Root cause of digital divide – wealth

I just ran into a fantastic piece on Mashable that I just has to share. I have been very deeply vested in the topic of Digital Divide in America for some time. I recently wrote a blog post on the subject on govloop that generated some interesting commentary (http://www.govloop.com/profiles/blogs/digital-divide-not-just-for). I have been searching desperately for statistics that correlate the adoption and access to technology against different variables such as wealth, age, profession, and others to understand what are the strongest influencers. This latest report from Pew International seems to do just that. Credits to Pew International and Mashable. I am sharing the Mashable article below including a link to the original report. enjoy!

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Link back to original post (http://mashable.com/2010/11/25/income-internet-use/)

The Great Wealth Divide in Internet Usage [STATS]

The fact that people who make more money spend more time on computers and connected devices doesn’t come as a major surprise. Yet it’s still impressive that a full 95% of people with an income of $75,000 or more use cellphones and the Internet, according to a recent study from Pew’s Internet & American Life Project.

“Those in higher income households are more likely to use the Internet on any given day, own multiple Internet-ready devices, do things involving money online and get news online,” Jim Jansen wrote in Pew’s summary of the findings.

Still, some of the results only verify what we already assumed; more income means more mobile devices and more Internet consumption. But what’s interesting is where the tipping point for Internet use along the span of household incomes occurs.

For instance, 70% of those who make less than $75,000 use the Internet at least occasionally, while 95% of those who make more than that use the Internet at least occasionally. Within that 95% of people who use the Internet, 99% of them use the Internet at home. Only 93% of Internet users in the lower income bracket use the Internet at home.

Not surprisingly, the study found a similar pattern for technology ownership, too.

When it comes to desktop computers, 79% of households that earn $75,000 or own at least one, compared to just 55% of households with lower income.
For laptop ownership, the rate was even less for lower income households at 47%, though 79% of higher income households owned laptops.
A major gap exists between income groups that own MP3s and iPods, too. Some 70% of higher income households own them, compared to just 42% of households that earn less.
Tablets and e-readers, though less prolific in either group, are owned by only 3% of lower income households; 12% of higher-income households own e-readers and another 9% own tablets, like the iPad.
The gap between income groups and tech ownership seems closest for one specific kind of device: game consoles. Just more than half (54%) of higher-income households own game consoles, compared to 41% of households that earn less than $75,000.

Researchers also took into account different age groups, races, communities (suburban vs. rural vs. urban), education levels and other factors that might seem to influence Internet and technology use. But, according to the report, the differences among those groups were slight. The biggest determining factor still seemed to be income.

“The control factor did not add major explanatory effect to the relationship that was not explained by income level,” the report states. “Simply put, a person’s household income is an independent predictor of the likelihood that she or he will be an Internet and e-mail user and to be associated with the online activities we cite in this report.”

The 13-page report [http://pewinternet.org/~/media//Files/Reports/2010/PIP-Better-off-households-final.pdf] also delves into e-commerce behaviors, Internet-enabled devices and online news consumption. The data from the report was collected via three telephone surveys of more than 7,000 adults.

iPad pilot – version 1.5 – More thoughts

In response to my previous post

Interesting Comments:

First, I will list some of the key comments and my responses in case you are not on govloop:

——————- Comment 1 ———————-

Comment by James Merritt

 

JUst wait until IT get a chance to muck things up. Back when IT was first introduced into the Federal Governement it was a support function. Now it has a strong hold on the production of every function within the government. I have a minimum of 17 different passwords to access the different operating systems we us. Each of which require a password change now every 12-16 weeks. Which is down from every 6 months. So. just wait IT will figure out a way to lock your new toys ability to be a flexable tool into another electronic type writter in the end. As for labtops, and why they are so costly to the governement. IT would rather replace it every 24 months when the warrenty expires instead of dealing with or allowing user access to update and scrub the old software. This would mean IT would have to understand the software along with the hardware. How original?

Comment by Sonny Hashmi

HI James. Seems you have had some really bad experiences with your IT folks. Unfortunately its a fairly common theme. IT has to balance the need for security/conformity/uniformity with the needs of individual end users, and often times IT departments chose to lock down things rather than trusting the end use to make choices and self serve. We are trying to change this trend in our organization by making choices available to our end user. In this vein, we started the iPad pilot, and before it, authorized the iPhone and android platforms. We are updating our policies to be more common sense oriented rather than prescriptive. I’d love to hear more ideas from you in how an IT department can enable its end users.

 

——————- Comment 2 ———————-

Comment by Ari Herzog, MPA

You recommend the VZW iPad? Why? From what I’ve heard, AT&T’s network is much faster — and the MiFi only makes it slower.

Comment by Sonny Hashmi

Ari: I haven’t tested the verizon mifi myself. My comment was based on two things:

1) The AT&T network is spotty at best. It may be faster in theory, but practically, around the DC area, 3G speed fades in and out depending on where you are. I am assuming (from all the hype) that verizon’s network is more reliable (maybe not?)

2) A mifi type device would like you hook up several devices to one data plan. Instead of issuing a mobile worker a plan/model for their laptop, a plan for their iPad, and a high data plan for their smart phone, you could, in theory, only issue one mifi which would act as the mobile data hub for any device capable of doing wifi.

Perhaps we need to do another pilot 🙂

——————- Comment 3 ———————-

Comment by Aaron Helton

This is probably the best and most sober analysis of the iPad for corporate use I’ve seen. Thank you for this.

As for the whole iTunes personal/corporate app use thing, this is something that Apple will have to address sooner or later. I can envision something similar to the breakdown between Google’s personal set of apps and the domain apps. That could allow users to access both corporate and regular app stores, but the corporate app store could also be configured to push out specific apps in addition to letting users choose from what the organization has already allocated or purchased. Licensing terms are usually Apple’s to muck around with, so I’m sure they could come up with something appropriate.

Comment by Sonny Hashmi

Thanks for the kind words Aaron. Love your thoughts and ideas for the corporate/personal app store model. With device convergence the only way forward, and the app ecosystem becoming a significant self sustaining business on its own, every major provider will have to solve this puzzle somehow. I think there are some fairly straightforward ways to do that. Apple could enable “corporate accounts” on the app store, which allow the ability for a central admin(s) to a) Procure certain numbers of app licenses that the organization wants to make available to its end users b) assign/unassign which other AppleIDs are authrorized to download/use a license for the corporate apps c) integrate the app buying process with the existing government/corporate procurement methods where an invoice is generated aggregating all app procurements against the corporate account on a monthly basis, etc. d) provide regular and on-demand reports and e) Allow corporate admins to block app genres like games, etc. to be purchased against the corporate account. This way, when an iOS device is deployed, either a new corporate AppleID is created for the end user, or the end user’s existing ID is linked to the corporate account.

Just some thoughts. I’m sure people smarter than myself are looking into this problem.

——————- Comment 4 ———————-

Comment by Ramona Winkelbauer

I would recommend WritePad (handwriting recognition software), especially if you wish to provide copies of your notes to other people.

Comment by Sonny Hashmi

Thanks Ramona. I’ll check it out

——————- Comment 5 ———————-

Comment by Kay Morrison

Sonny, are your testers using an external keyboard or the touch screen keyboard? Have you had any discussions on this?

Comment by Sonny Hashmi

Kay, thats a good question, we haven’t explored it formally, but I have hooked up the apple wireless Bluetooth keyboard that I had lying around in the office with the iPad and it works just fine. It boils down to the question of mobility vs utility. I feel that the onscreen keyboard is good enough that I don’t want the hassle of carrying a keyboard with me all the time. Others may feel differently. This Kensington case (http://news.cnet.com/8301-17938_105-20017554-1.html) looks interesting as it has a keyboard built in. But that begs the question. Why spend on a touch screen tablet? Why not just get a net book? Ultimately its a question of personal prefererence and your workflow.

—————— End of comments ————–

(Phew! There has to be an easier way to cross-post between blogs).

Additional Thoughts:

Ok, now some additional thoughts regarding the iPad, in fact, regarding barriers to the mobile revolution in general.

1) Access to secure, reliable, continuous Wifi networks: Read this interesting article the other day and it made me think.  Also check out the cart of iPad sales for the wifi only model vs. the wifi+3G model. One of the things I didnt even consider was how vital ubiquitous wifi network availability is to be able to seamlessly integrate mobile devices into your network.  It didn’t register with me since our organization is fortunate in this area.  We recently (March-Apr 2010) moved into a brand spanking new facility in SW DC and one of the infrastructure decisions we made was to provide seamless and uniform wifi everywhere in the new facility.  Frankly, when you have the ability to design the facility from scratch, its not very hard or expensive to build the hotspot/wireless bridge infrastructure in with the core network design.  As a result, we have seamless, high speed 802.11N secure wireless access within our facility. when you log on to the wireless network, you can see all your systems behind the firewall.  The iPad seamlessly starts to access email, CRM systems, intranets, sharepoint sites and network shares.

Now what if seamless secure wifi access was not available? the 3G iPad would still provide value, but the lower bandwidth would certainly make things less pleasant (longer file upload/download times, slower syncing, etc.).  Moreover, you couldnt see the back-end systems, intranets, sharepoint servers and CRM systems.  It would require a continual, active VPN connection which would cause further service degradation.  Things like Wyse remote access would be too slow to be practical.  Also, it would probably result in astronomical data charges with AT&T since the unlimited plans are no longer available.

The point here is that iPad like devices, and smart phones are here to stay and will be infiltrating the enterprise with or without the CIO’s approval.  If your facilities do not provide continuous, seamless wifi that is secure, this is an area you should invest in over the next year.  This would also help with things like hoteling, telework, and mobility applications (inventory, warehousing, mobile VOIP, etc.).  This would also improve the security posture of the enterprise (believe it or not).  You want to make sure that corporate data is traveling over encrypted wireless channels controlled by organization.  If such networks are not available, end users will inevitably hook onto nearby unencrypted third party networks, or use 3G, both of which are less safe than your own encrypted networks.  Owning your own wifi network also allows you to better manage corporate policies such as ensuring appropriate software and security stack for end points, access to banned websites/content, monitor traffic, etc.

2) Browser compatibility: Seems to me that one of the major inhibitors of fully leveraging iPad in the enterprise is the browser compatibility issues with corporate systems (not even talking about your legacy mainframe systems).  In our case, almost all of our major web based enterprise systems are incompatible or only partially compatible with the Safari browser (Ariba, PeopleSoft, Oracle, Cognos, Sharepoint).  The internal web applications we have developed in .Net work just fine.  All of these enterprise systems are typically designed with Internet Explorer in mind (obviously) and also work to a lesser extent with Firefox, but typically not with Safari (the red headed step child of the browser world).  Moreover, most of them are not compatible with the WebKit framework that is used within the iPad and iPhone browsers, as well as a myriad of other web browsers including the Android browser, and the browser packaged within Blackberry OS 6 onwards (including the Blackberry playbook).  In fact, the only major mobile platform that doesn’t use WebKit is the new windows Phone 7.

People smarter than myself can tell us what the reason for this incompatibility with Safari is.  Either the enterprise systems are being designed for Internet Explorer in mind, or use third party add-ons like Java, flash, etc., which we know is NOT very standards compliant, or they are being designed for open standards and Safari is not very standards compliant.  I suspect the truth is somewhere in the middle.

It seems to me that if more and more enterprise systems were somehow made to work with WebKit browsers, it would obviate the lack of apps supporting these systems.  I could, for example, suddenly be able to approve invoices and transactions, look up BI reports, process procurements, approve time sheets, etc. all form my smart phone or iPad browser.  Moreover, I could also do this from my blackberry, Android, and obviously, from my windows mobile device.  Seems like a win win to me.

There is some movement in this direction with SAP and Cognos both announcing full compatibility with WebKit browsers in their latest releases.  However, it does put an additional burden on the enterprise whereby some of the try potential for mobility with iPad like devices cannot be leveraged until they upgrade/modernize their enterprise systems, an arduous task in itself.  Otherwise, orgs can either hope for apps (3rd party or vendor released apps to tap into your back end systems are coming out.  Specifically, SAP and Oracle are pretty active in this space).  Or, the corporation can build and release its own app(s) that tie into its back end systems using existing or new transactional interfaces.  This requires skill sets, expertise and investment that most corporations do not have available.

3) Legacy Systems: Then there is this whole issue of legacy systems.  Most public sector organizations have their fair share of them.  In our case, we have core systems which are mainframe based, and a plethora of mid-tier apps using thick clients (VB, C++, Java, Oracle Forms, FoxPro, Lotus Domino, etc.).  There is really no easy way to enable access to these apps from modern mobile platforms, short of re-writing these apps into a standard web based platform, or to re-write a parallel app for the mobile platform that talks to the same back end database, both of which are arduous tasks.  Other public sector CIOs will agree with me on this.  How would you solve this problem?  Do you see this to be an issue in your organization?

What do you think?

Week 1 of the iPad pilot – the good, the bad, and the ugly

So we started the iPad pilot in our agency a week ago.

For the record, I am not new to the iPad, having used one pretty much since it came out purely as a personal consumer device. The point of this pilot is to find opportunities for large scale deployment of iPad as a mobile platform in our organization. Also for the record, while I am a Machead (there are 7 apple devices per adult in my home – Not good), in my professional capacity, I am in no way beholden to apple products. We are also planning on piloting competing tablet/mobile devices in our organization, specifically, the Blackberry Playbook and the Android Samsung Galaxy Tab (or any of the other million and a half Android tablets now available in the black, white and gray markets).

I will be sharing a few thoughts on this blog as we go through our pilot program. I am very interested in learning from you, if you have any success stories/horror stories to share, or ideas on how to increase business value through mobile platforms.

First, some framework for the pilot:

1) Why go mobile?

I’ll refrain from a lengthy diatribe on how the future of the corporate world is mobile and how truly mobile computing is the next big thing to happen to government. I’ll keep it simple instead:

a) Increased productivity – By untethering workers while providing them access to the tools they need to work, we hope they would be more productive and more accessible, and providing them access to information when and where it is needed.

b) Green Workforce – By enabling access to business systems via mobile devices, we hope to encourage and support our Agency’s interest in telecommuting, resulting in a greener workforce and reduce operational costs (facilities, power, etc.)

c) Reduced risk: This one is a little counter intuitive. Through increased control and management over mobile devices as compared to laptops, and the reduced capabilities of off-line data storage on mobile devices, we hope that these devices would actually reduce the risk of data breach in cases of loss or theft.

d) Reduce Costs: Mobile tablet devices, if used to successfully replace laptops issued to mobile workers in the majority of cases, can potentially reduce footprint costs. In most cases, when compared to a high end enterprise laptop, an iPad costs less, doesn’t require buying and supporting the OS and related software licenses, and the mobile data plans are likely more attractive than procuring and deploying individual USB 3G modems.

Atleast, we hope that some or all of these business objectives would be realized in real life. Thats the point of the pilot

2) The scope of our pilot:

Our pilot is fairly informal. The pilot deployment includes deployment of 12 iPads to several folks within and outside the IT/IS organization. Within IT, it is a cross section of managers and non-managers, and in different areas (project managers, techies, apps folks, BI folks, etc.)

From my perspective, there are three levels of validation/investigation that are part of this pilot:

a) Basic compatibility: Is the iPad compatible with our enterprise environment. Will it integrate with our security infrastructure, active directory, email, calendar and provide the basic out of the box functionality to a corporate user in a manner consistent with our enterprise needs and policies

b) Business Enablement/Acceleration: Can the iPad and other similar mobile platforms be used to improve/accelerate our business? What kinds of opportunities exist via the existing app ecosystem to improve what we do as an agency – This includes exploring different customer service models, exploring mobile BI, performing more mobile/untethered work, improving how we collaborate and present, etc.

c) Moon shot opportunities: What can mobile platforms like the iPad be used for to REALLY take the business to the next level, even if the functionality doesn’t yet exist. If we could build any app in the world to improve our business, what would it be?

We got the 3G+Wifi iPads because I was specifically interested in the mobility enablement aspect of the iPad.

For reasons unknown, our procurement also included procuring the Otterbox Defender Series iPad cases which are fit for duty in any theater of war, including the halls of your average corporate office. Seriously, you need to read the manual JUST to install this case. Once installed, it will render your iPad immune to attacks from anything less than an M16 assault rifle. It also adds about a pound to the weight and about 2 inches to the thickness of your sleek little toy. For corporate overhead types like myself, it is definitely overkill.

3) Impressions so far

Week 1 is always the honeymoon period. The pilot group is ecstatic to play with their shiny toys. However, some trends are already becoming clear. I will share my first impressions here:

a) the iPad is a slick device – Remember that I am not a new user to the iPad so this comment is not coming from a first time touch UI user or an apple newbie. I know what an iPad is and how it works. I’ve been using one for months. Having said that though, it is still a slick device even in the corporate world.

– Email/Calendar/Contacts integrate seamlessly (We are fortunate that our corporate email is fairly modern Exchange 2007 system and iOS device integration is well established around the city so we didnt have to break any new ground here). For those who use less modern/common place email systems, your experience may vary.

– There are tons of very useful apps, many of them free, allowing the iPad to be a useful device out of the box. You don’t need a lot of time before you can really start using it for business value. I stopped carrying my laptop from meeting to meeting on day 2. I am finding lugging my 6.5 pound Macbook Pro more and more cumbersome.

b) Content consumption is front and center –

The iPad certainly, and I think that mobile devices (tablets, smart phones) in general, are ideally suited primarily for content consumption. It doesn’t mean that you can’t create content on them. Certainly, smart phones are great at creating mobile content (pictures, geo-tagging, social updates, etc.), and tablets are equally good at it (The iPad doesn’t have a camera which many regard as a major weakness, although I personally think that there is very little value in having a point and shoot camera on an iPad sized device – more on this later). However, its quickly obvious so far that a lot of corporate content is not pictures, geo-tagging, and updates on facebook or twitter. In our case, content is mostly lengthy emails, memos, documents (word, excel, powerpoint), project plans, and reports, etc. Both creation and consumption of such content is important. The point here is that mobile devices currently are, and likely will remain primarily content consumers, not great at creating such content.

c) Content creation can be a little frustrating but works for simple things

Having said that, I was able to find some fantastic content creation apps for the iPad which I have used and like them across the board. They have minor differentiators and pros/cons, but all in all, the integrated with the base iOS modules pretty seamlessly, as well as cloud storage services like box.net, dropbox, Google Docs and MobileMe. A few of my favorite apps are listed in the “Apps” section. Suggestions are welcome for more.

d) There are several basic deficiencies that frustrate

Even though there are tons of daily use cases where the iPad offers ready and immediate assistance and improvement, it is clear that the iPad is first and foremost a consumer sector device. iOS 4.2 released yesterday helps to bridge the consumer-corporate bridge somewhat with the inclusion of SSL VPN and enhanced enterprise management tools, but there are some basic challenges that continue to frustrate. I will mention some of these later in this post.

e) Device/End point convergence is here to stay

This comment is not limited to just the iPad. End=point convergence is a real thing and it isn’t going away. CIOs and IT departments need to start thinking about how to deal with this challenge in new ways, through revamped policies and better guidance. The iPad, like virtually all other mobile devices, tablets and smart phones in the market today combine corporate aspects (corporate email, calendar, security, integration, business enablement) with consumer aspects (music, video, media, social networking, personal email, games). Apple devices are left of center towards the consumer end of the spectrum, and blackberry devices are right of center towards the corporate end. Android is hard to gauge (more on that later). However, its important to know that everyone is moving towards the middle (true convergence). This is obvious from how much time apple spends touting its enterprise adoption and how much time blackberry spends showing that it is “cool and hip”.

If your enterprise policies and processes are designed with strict separation of “personal” and “corporate” devices/data/usage, you are behind the curve. You can’t give someone a corporate iPad and then ask them never to upload any of their music, movies, shows, podcasts, apps or games on it. Well you can, but you are asking for an untenable situation. The question for IT department is and should be: We know that people are going to use these devices for personal stuff. What can we do to mitigate the risk of (fill in the blank) (corporate data breach, viruses, questionable behavior like pornography or gambling, security, productivity, yada yada yada). The good news is that once you have figured out answers to some of these questions, they will help you in other areas like telework enablement, using personal equipment behind the corporate firewall, off shoring, etc. There are no right or wrong answers, but do start figuring them out now.

f) Usage/Adoption isn’t as intuitive and “magical” as you may assume

If you are a geek, especially one that uses any apple products, its easy to assume that everyone else will have no problem learning how to use the iPad. That everyone knows how iTunes kinda sorta works, how to download and install apps, how to upgrade them when there is a new version out, how to sync your stuff with the iPad, etc. This is not the case pretty often. Many people, even tech saavy folks, have a hard initial time figuring it all out. From basic functionality of the device (where is “My Documents”? Where is the start button?) to more advanced things (How do I make sure if I download an app for the iPad, I can also download it at home for my iPod, What do I need to do to install an app. This one is asking me to create an account. etc.). Things can get tricky fast, so make sure you are prepared for some hand holding on the front end.

4) So whats good so far?

A few things are working out very nicely so far:

1. Basic compatibility with email, calendar, address book, LDAP etc. is working out seamlessly. Fortunately, we have a fairly modern exchange 2007/Active Directory based email infrastructure so integration was not an issue. Your experiences may vary, but im pretty sure that 90% of you will be able to get there either with or without app help.
2. Many mobility improvements are noticeable immediately. With the help of a few apps (in the apps section below), I was quickly able to get to the point where I don’t need to haul my laptop around anymore. I have access to all my business data (mostly just documents) with me via the cloud (MobileMe and Dropbox). If I get into a real jam, I have the ability to remote into my work computer and get access to whatever I need.
3. A few of the business acceleration things also work seamlessly out of the box: We are able to use the iPad to log, track and close help desk tickets from the floor. Our CFOINFO iphone app (Roambi engine) allows end user access to any of their financial reports and dashboards on the go. Our economists love the economic indicators app. Sharepoint integration is rock solid with a couple of apps allowing us to access and edit/update documents, perform workflow steps, etc. from meetings and discussions.
4. Productivity apps abound, although I still havent found a good one that can be shared/collaborated to do team based task management (other than sharepoint of course). Still looking to have a shared/collaborative GTD app with assignments and notifications
5. VPN access into our corporate firewall works well with iOS 4.2. We have a Juniper border VPN concentrator and the Junos Pulse app does a good job of getting us in. Cisco compatibility is baked into the iOS itself.
6. We are exploring the centralized management features available via Exchange Active Sync (such as remote lock and wipe, password requirements, etc.). From what i’ve heard, they work pretty well.

5) What’s not so good so far?

There are a few areas of real frustration that will probably introduce challenges to a wide scale deployment

1. The appleID/App Store/Account mechanism is utterly infuriating when it comes to corporate environment. Even if every end user creates a personal iTunes account (which many of them wont want to), and you could install iTunes on every workstation (which you may or may not want to or can do), there are huge issues. The primary issue is how to procure and distribute apps for corporate use. You can’t expect someone to pay for dozens of apps for corporate use (such as SharePoint access, office productivity, document editing, remote access, etc.), some of which cost as much as as $50 out of their own pocket. But there is no obvious way for the department/corporation to buy and distribute these apps on the corporate account. You are left with two choices. Either link a corporate credit card/P Card to the individual’s personal iTunes account (which is a bad idea and a recipe for fraud and misuse, and highly difficult to audit), or create a centralized corporate iTunes account (or set of accounts) to download and install apps (but then you get into the issue of licensing for apps – Should each “instance” be a separate license to be procured? A common corporate account would let folks download for multiple devices without paying. Also, you will need to “authorize/deauthorize” against the corporate account from multiple computers all the time to sync and download updates). Bottom lime is that this whole process is broken currently and Apple really needs to come out with some way to centrally manage App Store accounts/distribution for corporations before a larger scale deployment can be feasible. Any ideas on how to solve this problem?
2. The very basic question of “how to I access my network share drive” is surprisingly hard to answer. I haven’t found a good seamless way to do that yet. Actually, I found the “FileBrowser” app, which is fantastic and very easily allows you to access your SMB shares. The issue to keep in mind is that the server must be visible from the wifi you are logged into (DUH) or you have to VPN into your corporate network (DUH). Other than that, I can claim victory for this one. Any ideas?
3. AT&T service – Enough said. I recommend going with the verizon mifi + wifi route. This will also help cut back on any laptop USB dongles you have deployed. You can deploy one mifi for every mobile employee which will serve as their connection for iPads, laptops, etc.
4. So far, I have had no luck finding apps that work with Visio diagrams or MS Project documents. We use both of these formats heavily and it is really frustrating to have the sender “Save As” a PDF and send to you to send comments back “out of band”. I dont know why there is no support in any of the mainstream reader apps for these document types in the 3rd party app market, but ill be happy to blame Microsoft until I can find a better reason.

6) What are we working on next?

1. We are exploring automation for iPad config/deployment process using configuration profiles
2. We are exploring options available to remotely secure/track and manage iPads via the Exchange Active Sync mechanism
3. We are interested in registering for a corporate app developer license and start taking baby steps towards internal app development and distribution outside the app store mechanism, especially over the air.
4. We trying trying to find solutions to known frustrations
5. We are looking for new and interesting business use cases

Apps:

I am outlining a few of the office/productive office suite type of apps here:

i)Pages, Numbers, Keynote for iPad: These apps are actually pretty sold and nicely done. They are excellent if you are mac user in your regular computing, and if you use pages, numbers and keynote in general. Converting docs back and forth from MS Office was not always successful and there are some limitations on the export options. Also, they are designed primarily to work with MobileMe for cloud storage, which is a paid service. From a UI/usability perspective, these are top notch

ii) SharePlus for iPad, Moprise are both great apps to link to corporate Sharepoint servers. We use Sharepoint pretty heavily so this app has been very handy. It is actually really well done where documents can be downloaded, edited, saved, list items created, edited, etc. while presenting a nice clean user interface. One limitation of Moprise seems to be that it requires NTLM/LDAP authentication using the domain\username method. Our sharepoint server is configured to use form based authentication against a corporate ADAM instance. This may or may not be an issue for you.

iii) Bento is a fantasic simple database/organization app that lets you create your own simple databases. I have already created my set of databases for day to day automation, from keeping track of projects and tasks, to inventory, budgets, etc. You can probably do all these things in Excel, but Bento makes it easy and visually appealing. I havent explored it a lot but am interested in finding out if there is a way to share databases between people to co-create/access. This would come in handy for inventory, tickets, incidents, etc.

iv) DocsToGo, Office(2) HD, ReaddleDocs are all great apps for office document/content reading, writing, creating, sharing. They integrate with the native email client. you can open email attachments, create, edit and save documents locally on in a variety of online storage providers including DropBox, Box.net, Google Docs and MobileMe. Readdledocs is a reader only but is great with many types of document formats and saving/managing attachments. I prefer DocsToGo for content creation as it works with Microsoft formats the best.

v) EverNote, SoundNote, Dragon Dictation are great note taking apps for meetings and day to day stuff. They offer sound recording and good note organization. Ever note is rock solid but requires an Evernote account (free).

vi) Wyse/PocketCloud Really cool app to remotely access your PC or Mac via RDP or VNC. Worked really well when I was on the corporate wifi network. There is a little bit of work involved on your workstation but works really well once set up. My experience involved downloading the Wyse PocketCloud companion for my Mac at work (or a PC) and linking it to my gmail account. By linking via the gmail account, access doesn’t require any specialized port forwarding or firewall ACL changes. I am still investigating exactly what protocol/port is used for RDP/VNC connection if not the traditional RDP ports. Will share my results soon.

vii) OmniFocus for iPad I am a big fan of the OmniGroup software and have been an OmniFocus for Mac user for a long time. It was only natural for me to use Omnifocus for iPad, which is a killer app for me. I can’t live without it. It keeps my GTD database synchronized all my devices via MobileMe. However, it is on the expensive side for a GTD/tasks app. There are TONS of GTD/tasks apps for iPad, many of which are very good, some are even free. If you are not married to Omnifocus like I am, feel free to try any of them. They are a must have though. In my experience, it is also critical for your GTD/tasks app to sync with other platforms like your work PC/Mac and your smart phone.

viii) Merlin This one has been a mixed bag. I like Merlin for PM on my mac, and the app looks pretty slick, but its only useful if you create and share project plans in Meriln. In our case, Microsoft Project is the much widely used standard, which is why I only use Merlin on my mac to import/export MS Project plans. I even have to revert back to my VMWARE Fusion version of MS Project from time to time as Merlin doesn’t always play well with the more arcane aspects of MS Project. I am yet to find a good app to handle MS Project plans on the iPad, which is a major deficiently for me so far.

ix) FileBrowser – Indispensable if you are interested in accessing your corporate “Shared Drives” on MS Windows file servers shared using SMB protocol. It also connects to many other types of file targets including cloud offerings like MobileMe, box.net, dropbox, google docs, etc. Yeah when I said it does all that, it actually doesn’t.  Its designed to connect to windows SMB shares only.  Although there are several other excellent apps who will happily connect with all of these other types of file storage sources, from FTP servers, to cloud based solutions.  Some include ReaddleDocs and Goodreader, both are great.

Feel free to share your ideas, thoughts and advice to help our pilot program along.

Calling Citizen Developers – Come make a difference

Calling all citizen developers who may be interested in some pro bono geektastic work.

The Council of the District of Columbia is looking for a few good geeks and geekets to do a pilot citizen engagement app to use within the council member’s office. The idea is to leverage open source hosted platforms or cloud based solutions such as WordPress, Drupal, Ning or others to provide a citizen facing collaboration portal where upcoming issues, legislation or policy decisions could be posted, citizen feedback or queries can be received, routed, tracked and resolved. Ideally, we are looking for a combination of SeeClickFix, WordPress/Ning and Workflow.

Anyone up for a challenge? Give me a shout. This is true citizen engagement and citizen development in the making in the nation’s capital. Lets get to work.

Excuse Me… Your brand is showing

Branding, Brand Management, What is it good for (in IT)? Isn’t it that thing that the marketing/sales types worry about all the time?

So in case you haven’t noticed, I grew up in the geek ranks.  Most of what I have learned about leadership, management, strategic planning or brand management has been either self taught, or through mentor ship of others.  Which also means that I still have a heck of a lot to learn.  Coming up through the techie ranks, I regarded these disciplines of marketing, branding and selling with a healthy dose of skepticism and disdain.  After all, there are only two types of people in the world.  Those who are engineers and those who secretly want to be engineers.  Right? Who cares what you call the damn thing.  It is the first NUMA aware multi-threaded Object Oriented Kernel!  That is freaking cool.  And it only makes sense to call it NA-MultiT-OO-KOS64 standard enterprise edition.  Right? Right!

Brand Management is much more than just a headache for the marketing and sales gurus.  Its something we all partake in every day, and MUST get very good at.  Done well, brand management can be a powerful tool in a CIO’s arenal to be successful in the enterprise, even in government enterprises.

This blog post is not based on any structured and disciplined knowledge of the brand management field of study on my part.  It is just a collection of real world “things that work” that I have accumulated over time.  More importantly, I am very interested in hearing your ideas about other things that work, or things that would work better.

If you work in an organization,  you have a brand.

Everyone in the organization has a personal brand.  Whether you know it or not, you have one too.  People associate positive or negative impressions with your “brand”.  “John Doe is a nice guy but takes forever to do things sometimes” “Jane is very smart but can be very abrasive” “Mike is in that meeting, we are covered.  He is very reliable”.  John, Jane and Mike are people, but more than that, they are brands.  Just like in the world of marketing, these brands cab be “in” or “out”, “reliable” or “flaky”, etc.  It is essential that we a) Recognize that everyone has a brand; b) understand what our brand signifies to the larger audience; c) Cultivate our brand by enhancing the positives and mitigating the negatives to better align with our perceived role in the organization; and d) Constantly cultivate, refine, market and hype our brand.  You should be the best salesperson for your own brand.

The “brand” associated with business leaders and CIOs is more than just a personal brand.  It also attaches to the organization, unit or the department that the leader leads.  Its a double whammy.  If the CIO’s personal brand is regarded as “clueless” or “out of touch” or “in the way”, on one hand, the entire organization is perceived as such, and on the other hand, the organization starts to take cues from their leader (tone starts at the top) and starts to act in ways to mirror the leader.  You end up in a downwards spiral that requires external intervention (replace the CIO, kick some butt, take some names, etc.).  The reverse is also true.  If the CIO is regarded as energetic, innovative, in tune, honest, hard working, the organization is similarly regarded, and the organization starts to hum with the same vibe over time.  This simple change in brand perception can be the difference between “Oh they are always late, lazy and incompetent” to “Oh they are so over worked and under staffed, but i know they are trying their best”, for the same level of service.

Every major enterprise initiative has a brand

Brands are not limited to people.  They extend to enterprise initiatives too.  How many of us have heard projects and initiatives referred as “that system they are building” or “when we did “the restructuring”” or “the big move” or “the Audit” etc.  These are examples of large enterprise change initiatives that were never properly branded.  So a brand developed anyway.  You have to realize that a brand will develop around any such initiative anyway.  It happens very early in the process.  Probably the first time someone says “Oh I am going to a meeting for that.. you know.. that system they are trying to put in”.  Forever more, that new ERP shall be referred to as “that system”.

Just like people and departments, initiatives can be regarded as successful or not.  And a brand’s success is not measured in terms of the EVM metrics on the project, or the specific outcomes of the test plan.  It is a perception often completely unhinged from reality.  The most successful system implementation, consolidating dozens of business functions and processes, and aggregating multiple organization units can still be “that damn system that can’t produce the report I need” or “that damn system that is so damn slow”.

When it comes to enterprise change initiatives, projects are failures until proven successful, not the other way around.  Effective brand management can go a long way towards mitigating the negative, and hyping/selling the positives.

So what does it all mean?

How is this useful, especially to a CIO or anyone for that matter.  There are a few things we can learn and leverage here:

1) Know your brand:

Take an honest stock of what your brand represents.  Conduct an unofficial focus group, do a 360 degree review, or just take people out for coffee.  Ultimately, figure out if, in aggregate/general terms, the perception of your brand agrees with the aggregate/general perception of what your role should be in the org.  If you are the attorney general and people expect you to be tough on crime, but your brand’s perception is one of collegial, plays nice, tries to appease everyone, you’ve got a problem.  If your perceived role is to make sure there is harmony and collaboration in the team, and your brand’s perception is confrontational, reclusive, absent, you’ve got a problem.  Make sure your brand’s perception meets what people expect the role to be.  Or atleast what your boss’s perception of your role is. Lets start with that.

2) Build and nurture your personal brand

Once you know what your brand is, work on getting it more aligned with what the expectations of your role are.  Mitigate the negatives and highlight/hype the positives.  This may require learning to do things differently (less confrontational, more collaborative, go our and talk to folks in person etc.), or just doing brand management/marketing.  Smoothing over the right issues, hyping up the right meetings/discussions, telling others about what are up to and what you have accomplished, bringing cupcakes to work one day, whatever works.  This is a continuous cycle.  Tap into the feedback loop to constantly analyze your brand and constantly adjust your approach and actions to nurture and build it.   A successful brand will open doors of success in the organization.  Important decision makers and stakeholders will attend your meetings, take your calls, listen to your arguments, trust you more, and even forgive your mistakes.

3) Actively build brands where they should or will exist

Business leaders, especially CIOs are at the forefront of enterprise/business change initiatives.  Active and deliberate brand management is necessary to make sure that these initiatives get off the right foot, are perceived well, are well recognized and can coalesce organizational mind share.  The key here is that it is important to develop a brand for a new initiative, that encapsulates why this initiative is important.  It must tie to the business case at the highest appropriate level of the organization.  If the business case for an automation project is to save costs, the brand should not be “Mr. Speedy”.  It should be “The thrift monster”. This branding must be done at the very early phase of an initiative, possibly even during conceptualization.  This branding then should be consistent and must be nurtured throughout the initiative’s life cycle.  Some of the specific actions that support this approach are:

a) Give it a Name

Whatever initiative you are trying to do, give it a name.  Ideally, a nice catchy name that people like and don’t cringe about.  Heck crowd source the name picking process. Make it a competition. A great way to energize stakeholders and get people involved in the mind share.  I used to hate cutesy acronym based names for systems like ARROW and JUSTICE and MARS. But the fact is they are important.  These names provide a context for discussion and collaboration around a common goal.  If you don’t give it a name, the general public will give it a name. and it wont be very flattering.  It will likely be something like “That system” or “the new system” or “the new process” or “that dag-gone thing”, or worst yet, “Oracle” or “SAP” or “PeopleSoft”. Yuck! (I hate vendor/product names for project initiatives because it cultivates the us vs. them attitude.  “Oracle isnt working again.  That damn Oracle. What a piece of crap”. instead of “ARROW isn’t working again.  Its our system.  We need to fix it”.  Just an observation.)

b) Consistently leverage the brand

I like to come up with a simple logo for the project/initiative.  The logo goes on all project documentation, templates, team sites, etc.  Depending on the size of the project/initiative, it doesn’t hurt to get team members branded polo shirts or coffee mugs either. Consistently use the project/initiative’s name and brand in your communication and ask your team to do the same.

c) Cultivate the brand

Keep an ear open for perceptions and dialogue around the brand.  If conversations and dialogue starts to turn negative, improvise, adapt and overcome (Oorah!).

d) Build buy-in to the brand

Get all stakeholders engaged with the brand, not with you.  If everyone perceives themselves to be one of the “keepers of the flame” for the brand, they will do whatever is necessary to make it successful.  You will encounter less “us vs. them” attitude.

e) Hype the brand

All initiatives need cheerleaders.  If its your initiative, then pick up them pompoms.  Initiatives require a healthy dose of hype and marketing to overcome the natural inertia that opposes any change initiative, no matter how valuable.  Talk to people about how great the new system will be.  How it will solve so many headaches.  Tell them how the new process will save them so much time.  Tell them how great it will be to be in the new facility, or how much more efficient we will be in the new organizational structure. Give them examples.  Tie day to day things to the new initiatives (yeah I know these invoices are a pain in the butt. See that’s why we need to restructure so we can divide up the work in a more logical way.  That’s why we need the new system so we can automate some of this work.  That’s why we need the new virtualization platform… ok maybe the new virtualization platform wont really help you with the invoices.)

4) Have a little fun

Just because you are implementing a new financial system and a set of internal controls, doesn’t mean you have to act like Bob and Bob from Office Space. Have a little fun.  Arrange an office party.  Ger people together under the brand’s banner.  Start a blog, Start a newsletter. Attach positive, human and honest perceptions to the brand you have or the one you have created.

In a recent project, my team was responsible for relocating over 1200 business users, including their entire information technology stack, from six different locations into a new facility.  It was a massive effort that no one was particularly excited about (except myself I think). To do customer management, we created a team called “The League of Champions” which was comprised of business analysts, IT folks, infrastructure folks and key staff from business units.  We tried hard to not include any suits in the league of champions (suits include managers and other stuffy types). Everyone was encouraged to use their new “champion” titles in their email signatures. We also got “champion” jerseys (which happened to be bright neon yellow so everyone could see when a champion was coming – and the fact that the new site was still technically a construction zone and required safety equipment, but that’s neither here nor there).  Before we knew it, the champions were getting together for potlucks and informal planning sessions.  They earned the trust of our most exacting end users, and the overall move was successful, partially because of all the effort the champions put into it.  Many champions still meet to discuss cross functional and inter-departmental issues and challenges.

What are some of the things you have done in your organizations to build, cultivate, foster and leverage brands?

My IT predictions for 2011

2011 is sure to be a blockbuster year for IT. The perfect storm of a weak economy, focus on efficiency improvements and cost cutting will continue the wave of innovation and utilitatianism in IT unseen for the last ten years (atleast).

Gartner outlined its predictions for the top 10 strategic technologies for 2011 a few weeks ago. There are a few “oldies but goodies” on the list (such as the cloud. Can you believe that the “cloud” now solicits a response of DUH as opposed to AH among IT leaders? Man are we getting old fast!). My predictions are much simpler. Among many different trending technologies, there are two to keep in clear focus. Any of you knee deep in either of these technologies will have a great year next year:

1) Business Intelligence:

Whether in the government space or the private sector, Business intelligence is the new Canvas All Star shoe: Its been around forever, but its suddenly hip again. In the business context, BI is no longer a nice to have to show the world you are a mature organization. It is a must-have survival tool for your business. Embrace it. Think about how BI can help your business, especially in the area of forecasting, dashboards and analysis, not just reporting. Gartner talks about tapping into the organization’s weak signals for business advantage. It requires a very thoughtful approach to BI. Specifically, there are certain areas within BI that are bound to be hotter than others:

a) Dashboards: Designing effective dashboards is one part technology, two parts art. Effective Dashboards combine UI design, business intelligence, and data design. Its not easy to do, but done effectively, can provide a unique window into the organization’s operations. Dashboard visualization is a hot topic and will get even hotter in 2011. I have taken a few beta steps in this direction for the DC OCFO via CFOInfo, an interactive dashboard bringing data from a half dozen back end enterprise systems together into one view of the District’s budgets and spending plans. We have a lot of plans for growing this platform into new directions.

b) Mobile BI: Delivery of business intelligence on mobile devices will be huge. Every major BI vendor, from Cognos, to SAP/Business Objects, MicroStrategy, Microsoft and others are fixated on this space. We will be seeing a lot of development in this area. The beauty of mobile BI is that adoption is easy to sell. Everyone wants relevant data in the palm of their hands. literally. The key here is to ensure lineage of data: The ability to link and validate data end to end through the data chain – from the back-end system through the BI aggregation, through the visualization layer, to the device. Making sure that the “numbers match”. Again, this is part technology, part art. But the ROI is potentially huge. DC OCFO uses the Mellmo Roambi Engine to visualize budget, spending and financial trends for iOS devices. More details available on CFOInfo iphone app.

2) Integration

This is an area of divergent views among the hardcore techie community, but personally I feel that the era of big ERP is at an end. Noone has the money and stomach to spend $100M on a behemoth ERP anymore. The future is in loosely coupled specialized blocks of enterprise functionality integrated together using a BPEL/ESB mechanism . Time O’Reilly and Jeff Bezos have both endorsed this architecture recently. The idea is that distinct and logically packaged units of enterprise functionality and business processes (acquisition, payroll, financials, order fulfillment, CRM, etc.) can exist independent of each other in specialized self contained optimized units of COTS or SaaS solutions. What is then necessary is an ability to orchestrate and integrate messaging and transactions between these enterprise units of functionality in a seamless and in-line manner, using open interface protocols, BPEL, synchronous and real-time message passing. As long as the enterprise architecture standardizes on an integration technology (J2EE, JBOSS, Web Services, XML, etc.) and platform (SeeBeyond, Oracle Fusion, IBM WebSphere, etc.), integration between disparate systems is possible and sustainable. the DC OCFO is using this concept to integrate systems and business processes District wide and realizing real ROI. Check out the “OCFO ESB Success Story” slideshare preso for more details.

BI and integration will remain areas of interest within IT for the foreseeable future. These areas are highly specialized and require significant skill and experience to master. If you are an IT professional looking to solidify and broaden your influence over the next 3-5 years, my advice is to double down in these areas quickly.

p.s. I endorse no particular product or vendor in my analysis. Any inference or perceived endorsement is absolutely circumstantial. Readers are encouraged to analyze the vendor marketplace for relevance and appropriateness to their own organizations.

How to save Mr. (or Ms.) Mailman (or woman)

Everyone loves the Mailman.  I bet you do too. We love our mailmen (and women) so much we even give them a little present around the holidays.  They do an honorable service.  Come rain, or hail, or .. you get the picture.

Unfortunately the US Postal Service is in really really deep Doo Doo. And when I say Doo Doo, I mean crap. Word came out today eloquently captured in this tweet:

@washingtonpost: Postal Service posts $8.5 billion loss, will likely go broke by end of 2011: http://wapo.st/cTbNz0 – via @edatpost

Original Tweet: http://twitter.com/washingtonpost/statuses/3122405459361793

 

At this rate, our beloved mailmen (and women) will no longer be bringing us the lovely postcards from grandma as early as next year. Or at least they will be working on borrowed salaries.

We can talk all day about what the underlying causes for this situation are.  Bloated bureaucracy, rise of the interwebs, people just dont mail stuff anymore.  There are an equal number of counter arguments to all of these.. arguments. USPS is no worse than any other bureaucracy, USPS mission is HUGE making sure every address in the US is covered DAILY (or most of them anyway.. sorry rural routes), people don’t send mail anymore, but they do like their Netflix movies and Zappos deliveries, which should balance things out. etc. etc. etc.

Analyzing the root cause aside, lets talk about some ideas on how to get USPS out of this mess. Its clear that the business model needs to change fundamentally and it won’t be painless.  There are tons of ways to accomplish it.  I am listing a few here, but I am more interested in your thoughts.  So put on that thinking hat and lets reach way outside the box to discuss:

1) Raise the price of each stamp considerably. Like by 200%.  I suspect this would be a short term gain, long term loss. It wont change the fact that the overall mail volume is trending down, and would probably worsen the trend.

2) Change the tier model. Charge by package size/urgency. Cost could go up quickly as the package size/weight goes up.  USPS knows a lot about their business.  They are already doing work in this area (if it fits, it ships, etc.).  I will leave exploring this idea up to the experts.  Who am I know anything about the logistics and cost models of package shipping.  I suspect the fact that at least two global ruthless corporate giants (UPS and FEDEX) compete with USPS in the package space doesn’t help.  Yes. Competition sucks compared to Monopolies.  Welcome to the real world

3) USPS gets out of the package delivery game altogether.  Would this result in significant operational savings? What is the cost/profit margin on mail delivery vs. package delivery?

4) Change service model – Mail only gets delivered 2 days a week.  Other days, people can go pick up their mail form the post office if its urgent.  Hey this happens in other countries

5) Start a corporate payment model where corporations (I mean bulk mailers, free offers, crap I dont care about etc.) are charged a higher per item mailing charge. This would serve a dual purpose. Less crap I don’t care about and USPS has to deliver, more revenue for USPS from those corps that still want to send me crap.  May also nudge people in the right direction to go to online bill pay (for example) if the additional mailing fees are imposed on the customer.

6) Charge 1 Million Dollars per delivery of the hardcopy Yellow Book.  That oughta teach em to send it to me again.  I am sure I am not the only one here.

What do you think?  Any ideas you care to share?

 

Testing #WP 2 #twitter integration

Lets see if this blog post makes it to #twitter land.  Fingers crossed….

Veterans’ Day 2.0

Today is veteran’s day. A day americans come together to honor our veterans and their service to our homeland.  No matter which political or social creed you belong to, we can all agree that our veterans deserve nothing but the very best support, care and respect we can offer them.  Unfortunately, our society is not always there for our veterans when they need it the most.

Today got me thinking about how we can revamp the concept of veteran’s day from a day of honor and respect, to a day of service.  As a society, we try our best but we do a pretty lousy job of transitioning our vets back into civilian life.  Government and the private sector does not or cannot offer the necessary level of psychological care, training, job assistance, skills development and overall social integration that is necessary for someone to transition form a war hero to a productive member of civilian society.  I have never had the opportunity to serve the United States Military.  I cannot pretend that I know the complexities, the issues and the challenges involved.  I do not have a concrete plan. I don’t think there can BE a concrete, formulaic way to tackle this national issue.  I think each veteran’s experience, needs and situation is unique and must be handled as such.

What I do think I know.. is that we can all help.  Yes we can. Not just be attending the parade, but by volunteering.  Getting involved. Finding out what the vets in your community need? Are there issues of homelessness? counseling? job training? skills? help finding a job? a place to stay? financial assistance? Help with babysitting or family assistance? legal assistance? help buying a house? help buying a computer?

If we look at america as one big talent pool, it is pretty darn impressive. Each of us possess skills and experience in things big and small, from project management to management of grocery lists, that can contribute towards the solution in some way, shape or form.  The biggest question is how to harness this knowledge, energy and yes even desire of people who want to help, and channel it in a meaningful and constructive way to help our vets.  Many models could make sense:

1) The VA could take an active role in connecting volunteers to vets.  Many things could be done here.  One can envision putting together a craigslist type of online clearinghouse where vets can registers and outline their daily challenges, and volunteers can find areas where they can assist.  Oversight and championship from the VA would reduce the instance of fraud and abuse.  The challenge here would be that the VA’s role and vision is national and global.  I can imagine that it is difficult for the VA to think and act on a micro-community level.  However, I suspect that to be effective, the needs of vets must be understood and addressed at a local/community level.

2) A new non-profit could be established to focus on just connecting vets to volunteers.  However, setting up a successful non profit with the reach and scale to address a problem of this magnitude is not easy

3) The existing network of non profits and volunteer organizations, including entities like AmeriCorp, Teach for America, Code for America, and Habitat for Humanity could connect, collaborate and provide veteran focussed services and offerings

I don’t know what the solution is, but I do know that we need to all start taking active steps towards finding one.  We have a generation of veterans returning from two wars, and they deserve and expect that their homeland will take care of them when they return.  If we apply the same level of energy that the #gov20 community is enjoying these days, we can definitely start developing the structures and visibility needed to move this ball forward.

What are your thoughts? Share your ideas and insights. Lets see if technology has a role to play here.  Especially if you have experience dealing directly with veterans’ issues (which I don’t), I would love to hear your perspective.

God bless our veterans and this great country.

Great Question

I was asked a great question today.. To which, I had no answer. (Thanks @zaims)

Would you rather have a job doing the thing you love doing the most, but with colleagues you can’t stand, or a job doing something not amazing, but around people you genuinely admire, respect, and want to be around.

I have no idea. What do you think?