 

Purpose-Built Data Integrations

As a more narrow approach to integration, purpose-built data integration is designed to meet a specific business need, with pre-defined capabilities bundled in the solution. Frequently purpose-built data integration comes as an appliance. Purpose-built data integration services in the cloud comprise an evolutionary step for making data integration services available to business users, to initiate integrations between specific sources or applications.

Cloud services for purpose-built integrations usually include data replication, migration, and synchronizations for customer data. Typically integrations involve specific SaaS applications like Salesforce.com and Netsuite as "pre-set" sources and targets.

These services work with focused use cases where business users do not have to make lots of decisions about how the integrations will be accomplished. Wizards are employed to walk business users through the process. However, at minimum, business users must have knowledge of the sources and targets, and basic understanding of the data integration task, to work confidently and accurately through the purpose-built approach.

 

Business Innovation from Data Integration Services

The evolution of data integration services must align dynamically to the business as it changes. Business users require rapid responsiveness to integration needs, through technology that is 'proactively' ready for many use cases that reflect expected and realistic business situations. Innovations for cloud-based data integration services contribute to optimal business performance and to the faster delivery of valuable data that frequently has a short shelf life of relevance.

Data integration services can tap into the rich value of the cloud and how it connects businesses through common services, with business processes providing contextual frameworks. Such data and process agility underpins must-haves for the competitive organization: always-on intelligence, new business opportunities, innovations in products and business models, robust collaborative processes for the ever-growing business ecosystem.

 

Image source: trendmicro.com

 

This post was brought to you by IBM for MSPs and opinions are my own. To read more on this topic, visit IBM's PivotPoint. Dedicated to providing valuable insight from industry thought leaders, PivotPoint offers expertise to help you develop, differentiate and scale your business.

 

About the author: Julie Hunt understands the overlap and convergence of many business processes and software solutions that once were thought of as "separate" – and how this impacts software Vendors and Buyers, as well as the strategies that enterprises implement for how technology supports the business and its customers. Julie shares her takes on the software industry via her blog Highly Competitiveand on Twitter: @juliebhunt For more information: Julie Hunt Consulting

 

The Missing Pieces of Master Data Management Services

 

A master data initiative is meant to deliver a unified and well-integrated source of cross-organizational data that is reliable and up-to-date, while eliminating silos and redundancies across the organization. Master data management (MDM) software solutions comprise an essential piece for trustworthy analytics that lead to better decision-making. Master data is also a much-needed accompaniment for big data analytics, providing critical context for big data, and as a means to connect big data analytics to business objectives and value.

We're seeing more offerings for MDM services from IT and solutions consultants, managed services providers, and software vendors – with cloud platforms playing a clear role in these offerings. Third party technology services often result in lower costs and faster time to solution use and to the engendering of business value. Unfortunately providers of MDM services frequently only target IT groups, and, as such, fail to include the very important business stakeholders in a client organization. A technology-only approach to MDM results in significant pieces missing from the puzzle, which will impede how well MDM will work for an organization, particularly to produce business value.

These missing pieces relate to people, organizational change and new processes, which in turn often give rise to internal political issues that must be identified and dealt with. For successful MDM initiatives, technology should take a back seat until thorough understanding is mapped out for the people, practices and processes of the organization. Otherwise there will be a serious impairment of the integrated vision of how a master data initiative impacts the organization and the work that is done to achieve business objectives.

A focus solely on technology ensures that the needs and requirements of the business won't be met, and that the MDM initiative will fail to address essential non-technology elements, such as relationships with key people. Business champions, stakeholders and influencers are all critical to the success of any MDM project.

Data governance is another crucial function that aligns the important elements of people, practices and processes with master data management. Again, the plan for data governance must be in place from the beginning of an MDM initiative. It is an essential apparatus for helping to mitigate the many obstacles that can plague MDM.

Third party services providers have a big opportunity for providing MDM services. But such services must include the business and people sides of the story. Often a neutral outside consultancy or service provider can help achieve the organizational change required for MDM to make a difference for businesses. Service provider insight and experience enables the identification of problems from the beginning and provides useful solutions and guidance for clients to mitigate internal politics.

Services providers must be prepared to develop a well-structured MDM vision for clients that aligns to and realistically supports overall corporate strategies, business unit goals and optimal business operations. Such a vision must address not only how business is done today, but what organizations want to accomplish further down the road. A focus on technology alone cannot achieve this sort of visionary work. By providing the full scope of work for MDM initiatives, a service provider will stand well above those who only focus on MDM as a technology "project".

 

Image source: http://www.danpontefract.com/give-piece-a-chance/

 

This post was brought to you by IBM for MSPs and opinions are my own. To read more on this topic, visit IBM's PivotPoint. Dedicated to providing valuable insight from industry thought leaders, PivotPoint offers expertise to help you develop, differentiate and scale your business.

 

About the author: Julie Hunt understands the overlap and convergence of many business processes and software solutions that once were thought of as "separate" – and how this impacts software Vendors and Buyers, as well as the strategies that enterprises implement for how technology supports the business and its customers. Julie shares her takes on the software industry via her blog Highly Competitiveand on Twitter: @juliebhunt For more information: Julie Hunt Consulting

 

Industry-Focused Services Deliver Unique Value

 

I often advise my clients (B2B software vendors and professional services firms) to seriously consider well-targeted markets that require extensive expertise that will set the vendor apart. These markets might be a specific industry focus or niche services for distinct industry or business problems. Such specialized offerings provide an important way that vendors can competitively differentiate on real performance that benefits their clients. MSPs are no different in this respect, particularly as traditional IT managed services have become highly commoditized, with an overflowing field of competitors.

 

Distinctive Expertise Means Big Value for Clients and for MSPs

To provide niche or industry-specific services means developing in-depth expertise for that particular service offering, both in terms of the industry or niche and the problems that need to be solved. The MSP becomes highly proficient in understanding the details of a specific industry need - on all fronts: business; technology; processes; practices; external requirements such as compliance; and how the new services will impact client imperatives.

Hands-on expertise is essential. The MSP becomes the "go-to-guy" for certain industries or business specialties because of proven knowledge and ability. This expertise serves to market the MSP naturally through real demonstrations of subject matter mastery and problem-solving. It will require that the MSP directly participate in the world of the specialty, including attending events, user group meetings, training opportunities, and so on. Such events provide excellent access to potential clients, as well as organic marketing through articles, blog posts and news releases written about the events by other parties.

When MSPs specialize, they're able to walk in the shoes of their clients, to better understand what they are facing, and to visualize new ways to help them solve problems. The MSP now walks the walk, as well as talks the talk. Being able to speak the same language as customers and users engenders trust and opens clearer lines of communication. Hands-on expertise in specialized areas allows the MSP to know what matters to their clients and what solutions will make a difference. And their clients will quickly see that the MSP is for real.

Knowing specific industries or niche markets makes it easier to assess the needs of each customer, and to determine the best solutions. The MSP builds a knowledge bank of problems, pitfalls and best practices related to solutions for focused markets. As a result, reusability becomes a competitive advantage for the MSP, from assessing client needs and constructing bids, to basing applications and solutions on proven solution templates. MSPs become thoroughly in the know for the top industry preferences for specific software solutions and the corresponding software ecosystem.

All of this leads to opportunities for unique services that few other MSPs are able to provide.

 

Technology Services Focus for Retail Fashion Industry

New York City-based service provider eMazzanti Technologies has been actively targeting the retail fashion industry with services to improve transactional technologies, such as mobile POS systems, and services for comprehensive cyber security. eMazzanti provides extensive security services for customer and business data protection, including network security solutions and appliances, supplemented by eMazzanti monitoring and remediation services.

To deepen industry expertise, eMazzanti staff now includes experienced retail fashion professionals. eMazzanti sees greater opportunity in serving broad needs across a retail fashion business, beyond the traditional IT services of the past:

Looking to enhance clients' retail revenue growth, the company is continually assessing emerging technologies such as digital mirrors, interactive product displays and customer recognition systems for retail customers. Existing and future technologies depend on reliable and secure network design and deployment, eMazzanti's core strength.

 

Selling Value over Price

Traveling the path of niche and industry services helps smart MSPs escape endless pricing "wars" for commoditized services provided by innumerable MSPs. Value is immediately obvious to clients when focused services are available for unique needs within an industry or niche market.

All clients want top notch technology services providers, and many are on the lookout for services that have a tight fit for their specific industry or niche. Tailored services offer such clients competitive advantage for attaining business objectives. Clients know their businesses can see healthy growth when partnered with MSP firms committed to deep expertise for their clients' specific industry needs.

 

 

Image source: dev2ops.org

 

This post was brought to you by IBM for MSPs and opinions are my own. To read more on this topic, visit IBM's PivotPoint. Dedicated to providing valuable insight from industry thought leaders, PivotPoint offers expertise to help you develop, differentiate and scale your business.

 

About the author: Julie Hunt understands the overlap and convergence of many business processes and software solutions that once were thought of as "separate" – and how this impacts software Vendors and Buyers, as well as the strategies that enterprises implement for how technology supports the business and its customers. Julie shares her takes on the software industry via her blog Highly Competitiveand on Twitter: @juliebhunt For more information: Julie Hunt Consulting

 

 

Designing for the ‘Anywhere’ Mobile Workplace

 

For most organizations, business today has a fast pace, is global in nature and relies more and more on virtual networks of employees, partners, supply chains, and outside consultants. Mobile has a critical role here. Mobile is no longer just about devices, it's a catalyst for changing corporate culture that must evolve to ensure the competitive survival of the organization. Mobile is becoming a critical path for providing the workforce with streamlined and secure access to the right data, tools, and applications to do their jobs effectively - anytime anywhere.

Managed services providers have long had expertise for optimizing technology infrastructure, mostly focusing on the technologies and the operations that use them. Mobile is different. MSPs should not only handle the tech services but must understand the big picture culture of a mobile workforce. The underlying services must match all the different ways that a workforce utilizes mobility. End-to-end design services for this new world of work would be an invaluable offering for many organizations.

An outside-in approach to designing the entire mobile experience, including infrastructure, will ensure highest returns to clients in terms of productivity, security and the benefits for desired business outcomes. MSPs can be expert advisers for helping organizations understand the change in "culture" that comes with the 'anywhere' mobile workplace.

 

Who are Mobile Workers? Everyone

Mobility is rapidly becoming a critical element of business technology for many workers around the world. Mobile work activities happen just about anywhere. The classic example has been the "untethered" employee hunkered down in a Starbucks, working away. But today all kinds of employees are actually accomplishing mobile work everywhere: at home, commuting, at client sites or in the field, in libraries or parks. Some are rarely in the office and may not even be working from home. Even traditional corporate office-based employees are shifting more work to mobile devices, and carrying on work "anywhere".

What kind of work flourishes when the mobile office is anywhere? An obvious area is all kinds of services work performed at customer or client sites. Mobility has revolutionized the productivity of such workers in the field. Another category: employees heavily involved in creative work often seek out unconventional sites where mobility connects these employees to the tools they need and to their collaboration partners. Innovative work requires interactions with the world, new ideas, people who are not part of the corporate mindset or even the employee's corporate world. At the other end of the spectrum, effective mobile workers can be those whose jobs focus primarily on well-defined tasks or results-oriented work that fit a fixed set of metrics to show completion and value.

For all of these mobile employees, the work itself will probably become more project-focused. Ever-changing teams of employees, partners, contractors, and consultants will come together as needed, contributing to the needs of such projects.

 

The New Mobile Workplace Still Needs the Human Touch

With the advent of mobility the corporate office environment has started to change. At corporate sites, traditional offices and cubicles are giving way to an increase in casual meeting spaces to support the need for face-to-face meetings and collaborations when truly mobile workers come into the corporate office. Relationships and the focus on corporate goals are strengthened with regular in-person contact. Management and others need to personally interact extensively with mobile workers to understand the value they bring to work communities and business outcomes. While virtual collaboration is on the rise, it's still essential for mobile workers to physically re-connect with fellow workers and partners to take advantage of in-person sessions that tap into the group dynamic.

With this need for in-person contact, the office experience must undergo change. Management must support, encourage and allot more time for interactions between office-bound regulars and mobile workers. Such activity should be considered part of the job. Some of the space that was allocated to offices and cubicles will give way to a variety of meeting areas. But 'untethered' mobile workers also need private work areas at corporate sites. These areas need to have a human touch, again to reconnect these workers with the company that employs them.

 

 

Image source: itbusinessedge.com

 

This post was brought to you by IBM for MSPs and opinions are my own. To read more on this topic, visit IBM's PivotPoint. Dedicated to providing valuable insight from industry thought leaders, PivotPoint offers expertise to help you develop, differentiate and scale your business.

 

About the author: Julie Hunt understands the overlap and convergence of many business processes and software solutions that once were thought of as "separate" – and how this impacts software Vendors and Buyers, as well as the strategies that enterprises implement for how technology supports the business and its customers. Julie shares her takes on the software industry via her blog Highly Competitiveand on Twitter: @juliebhunt For more information: Julie Hunt Consulting – Strategies for B2B Software Solutions: Working from the Customer Perspective

 

Riding the Mobile Data Highway

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Image source:  cisco.com

 

Vendors and services providers for mobility management solutions can overly fixate on the vast array of software platforms and services for "corralling" mobile devices and ensuring secure computing. While these are vital areas, ultimately to enable successful organizations it can be far more important to provide services to amplify the value of what employees are doing with mobile devices. Particularly as businesses have become more mobile, the never-ending ebb and flow of data has made comprehensive data management a mission critical element both for business agility and for guaranteeing trustworthy, useable data.

Mobility adds a distinct flavor to real-time data management, particularly since mobile is a top source of big data. But data by itself – no matter the source – carries no value. Even worse, poorly managed data can cause real harm to organizations. Real value accrues when data sources are streamlined and cleaned up, when the processes that consume and create data are more responsive to business needs, and when business users trust the data they are using for decisions and work requirements.

Obviously business data is everywhere these days, as cloud services and mobile software offerings keep pace with worker preferences for tools. End-to-end task workflows may even take place on multiple platforms, off and on premises. The future of applications for mobile devices is ultimately about providing the workforce with the data they need, when they need it and where they need it. With a growing "mobile first" mindset for workers, organizations must enable as much functionality for their employees as possible while also ensuring data - and corporate - security.

One of the important changes for data management solutions is the demand for many different ways that integration processes can be created and used. Not only do data integration platforms need to be high performance, they must continue to innovate ways to connect to data where it lives, and then perform any number of actions to take data where it is needed. Added to integration and management imperatives is the ongoing battle to eliminate more data silos, to speed up access to the right data from mobile devices.

With 'speed to solution' as a crucial aspect of mobile data management, managed services can play an important role to provide what many organizations need, by applying expertise in mobility and cloud services to 'old school' data management processes and mindsets. True data mobility gives rise to data flows consistently and "effortlessly" (from the user perspective) between any points whether cloud or on premises.

Managed services have a natural fit with the management of the entire life cycle of mobile data and information. The objective is to keep up with changes regarding where data is created and stored, and where it needs to flow, to reach everyone in the organization who can benefit from such data. So mobile data management is as much about continuously creating and maintaining the right business processes as it is about data access and security.

Process-centric initiatives are often optimal approaches for the things that companies want to accomplish. Business processes make it possible to directly connect work to business outcomes that lend themselves to various metrics that provide clarity for business performance. It is through business processes that data can be mapped to business value.

Some of the difficulty for transitioning how enterprises derive value from business processes (and the data running through them) is the fact that most data-related initiatives have been driven by IT instead of by business-oriented roles. To enable better business outcomes, mobile data management initiatives need to bring business and IT teams together as symbiotic partners. Managed services providers can be the game-changing bridge to promote strong relationships between business and IT teams in order to best support a growing mobile workforce.

 

This post was brought to you by IBM for MSPs and opinions are my own. To read more on this topic, visit IBM's PivotPoint. Dedicated to providing valuable insight from industry thought leaders, PivotPoint offers expertise to help you develop, differentiate and scale your business.

 

About the author: Julie Hunt understands the overlap and convergence of many business processes and software solutions that once were thought of as "separate" – and how this impacts software Vendors and Buyers, as well as the strategies that enterprises implement for how technology supports the business and its customers. Julie shares her takes on the software industry via her blog Highly Competitiveand on Twitter: @juliebhunt For more information: Julie Hunt Consulting – Strategies for B2B Software Solutions: Working from the Customer Perspective

 

The Best Mobile Solutions Aren’t ‘One Size Fits All’

 

Managed services providers are finding extensive opportunities in newer technologies that hold great promise for improving business competitiveness and employee productivity. And managed services providers have many of the same challenges as vendors to find success with these new technologies:

• They must reframe the business approach to focus strongly on customers
• They must prove real value to their customers' businesses
• They have to present differentiated advantage to customers
• They have to understand that One Size does not Fit All

 

An exciting yet perplexing area for both organizations and technology solution providers is mobility. The opportunities – and the stumbling blocks – for comprehensively taking advantage of the broad, ill-defined and volatile world of mobility continue to be: management / governance, security and cost, while still maintaining "freedom" of mobile usage for workers.

Mobile isn't just one thing: from the multiplicity of devices complicated by BYOD, to the proliferation of innovative apps developed both internal and external to the organization. And adding to the situation: all the pieces need to work together at optimal levels – no small task for organizations of any size.

Managed services providers have a goldmine of possibilities for bundling basic mobile management services with platforms for app development, distribution and governance. Mobility is leading the way for MSPs to move from operational technologies to comprehensive services that include systems integration, consultative advisor, infrastructure re-designs – all to accommodate accelerated implementations of new technologies like mobile.

MSPs should build out 'bundles' of strategies and planning approaches as part of tailored end-to-end solutions for different kinds of organizations and the outcomes that they want from mobile adoption and use. Organizations need managed services to integrate mobile into existing infrastructure, and to enhance business processes and systems to take advantage of mobile capabilities. Managed services providers also have to accommodate accelerated mobile innovation that must constantly be folded into existing services.

The overarching rule for mobile managed services is that they're not the 'end' but an important new 'means' for accessing the processes and software technologies of the business: CRM, analytics, eLearning, knowledge sharing, marketing, customer service, and so on. MSPs must understand that 'one size fits all' won't work here. The focus should be on what works best for each organization and how it wants to work to achieve business goals.

Such new approaches to mobility services reflect the changing landscape of managed services, where the creation and delivery of managed technology services are moving from traditional mindsets and business models to the emergence of managed services providers as agile, customer-responsive, business-oriented partners. Many organizations desperately need the services of expert partners to help drive business and productivity innovation through new technologies.

 

Image source: IBM

 

This post was brought to you by IBM for MSPs and opinions are my own. To read more on this topic, visit IBM’s PivotPoint. Dedicated to providing valuable insight from industry thought leaders, PivotPoint offers expertise to help you develop, differentiate and scale your business.

 

About the author: Julie Hunt understands the overlap and convergence of many business processes and software solutions that once were thought of as "separate" – and how this impacts software Vendors and Buyers, as well as the strategies that enterprises implement for how technology supports the business and its customers. Julie shares her takes on the software industry via her blog Highly Competitiveand on Twitter: @juliebhunt For more information: Julie Hunt Consulting – Strategies for B2B Software Solutions: Working from the Customer Perspective

 

Gaining Advantage through Multi-Cloud Services

 

Cloud computing has opened up tremendous possibilities for any kind of business, whether it's a company taking advantage of cloud solutions, or vendors and custom developers using the cloud as a platform. Due to the proliferation of cloud services providers (CSPs), there is now a robust ecosystem of options for doing just about anything in the cloud.

Right now there are numerous choices in terms of solution delivery models, types of cloud architectures, and value-add services. Lots of choices translate into value for businesses -- but come at the price of complexity for choosing services, particularly since many organizations maintain a mix of cloud services. Companies wanting to gain the most advantage from multiple cloud services must weigh all the capabilities for each service, and what it will take to integrate each service into the overall systems infrastructure. With so many factors for making decisions, companies can turn to third parties to navigate a frequently difficult path.

 

 

Cloud services brokers (CSBs) have become an important arbiter of the desire to take advantage of cloud services. Cloud brokers act as an intermediary service between cloud service offerings and the business consumers of those services. CSBs assist with individual cloud strategies, and usually provide services for integration, aggregation and customization to pull together multiple cloud offerings to better meet business needs. As they currently exist, CSBs are expected to act as trusted advisors, without any preferences for particular cloud vendors.

 

 

With the growth of cloud brokering, supporting technology solutions are on the rise. The use of CSB enablement technologies provides essential capabilities for dynamic management and monitoring of cloud services. These solutions focus on centralized governance of multi-cloud services, including provisioning new services or reducing services usage as needed. The CSB-related technology market is quite vibrant, with analyst David Linthicum providing this assessment of potential market growth:

The CSB-enablement market focuses on those technologies that broker private and public cloud services, including the capabilities defined in this report. This market will grow from $225.42 million in 2013 to $2.03 billion by 2018, at a CAGR of 55.3 percent. The overall global CSB market will grow from $1.57 billion in 2013 to $10.5 billion by 2018, representing a CAGR of 46.2 percent, according to MarketsandMarkets.

To gain advantage from cloud services, companies have to overcome technical and strategic challenges to move work to the cloud in the first place. But the challenges continue after initial deployment and require the support of those who understand how the different services function, and interoperate with other cloud services. Often this support is provided by cloud services or managed services providers.

Debate continues as to whether cloud services brokers should offer more value-add services related to specific cloud offerings or should remain at arms-length from such offerings. Another wrinkle relates to the increasing number of existing cloud services providers that are delivering cloud brokering services. For either party, the obvious issue is conflict of interest. And in the case of cloud brokers who partner with CSPs, there is the issue of direct competition.

Some analysts maintain that brokers should stick to expertise in unifying services for businesses, helping them put together the best pricing while fulfilling needs with the right services. Understanding disparate solution architectures and licensing models is an important function that sets brokers apart from cloud services providers.

 

 Image Source: baquia.com

 

This post was brought to you by IBM for Midsize Business and opinions are my own. To read more on this topic, visit  IBM's Midsize Insider. Dedicated to providing businesses with expertise, solutions and tools that are specific to small and midsized companies, the Midsize Business program provides businesses with the materials and knowledge they need to become engines of a smarter planet.

 

About the author: Julie Hunt understands the overlap and convergence of many business processes and software solutions that once were thought of as "separate" – and how this impacts software Vendors and Buyers, as well as the strategies that enterprises implement for how technology supports the business and its customers. Julie shares her takes on the software industry via her blog Highly Competitiveand on Twitter: @juliebhunt For more information: Julie Hunt Consulting – Strategies for B2B Software Solutions: Working from the Customer Perspective

 

MSPs -- Picking the Right Technology Partners

 

 

Managed Service Providers (MSPs) can find sustained success by building out a strong and highly complementary partner ecosystem. In the technology industry, the term 'ecosystem' is tossed around quite a bit. But for MSPs the right ecosystem makes all the difference for organic growth, flexible offerings and continuously meeting a wider variety of customer needs. MSPs have long been a growth segment for technology partner channels. Now MSPs should turn to fellow service providers as significant candidates for partnerships in their own ecosystems.

 

So how can you find the right technology partners and then leverage those partnerships for greater competitive advantage? It involves a good deal of analysis that explores your business strategy, what your customers need, and what third party services can bring to your game. How do you want to structure your own partner ecosystem, how does it affect your go-to-market strategies, how does it benefit your business, and how does this help you better serve your customers?

 

Other crucial questions to explore with potential partners:

    How does the partner offering add value and innovation to your services?

You need to ask this question to establish the breadth of the combined services. Then assess the impact of the "new" platform of services on your customers' business needs and goals. Another area to explore: does the combined platform add competitive differentiation from other MSPs? Revisit frequently what your partners visualize for future direction and new services that may provide further competitive advantage. If a partner seems to be stagnating, it may be time to search for someone new.    

 

What's the plan for collaborative Marketing and Sales?

If support for Marketing and Sales are in the mix, make sure that the prospective partner will deliver what you need. Explore in detail what the partner intends to do, what sort of timeline, examples from other partner experiences, and how strong the results were for generating new business. What sort of reporting and metrics will the partner provide to show activity and outcomes? What kind of resources does the partner have in place to provide strong support in this area?

 

What's the dollar and cents bottom line?

Take care not to solely focus on technology conversations. The financial side of any partnership is just as important. Fully discuss financial models to make sure that you pick one that integrates with your business model and goals. Make sure the financial arrangements provide the profitability you expect.

 

How does the partner view the customer / end user experience?

If you are strongly focused on a customer-centric business strategy (and you should be), find out if your potential partners share your passion for high quality customer and end user experiences. If a partner does not put a high priority on customer success with the overall services platform, you could be endangering your business.

 

    What kind of specialized technical support will you receive?

Once you have integrated the partner offering into your overall platform, you need to know that you will have dedicated support resources to quickly take care of your issues and those of your customers.

 

Partner ecosystems open up a lot of new business opportunities for MSPs – when they are based on the right strategies. As technologies and markets change, MSPs are shifting from traditional approaches to offer more innovative and timely services. But in building out a partner ecosystem, you must be alert to protecting your reputation as a trustworthy and reliable service provider. Your collaborations with other MSPs must add to your reputation, not jeopardize it.

 

 

Image source: Personal Touch

 

This post was brought to you by IBM for Midsize Business and opinions are my own. To read more on this topic, visit  IBM's Midsize Insider. Dedicated to providing businesses with expertise, solutions and tools that are specific to small and midsized companies, the Midsize Business program provides businesses with the materials and knowledge they need to become engines of a smarter planet.

 

About the author: Julie Hunt understands the overlap and convergence of many business processes and software solutions that once were thought of as "separate" – and how this impacts software Vendors and Buyers, as well as the strategies that enterprises implement for how technology supports the business and its customers. Julie shares her takes on the software industry via her blog Highly Competitiveand on Twitter: @juliebhunt For more information: Julie Hunt Consulting – Strategies for B2B Software Solutions: Working from the Customer Perspective