In about an hour I will be landing in Brussels to share experiences, thoughts and ideas on migrating away from a global and distributed IBM Lotus Notes/Domino solution to a new platform.

There are quite a few things to think about, no matter if the migration is from one platform to another or even to a newer version.

Here are three of the things I will be sharing today:

Business case

Building a business case on mere cost cuts for licenses and hardware will most probably not motivate a migration. The return of investment in pure financials after a migration project will take years to realize. The business case only starts making sense when you add qualitative values onto of quantitative. Things like:

• User experience, will it be faster to find documents? Less time to spent to perform tasks?
• Platform alignment and integrations.
• Ease of finding competence

One-to-one migrations

There is no such thing as a one-to-one migration on a feature level. The new solution will be different, take advantage of that. Don’t try to bend it over backwards based on what is in the old.

Use the strengths in the new to deliver more value then is currently there. Focus should be on delivering the same capability, adapted and improved.

The big bang theory

Don’t do big bangs. Do a phased migration. It will let you learn from experience and adjust as you go. Plan for, and expect, co-existence. Find the key usage scenarios and migrate one or two of them. Adapt, improve, move on.

Don’t be fooled by the straight forward advices; there are more than one devil in the details here.

My experience is that any migration will be a bumpy ride. However, following these three advices will give less bumps for the business and more tools to parry them in the project.

Happy migrations!

It is a list of 10 very concrete tips from a rhetorical and mingle expert. Very good tips, any geek following this will be successful (oh and yes, it works for picking up both men and woman as well

Don’t miss this:

Rhetorical success is all about how to mingle, in the most efficient way. Mingle in reality. Mingle online. Mingle during parties and mingle in the office. It does not matter. You prepare your mingle in the same way as you – of course – prepare a text for publication. Ok?

Go to the ten tips here: Rhetorical success: How to mingle.

This is a very common statement in any organization today. They want to replicate the success of social collaboration giants like Facebook, Twitter and YouTube is massive. Having people in an organization engaged in communication as they are on those services is very compelling from a business perspective.

The next question after that is usually:

- “Can technology X give me Facebook”?

“Technology X” is commonly SharePoint 2013, Yammer, NewsGator or Lotus Connections. There are several organizations interested in investing into these applications to get “Facebook”, “Twitter” or “YouTube” to their organizations.

But why? Are they asking the right questions?

Social collaboration is after all not a technology. It is soft values such as communication, engagement and people. To realize those values, technology is not the answer – it is just one of the tools. As such, there are others that are much more important to get right.

Communication Strategy
All features of a social collaboration platform or product is there to enable communication in some form. From micro blogging to video archives, they are built to let people engage in communication with each other. So ensure that these communications are engaging and valuable for you as a business, the features you enable and create need to have a strategy behind them. A strategy to align them. A strategy to ensure you invest in the right communication tool for your organization.

Useful, Usable, Beautiful
The above title is the catch line for the Avanade design studios. It is the catch line because these three together makes up the best user experience for any application. For social collaboration projects is is one of the key components. If you want to engage your people to communicate, the tool need to be bring them immediate value, be easy to use and be visual appealing. Anything less and the threshold of using the tool will be to high and you will fail to engage your people.

Changing behavior
It does not matter if you have the most useful, most useable, most beautiful tool to enable your communication strategy if nobody is using it. Change does not come easy. Change is not automatic. Change will be initiated from a “what’s in it for me” perspective. So you need to plan for change; What training will you have (videos), what incentives will there be (gamification), what activities will you drive to ensure adoption (collaboration champions)?

When Facebook and YouTube first started up, they did not have any of these in place. But yet they succeeded in building the largest social collaboration sites in the world. There are several reasons they did. The “what’s in it for me”-incentives are very compelling, the early adopters where already champions of internets various services and the value where apparent for them. To replicate the same success, you need to replicate the same setting.

Social collaboration is really valuable for any organization. But value is not objective, it is subjective. Any tool you want people to use need to be valuable for them and should under no circumstances create pain or frustration. To successfully instigate change in your organization, you really need to plan for it. Ensure you get all three right in your social collaboration project, and it will be as successful as Facebook has been.

A few years back I was involved in in a project that had the attention of a vice president in a huge enterprise. The project had haltered and the VP’s response was to micro-manage developers tasks. One of the meetings I was asked to prepare was to explain why a switch in data access technology had to be done. A gruesome task: Explaining technology limitations to someone with absolutely no technology background. In the end it succeeded. Turning technology limitations into pure numbers: Bugs/LoC, Cost of a Bug, hours spent on performance tweaking, etc., etc.

But that is not what this post is about. This post is about how I got him to understand that developers are not glorified copy writers with the task of writing as many letters/day as possible:

- “I don’t understand? How can you only produce 100 lines of code in a full day? And that’s with two developers at the same keyboard!”

- “You write business plans right?

- “Yes.”

- “And how long is that document, about 30 pages?”

- “Yes?!”

-“I can write 30 pages of text in Word in a day, maybe half a day. How come it takes you weeks to produce the business plan?”

-“Isn’t that obvious? We need to figure out what the business plan is about, the text is just a documentation of our thinking.”

-“Exactly”.

From that point on there were no more discussions on lines of code, technical details or design/architectural decisions. From that point on it was only about features and velocity, process and predictability, and the most important feature of them all: delivery.

If you decide for a negative vote before the European Court rules, let me tell you that the Commission will nonetheless continue to pursue the current procedure before the Court, as we are entitled to do. A negative vote will not stop the proceedings before the Court of Justice

Source: http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120625/12333619468/eu-commissioner-reveals-he-will-simply-ignore-any-rejection-acta-european-parliament-next-week.shtml

It seems that Karel need to be reminded who put him in office and who pays his salary, I just sent this to him and I suggest you send something similar:

His email address is: karel.de-gucht@ec.europa.eu

—

Dear Karel,

I understand that you are very keen on pushing through the ACTA
treaty, even if the parliament says no. It seems that you are
really passionate about the copy right laws and infringements upon
them and I appreciate all the work you have put into the treaty.

I just want to remind you that the parliament is the voice of the
citizens of EU and not all of us share your undisputable conviction of
the democratic value of the ACTA treaty in its current form. We do, after all, live in
a democracy and as such you are employed at your current position at
the discretion of us, the people.

Not listening to the parliament is an act of dictatorship and not
in the spirit of democracy so I would ask you to reconsider.

Thanks for your service to us, the citizens of EU.

–
Patrik Löwendahl, Stockholm, Sweden

I have yet to meet a communication strategist or HR representative at a large enterprise that isn’t talking about getting an “internal Facebook” for their employees. The reasoning behind this is a long discussion of its own and one could argue if they really need an “internal Facebook” or if it something else.

But the key point is that influential decision makers see strengths in social media for internal communications. There is a strong market and Microsoft just grew stronger in the possibility to meet that market.

Combining the Enterprise products already from Microsoft, Lync and SharePoint, with Yammer (that already integrate with SharePoint) is a very compelling combination. Think of the possibility to have a really good network and with the ability to connect, communicate and collaborate with your peers at your fingertips (Literally using smartphone clients). I know that my workdays are much easier with those tools.

Social collaboration is having a lot of traction with Twitter starting to have the prospect of big earnings from advertisement, new services like Pinterest and smartphones really extending the social networks to everywhere, anytime; all this makes social networking a commodity. Social is getting in everywhere, even into enterprise processes. Yammer is strong here. It is very strong even.

Social Media could be a hype, Facebook’s introduction to the stock market hasn’t been flawless. And yet there are several big projects running that show real Return of Investement. So even if social networking for consumers seems to struggle, social networking for the enterprise isn’t.

Is this a smart move for Microsoft? I believe so. I know that combining Yammer and SharePoint already today gives my clients some of the functionality they are asking for. Buying Yammer and bring it closer to their other products, can only make Microsoft stronger on the Enterprise market.

–

The annoncement

Yammer Inc

Swedish Commentary

I am not really sure Apple and Google have recovered from the sucker punch that was Surface before Microsoft landed a right hook revealing the near future of Windows Phone. With Surface they showed their true innovation potential and got to explain the full Windows 8 vision. With what they showed today, they clearly stated that the smartphone fight will last the full 12 rounds.

- “So you think you will be ahead in the hardware game? Let me show the full potential of a shared core and driver model between Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8”, Microsoft started stepping into the ring dodging left and right.

- “So you want a voice controlled Phone? Cool. But we’ll just make it available to all applications not just one”, that jab they throw out landed hard.

- “So you want to constrain your developers on their business models? We’ll just allow in app purchases for more options”, Microsoft said while throwing a right hook.

Punch after punch, the key note at Windows Phone Developer Summit either put the Windows Phone 8 platform at par with the competitors or ahead. Sometimes far ahead.

Agreeable they should’ve probably had a strategy to upgrade all old phones, sales of Windows Phone 7.5 will probably drop a little bit now. But it is worth it. No doubt.

As an app developer I really like the shared browser experience across devices / form factors. This means that responsive design will be THE skill to pick up for web designers. I like that the features they add are really not apps, or in the case they are they are extensible, like the Wallet where you can add your own payment methods, or the maps API and NOKIA map data that is accessible, that voice commands is an API and not an app (even though I am still skeptical about its viability).

As a consumer I really like the VoIP integration that makes any VoIP call appear and function as any other call, another nail in the current business model of the operators coffin. I like that I get really good NFC support, I am not super psyched about the new home page but getting updates over the air and the background location feature will make me like my phone more.

As an enterprise user and enterprise mobility implementer, I love the fact that the enterprise app store and operations are not an app, but templates and frameworks to customize your experience. I applaud that we, finally, get encryption on the phones. Along with Microsoft Rights Management this will make the phone really secure.

Overall, this has been a good week for Microsoft. They’ve really shown that they haven’t given up. That they aren’t knocked out. That there is fight left in them and that they can throw a mean right. Google and Apple better look out.

Further reading
–

Windows Phone 8 Wallet hub beats Apple’s iOS 6 Passbook

Windows Phone 8 Unveiled

Microsoft Windows Phone 8: There is good news and bad news

Microsoft Windows Phone 8 finally get’s a “real” Windows Core

Windows Phone 8 get’s dual core, 720p and microSD

MS teases Windows Phone 8 enterprise features: Company Hub, encryption, secure boot, IT management

Microsoft Outlines Windows Phone 7 To Windows Phone 8 Upgrade Calls It Windows Phone 7.8

For me this announcement really was about that, taking the tablet one step closer to a full fledge PC. Using the cover as a keyboard is a brilliant idea and the heavy investment in the kickstand to go along with it. Add to that some small design details like making sure it had the feeling of a book and the investment in making digital ink feeling natural. They’ve really tried to push the boundaries a little bit further on the market totally dominated by IPad.

I like it. I’m enough of a geek to want one and play around with, just about NOW. I want to feel the keyboard, play around with the accelerometer they built into it (the keyboard knows where it is in relevance to the tablet), want to see if it is as light and thin as it looks.

But the market is bigger than us geeks. Just last week I was in a meeting with the head of a large Swedish enterprise that said something in the lines of “If I just had a keyboard and access to my windows apps, I wouldn’t need a laptop. Actually most of my employees wouldn’t need one, I could really do with a tablet”. So that’s at least one customer that will be happy to hear about this piece of technology and I’ve already emailed him the link to the official Surface website.

Still no pricing and no availability though, but time frame for windows 8 seems to be Octoberish according to the news blogs so it would be safe to assume that the tablets will arrive at the same time. What markets and what SKU’s are impossible to say. Yes there will be two SKU’s, one based on ARM and one based on Intel iCore 5 Ivy Bridge (the cooling was really cool as well).

The tech will be solid and the innovation is good, but what about the principles? Microsoft building their own tablets while Nokia, their premiere device partner, is rumored to build their own? Acer and Asus is pushing Ultra books really really hard?

They’ve really succeeded with XBOX and Kinect but failed with the Zune player, is it wise to get this big and risky push into hardware as a software company?

I think it is.

Some links:

Richard Hay’s observations

Youtube video of the cover

Official press release

Engadget on the two hardware specs

Offical Surface website

Netflix running on WIndows 8 Surface

Some information about the cameras

My local tech shop at Kungsholmen (within walking distance that is) suggested I’d try out Logitech. In the past I’ve only used Steel Series and Razor but he insisted that it was a good choice.

-"I use it myself", he argued, "and I will never go back".

With a review like that I’d ought to try it at least.

Form factor

It’s a classic headset in shape and form with a couple of quirks that I’ll talk a little bit about.

The connection is USB which I like. For me it means I can just plug it in and out conveniently in the front USB ports on my computer. This enables Windows to automatically disable the external speaker system I have plugged in.

Other headsets have had really fragile cables but the Logitech G35 has a strongly enhanced cable that I feel won’t break anytime soon:

Covered in a strong fabric fishnet “sock” I am certain the cable won’t be what breaks first on this set.

I really like that Logitech has gone for a shedable microphone instead of the clip on they, and Steel Series, usually have. It’s just so much better and I’ll never buy anything else from now on.

The fitting of the headset is highly customizable, the box contains two extra cushions for the head strap. So your strange head shape will get the best support, a nice touch. The headphones are adjustable both in height and in angle as the below pictures show. All in all, they are a very good fit for my head.

Functionality

The headset was easily installed. Windows found the drivers automatically when plugged in but the CD came with configuration software. The software makes it easy to configure volume, treble, bass and microphone levels and to bind the three functionality buttons. There is predefined mappings to Ventrilo but not Team Speak, which was a bit disappointing. But might only be a web search away to get to it though.

There is also options for morphing the voice, a really unnecessary feature in my opinion. But I guess someone likes it.

In addition to the three functionality buttons (G1-3) there is also an analogue volume control and a mute button. Not sure I will use the volume control, I have one on my keyboard that my right hand is used to reach for, but the mute button can be really useful when on team speak.

Sound

The headphones closes of your ears really well from outside sounds and there is good bass and treble distinctions. I am not really found of the virtual surround, it makes the sound bleak, but it might be something I have to get used to.

Playing Tïesto – “Carpe Noctum” that has a real deep bass gives me the heavy club feeling I like. Loreen’s – “Euphoria” (Sweden just kicked your asses in the Eurovision , I can hear her voice as sharp as it should (not in surround mode though). So overall, very happy with the sound.

Summary

First few hours with the headset and I am really happy so far. It was a good recommendation I got. Keep an eye on my twitter for updates after I’ve done some raiding and action packed games.

Logitech official product page

Logitch G35 @ Pricerunner

“Nothing endures but change”

The phrase is accredited to the philosopher Heraclitus on of Plato’s influences. In our industry, the quote is o’ so true and there is a new change at the horizon we need to embrace.

You have probably heard that to be a successful solution developer you need to understand the business. This is true; to deliver a solution you need to understand more then just technology. However, in a very near future this will not be enough. In a very near future you will need innovate solutions not only develop them. In the same very near future you will need to understand how to innovate business using technology not only apply the technology to the business.

In that future, to stay relevant in your on-shore locations, you need to turn into a solution innovator and move away from being a solution developer. If you can’t take on this shift; you WILL be outsourced.

The outsourcing paradigm has really evolved the last couple of years. It is moving away from being “IT on tap” into strategic partnership. I only need to go as far as the company I work for, Avanade, to see how we build centers that are client specific. Centers that capture knowledge of our clients business and already today deliver the solutions and value they need with very little or no on-shore assistance.

While I am looking back at the last 12-13 years that I have been developing solutions for clients, I see a pattern. It used to be enough to be a skilled programmer, then that got moved into outsourcing factories. It used to be enough to be skilled at designing solutions, then that got moved into outsourcing factories. At the moment it might be enough to understand the business, but I am certain that will move into outsourcing factories as well. Following this path we need to take that next step to be significant.

Deploying that last bits of code into production and seeing your client silently nodding and agreeing that you delivered as promised; creates a rewarding feeling that I am sure we all have felt.

Deploying the last bits of code on a solution that delivers business innovation which you brought to the client; rewarding is not a big enough of a word to describe what you will be feeling.

Of course the difference in time zones and cultures as well as the distance between countries is making this transition a bit slower, but it will come. Services like Lync, Skype and other collaboration tools is closing the gaps and gives us unique insight in each others cultures.

After working a couple of years in a truly global company, I really feel I can understand and collaborate with people across the globe a lot easier then before and I have peers in other locations I feel as close to as the colleague sitting at the desk next to me.

The transition will come.

Understanding the business will very soon not be enough. You will need to start innovating, you will need to be proactive to your clients needs, being reactive won’t cut it. Personally I turned to “Innovation: The Five Disciplines for Creating What Customers wants” to start my transition and am really looking forward to reading “Where Good Ideas Come From: The Natural History of Innovation” and “Democratizing Innovation” during my summer vacation.

I suggest you do too, and fast before your job has moved to another shore.

Some useful links:
TED Talks: Charles Leadbeter on Innovation
Slide Share: Thinking about innovation