As the title suggests, the objective was to define strategies for overcoming typical corporate resistence to raw innovation, regardless of the evidenced value.
CHAPTER 9:
RULES FROM REVOLUTIONARIES
ESSAY 3: Brian Bauer, Étape Partners.
OVERCOMING OBJECTIONS
Objection 1: Virtual World
Technologies are not “serious” technologies
Quite often technology that ends up
becoming a valuable business tool did not start out that way
Public “chat rooms” and web forums
also did not begin as business tools. (e.g.: AOL in 1992 was not focused on
chat rooms for “co-worker collaboration”). Virtual Worlds can be as serious as
you want them to be, but you must define your business objectives first, and
rationally dissect Virtual World technologies to clearly and explicitly
identify the components that will help meet these objectives. For example “implement
a virtual employee lounge” is not a valid business objective
Essential technology is defined as
such only because it has displaced something else, or filled a functional void
within an organization. “Serious” technology is defined as such because it is
used to accomplish a serious task or business objective. Much of the skepticism around VW technologies
comes from people who have only been exposed to the not so serious side of the
technology (e.g. whimsical avatars
flying around fantasy gardens).
The same technology that is used to
share presentations online (e.g. WebEx, Live Meeting) can just as easily be
used to share photo albums and/or children’s stories. Microsoft does not market Live Meeting by
showing friends huddled around their screens looking at photos of a birthday
party. They show their technology in context, they TELL you what the advantage
is, and they show it performing a serious business task. We must do the same thing with Virtual
Worlds.
Objection 2: We don’t have the
money to invest in non-essential technology
Very few companies do. If your
company is not able to make a commitment to investing in Virtual World
technologies, and spend the time/energy needed to understand how it can be leveraged
as an essential technology, then your organization is not ready.
That being said, the economic
environment today is ideal for introducing innovative technologies. Travel
budgets are slashed, flex time and work from home is becoming even more
prevalent. And yet, the necessity for
coworker collaboration, and leverage of existing human capital is being pushed
to new limits. Why would you believe that with legacy tools alone you can
forever continue to squeeze more performance out of the same, or reduced
numbers of people? Is there a sound
historical basis for this? Rather, let’s
focus on empowering the human capital that remains, and make every IT dollar
count more than it ever has.
Define your highest priority
business objectives. Define your most
urgent organizational financial pressures, and work to construct a credible,
successful argument for how Virtual World technologies can address them more
effectively and efficiently than the existing suite of collaboration tools
within the enterprise. If you cannot define your business objectives down to an
actionable level of detail, and if you cannot define your financial constraints
(and opportunities), then you are not ready for Virtual Worlds.
Objection 3: There are many high
profile cases of “limited success” in VW TECHNOLOGIES deployments, why should
we try it?
Virtual worlds are such an immature
technology, especially in the corporate environment, that even the best
business managers may forget everything they know to be true when it comes to
this kind of technology. In other words,
irrational exuberance could lead to certain failure.
Many of the historical emerging
technology failures have resulted from implementations that were not properly
crafted for the target audience.
The application of Virtual World
technology as a corporate business tool is in its infancy. To do it well is not fast, easy or cheap. It
can be done well, but this requires a deep level of commitment. Today, there are a couple of major problems
in the way that corporations are introduced to this emerging technology:
First, Virtual World technology
vendors sell what they have. This
assumes that the customer wants/needs what the vendor has built. Microsoft can
sell Word and Excel this way because for most of the business world, the
product is mature enough, and feature rich enough to meet the needs of the
purchaser. With Virtual World Technologies, we are still in the proverbial
garage tinkering. Selling the enterprise application of Virtual Worlds must
begin with asking the question to the customer “what are your business needs”.
Not “what do you need a Virtual World for”, and certainly not “let me tell you
how great my product is”.
Second, Virtual World marketing
tends to “go big” rather than small. Big
is quite often harder to achieve than small. It is much easier to accomplish a
task, than it is to accomplish a concept.
For example, “collaborate more with your colleagues” is a concept while
“Pick up the phone and call your colleague,” is a task. We must define, and
then explain to our target audience, not just the concepts that Virtual Worlds
enable, but the activities and tasks that they improve or transform.
Goals are achieved through a
process. A process is defined by series of tasks. Tasks are accomplished using
tools. A Virtual World is a tool. Like a hammer. A hammer does not build a house, but you
can’t build the house without one. This
is the way that we must talk to our target audience about Virtual World
technologies.
ESTABLISHING A
BEACHHEAD
The best reference and precedent for understanding what will
ultimately be successful with Virtual World Technologies technology is to
remember the “flight to the internet” from 1998 to roughly 2000. Everybody became part of the movement. There seemed to be limitless potential for
every idea to become a success.
But, ten years later, we can see with some clarity that
“good” ideas, will always be good, and bad ideas will always be bad. So what can we take away from this? Let’s understand what made the good ideas
good, and postulate that what has been a good, sound, business decision in the
past, may continue to be in the future.
The internet delivered success onto:
·
Services
that could not be performed in physical reality due to physical
constraints. eBay is a good example of
that. It is not viable to attempt a
physical auction where “everything” is up for bid. WebMD is another good
example: it is not physically viable to
try and bring together a large enough collective of doctors to provide such a
clearinghouse of medical information
·
Services
that could be delivered Faster, Better, Cheaper on the internet. E*TRADE is great example of this.
Our intent by pausing to reflect on internet
success/failure, is to reference the introduction of the last great “disruptive
technology” and learn the lessons that are so important. When we look for low
hanging fruit with Virtual World Technologies, we can do one of 2 things:
·
Take
every unvetted idea that comes to mind, through it into Virtual World
Technologies space, and wait to see what sticks
·
Take
a good hard look at those things that are simply not possible using any other
technology and focus on them
If time and money are not a factor, and it’s not important
that your initiatives attain a high rate of success, the scatter-bun approach
might be interesting. However, if your
business, like most businesses, is highly scrutinized using ROI and program
success statistics, our advice is to focus on a small number of real business
tasks that like the successful internet programs, target services that really
are not possible without the advent of new technology.
SECURING SPONSORSHIP
When it comes to navigating the IT waters of a large
enterprise, Virtual World technologies are not really that unique. The same
variables are in play:
·
Who
will pay for it?
·
Who
will support it?
·
What
is the business value”
·
Do
we already own this sort of technology? Have we tried it before?
In a utopian corporate environment, the dog will always wag
his tail. But, in many large
institutions, the tail (IT) very often wags the dog (The Business). We could spend an entire book (and this has
surely been done already) trying to understand this phenomena, or we can accept
the rules of the game, and play it with the following rules in mind:
First, we are going to spend money. This money needs to come from someone’s
budget. Therefore we need a business sponsor. The business sponsor will almost
always need to answer to a higher “business authority” before they can spend
their money. The higher authority will want to see business value clearly
defined. So have your business objectives mapped out to the real dollars of
this project.
Second, you need to satiate IT. The best way to do this is
to ask for IT’s help as early in the adoption process as is feasible, even if
you don’t need it or want it. IT will need to host and support your
product. This is more work for
them. But, the savvy IT manager will
also recognize that:
·
They
can get their hands on cool, geeky new stuff
·
They
can get credit for a successful project
MAKING THE CASE
In today’s corporate environment defined by flexible work
schedules, disparate physical locations and functional alignment, providing an
impactful tool that breaks through these process-challenges is essential. The Virtual Corporate Environment is such a
tool.
VCEs will help unify an organization’s diverse population of
associates who are both physically separated and functionally discrete. Efficiency and effectiveness can be raised to
levels not currently achievable in the physical space resulting in favorably
impacted business results. The VCE will
be an environment that exists for bringing together associates who are separated
not only by physical space, but by function as well.
The VCE will enable both structured and casual encounters
with co-workers much in the same way people would interact with other when they
work in close physical proximity. The
belief is that the facilitation of more frequent and impactful encounters with
co-workers will enhance working relationships and ultimately yield improved
business results driven by increased productivity and efficiency.
A VCE will create a collaborative and social environment
that encourages both formal and informal co-worker encounters. It is anticipated that increased encounters
between functional silos and physically separated associates will encourage
communication and cross-functional awareness among individuals and groups who
are all part of a cross-functional process.
Process awareness that transcends functional
responsibilities is believed to be a key enabler of success when the goal is to
improve a singular result. VCEs create a
platform for ensuring that all associates are well equipped with an
understanding of business priority, cultural principals and process oriented
objectives. It is believed that if all
process contributors are fully immersed in process and not just function, the
unique ability of each contributor will help to improve the quality of the end
result
CROSSING THE CHASM
High quality Virtual World Technologies can be a very
effective medium for gaining an employee’s full attention. It is also a
powerful tool that can be used for teaching and collaboration. But do we need a “world” to accomplish our
business objectives? Or are we better served with a set of Business Tools that
are deployed as needed in specific situations?
After all, we are not trying to create the “Matrix” we are trying to
achieve business results.
Employees use Business Tools to accomplish tasks that are
part of a process followed to achieve a result.
As such, we can think of Virtual World Technologies as a business tool,
if deployed the right way. Think of it
this way: when Microsoft first created MS Word, were they attempting to change
the way in which people fundamentally did their jobs? Or were they looking to
create a vastly improved typewriter?
More than 20 years later we might argue that Microsoft Office has
fundamentally changed the way people work, but in the beginning, the goals were
more modest.
Revolutionary change happens incrementally. Paradigm shifting tools are delivered
discretely and become ubiquitous. When
the timing is right, these tools can be conjoined, and we will find that the
office-of-the-future exists. The death trap of Virtual World technology
adoption in corporations is to attempt to create a parallel reality that is as
large as your physical reality. Do you need a room, or a world? Be honest with yourself and your
organization.
GOING MAINSTREAM
We cannot force the issue of “mainstreaming” Virtual World technologies. They are still
bleeding edge and niche. This may change very quickly, but let’s not take on
the burden. Instead, let’s focus on
ensuring that our new technology has everything it needs to cross over, and
does not have any of the constraints that would prevent it from crossing over.
The following is your recipe for success. Deviate from these
priorities at your own peril:
·
Ease
of use
·
Stability
·
Business
Functions
·
Performance
DEMONSTRATING VALUE
How do you demonstrate value to your stakeholder? You start
by asking your stakeholders what their business objectives are in terms of
Objectives, Processes and Tasks. You survey the landscape of existing tools
used to perform essential tasks. What are the strengths, weaknesses, gaps, etc.
You explore what can be done (as opposed to what has already been done) using Virtual
World technologies, and determine if this approach provides a better tool for
performing the objective, process and/or task.
If you can establish that Virtual World technologies do indeed
provide value-add to the business issue, your last bit of work is building and
implementing. But this is the easy
part. Manage your project well, and the
new tools will go into the toolbox and quickly be recognized as faster, better,
easier than legacy methods of work
DOUBLE LOOP
REFLECTION
Do not get involved in Virtual Worlds as a “me too” play
Second Life is riddled with hundreds of millions of dollars’
worth of “me too”. The internet is a similar graveyard. Take the time to
understand what Virtual World technologies can do for your business. And don’t just ask the Virtual World vendor,
do some soul searching and proper business analysis within your organization,
document and think about your challenges and needs. Only then do you call the tool
salesman.
Define your business objectives as an actionable level
“Improve Performance” is not actionable, “Reduce Costs” is
not actionable. “Improve Customer Intimacy” is not actionable. These are all
great business objectives, but as we know, objectives are met by following a
process, comprised of tasks, performed using tools. Actionable change happens
at the tasks and tool level (unless of course you are also changing your
business objectives). Be clear how the business objectives tie to task through
process and be sure that Virtual World technologies being applied provide
significant differentiated value over existing collaboration tools.
Approach Virtual Worlds as business critical technology, nothing less
It’s not just about the money. Your employees are busy. They have methods of work that they employ
because they are well understood, require less thought (than change), and are
quite often efficient.
Introducing a disruptive technology as “hey try this” is
quite likely going to yield a different result than “this new technology is
easy to use and will reduce your workload by 25% so you can spend more time
with your family”. While this may be an
extreme example, the point is that you must manage people’s perceptions of your
Virtual World initiative. If you do not tell them what to think, they will form
their own conclusions, and that is not good risk mitigation.
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