Friday, February 05, 2010
Xpediant's webcast with Momentive, Open Text
Please click on the title to view the recorded webcast we did with our customer Momentive Performance Materials. It discusses the implementation of their Social Intranet using tools provided by Open Text and our expertise.
Sunday, January 31, 2010
Predictions for 2010
It's the end of January 2010. A lot of people have a lot of hope tied to this year. This is the year our economy is supposed to turn around, this year we are supposed to have better health care, all of us will have jobs and our standing in the world economy will be relinquished.
Before I write about what has happened to date, I wanted to share with you some predictions made by two very different kinds of people. One, a reporter for the NY Post and the other by a Psychic. In my humble opinion either one could be just as credible as the other.
According to Terry Keenan, New York post reporter, the unemployment rate will deceptively drop this spring as 800,000 Americans join the Census Bureau payroll. However, as these workers attempt to re-enter the private-sector workforce later in the year, the unemployment rate will once again climb stubbornly to the 10 percent level.
The rising tide of job losses will cost the Democrats their majority in the House of Representatives and will trigger a late-year rally in the stock market akin to the rally we saw after the GOP took Congress back in 1994.
In the face of bruising losses in the mid-term elections, President Obama will overhaul his economic team. The first to go? Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner.
Oil prices will return to triple-digit territory after Israel attempts to remove the Iranian nuclear threat. The tacit support of the US in the operation forces President Obama to return to Oslo to give back his Nobel Peace Prize.
These are three of her ten predictions that can be found at
http://www.nypost.com/p/news/business/changes_in_24lq72ZmmtQ4Vc4nkVlQkO
Craig the psychic predicted the death of Bin Laden, an MP would be caught in indecent act in a public toilet, a secret human cloning experiment attempts to clone famous person, Iran would give up its quest for a nuclear bomb but South Korea will continue to threaten peace and petrol prices will shoot through the roof as OPEC makes price fixing deal with Russia.
You can read the remaining predictions at
http://psychics.co.uk/prediction/predictionsfor2010.html
So what did Keenan and Craig have in common? Yup, both predicted gas prices would go through the roof. Why am I not surprised.
Let's see what has come true this far? Keenan wins one point because she predicted the Democrats would start losing their seats because the economy has not yet magically turned around. She was right. Massachusetts for the first time since the 70's has elected a republican senator.
Both Keenan and Craig could not go wrong with the oil prices prediction. But then again does it really take a psychic or an analyst to predict that one? I think not!
Do you have any predictions for 2010 to share with us? We would love to hear from you.
Before I write about what has happened to date, I wanted to share with you some predictions made by two very different kinds of people. One, a reporter for the NY Post and the other by a Psychic. In my humble opinion either one could be just as credible as the other.
According to Terry Keenan, New York post reporter, the unemployment rate will deceptively drop this spring as 800,000 Americans join the Census Bureau payroll. However, as these workers attempt to re-enter the private-sector workforce later in the year, the unemployment rate will once again climb stubbornly to the 10 percent level.
The rising tide of job losses will cost the Democrats their majority in the House of Representatives and will trigger a late-year rally in the stock market akin to the rally we saw after the GOP took Congress back in 1994.
In the face of bruising losses in the mid-term elections, President Obama will overhaul his economic team. The first to go? Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner.
Oil prices will return to triple-digit territory after Israel attempts to remove the Iranian nuclear threat. The tacit support of the US in the operation forces President Obama to return to Oslo to give back his Nobel Peace Prize.
These are three of her ten predictions that can be found at
http://www.nypost.com/p/news/business/changes_in_24lq72ZmmtQ4Vc4nkVlQkO
Craig the psychic predicted the death of Bin Laden, an MP would be caught in indecent act in a public toilet, a secret human cloning experiment attempts to clone famous person, Iran would give up its quest for a nuclear bomb but South Korea will continue to threaten peace and petrol prices will shoot through the roof as OPEC makes price fixing deal with Russia.
You can read the remaining predictions at
http://psychics.co.uk/prediction/predictionsfor2010.html
So what did Keenan and Craig have in common? Yup, both predicted gas prices would go through the roof. Why am I not surprised.
Let's see what has come true this far? Keenan wins one point because she predicted the Democrats would start losing their seats because the economy has not yet magically turned around. She was right. Massachusetts for the first time since the 70's has elected a republican senator.
Both Keenan and Craig could not go wrong with the oil prices prediction. But then again does it really take a psychic or an analyst to predict that one? I think not!
Do you have any predictions for 2010 to share with us? We would love to hear from you.
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
How Momentive Got Social with Performance Materials
Momentive Performance Materials, the world's second largest producer of silicones and silicone derivatives, needed to find an effective way to engage its employees, partners and customers. In 2009 they implemented Open Text Social Media, using assets from other Open Text products they created a cohesive framework for their organization and continue to extend the platform and achieve maximum business value.
This webcast will discuss the business issues, technology rationale, implementation approach and results of Momentive’s decision to go with Open Text Social Media and Xpediant.
This webcast will discuss the business issues, technology rationale, implementation approach and results of Momentive’s decision to go with Open Text Social Media and Xpediant.
Wednesday, December 30, 2009
September 11 Happened In This Decade
These past couple of years have been so oppressive on most of us that’s it’s hard to remember other significant events that happened just a few years ago. As we approach 2010 and we at Xpediant Solutions wish you all a Very Happy and Prosperous New Year, I thought it might be good to take a moment and review the momentous events of this past decade, some of which are emblazoned in our memories forever because they changed the very fabric of our country and others which fizzled out of the news after their 5 minutes of fame.
Do you remember Y2K? The ultimate scare that the country would come to a standstill as the century turned. Yes, that happened in this decade. Turns out nothing happened. Developers raked in millions of dollars in re-programming fees and all was well with the world. 2000 also brought us the presidential nominations of George Bush, Jr. and Al Gore of the Republican and Democratic parties respectively. Year 2000 was the year of hanging ballot chads that caused a vote recount in Florida declaring George Bush, Jr. as the new President.
2001 is the year etched in our memories forever. September 11 happened in 2001. We all remember where we were, what we were doing, and how we felt when two planes collided into the World Trade Center in New York City and killed nearly 3,000 people. America was changed forever. Planes became deadly weapons, travel changed forever, the backbone of the American economy broke down and has cascading effects till today. America attacked Afghanistan in 2001, the Patriot Act was signed, Apple released the iPod and Harry Potter became the most watched movie in the world.
In 2002 the country focused on security. Homeland Security unveiled colored terrorism alerts that we see posted at airports even today. The bombing of an American night club in Bali took place in this year. On a lighter note the American Idol program was released this year and we all became familiar with Simon’s insults and Paula’s gestures.
The highlight of 2003 was Secretary of State Colin Powell’s case against Iraq which urged the President to send troops to fight Saddam. The words “shock” and “awe” became part of our vocabulary as we sat and watched our soldiers obliterate Iraq. We lost and found Saddam Hussein in this year. 2003 also brought us the death of all astronauts aboard the space shuttle Columbia which disintegrated while re-entering the earth’s atmosphere. The SARS scare happened this year and face masks became a fashion statement. In this year Martha Stewart went to prison and her location was nicknamed Camp Cupcake and California elected Arnold Schwarzenegger as its Governor.
Anyone remember John Kerry and Howard Dean? Yes, they campaigned on the democratic ticket, then Kerry flip flopped and Democrats did not stand a chance. Bush, Jr. was re-elected President. 300 people died in a terrorist attack on a train in Madrid, former President Ronald Reagan died at age 93, the world was outraged at the atrocities encountered at the Abu Ghraib prison, ten more Eastern European countries joined the European Union and the Boston Red Sox swept the World Series against the St. Louis Cardinals.
Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice became the first black woman to hold this post in 2005. Pope John Paul II passed away in April this year, and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was elected president in Iran beating popular Rafsanjani. Those of us in Houston can never forget that Katrina happened this year. Katrina not only impacted New Orleans, it also changed the demographics of Houston forever.
2006 saw the death of another former US President, Gerald Ford who died at 93. 2006 was the year of scandals. Dick Cheney shot hunting partner Harry Whittington, former representative Randy Cunningham went to prison for conspiracy and tax evasion, Representative Mark Foley resigned after sexually explicit emails and instant messages were found in his name, and pastor Ted Haggard admitted to having solicited a male prostitute for sex and drugs.
2007 was characterized by peace, war and dog fighting. Yes, dog fighting. This was the year quarterback Michael Vick was convicted of dog fighting and served 18 months in prison, this is also the year Al Gore and Rajendra Pachauri won the Nobel Peace Prize for their work on combating global warming. In 2007 Brittney Spears finally “lost it” and shaved her heard in front of Paparazzi. In this year Virgina Tech University lost 32 students to a single disturbed student who opened gun fire and Pakistan lost the last of the Bhutto family (Benazir Bhutto) to a bomb attack.
What can we say about 2008? This was the year the economy started to really tank. First Lehman Brothers went bankrupt, then AIG asked for a government bailout whose use came under investigation when lavish managements trips were uncovered on the books. 2008 saw worldwide political upheaval with Fidel Castro resigning in Havana, Cuba, Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe being forced to share his victory with his rival when his victory was considered fraudulent, and former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic was arrested on charges of genocide.
The now famous words “hunker down” did not apply only to our experience with Hurricane Rita but have become synonymous with how we have spent 2009. Most of us have hunkered down; accounted for the things we are thankful for and tightened our belts with the hope for a better year next year. 2009 brought us shock and awe when we heard of Ocatamom and her octuplets, the economy hit American auto makers hard and Detroit became a ghost town, Sarah Palin decided to resign as Governor of Alaska and bask in the media limelight with her “social” activities, balloon boy’s parents apologized for the publicity stunt they tried to pull by alleging their son had flown away in their hot air balloon, but maybe the best thing that has happened to date is that the Health Care Reform bill passed on Christmas Eve with a 60-39 vote. Whether or not this bill will change America’s health care system still remains to be seen.
This article has been excerpted from several videos by Newsweek magazine that highlighted events in this past decade from 2000-2009. If you would like a complete list of all events and author opinions please visit the site at www.newsweek.com
Do you remember Y2K? The ultimate scare that the country would come to a standstill as the century turned. Yes, that happened in this decade. Turns out nothing happened. Developers raked in millions of dollars in re-programming fees and all was well with the world. 2000 also brought us the presidential nominations of George Bush, Jr. and Al Gore of the Republican and Democratic parties respectively. Year 2000 was the year of hanging ballot chads that caused a vote recount in Florida declaring George Bush, Jr. as the new President.
2001 is the year etched in our memories forever. September 11 happened in 2001. We all remember where we were, what we were doing, and how we felt when two planes collided into the World Trade Center in New York City and killed nearly 3,000 people. America was changed forever. Planes became deadly weapons, travel changed forever, the backbone of the American economy broke down and has cascading effects till today. America attacked Afghanistan in 2001, the Patriot Act was signed, Apple released the iPod and Harry Potter became the most watched movie in the world.
In 2002 the country focused on security. Homeland Security unveiled colored terrorism alerts that we see posted at airports even today. The bombing of an American night club in Bali took place in this year. On a lighter note the American Idol program was released this year and we all became familiar with Simon’s insults and Paula’s gestures.
The highlight of 2003 was Secretary of State Colin Powell’s case against Iraq which urged the President to send troops to fight Saddam. The words “shock” and “awe” became part of our vocabulary as we sat and watched our soldiers obliterate Iraq. We lost and found Saddam Hussein in this year. 2003 also brought us the death of all astronauts aboard the space shuttle Columbia which disintegrated while re-entering the earth’s atmosphere. The SARS scare happened this year and face masks became a fashion statement. In this year Martha Stewart went to prison and her location was nicknamed Camp Cupcake and California elected Arnold Schwarzenegger as its Governor.
Anyone remember John Kerry and Howard Dean? Yes, they campaigned on the democratic ticket, then Kerry flip flopped and Democrats did not stand a chance. Bush, Jr. was re-elected President. 300 people died in a terrorist attack on a train in Madrid, former President Ronald Reagan died at age 93, the world was outraged at the atrocities encountered at the Abu Ghraib prison, ten more Eastern European countries joined the European Union and the Boston Red Sox swept the World Series against the St. Louis Cardinals.
Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice became the first black woman to hold this post in 2005. Pope John Paul II passed away in April this year, and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was elected president in Iran beating popular Rafsanjani. Those of us in Houston can never forget that Katrina happened this year. Katrina not only impacted New Orleans, it also changed the demographics of Houston forever.
2006 saw the death of another former US President, Gerald Ford who died at 93. 2006 was the year of scandals. Dick Cheney shot hunting partner Harry Whittington, former representative Randy Cunningham went to prison for conspiracy and tax evasion, Representative Mark Foley resigned after sexually explicit emails and instant messages were found in his name, and pastor Ted Haggard admitted to having solicited a male prostitute for sex and drugs.
2007 was characterized by peace, war and dog fighting. Yes, dog fighting. This was the year quarterback Michael Vick was convicted of dog fighting and served 18 months in prison, this is also the year Al Gore and Rajendra Pachauri won the Nobel Peace Prize for their work on combating global warming. In 2007 Brittney Spears finally “lost it” and shaved her heard in front of Paparazzi. In this year Virgina Tech University lost 32 students to a single disturbed student who opened gun fire and Pakistan lost the last of the Bhutto family (Benazir Bhutto) to a bomb attack.
What can we say about 2008? This was the year the economy started to really tank. First Lehman Brothers went bankrupt, then AIG asked for a government bailout whose use came under investigation when lavish managements trips were uncovered on the books. 2008 saw worldwide political upheaval with Fidel Castro resigning in Havana, Cuba, Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe being forced to share his victory with his rival when his victory was considered fraudulent, and former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic was arrested on charges of genocide.
The now famous words “hunker down” did not apply only to our experience with Hurricane Rita but have become synonymous with how we have spent 2009. Most of us have hunkered down; accounted for the things we are thankful for and tightened our belts with the hope for a better year next year. 2009 brought us shock and awe when we heard of Ocatamom and her octuplets, the economy hit American auto makers hard and Detroit became a ghost town, Sarah Palin decided to resign as Governor of Alaska and bask in the media limelight with her “social” activities, balloon boy’s parents apologized for the publicity stunt they tried to pull by alleging their son had flown away in their hot air balloon, but maybe the best thing that has happened to date is that the Health Care Reform bill passed on Christmas Eve with a 60-39 vote. Whether or not this bill will change America’s health care system still remains to be seen.
This article has been excerpted from several videos by Newsweek magazine that highlighted events in this past decade from 2000-2009. If you would like a complete list of all events and author opinions please visit the site at www.newsweek.com
Friday, December 11, 2009
Corporate Communities
Major brands are still failing at online communities and social media. Sounds like an opportunity. Get the report...
Monday, November 30, 2009
Are Social Media tools the bane of content management's existence?
Social media, most call it a buzz word and it may be, but it is a different way of sharing information than before. Social media tools such as blogs, wikis, RSS feeds, photo sharing sites, entertainment platforms are used not only for communication but collaboration, multimedia sharing, sharing reviews and opinions, entertainment platforms, and integrating information. It's the new way people work.
If content management is the process of identifying, capturing, classifying and storing content so that it can be easily accessed by others and if social media is the new way of capturing and sharing information then Houston...we might have a problem.
Organizations now realize the impact of social media tools on information sharing within the organization. Major organizations have blogging staff, CEOs have personal blogs they populate regularly. It helps them disseminate information to their customers, potential customers, investors and media and it is a means for them to get feedback unfiltered and unsolicited. Many of these blogs have important information, information you can refer to later but how and where do you store it? Blogs are not the only tool companies are using to share information. Internally they are using wikis, collaboration sites, social networking sites, and even opinion sites to gauge what their customers are saying about them. With all these disparate applications in use, each sharing valuable content how should a company or should a company make an attempt at storing and sharing some of this information with others?
One viewpoint is to carefully analyze the kind of information being shared. Some information is perishable. It is valuable only to the two people sharing it at the time it is shared in. Gleaned and rewritten and stored out of context not only is that information useless but might also be dangerous if decisions are based on it without contextual knowledge. Recognize those kinds of information and let them be. Part of having a usable content management system is knowing what not to put in it. No doubt you might lose out on a couple of valuable nuggets that you could have stored, that someone could have captured and maybe even benefited from, but in the big scheme of things the payoff wouldn't be worth the effort.
For all other "harvestable" information, the most efficient way to capture the information is to assign someone to do it and that someone is NOT the author. Gather some base metrics of what it takes to harvest and formulate a piece of reusable content from the social media tools in use. Use those base metrics to figure out how many people you need or how many man hours you need to glean the information. Yes there is some process work in there too. Like the content has to be cleaned and formulated and in the end vetted by the author before it's posted on the company site for employee use but this process is far more simplistic than the one you would have to create to encourage the author to create the piece of content because their core competency is not writing, it's being an engineer or a chemist or an architect and encouraging them to write reusable content will take at least twice as long and they see no value to themselves in doing it. Yes, they will freely share the information with their peers but that's because they are learning as much from their peers as they are sharing but when you ask them to formulate a piece of content into a reusable artifact suddenly you might as well be talking Greek.
So it raises the argument whether organizations should have content management at all? For now, Yes! because our tools are not cohesive enough for us to be able to find all information about a topic regardless of the tool it was shared in. We are not savvy enough yet to automatically create institutional histories of work done in the past, we have just started getting comfortable sharing but our technology is not sophisticated enough to know on its own what is and isn't valuable to others in the company. All these things are very possible, and likely even exist but they haven't hit mainstream yet and until then we need to identify, capture, classify, store and disseminate information for our organizations.
If content management is the process of identifying, capturing, classifying and storing content so that it can be easily accessed by others and if social media is the new way of capturing and sharing information then Houston...we might have a problem.
Organizations now realize the impact of social media tools on information sharing within the organization. Major organizations have blogging staff, CEOs have personal blogs they populate regularly. It helps them disseminate information to their customers, potential customers, investors and media and it is a means for them to get feedback unfiltered and unsolicited. Many of these blogs have important information, information you can refer to later but how and where do you store it? Blogs are not the only tool companies are using to share information. Internally they are using wikis, collaboration sites, social networking sites, and even opinion sites to gauge what their customers are saying about them. With all these disparate applications in use, each sharing valuable content how should a company or should a company make an attempt at storing and sharing some of this information with others?
One viewpoint is to carefully analyze the kind of information being shared. Some information is perishable. It is valuable only to the two people sharing it at the time it is shared in. Gleaned and rewritten and stored out of context not only is that information useless but might also be dangerous if decisions are based on it without contextual knowledge. Recognize those kinds of information and let them be. Part of having a usable content management system is knowing what not to put in it. No doubt you might lose out on a couple of valuable nuggets that you could have stored, that someone could have captured and maybe even benefited from, but in the big scheme of things the payoff wouldn't be worth the effort.
For all other "harvestable" information, the most efficient way to capture the information is to assign someone to do it and that someone is NOT the author. Gather some base metrics of what it takes to harvest and formulate a piece of reusable content from the social media tools in use. Use those base metrics to figure out how many people you need or how many man hours you need to glean the information. Yes there is some process work in there too. Like the content has to be cleaned and formulated and in the end vetted by the author before it's posted on the company site for employee use but this process is far more simplistic than the one you would have to create to encourage the author to create the piece of content because their core competency is not writing, it's being an engineer or a chemist or an architect and encouraging them to write reusable content will take at least twice as long and they see no value to themselves in doing it. Yes, they will freely share the information with their peers but that's because they are learning as much from their peers as they are sharing but when you ask them to formulate a piece of content into a reusable artifact suddenly you might as well be talking Greek.
So it raises the argument whether organizations should have content management at all? For now, Yes! because our tools are not cohesive enough for us to be able to find all information about a topic regardless of the tool it was shared in. We are not savvy enough yet to automatically create institutional histories of work done in the past, we have just started getting comfortable sharing but our technology is not sophisticated enough to know on its own what is and isn't valuable to others in the company. All these things are very possible, and likely even exist but they haven't hit mainstream yet and until then we need to identify, capture, classify, store and disseminate information for our organizations.
Saturday, October 31, 2009
Common IT Architecture Mistakes
Can anyone guess what one of the most common issues mid to large size organizations have, technically speaking?
Too much technology!
What I mean by this is that organizations acquire or build systems in silos based on the needs of a certain part of the company. Sometimes even within a business unit or division you will find instances of duplicate applications that were initiated by different people within the organization. This usually happens because there is no strategic group that focuses on the overall technical strategy and needs of the organization.
It may be too late for most organizations to start from scratch to build out a comprehensive architecture plan, primarily because it's cost and time prohibitive. But it's never too late to review what you have and ensure that going forward, all technical decisions that are made, are made with the intent to align existing technology with new requirements and to standardize the purchase or creation of all new applications.
Technical architecture should be reviewed at two levels. The hardware level, do I have enough servers, are they networked, do I have redundancy, etc, and the software level which is more what I am referring to, that is, what applications do we already have, what are each of their functions, which parts of the organization use them, which parts of the organization need the same functions and how you can align future enhancements and capabilities so that you can leverage the use of these existing applications. Within this, you should also review the choice of platforms being used for development to ensure that you are not locking yourself into a technology that prohibits integration with other technologies. Here are some article links that will guide you at the strategic level:
The Most Important IT Architecture Issues Today
Sotware Architecture
An Introduction to Software Architecture
Software Architecture: Using Viewpoints and Perspectives
It's almost the end of 2009. If you are considering software enhancements for next year, it is imperative that you take some time to think through your objectives at a strategic level and map out your software development plan going forward.
The economy is certainly stabilizing, but we still don't have money to burn!
Too much technology!
What I mean by this is that organizations acquire or build systems in silos based on the needs of a certain part of the company. Sometimes even within a business unit or division you will find instances of duplicate applications that were initiated by different people within the organization. This usually happens because there is no strategic group that focuses on the overall technical strategy and needs of the organization.
It may be too late for most organizations to start from scratch to build out a comprehensive architecture plan, primarily because it's cost and time prohibitive. But it's never too late to review what you have and ensure that going forward, all technical decisions that are made, are made with the intent to align existing technology with new requirements and to standardize the purchase or creation of all new applications.
Technical architecture should be reviewed at two levels. The hardware level, do I have enough servers, are they networked, do I have redundancy, etc, and the software level which is more what I am referring to, that is, what applications do we already have, what are each of their functions, which parts of the organization use them, which parts of the organization need the same functions and how you can align future enhancements and capabilities so that you can leverage the use of these existing applications. Within this, you should also review the choice of platforms being used for development to ensure that you are not locking yourself into a technology that prohibits integration with other technologies. Here are some article links that will guide you at the strategic level:
The Most Important IT Architecture Issues Today
Sotware Architecture
An Introduction to Software Architecture
Software Architecture: Using Viewpoints and Perspectives
It's almost the end of 2009. If you are considering software enhancements for next year, it is imperative that you take some time to think through your objectives at a strategic level and map out your software development plan going forward.
The economy is certainly stabilizing, but we still don't have money to burn!
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