WelchmanPierpoint - Lisa Welchman

Web Enabling Your Business Strategy: Blockbuster & Nordstrom

Lisa Welchman — Mon, 30 Aug 2010 10:28:17 -0700

I’ve been spending a lot of time this summer working with leaders to help them crystallize web and digital strategy for their business. At first, they seem to be disinterested because they think I’m asking them to determine their organization’s web design, content or technology strategy. But I try to hold their feet to the fire and explain to them that an organization’s online strategy is about business, about profit and meeting the mission and performance indicators. I tell them if they aren’t driving the organizational digital strategy, then there is a high likelihood that the strategy is missing the mark. I tell them that if they think they don’t have to understand the fundamental capabilities and impact of the web because they are executives, then they are missing the mark. In the web age, digital strategy and business strategy are the same thing. People who are accountable for profitability need to engaged in setting the digital agenda. Even then, digital direction can go very right or very wrong depending on who is in charge and how in tune they are with the substantive business change that has occurred since the advent of the web. There are two examples that have been in the news this summer that illustrate what can happen when business leaders “get” the web—and when they don’t.

Nordstrom

There was a great article in the New York Times in August: “Nordstrom Links Online Inventory to Real World.” If you work with the Web in your organization and are trying to get your executives to be more engaged, this is a good article to bring to their attention. In short, Nordstrom (a US retail department store) decided to surface real-time inventory information on its web site so that (for example) a San Franciso buyer can buy that last Prada bag from the Towson, MD Nordstrom and have it sent to them. It seems very simple but, according to the article, this type of real-world/web integrated inventory management isn’t common for department stores and that in the 11 months since Nordstrom made the inventory change, its same-store sales has “out-performed it’s competitors.” That’s real dollars and web sense-- not just a feel good social media experience (although Nordstrom does a bunch oft hat as well). Nordstrom effectively merged data from an aspect of traditional supply chain management with its digital presence for a positive result. This type of change generally requires internal collaboration and sponsorship at the executive level.

Blockbuster

On the other hand, there’s Blockbuster (video rentals) that has been steadily going out of business over the last few years. I like this CNET report from earlier this summer at CNET "Blockbuster stock to be delisted from NYSE". And then there is the more recent news of a possible bankruptcy. For some reason, it has been particularly hard for companies that distribute and sell media and information products to figure out profit strategies in the face of the web (despite upstart competitors showing them the ropes). But, unlike newspapers and another print periodicals, the consumer market never really believed that the were going to really get movies for free. Blockbuster had the market and didn’t react fast enough to the change in distribution channel from brick and mortar stores to (of all things) snail mail, then kiosks and now streaming media. And that's not to mention the missed opportunities at building communities around folks that watch movies. That means someone in the executive suite at Blockbuster didn't get it; so, at a critical moment, the Blockbuster business strategy didn’t include a mature view of the web and its capabilities.

Only time will tell how many more market leaders will get Blockbusted by more innovative and web-saavy competitors. The web has a way of changing rules that seasoned executives think of as immutable business fundamentals. So, if you work in the web arena of your organization and see the holes in the approach to web strategy, do your best to get the attention of your leadership and help them bring you organization into the web age.

"Hitting the Wall: Why Web Governance Matters More than Ever"

Lisa Welchman — Thu, 17 Jun 2010 06:36:38 -0700

Federal Web Governance Workshop

Lisa Welchman — Thu, 03 Jun 2010 11:55:20 -0700

Web Execution (Web Team): A Definition

Lisa Welchman — Fri, 28 May 2010 10:43:14 -0700

One of the oldest Web management problems is determining the structure and make-up of the Web team. A well-formed Web team allows an organization to build its Web presence effectively and efficiently. Historically, the organizational Web team has evolved from a single individual who had the foresight to purchase a domain name and post the organization’s first Web pages. From the 1990s do-it-all Webmaster, this sole person eventually developed into today’s more sophisticated Web division, with organizationally distributed content publishing, application development and data management, and a gaggle of external support vendors.

In consulting practice, I use “Web Execution” instead of “Web team” to broaden the scope of what the latter typically brings to mind. More specifically, I transform that image from a group of folks off in a corner working on a Web site to the reality of what it takes for an organization to produce and manage a Web presence—that is, an execution strategy. Solid Web development requires a number of resources, both in and outside of the organization, solidly executing against the Web standards and towards performance indicators established by their organization.

Some of the questions addressed in the Web Execution realm include: When it is appropriate to hire new resources? When is it appropriate to outsource development? What should the senior roles be for the Web and where should they be seated in the organization? The specific answers to these questions will be unique for every organization. Every business will have to determine how to: 1) organize those functions; 2) optimize their interactions; and 3) specify what job roles will be derived from these functions. It’s an art, not a science. So there is no universally “correct” team structure for producing a Web presence. There are, however, some things to keep in mind when you are staffing for Web Execution. There are also some good practices for Web Execution and Web team formation.

The Business Case for Web Execution

Fifteen years ago, most organizations interacted with their constituents, customers, members, or citizens via print, the phone, or face-to-face communication channels. Today, many organizations find that their first, primary, or only point of contact with these same people happens on the World Wide Web. Despite this change, very little formal attention has been paid to the appropriate structure for getting Web work done. There are two main dynamics that contribute to this lack of attention:

Organizations, led by senior management teams that grew their careers prior to the advent of the business Web, have frequently segregated their Web Execution efforts. Their experience (or lack thereof) of business success did not include the World Wide Web. So despite the Web’s operational primacy in communications and transactions, the Web team is frequently off in a corner, serving as an after-thought in business process. Subsequently, a lot of business opportunity is being missed.
Conversely, Web management personnel, while forward-looking with respect to the use of technologies, are frequently weak in the area of business management. So although they understand that the Web Execution function is not being properly funded or managed, they lack the management skills to turn the situation around. In response, Web personnel thrash about, executing on project after project, in quest of the magic bullet that will solve the Web problem. Consequently, resources are wasted or misdirected given the strategic objectives of the business.

These two dynamics produce a Web Execution quagmire, from which most organizations have been unable to escape. The Web team is in an organizational blind spot. Consequently, the Web Execution function is compromised, and Web presence quality and effectiveness are generally low or otherwise off target.

While a low-quality Web presence can be a liability, the real inherent risk in a segregated and immature Web Execution function lies in an organization’s inability to proactively take full advantage of the Internet as a business platform. This oversight is illuminated not only with respect to e-commerce transactions, information, and data dissemination but also with regard to the invention of the 21st century integrated real-world/Web products and service that will be demanded by the maturing digital native population. An organization that refuses to take steps to improve its Web presence quality may ride rich and happy on legacy Web-disabled products and services. But in reality, there’s likely a slow leak in the business’s bottom line or ability to meet mission objectives.

A mature approach to Web Execution can help stop this leak and move the organization’s business practices into the 21st century.

What Is Web Execution?

Web Execution is the definition, coordination, and support of all the tactics required to produce and maintain a high-quality Web presence.

There are two core sub-functions of Web Execution:

Product Management
Program Management

Web Execution must be tuned to the objectives of the organization (ideally expressed as Web performance indicators) and must be supported by a mature approach to Web Governance. When executing within these considered and relevant constraints, the freedom and flexibility to break away from linear, slow, and traditional IT development processes increases. This flexible liberty allows the organization to react quickly to new possibilities in Web Execution while maintaining the quality and effectiveness of its Web presence. Standards will enable both collaboration and fast, quality development, not hinder them. Key performance indicators will provide a framework of organizational relevancy for the Web team so its members can make the right decisions about which content, data, and business processes should be enabled via the Web channel. Without standards and key performance indicators as a nucleus for orienting it, Web Execution will be chaotic.

Web Execution Atom

(click here or on image for more eye-friendly PDF- new window)

What Web Execution Means for the Organization

When Web Execution is functioning properly, the old broken Web team function becomes an optimized and flexible Web production machine. As a result, the organization is able to react quickly to new requirements, technologies, and business goals. In this world, the organizational Web site contributes to the bottom line and/or mission of the business in a substantive and measurable way. Web personnel morale also improves, and, in the best cases, the entire organization becomes Web-enabled as the collaborative best practices of the Web team extend outward into the organization and interact with legacy informational and operational management arenas, such as records management, human resource management (Intranets), sales and marketing, or IT.

Web Program Management

Web program management has to do with the administrative and communications functions of the Web team. It entails getting the money and headcount for projects and evangelizing and communicating the value of the Web internally to help align non-Web personnel with the organizational changes that might need to happen because of the reality of the Web. Some of these changes might be tactical (e.g., learning to write for the Web); others might be strategic (e.g., helping the organization understand that a core operational function is obsolete or of minimized value as-is in the face of the Web.) A traditional support call center is an example of the latter.

There are several main areas to consider with respect to Web program management:

Tending to the Web budget;
Emplacing mechanisms to evaluate Web performance;
Managing the Web portfolio;
Supporting the Web stakeholder community; and
Optimizing business process management as it relates to Web Execution.

What Web Program Management Means for the Organization

Web program management functions can be addressed by a Web team Program Manager. Alternatively, they can be outsourced or distributed across the organization. Completeness is more important than the organizational placement of these resources. In other words, a complete Web program management function that is ill-placed will outperform an incomplete Web program management function that is well placed. That said, don’t get hung up on where the Web team should “live.” Rather, when looking at Web resources in aggregate across the organization, get hung up on making sure the function exists and is complete and orchestrated.

Web program managers tend to spawn from both the traditional management arena and the Webmaster arena. But no matter where there initial experience is derived, Web program managers understand the value of the Web as a transformative tool for business. They are good managerial diplomats and can effectively navigate the sometime bureaucratic channels of management as an advocate for the Web program. As such, they send a message of value and opportunity upward and bring down guidance so that Web product management is relevant.

Web Product Management

Product management is the orchestration of the full arena of Web development, from editorial to technical. This is the area most think of as the Web team—where actual Web pages are designed, systems and applications developed, and Web sites are spawned and maintained. Ideally, Web product management has both operational and research and development aspects. While requiring strong elements of creativity and invention, Web product management must execute against a standards-based framework in order to scale. Therefore, product management should be guided by Web measurement tactics, both qualitative (in the form of user experience testing) and quantitative (by way of Web analytics). When consistency and horizontal alignment are not required, a more individualistic craft model of Web product management might be feasible.

What Web Product Management Means for the Organization

When managed as a product and not a series of individual projects, the Web becomes a sustained operational asset for the organization. Both the Web platform and the team that supports it are available to the entire organization. They can uphold initiatives and implement cutting-edge or practical solutions that contribute to the organizational mission and/or bottom line.

Finding the right blend of resources to keep the Web site’s quality high and expedient is a challenge, but when actively defined and formalized, Web Execution can be brought under control. It can then move Web development and the organization into an arena where business opportunity is high and the ability to actualize online functionality is greatly heightened.

The Digital Deca: 10 Management Truths for the Web Age eBook

Lisa Welchman — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 17:57:23 -0700

Lisa Welchman takes a fun look at how negative and positive organizational
dynamics manifest on the Web in this eBook. She explores the 10 management truths organizations must understand and implement
when retooling to be effective online and remain relevant
in the information–driven 21st century.

Web Governance Now! Video - Part 2

Lisa Welchman — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 18:17:03 -0700

Lisa Welchman speaks about Web Governance at a Vamosa Briefing in
London.

Web Governance Now! Video - Part 1

Lisa Welchman — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 17:32:51 -0700

Lisa Welchman speaks about Web Governance at a Vamosa Briefing in London.

The Digital Deca: 10 Management Truths for the Web Age

Lisa Welchman — Tue, 23 Mar 2010 17:06:16 -0700

Webinar: Building an Effective Web Team

Lisa Welchman — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 07:07:23 -0800

In this recorded Webinar, Lisa Welchman discusses the functional areas (both technical and non-technical) which must be addressed when building an effective Web team.

Intranet Policy

Lisa Welchman — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 13:20:59 -0800

In the March/April 2010 issue of Intranets, Lisa Welchman discusses the importance of evaluating corporate policy in light of the Web and intranet.

And Still We Rise: The Professionalization of the Web Vocation

Lisa Welchman — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 13:38:59 -0800

February was Black History Month in the United States. My birthday also falls in February and this year I was 46. These two events always weave themselves together for me because the year I was born is the year The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was passed. Today, I own a business and am asked to speak as an “expert” at conferences globally. Some of these conferences are held in hotels that on the day I was born would not have seated me in their restaurants or let me spend the night in one of their rooms. So, every year when my birthday comes I am compelled to stop and acknowledge the efforts of others that made a way for me. A lot has changed in my lifetime and I am grateful to those who made it happen.

Change does not come easily or quickly especially when it’s significant change. And for every type of change, be it political, business, or cultural, there is a cadre of individuals who align or collude to effect that change. There are your quiet but brave types who might shy away from the limelight but take on the issue directly; and their natural counterparts, the righteously loud. And, there are charismatic visionaries who inspire the masses and make individuals feel as if they can change the world. There are those in “the system” who try to make change from within and the ones who put their heads down to do the mundane but necessary grunt work. There is even a role played by the complacent, the naysayer, and the cynic who insists that things can never change— if nothing else, they are the motivators.

Last week I was at the Web4Dev conference in Brasilia where more than 100 people from around the world (and over 1,000 others via Webcast) assembled to discuss how the Web could be used to forward the initiatives of the United Nations. And while there was a topical focus on the use of social media, there was a lot of talk about change. There was visionary talk about how the Web is changing the world and enhancing our ability to level the global playing field. There was talk from those in the Web trenches about how the Web has changed the role of organizational communicators. There were hands on Web professionals talking about how the ever-scaling Web has changed their role from the geeky Webmaster to chief advocate and manager of the organization’s most important communications and operational tool.

We discussed how significant change in organizational governance was required to absorb the Web’s impact. And considered how one might reinvent an organization like the United Nations using the capabilities of a powerful platform like the Web. The possibilities were exciting and awesome as we heard inspirational success stories from organizations like Save the Children, The World Bank, Ashoka, and the Communication Initiative Network.

It’s good to have vision and be inspired by early Web successes. But, at some point, it’s time to move forward in earnest to take the difficult steps that will lead to broad, sustained transformation. And these difficult steps, in many cases will need to be taken by Web professionals. If you are a Web professional, ready or not, the success of the Web in your organization is most likely in your hands and it is up to you to help your non-profit, corporation, NGO or government manage the change that is occurring organically all around us. But in order to be taken seriously as professionals who can effect real change for our organizations, we need to be taken seriously as professionals. And that mean that we need to take ourselves seriously as professionals by defining what it means to be a Web professional by establishing some best practices and a vocabulary for the varied work that we do. Here are some steps I believe you can take now:

Organize and Volunteer:

We can’t lead our organizations into the Web era if we can not articulate the nature and value of our profession. There are many organizations out there for people who work on the Web. Other than Web4Dev, the two I am most familiar with are Content Management Professionals which focuses more on the day-to-day of getting Web work done and the other is the Internet Strategy Forum which provides an information sharing and networking environment for those tasked with creating Web and Internet strategies for their organization. Join one, volunteer your time and help mature the Web profession.

Sit-in:

While I still believe that, over the long term, no Chief Web Officer is required in the executive suite, I do believe that the Web needs to be integrated into business as usual. And, in some cases, business as usual needs to be integrated into the Web. Some organizations have fallen into a routine where Web design and supporting back end technological choices are treated as if they are a matter of taste, not something to be determined by those with special skills. If you are a Web professional in an organization where the Web is inappropriately utilized, you should build a business case which articulates why the Web is important to your business and why Web professionals should be making the choices about how the Web is managed in your organization. Then, tell your story loud and clear to anyone who will listen. And don’t stop until the message is heard. Be civilized, be data driven, be appropriate, but hold your ground. This might involve some vocational risk and therefore is not for everyone… but change is not easy.

Boycott:

We all need jobs but there is no reason to work stupid. When someone in your organization asks you to do Web work that you know doesn’t make any sense, don’t do it. I’m not talking about the small battles. I’m talking about the long lasting technology decisions that make no sense coming out of the gate or thinking you can fix an entire broken Web presence with a social media strategy. You may not win every battle but with a reasoned argument that focuses on resource and creating value for your organization, you can win the war.

We are not oppressed, underfunded Webmasters. We are agents of change: the catalyst between where our organization is now with the Web and where it can be. That’s a morally powerful position to be in when your Web presence supports an organization whose role it is to alleviate human injustice. It’s a fiscally powerful position, when the goal of your business is to keep your stockholders happy. It’s a culturally powerful position when the goal of your organization is to educate.

Understand and realize your power. You are a highly skilled, highly specialized cadre of professionals. If you’re doing real strategic Web work, then no one else in your organization can do what you do. Face it; most people barely understand what you do. Perhaps that’s hubris and cynicism but there is some fundamental truth there and, professionally speaking, some advantage and power. Use it.

3 Must-Do's for Agencies to Improve Citizen Engagement

Lisa Welchman — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 14:46:39 -0800

This Federal Computing Week article (2/5/2010) quotes Lisa Welchman on the role of policy-setting and standards-creation bodies in facilitating increased collaboration.

Engaging Senior Leadership in Web Strategy

Lisa Welchman — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 09:03:17 -0800

Successful Web strategy achieves two results-- guiding principles and formalization of authority-- and both are set by senior leadership.

Webinar: Building an Effective Web Team

Lisa Welchman — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 09:11:24 -0800

Web Governance

Lisa Welchman — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 06:32:53 -0800

Strategy and Governance for Open Government: Enabling your Agency from the Top

Lisa Welchman — Wed, 13 Jan 2010 05:53:46 -0800

Panel Discussion: Planning for Governance of Open Government

Lisa Welchman — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 10:36:26 -0800

Webinar: Engaging Senior Leadership in Web Strategy

Lisa Welchman — Tue, 05 Jan 2010 13:16:17 -0800

Chop Code; Carry Content: An End of Year Thought

Lisa Welchman — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 07:37:57 -0800

I’ve had my head down the last few months working on a number of projects. But a couple of days ago, someone sent me an email note that inspired me to stop and write this blog post. He was asking me, 'what do you do if you work in an organization where the leadership just doesn’t get what you do? What do you do if you are a smart Web person— maybe a content strategist, a gifted designer or application developer— and your bosses (from middle management to CEOs) don’t appear to be strategically engaged with the Web?'

People ask me this question a lot. Frequently the person asking is angrily asserting that senior management is a liability and ought to be fired and replaced by them. Or, at the very least, they’ll argue that some position must be made at the senior level so that Web strategists can whisper smart Web nothings directly in the CEO’s ear.

In general, my answer has been prescriptive and action-oriented. I’ll either say something like, “they don’t get it but you do. Stand up and lead, and quit your whining!” Or, “learn to speak the language of management and stop saying stuff like ‘CMS’ and ‘metadata’ to high-level managers.” Or, “go to business school and become the CEO.” And, I believe those things. But the gentleman who emailed me knew all of this already. He wanted to know what to do if your calling is to design Web pages, or write elegant clean code, or define controlled vocabularies all day. What do those people do?

So, there is the other, less mouthy and in-your-face person who is frustrated and perhaps beginning to feel helpless as they realize that the coolness of the World Wide Web and its capabilities might just get rolled by the centuries old bureaucratic tendencies of the big bad corporation— that the cool work we Web folk do might be getting not-so-cool. There is a sense of negative inevitability as the gridlocked nature of a nested management structure makes it impossible for Web teams to function with the object-oriented speed required in the 21^st century. So, some of us are in mourning or giving up, assuming that we’ve lost the battle.

But I believe the mourning is premature. No, it’s not a do-it-yourself Webmaster world anymore where you get to call all the shots. But that doesn’t mean that the power of the Web will not be actualized in due course. And while there is no substitute for fearless, informed leadership, sometimes it just isn’t there.

Consider from your Web trench that the impact of the Web has been so strong that it has left leadership stupefied. It can be convenient and personally gratifying to criticize when you don’t have the ability or power to act. Being an armchair CEO for a meeting or an afternoon daydream is easy. But, you need to stay alert. The whole organization can’t be Web-stupid. If those who have Web expertise give up, become cynical, or over-compromise in execution, who will be there to execute when leadership does regain their vision?

And it will happen. Natural market competition will resuscitate business leaders. There might be a few more causalities but some old generals will get up off the ground and some new leaders will come up through the ranks. And, this effect will ripple through less market-focused organizations like higher education and the government, more or less. Just as it does now.

There’s a well-known Zen saying: "Chop wood; carry water." This thought, among other things, reminds us of the value of work even when it’s not clear where or what the result will be. Being a Web manger is a thankless and frustrating job in most organizations. But I’d urge those of you who care about quality, who care about the mission or bottom line of your organization, not to lose heart — even if there is no clear and sensible Web strategy. Don’t quit your personal vision of excellence:

Don’t be seduced by easy power of social media…use it well. The quick, cheap and deep Web channel can proliferate wrong just as quickly as it proliferates right.
Don’t forget to demand the same standard of yourself that you demand of your peers. Just because you work on the “cool” Web doesn’t mean that your motives can’t be skewed by a desire for power and control.
Accept the shifted and more mature reality of what it means to manage and collaborate through the Web. A blog post of mine wouldn’t be complete if I didn’t say “Web Governance” at least once. So, “Web Governance:” It includes Web policy which protects your organization from getting in trouble online and Web standards which enable collaboration.

The Web will rock the business world for decades to come—in ways we can’t imagine. Play your role in the revolution. If you are a leader, lead. But, if you are not: chop code; carry content. We need you to hold the place of sanity and stability. You are the sculptors of the technology. And I believe that you hold more of the future in your hands than you know.

Webinar: Web Governance Now!

Lisa Welchman — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 11:58:50 -0800

Passing Along Some Kindness: One Free Day of Me

Lisa Welchman — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 05:56:05 -0700

The other day I came home from work and Mac, the man who cuts my grass, was working in my yard. I smiled and waved and asked how he was and he said “You know, I’ve been really blessed with work this year. I’ve been really fortunate. So, all the work I’ve done for you this summer and fall is free.” I paused for a minute, surprised, and then said. “Thanks. I’ll take that and pass it on.” And then I forgot about it.

The next day I was killing time in a small shop near my son’s school waiting for pick-up time and was looking at some necklaces and admiring them out loud to the shopkeeper. She said: “Yes, those necklaces are fun. My daughter does a silent auction for a youth group and I always donate one of those. They are very popular.” I said: “My son’s youth group is doing a silent auction…” with no intention of trying to get her to give me anything, it was the farthest thing from my mind. I was just making conversation. But, before I could get the story out, she gave me a necklace for the silent auction. And then I forgot about it.

Until I woke up in the middle of the night last night and remembered. I do my fair share of volunteer community work: sit on boards, food pantries, etc. But here was an example of two people who had given me some thing that they ordinarily sell. Two days in a row. And I had promised to pass it on. So, I’m using our blog to offer some organization a free day of onsite consulting services and some follow-up time on the phone.

I’ve spent the last 13 years of my life being fortunate enough to work with an emerging technology and have been privileged to see the inner workings of some really phenomenal Web sites. I’ve learned a lot about what works and what doesn’t work. I have concluded that the way people work and collaborate around a Web site impacts the quality and effectiveness of the site itself. So, I work with Web Teams to try and help them make right the way they work so the Web is better. I’ve built a decent reputation, a small business, and I am able to feed, educate, house, entertain, and clothe both myself and my son.

So here’s the deal:

You:

Send me your story. This is not a contest. I just need to know a little about you and your organization and understand what your problems are. A page is enough. Remember, I don’t design Web sites or implement technology. I work with the people who work on Web sites to help them improve the way they manage the Web so that the site and their overall Web presence can be better, more effective. Look at what we do and make sure I’m the right fit for you and that you don’t need a really good information architect or technologist. I know a lot about those things but it's not my core expertise.

Me.

At my own expense, I’ll take a plane, train, or automobile to wherever you are and spend a day with you and your Web team trying to help you sort out your problems and offer some advice. We can talk on the phone some before and some after. I won’t promise a miracle but I will give you the benefit of my knowledge and experience in Web management.

And, I won’t put your name (or anyone else who sends me info) on a marketing list, sell your name to anyone, or subscribe you to our newsletter, and I won’t try to up-sell you any of our services. I’m just trying to honor my promise to Mac.

Right now, I’ve got my head down writing an outrageously long blog post (that's probably really a paper) about Web Team structure and then I’ll be on the road doing a couple of speaking events in early November. So, if you are interested, please send me some info by November 30^th and I will take a look and see who seems like a good fit.

Send your story to me via our contact form.

Thanks.

Web Governance, Now!

Lisa Welchman — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 06:55:46 -0700

Web Governance, Now!

Lisa Welchman — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 06:53:17 -0700

Testimony: Federal Election Commission's Hearing for Website & Internet Improvement Initiative

Lisa Welchman — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 11:15:35 -0700

Listen as Lisa Welchman and colleagues from EPA and GSA testify at the Federal Election Commission's public hearing for the Website & Internet Communications Improvement Initiative on Aug. 25, 2009.

Industry-Wide Experience with Web Governance

Lisa Welchman — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 11:52:33 -0700

Federal Election Commission's Internet Initiative Public Hearing

Lisa Welchman — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 05:57:20 -0700

No Chief Web Officer Required

Lisa Welchman — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 05:44:47 -0700

It’s a widely-held belief among various Web practitioners (from content strategists and information architects to Web infrastructure tool builders and application developers) that senior executives don’t understand the real power and capability of the Internet. And, that this lack of understanding has left Web Teams executing in a vacuum, with inappropriate funding and inadequate headcount. More importantly, it has left organizations exposed, as new Internet-enabled businesses sneak up and shut down the slower-to-react belle-weathers. The house is on fire and the C-Suite has got a garden hose.

To address this strategic deficit, there’s been a lot of discussion about the placement of a senior Web-savvy person in the C-Suite to drive the creation of a sensible Web content and information strategy. I’ve thought about this potential new role in the C-suite a lot and think that it’s not required.

My philosophy background always makes me apply Occam’s Razor to any solution, and thus I don’t see that real long-term value can be added by increasing the number of bodies at the executive level. That doesn’t mean I don’t believe there is a lack of Internet smarts in the C-Suite—my experience shows that the C-Suite in most organizations is not “Web-enabled” and frequently to the detriment of the business.

So, I’d like to illustrate how I see the problem and offer a suggestion about how the situation can be improved without creating a new role.

There are three players acting in this dynamic: The C-Suite, Middle Management, and Web Experts. Here’s how I see the existing interaction:

And here’s my explanation of the dynamics behind this scenario:

The C-Suite’s Lack of Web Understanding

Down-side: At the executive level there is an element of conservatism, resistance to change, or just general ennui about the Web, depending on the individuals involved. Organizations, led by executives that grew their careers prior to the advent of the business Web, have frequently segregated their organization’s Web efforts because these pre-Web executives view both the strategy behind the use of the Internet and the business process of building the Web presence as tactical. Their personal experience of business success did not include the World Wide Web. So, despite the Web’s growing operational primacy and the ever-growing opportunity for creating business, the Web, strategy and execution, is frequently off in a corner, an after-thought in business-process.

Therefore, middle management and the Web Team are forced to manage a sophisticated Web presence with inappropriate human and fiscal assets (often riding piggy-back on Marketing Communications or IT budgets) and with little or no organizational strategic guidance.

Up-side: These executives are super smart and the most strategic thinkers in your business. They steer the ship and step up to the plate daily to make the big and difficult decisions that impact thousands.They just don’t “get” the Web.

Middle Management Pulled in Two Directions

Down-side: Organizational middle managers are not taking any risks.They are doing what their superiors tell them. From time to time, if there is a Web Expert below them who is able to make a cogent business case for resources or change, they may shop that idea up to the C-suite. But, the middle manager is not swayed by the lure of a cool technology, as a Web Expert might be. They’re looking for business value and alignment with business strategy and objectives. And, what is core to the failure in this area is that they frequently lack the specialized expertise and understanding of the strategic and technical capabilities of the Web required to translate the “give me more” arguments of the Web Expert into a serious business case. So, a lot of business opportunity dies on the vine at this level.

Up-side: If you give them something to manage, they’ll manage it well. They know how to build consensus and get the resources to make things happen. In the rare case, when this manager is also a Web Expert, the positive impact on the quality of Web Execution, and therefore the quality of the Web presence, can be staggering.

Frustrated Web Experts

Down-side: Those who work on the Web day-to-day, from the most junior individual practitioners to the most senior gurus, are frequently weak in the area of business strategy and management. Often they lack the skill and authority to effect real change in the enterprise, but, due to the disconnect with the top of the organization, are frequently put in the position to make strategic decisions about the use of the Web channel which impact the bottom line.

Saddled with the task of operating without strategic business guidance and appropriate support from middle management, Web Experts frequently thrash about, executing on project after project, in quest of the magic bullet that will solve the Web problem. Consequently, resources are wasted or misdirected.

Up-side: Real Web execution maturity is coming into play 15 years after the advent of the commercial Web. In almost every organization we’ve worked with, the amount of real Web talent related to the strategic and tactical development of content, data and applications for the Web is staggering. The fact that, without guidance and resources, these people create and maintain what is probably the first (and sometime only) point of contact for a business, is admirable and deserves more recognition than it receives.

Web-enabling the C-Suite

So, what can be done about this?

I think the solution is simple—or certainly a lot simpler than creating a new role at the executive level. The answer lies in the education of the C-Suite. There are a few ways this could get done. For instance, an organization could use outside coaching by an Internet Strategist or, more drastically, replace some personnel in your executive suite. But I think that, for most organizations, change can be most effectively and less disruptively achieved through active collaboration by Web experts and middle managers.

Within an organization, there are usually a few Web experts with some strategic DNA and a few middle managers who understand the missed business opportunities that have occurred as a result of lack of integration of the Web function at the executive level. If middle managers and Web experts join forces, they can combine managerial courage and skill and Web expertise and vision to build a sound business case for strategic use of the Web. Be prepared for push back and have your facts and figures straight. This cannot be an emotional or “because it’s the right way to do it” appeal. It has to make business sense, not Web sense.

Business Value = "Instant On"

My experience has been that when shown business opportunity supported by quantitatively expressed value that benefits the mission or bottom-line of the business, most executives sit up and listen AND learn, AND integrate the larger lesson instantly when the actuality meets the projection. Showing how use of the Web will make the organization more effective or profitable should act as an "instant on" button for the C-Suite. If it doesn't, then the organization truly is in trouble from the top down. And no Chief Content Officer, or Chief Web Officer is going to fix that. You simply need a better CEO.

Yes, if you are a Web expert when you help make this translation, it might mean for an instant you might be doing part of the job of the C-Suite, but that doesn’t mean you belong in the C-Suite. At least not at this juncture for most. The function of the C-Suite is beyond the capabilities of even the most senior Web practitioners we have worked with—and we’ve worked with some genius-level Web folks. It’s just a different skill set.

For those Web experts that do have the constitutional make-up and the desire to reach the C-Suite, they need to educate themselves about the business, holistically, and make the natural progression to the executive roles--carrying with them their Web intelligence. It doesn’t make good business sense to promote a relatively junior resource to the executive level because of a temporary knowledge deficit at the top.

With a Web-enabled C-suite, all players should be more comfortable and effective in their roles:

All of that said, I’ll allow that some businesses might need a chief Content Officer or Chief Web Officer at the C-level because of their particular business model. If that’s the case, then so be it. But I don’t think there is a need for a new standard role in line with the CEO, CFO and CIO. You just need web-enabled versions of CEOs, CFOs and CIOs. Those in this role in a legacy capacity need to be educated. In a few years, I think much of this will be a moot point as the digital immigrant and digital native populations naturally progress to the executive level bringing with them all their Web savvy.

Maybe one of them will be you!

Moving from Web Management to Information Management: Four Things You Can Do Now

Lisa Welchman — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 15:47:28 -0700

A few months ago I was at a conference in Philadelphia and had the pleasure of spending a lot of time talking with Bob Boiko. Bob is the author of the Content Management Bible and one of my favorite books, Laughing at the CIO. I enjoy Bob’s company because he’s a generous person, a great thinker, and he likes to challenge me. The theme of this particular encounter with Bob was: Why do I call what I do Web Operations Management instead of Information Operations Management? I took Bob’s point and told him that I had asked myself the same question since I started consulting 10 years ago.

My rationale to Bob was practical. I told him that most organizations that we work with have enough trouble trying to manage their Web channel alone and that, often, when I’ve suggested the idea of considering the total information universe (print, Web, mobile, face-to-face, etc.) and managing that holistically, most clients get overwhelmed. So, we help them with what we can and are always on the lookout for that client that might be ready or eager to work on the bigger picture.

Bob is part of a rare breed. He is an academic at heart with a lot of hands-on business experience. So, he accepted my response as valid—although I was left with the friendly impression that he thought I was wimping out. But, it did get me thinking more concretely about what challenges lie in the chasm between Web management and information management. More specifically, how does a Web manager manage the short-term Web presence while helping the organization move towards a longer term holistic information management vision? I think there are few simple things you can hold in mind now:

Manage the Web channel well and in an open manner. That means when designing and developing for the Web channel, use good practices. There’s a lot of well-meaning but slapdash development going on in Web development circles. Agile development doesn’t mean crappy development. And, when designing interfaces and systems, assume that other systems (information channels, etc.) will flow through and around the Web channel if not now, then in the near future and forever.

Look for obvious and simple ways to align and share with other information channels. RSS and a shared taxonomy with a controlled vocabulary are information-sharing manna from heaven. Use them to create quick and light integrations between various Web channels and to share and refer to information. That could be as simple as using a shared taxonomy to tag content for publication, which could lay the groundwork for deeper integration if required in the future.

Stop creating your Web sites in autonomous silos. It was very, very easy for businesses with silo’d business operational practices to fall immediately into a silo’d Web operations management scenario. The result of many different Web development schemes in an organization is, most likely, an incongruent Web presence—maybe difficult to navigate, unsearchable, out of date. Of course, we’ve been talking about the silo’d Web presence for the last fifteen years. And everyone knows it is bad but lots of organizations are still operating in a way that produces a less than optimal site. So, one more time: Stop developing the Web in silos. If you’ve sincerely tried to do this and can’t, it means that you probably have deep operational and cultural undercurrents in your organization that will need to be addressed in order for you to be able to create that unified Web presence your organization needs and your customer and partners want. And, you might need to ring up your CEO to get those changes made.

Learn from the older channels. We Web folks are lucky because we’ve got the fastest, sexiest and latest information channel to play around with. But don’t assume that the Web and the Web team have all the knowledge about how to manage information. Web Managers have a lot to learn from librarians, records managers, document managers and more. We’ve also got a lot to learn from business people who know how to manage programs and organizations in order to achieve a goal. And a front-line call center representative could tell you a lot about the appropriate-use cases for interacting with your public, customers and partners.

So, Web Managers must think globally (information) and act locally (Web) all the while trying to widen your universe and build the internal business relationships which will allow your organization to manage its information more holistically now or in the future.

The First Step: Realizing that you are powerless over your Web presence and that it has become un-manageable

Lisa Welchman — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 08:12:06 -0700

Setting: Lisa's neat and tidy office at WelchmanPierpoint, Baltimore, MD USA

The WelchmanPierpont Office Phone: Ring Ring

Lisa: Good Morning, WelchmanPierpoint

Web Manager: I want to talk to you all about your services

Lisa: OK, what do you want to know?

Web Manager: Who is this?

Lisa: Lisa Welchman

Web Manager: You answer the phone?

Lisa: Yes, there are only four of us here. Everyone else does actual work and I sit around all day answering the phone and writing annoying blog posts and presentations.

Web Manager: Wow, well I liked your last post on (fill in the blank).

Lisa: I didn’t write that one.

Web Manager: Oh, well...

Lisa: So, how can I help you?

Web Manager: (taking a deep breath) Well, we're kind of in an unique situation here. We need to redesign our Web site, implement a new CMS, integrate 8 sites into 3 and roll out 15 new social media applications before (pick a completely irrational, un-doable date).

Lisa: (trying not to choke on her gluten-free cookie) Oh. That’s sounds
interesting.

Web Manager: (nervous laugh) Yeah.

Lisa: So, do you think you can actually get it done?

Web Manager: Well, we could except that (pick one or more: my integrator sucks, marketing sucks, IT sucks, my CMS sucks, my manager sucks, the lines of business suck).

Lisa: (listens for 30 minutes about why they all sucks and can't get anything done and then says) Sounds like you really have a Web Operations Management problem. You need to:

Get your CEO to pay attention to your work in a strategic way and empower you with money and head count and reasonable expectations;
Put some accountability, policy and standards around your Web presence development;
Produce your site in a mature non-knee jerk, mature manner;
Prove your Web presence’s value to the organization by establishing key performance indicators and then measuring against them.

Web Manager: Don't you say those same four things over and over again to everybody? I heard you give a talk once. It sounded really good but we've got a special situation here...

Lisa: Well, I believe in those four things....

Web Manager: (cutting Lisa off) Yeah I know. And you're a genius. But I’ve got to get this Web site fixed by (date). After we do that we can fix all that other stuff. Plus, we’ve already tried to do this (pick a number from 1 to 5) times and never works. So, it’s crucial that it gets done this time (read, or I might lose my job).

Lisa: Well, I don’t think you can fix all that other stuff without doing the
stuff I said first because, blah, blah, blah (fill in the blank with 30
minutes of Lisa's Web operations management lecture).

Web Manager: Well, that sounds great but I’ve got a real job. Do you know anybody else who can help us redesign our Web site, implement a new CMS, integrate 8 sites into 3 and roll out 15 new social media applications before (pick a completely irrational, un-doable date)?

Lisa: Well, given the dynamics in your organization, I can’t really think
of anyone (...that I’d want to put in that position). We don't design or implement anything, we just fix Web teams.

Web Manager: Yeah, well we'll get to that at some point. And, thanks for your time! You really know a lot about this stuff and I read your blog posts all the time. They're right on target (but I'm not going to really do what they say because it sounds a little scary).

Lisa: Good luck! Call us if you can think of a way we can help.

Fast forward two years:

Phone: Ring ring

Lisa: WelchmanPierpoint

Web Manager: Is this Lisa?

Lisa: Yes.

Web Manager: You probably don’t remember me but my name is Well Meaning but Overambitious Web Manager #5645 and I talked to you a few years ago...

Lisa: Ah yes,I remember you well. You were the one who wanted to redesign your Web site, implement a new CMS, integrate 8 sites into 3 and roll out 15 new social media applications before (pick a completely irrational, un-doable date). How did that work for you?

Web Manager: Well, we’re kind of stuck. We picked a CMS but it doesn’t really work that well with the Web site we designed and the Web teams of three of the organizations didn’t want to do the site consolidation. So, we’ve kind of scaled back on that. But we did roll out all 15 social media applications. Three of them are great. One of them kind of got us mixed up in a lawsuit and the other 11 no one uses.

Lisa: Hmmm. Sounds like you have a Web Operations Management problem.

Web Manager: Yes, it does.

How Transparent is Federal Web Management?

Lisa Welchman — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 10:28:55 -0700

The WelchmanPierpoint offices are located in Baltimore, MD. So what, you ask? Well, Baltimore is about 40 minutes by train from Washington, DC, so, we have a lot of federal government clients. We didn't plan it that way, it just worked out like that. As it turns out, that's not a bad thing. Federal government agencies for the most part have pretty messed up Web sites. And that's what we like: big, super-bad, un-navigable Web site atrocities. It's even better if they are run by completely log-jammed, back-stabbing, passive-aggressive bureaucratic organizations. I'm not saying that's the way the Federal government is...but it's possible, right?

The latest mantra we hear rolling up Interstate 95 from Web Managers in the Federal sector is a stream of 'open government/Gov 2.0/transparency.' It's loud, strong, and when translated, seems to mean “those big, bad, lobby-money-taking, evil management, political appointee, elected official types in the government need to have the whistle blown on them. We're going to wield our Web 2.0, blogging, mash-up, Twitter swords and conquer the beasts!”

Good. Needs to be done.

But drop the sword while you're at it, Federal Web Manager, and conquer your own transparency beast.

I am small business owner, a government contractor, and a US citizen. So, from time to time, I have to interact with Government Web sites to get things done. And even with a deep insider's view of Government Web management, I can't for the life of me figure out how Web Managers and various agencies determine what goes on the Web and what doesn't. How does that decision-making process work?

After 10 years of working with these people, I kind of know the answer: there is no real decision-making process.

You guys just shovel content and applications onto the Web and when some of it hits pay dirt and is popular, you run the flag up the pole and say look at us! And if it's not popular? Well, from what I can tell, you just leave it on the server forever, or until someone important in the organization says they don't like it, at which point you take it down. That doesn't sound like a citizen-centered plan, and it doesn't sound like a particularly transparent process.

If the Web is as important as we say it is then shouldn't the decision-making processes behind how it is managed be just as transparent as the decision to open a new regional office, build a dam or fund a particular program? Right now decisions about the Web are controlled by an elite group of well-meaning Web Managers who spend federal dollars and operate largely with no plan and zero accountability.

I know that Federal Web Managers want to believe that they are operating transparently just because they work with Web-based technologies that foster collaboration. And I know that Federal Web Managers believe in open government and transparency. But, believing isn't doing. And being a Web Manager doesn't make you exempt from the same accountability standards that should exist for the rest of government employees. So, while you’re making recommendations for how the rest of government ought to operate, come up with some for yourselves as well.

Here's a few to get you started:

Figure out how to collaborate within your organization so that citizens can have a better Web experience. Tear down the bureaucratic walls within the information management arena. I'm tired of wading through content, data, and documents from the government as if they are disconnected sets of information. As a citizen, I don't care if they come from three different parts of the organization, or that the document management boss thinks the Web management guy is jerk. Clean up your information house so I can get more useful information in the formats that I want, when I want.
Tell us who is in charge of the Web. I want to know who is in charge of the Web at every Federal organization. I know that maybe some federal agencies don’t know who is really in charge of the Web within their organization--so, figure it out! And then make sure it’s communicated clearly to the public (and including “contact webmaster@fedagency.gov” in your footer doesn’t count!)
Step up to accountability. OK, it has been about 10-15 years probably since your Web site went online. It’s time to treat the Web like it’s the substantive entity that it has become. That means operating to a budget, eliminating Web redundancy, providing measurable results and contributing to the running of sensible government through the creation, deployment and management of mission-centered applications, data, and content.

It’s a fascinating and interesting time in the history of the Web. There's so much opportunity and so much going wrong all at the same time. One thing is clear, though. In the Federal sector, amidst all this dysfunction, there exists a genuine eagerness to get the Web right -- to support the mission of our government by creating a great online user experience for citizens. The intent is there. Now, live up to it with action.

The Three Wise Web Monkeys: Engaging the C-Suite in Strategic Web Management Keynote Address

Lisa Welchman — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 08:02:48 -0700

Four Key Ways Companies Can Operationally Improve Their Web Sites

Lisa Welchman — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 09:53:32 -0700

Lisa Welchman discusses four key things companies can do operationally to improve their Web sites in this video from the Business Marketing Association's 2009 annual conference.

Gilbane San Francisco: Fundamentals of Web Operations Management

Lisa Welchman — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 12:24:11 -0700

Lisa Welchman discusses the challenges facing today's Web teams and Web Operations Management in this cmswire.com article.

Building Better B-to-B Web Presences Panel Discussion

Lisa Welchman — Wed, 27 May 2009 06:28:30 -0700

A Call to Action for Web Managers: Blow the Whistle

Lisa Welchman — Mon, 18 May 2009 18:02:34 -0700

This is a story for all of you out there who manage your organization’s Web presence and are too fearful to take the steps required to effect real change.

I remember a vocation-defining moment more than a decade back when I was still working at Cisco Systems. It was the 11th hour of a Web content management product selection and we were trying to figure out whether or not to buy the software we had just tested. The software in question was Interwoven Teamsite (I think version 1.13). This was the first Web content management system product selection I had ever done. This was the first Web content management system product selection any one at Cisco Systems had ever done. It was the late 1990s when the Web in the enterprise was still relatively new and everyone who worked on Web sites were experts at making up stuff and implementing it quickly just to see if it worked. People still do that now but they call it Web 2.0.

Anyway, when I joined Cisco Systems in 1996 I was coming in on the heels of the real Cisco Web site pioneers. The site had taken off, Cisco was already doing multi-channel publishing. And there was a mountain of marketing materials, technical documentation, and various e-commerce applications and software images for product support on the site.

Many, many smart people were working on the site but most were early adopter types. Lots of vision and execution power—but not a lot of planning or process orientation. So things were getting out of alignment and the power struggle between IT and Marketing was beginning to form. I wish we had thought more about Web Governance as a concept then. It would have saved a lot of grief. But to be honest, all those Wild West Web types would have laughed that right off the table.

We Tried Every WYSIWYG Tool on the Market

In an attempt to wrestle down a huge, unruly Web site, Cisco’s Web publishing and development community had used just about every text editor and WYSIWYG tool on the market as well as made a few of our own. We’d also done some best practices stuff like establishing file naming conventions and directory structure rules. And, some organizational stuff like moving the Web team around from group to group and giving it a better name, adding more people to IT, adding more people to Marketing, decentralizing content authoring to alleviate the “webmaster bottleneck,” and, redesigned the homepage a few times.

And none of it worked.

We still had a huge, unruly Web site. It just had different graphics, a better-named Web team and more people shoveling on content and applications. Finally, out of desperation, we decided to try a new-fangled thing called a Web content management system.

We Wrote a Great Web CMS Requirements Document

You wouldn’t know it from looking at the top of my desk, but I’m a process girl (except for the process of cleaning up my desktop). So the idea of a tool that was going to add some process and control to Web content publishing got me excited. So, I volunteered to drive the product selection process. And, I must say, given that this was around 1997 or 1998, we did a pretty good job with the product selection. We got a number of things right:

We wrote a requirements document which included use cases focused on content contributors' needs.
The product selection team was organizationally diverse which resulted in a set of requirements which reflected the needs of all the Web site stakeholders – both the Marketing and IT sides of the house and a few of the lines of business (we could have been better about this).
We piloted the software to determine if it would actually work with our use cases. (And, after some twisting and stuffing, it did).

But this blog post is not about Web CMS product selection.

It’s about a Eureka that I had at the 11th hour of the product selection – a Eureka which led to my current vocation as a consultant who helps organizations figure out how to manage big, messed up Web sites. (Who knew product selections could be so inspiring?)

So, here we are sitting around the table, Web CMS pilot complete. We had quite a crew around that table including Chris Sinton who was a pioneer in the B-to-B e-commerce movement of the mid-late 1990s. I have to mention Ellora Sengupta on the IT side at Cisco who wrote an amazing requirements document and helped drive the piloting of the software. Ellora could slap the last stretching-of-the-truth-about-functionality out of any software vendor. Clint Stark was a great project manager—you know the kind that knows how to stay out of the way of the subject matter experts but also pushes things along.

On the vendor side was Peng Ong, an amazing human being and one of the Founders of Interwoven and, I think that Russell Nakano, the other Interwoven co-founder, might have been there as well. I remember fondly a white-boarding session with Peng and Russell where we ruminated about what a Web CMS really ought to do. None of that has ever come to fruition in any system I’ve seen—yet.

Also at the table was the man who was nice enough to put me in the job at Cisco that has lead to more than a decade's worth of fun invention around Web Operations Management, David Grabel. David didn’t always know what I was talking about when it came to Web management (I didn't always know what I was talking about) but he respected me, trusted me, and made sure that my projects were funded. There were several others there as well on both sides.

And then there was me: Program Manager Lisa with a degree in Philosophy. Thank goodness I can be delusional from time to time. It honestly never occurred to me that I might not know what I was doing.

So, here was the situation (see if it sounds familiar):

Web production at Cisco was pretty out of control. Not chaos, but not great. We did not have separate development, staging and production environments which meant that way too many people had access to the production server and were messing around with mission-critical live content all the time, real-time. There was no audit trail for what happened to content. The site was full of redundant, outdated and trivial content. On the apps side there was a lot redundancy (the Web CMS wouldn’t help with this but the apps were still there).

AND...

The Web CMS pilot had shown that the software could manage the hundreds of thousands of content pages that was Cisco.com, integrate with some key, internal publishing systems, and help us gain some control over the site. The solution was imperfect but better than what we had. We needed this.

BUT...

The senior people around the table were reluctant to make the commitment to buy the software. They were concerned about the risk of going with an untried product. To everyone’s defense, Cisco deploying a Web CMS was jumping into the big software unknown with a very prominent poster-child-for e-commerce Web site.

But, having lived in the production trenches of the site for awhile and understanding exactly how much was wrong with the site and its management, I couldn't really stomach management's reluctance to take hold of this obvious opportunity. All of Cisco.com was nothing more than a completely unplanned, unproven, fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants software experiment. And here we had this tested software application and they were saying "no"?

So, I said to a table of people who were more experienced and much more highly paid than I, “What about the risk of continuing to work the way we are working now?” Chris Sinton turned, looked at me, paused for a moment and said, “Good point.” And, that started a real conversation about the benefits and risks associated with continuing with the "as-is" model of operating the site-- and in that same meeting we made the decision to move forward with the software.

Less than a year later, I realized there was a lot more to fixing a broken Web site than a CMS and I left Cisco Systems and started the business which would become WelchmanPierpoint.

In 2009, Web Operations is Just as Bad as in 1999

So, over 10 years later, what about the risk of continuing to manage your organization’s Web presence the way you are managing it now? How complicit are you in the crime of your organization's poor Web operations? Are you just going with the status quo because you're too afraid to make noise?

Here's my little lecture for you:

Status quo does not equal correct, or optimal, or high-value. Status quo just happens to be the way your organization fell into managing the Web. Status quo is lazy. You know that the way you are managing your site is inefficient and does not produce a Web presence which, if examined, supports the values and mission of your organization.

If you are an experienced Web manager, you know better than this. What you maybe don’t know is that the other faster, smarter people around the table don’t know better. It’s not that they are passive-aggressive or spiteful or out to make your life miserable (all things that I've heard from the Web trenches). They really don’t “get it.” They haven’t been working heads down on Web sites for the last ten years. You need to help them “get it” by explaining both the opportunities that proper Web management provides and also expose the real risks associated with poor Web management.

You are a Web Expert, not the CEO, not CIO, not VP of Sales. Exposing this risk and benefits of improper Web management is your job and you probably know what to do to maximize the benefits and mitigate the risks. The fix most likely isn’t easy. The fix might require changes beyond your current vocational range. So, stretch a little and then a little more. You can start by opening your mouth and stating the obvious, which might be that your Web site as it is managed now might be creating some real risk for you organization. Start the conversation.

The transformation to mature web operational practices will not happen overnight. It will take years. But, it will not start if those of us who have the knowledge to make the change happen sit back, tight-lipped and do nothing.

Blow the whistle.

Keynote Analyst Panel

Lisa Welchman — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 10:33:36 -0700

Web Strategy: A Definition

Lisa Welchman — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 14:02:02 -0700

Despite the simplicity and some would say obviousness of the concept of “Web Strategy,” it is a definition that I’ve struggled with for many years. Frequently, when organizations and individuals talk about Web Strategy they are talking about the organization’s approach to creating the outward facing Web site-- that with which the general public or the employee (in the case of intranets) interacts. However, I’ve come to understand that in order to be effective, a Web strategy should address not just how an organization will address the wants and needs of its customer or user base, but also how the organization will make that user experience happen operationally.

The Business Case for Web Strategy

From a management perspective, most organizations grew their Web sites in a bottom-up manner. Somewhere in your organization during the mid 90s, someone purchased a domain name and put up the first Web page. Most likely, no one from the “C-Suite” was involved. Now, 15 years later, except for the Amazons and EBays of the world (organizations that wouldn’t even exist without the Web), most organizations continue to manage their Web sites tactically, from the bottom up. This trend is reflected in the results of research which focuses on the Web Management profession: the strategic leadership of most organizations continues to be disengaged from Web management. Many organizations are beginning to wake up to the reality that the Web needs strategic management. But, this awareness is usually at the mid-level management tier, not at the senior-most levels of the organization.

While the disengagement of CEOs and their C-Suite colleagues from tactical Web matters (like technology implementation and Web design) is appropriate, it is a risk for these leaders to be strategically disengaged. The high-level quality and operational drivers are best given by those who hold the long-term strategic vision for the organization. As the Web becomes more and more the primary communications and transactional vehicle for organizations, it is crucial for strategic senior leaders to set the strategic agenda for the Web. Without this leadership, mid-level Web Managers and subject matter experts are in the position of making uninformed decisions about the direction of the organization’s primary communications, sales, marketing and transactional vehicle.

What is Web Strategy?

Web Strategy is the translation of organizational objectives and values into high-level management directives for the Web. Enacting a Web Strategy involves two activities:

the establishment of a set of Guiding Principles for the Web presence;
and, the Formalization of Authority for the Web in the organization.

Enabled by formal Web Governance, a properly-managed Web execution division, and appropriate measurement tactics, Web Strategy is the “first cause” for a high-quality mission-centered, low-risk organizational Web presence. Web Strategy ensures that the tactics of Web site development align with overall organizational mission.

What Web Strategy Means for the Organization

Having clarity by way of Web Strategy from the senior leadership provides needed guidance for those who develop and manage the organizational Web presence. This means that Web stakeholders don’t have to guess or argue about which are the right initiatives for the Web--there would be organizational goals against which to measure the value of new technologies or other Web presence enhancement. In the last 10 years, anecdotally, we have seen a no-win trend developing in organizations without a Web Strategy. Web teams are driven by an ongoing power struggle between a slow-but-steady, traditional IT-focused team and a fast, knee-jerk, reactionary, “do it now” Communications focused team. The result is an un-even, low-quality Web presence driven by an organizational debate instead of customer and organizational needs.

When there is a Web Strategy in place, this “push-me-pull-you” dynamic is diminished through the establishment of a relevant agenda to guide Web development and the empowerment of the teams appointed to execute that agenda. The adoption of this approach to Web Strategy points to the development of a relevant, more effective and higher-quality organizational Web presence.

Web Guiding Principles

Web Guiding Principles describe how the organization will use the Web to support core organizational values and business objectives. In general, they can:

ensure that the organizational mission and values are reflected in all Web properties;
articulate high-level business objectives for Web properties;
and, establish basic compliance parameters for the organizational Web Presence.

Web Guiding Principles are not standards or policies. They are expressed in order to ensure that the Web team is implementing in line with the longer term, though perhaps not obvious, objectives of the organization.

Here are two examples of Web Guiding Principles—one from the UC Berkeley Library Web site and one from the US Department of Health and Human services.

What Web Guiding Principles mean for the organization

When an organization has a set of Web Guiding principles, those who work on the site understand exactly what the senior leadership expects to achieve with the Web presence. When mid-level management translates these principles into a set of key success indicators, the organization can be sure that all Web initiatives are grounded in the reality of business objectives. The principles act as a guide for those making tactical decisions about Web development and can help the Web team determine where the forward-looking research and development efforts should be placed and when and where the organization ought to invest in deep technology infrastructure enhancements.

The Formalization of Authority for the Web

Formalization of Authority is the emplacement of high-level authority for Web Governance and Web Execution, and the expression of the key success indicators against which to measure Web performance. In order to have power, it is an action that is best performed from a very senior level of the organization.

What Formalization of Authority means for the organization

When someone from the C-Suite or other senior leader says, “make it so,” it generally tends to get done. Clear delegation of authority can put to rest the battle between program offices, communications and IT regarding “ownership” of the Web. The Web presence is “owned” by the organization and the decision regarding who is responsible for managing the presence is a strategic, operational decision. Likewise, the decision regarding who will “govern” the Web through the creation of Web policy and Web standards, can be clearly articulated and therefore allowing Web experts to spend less time in internal power struggles and more time directing their efforts towards improving Web quality. Lastly, success indicators help keep those who work with the Web accountable for their implementation choices and allows the organization to measure effectiveness in order to better leverage the Web channel in the future.

An effective Web Strategy provides the required guidance and implementation authority required to create and maintain a high-quality Web presence. It also emplaces accountability mechanisms to ensure that Web teams take a mature approach to developing and managing the organization’s most powerful communications and transactional tool.

Is Web 2.0 a Cult?

Lisa Welchman — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 12:08:19 -0700

The other day someone told me that I’d missed the train on the Web 2.0 social networking technology trend. I was taken aback. Me? Early Pine user in the late 1980s; using Lotus Notes to try to map every Citicorp employee and their reporting relationships in the early 90s (I never managed it); and me coding HTML in a text editor and brazenly using the three Unix commands I knew to push Web pages on and off the production server for Cisco Connection Online in 1996? Me not get something that’s all about the Web and communication and collaboration? Impossible.

But then I thought: Has it happened? Am I old? At 45 have I finally crossed that line to “you don’t get it?” My assertion which generated the missed-the-train comment was that there might be negative consequences for both organizations and individuals if they blindly adopt online social networking.

I also said that organizations ought to adopt policies to mitigate the risks associated with online social networking. To be fair, I did also say (and I think this was what really got them upset) that some organizations might not want to do social networking right now because the risk might outweigh the benefit. That last thing was apparently not quite right. I got smacked back with the “people have voted with their feet” and “the train has left the station.” I was challenged to find one negative thing about social networking. I was almost silenced.

Except when arguing with my son, I don’t think well on my feet. So, I wouldn’t have had much to say back anyway but I was also taken by the sheer, angry emotionalism that was coming at me. How could I dare say anything bad about social networking? Didn’t I know that Web 2.0 and social networking was making the government transparent, feeding starving folks in developing nations, and helping marketing communications teams side-step the treacherous processes of the IT department? This was it. Web Nirvana. The future is now. It’s all good and it’s only going to get gooder.

On the way back home from this encounter I said to a colleague: “Wow, these people have really drunk the Web 2.0 Kool-Aid.” And then, because I’m a stream of consciousness thinker, I thought about Jonestown and then I thought: Wow! Is Web 2.0 a cult?

So, I decided to take a deeper look at Web 2.0 and its followers to see if indeed a cult had formed. In the spirit of 2.0, I’m using Wikipedia content as my sole source for definitions of terms. And, in order to stay within the concentration limit and scientific method of the social networking community, I’ll only take a quick tweet-speed look at three cult characteristics as a sample: Mind Control, Love-Bombing and Coercive Persuasion and then come to a conclusion. Why over complicate things?

Mind Control 2.0

From what I can tell, mind control means making somebody think something other than what they’d think if they weren’t thinking about what you mind-controlled them to think about. Web 2.0 does that. Let’s take an example. You log on to Facebook with the sole purpose of saying "Happy Birthday" to your Mom and then getting back to work. Two hours later, you’re still on Facebook taking the quiz, “What Kind of Shoe are You?” Other examples of Mind Control 2.0 are thinking that you have more friends than you do because 10,000 people are following you on Twitter and feeling that it’s OK that you stepped over the half-frozen homeless guy on the corner next to your apartment because you’ve got money in Kiva.

Love-Bombing 2.0

Love-Bombing is when a bunch of people who barely know you act like they like you a whole lot so you’ll stay in the cult. This one is a no brainer. Ever get one of those messages that says: “Hey, it’s my cousin Alex’s birthday. Everybody tweet him and say 'Happy Birthday'.” That’s Love Bombing 2.0. It’s also referred to as Love Spam and, like your e-mail Spam, it grows like a fungus. Love Bombing also looks good from the outside. So, it’s something good to point to if you’re a Web 2.0 Cult recruiter. Wouldn’t you like to be amongst those that get 107 people to say "Happy Birthday" to you on Facebook? It looks so good. So happy.

Coercive Persuasion 2.0

Coercive Persuasion is trying to get a rational person with a well thought out opinion to change their mind about something so that they believe the same thing you believe so you get to feel better about yourself and be “right.” This is what I think was happening to me. Someone was trying to mind control me into thinking that Web 2.0 had no negatives associated with it even though I know it does. It almost worked too. I know what’s coming after this. It’s the good old “it’s not the technology that’s bad; it’s the people that use the technology that are bad” argument. It’s worked for the National Rifle Association so it ought to work for those Web 2.0 evangelists too. Good luck with that.

So, based on my thorough analysis 2.0, I think that we can see that Web 2.0 is a cult.

I’m only half kidding here. I know that these new software designs and business models that we call Web 2.0 are extremely powerful. I know a lot of people have and will continue to make a lot of money off of Web 2.0. I know a lot of people will be helped because of Web 2.0. But some people will be hurt by it and be ripped off online and lose their identity or purpose in a sea of packets. Some businesses might expose themselves to risk. So we should all be careful. That’s all.

So, here’s my delayed prosaic rebuttal to the one who accused me of missing the train:

Nothing is so risk-free or perfect it need not be examined. Ease of use, popularity and wide-spread adoption are not indicators of correctness or quality. Things that people invent are tools, not saviors. Whether a business or an individual, consider the consequences of your actions and the impact that a single tweet or gesture can have coupled with the global, real-time, 24/7 nature of the Web. Be in awe of the Web and have a little fear. Then, go ahead and use Web 2.0 to make the world a better place.

Or in Tweet length: Moderation in all things; and, play nice.

Web Governance for the Federal Sector

Lisa Welchman — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 11:02:37 -0700

Webinar: "From Web Manager to Web Division"

Lisa Welchman — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 16:41:02 -0700

Web Governance: A Definition

Lisa Welchman — Sun, 15 Mar 2009 11:42:46 -0700

I’ve been thinking deeply about a definition of Web Governance and the formalization of methodologies for implementing Web Governance in organizations for the last ten years. As I venture out to speak about Web Governance, I find that different organizations have different senses of what Web Governance is (and isn't). Some have a very broad idea of Web Governance, which might include operational and production-related business processes. Some think of it as the rules related to Web content management (but not Web applications development). Some relate Web Governance to Web Team management. All of these concerns need to be addressed under the larger umbrella of Web Operations Management. But, Web Governance, I feel, is something very distinct and should be examined away from all the noise of Web site production and Web Team management. Below, I've offered up my definition of Web Governance. I'm hoping for comments and discussion so we, as a community, can help codify the meaning of Web Governance and contribute to the maturation of the Web Management profession.

The Business Case for Web Governance

Over the years, the organizational Web presence has grown organically to such an extent that ad hoc and informal business processes and management and production guidelines are no longer adequate to manage it. The continued growth of the organizational Web presence managed by informal processes and guidelines exposes organizations to risk and liability. Key risks include loss of credibility, loss of market share, resource waste, and risk of litigation. While the risks associated with a corporate Web presence can not be completely eliminated, they can certainly be mitigated and the liabilities which come along with an underperforming or low-quality Web presence reduced--but only if organizations apply standard corporate governance constraints over Web operational practices.

What is Web Governance?

Web Governance is the authoritative administrative structures that set
policy and standards for Web product management. It includes:

the implementation of a Web Governance Framework;
the establishment of Web Policy;
and the codification, implementation, and enforcement of Web Standards.

Combined with strategic leadership from the executive level, mature
management of the Web division, and comprehensive Web measurement practices, Web governance is one of the core dimensions of a mature Web operations approach. It helps reduce Web development risks by establishing clear Web decision-making authority, extending Web accountability to more senior levels of the organization, and improving Web standards compliance.

What Web Governance means for the organization:

Web Governance refers to the way people make decisions about the
organizational Web presence. It determines who gets to sit around the table when those decisions are made and who has final decision making authority when consensus cannot be had through discussion. Web Governance also includes writing Web-specific polices that will reduce risk to the organization, and forming appropriate teams to write the Web standards that will raise the quality of the organizational Web presence.

If organizations implement Web Governance, have a Web Strategy, a sensible and unified approach to Web content and application development, and effectively measure Web performance, the organizational Web presence can be a great asset and not a liability.

Web Governance Framework

The Web Governance Framework specifies the organizational mechanisms through which Web Governance related policies and standards are set, maintained, and enforced. Ideally, the Web Governance Framework should be emplaced by a formalized mandate from senior management. A Web Governance Framework specifies who provides inputs and who makes decisions related to the various aspects Web operations, from non-technical communications focused-concerns such as the design of Web sites to highly technical such as load balancing and network security.

What a Web Governance Framework means for the organization:

Having a Web Governance Framework helps minimize and settle internal Web site ownership disputes and can smooth the relationship between Marketing Communications, IT, and various departmental Web stakeholders. This turns the focus to managing Web sites instead of arguing about them. Because the framework holds senior strategically-focused organizational leaders, mid-level program and line of business managers, and Web subject matter experts, it provides a structure to align the strategic and tactical needs and concerns of the organizational Web presence. This ensures that the management of the Web is properly orchestrated and conducted in accord with both organizational needs and website-user needs.

Web Policy

Web Policy refers to a set of legal, compliance-related, editorial and technical constraints for Web development. A mature approach to establishing Web Policy considers the full range of Web-based interactions an organization can have with the world and considers what constraints and practices may need to be put into place in order to protect the organization from risk, ensure that the organization is in compliance with any relevant regulatory concerns, and otherwise operating within the bounds of the law and good practices.

What Web Policy means for the organization:

Web policies guide the organizational Web team by putting into place the constraints of Web development. These constraints are mandatory: meaning that all that those who develop content, data, and applications for the Web must abide by these policies whether those developers are part of an in-house Web team or an outsourced vendor team, or are casual contributors to the site via interactive software. Most organizations have an incomplete set of Web policies that may focus on security and privacy concerns or a set of best practices or Web Standards (see below) that may masquerade as Web Policy. Web Policy is best set at a fairly senior level of the organization with the guidance of key senior Web subject matter experts.

Web Standards

Web Standards describe specific parameters, limits, and exceptions for the development of Web products. It provides explicit protocols to be used by those creating content, data, and applications for the Web. Web Standards should cover design and editorial, information organization and access, Web tool and application, and network and server infrastructure concerns. Standards differ from "guidelines" in that they must be adhered to and they differ from standard operating procedures in that they do not specify deep procedures or workflows that may be utilized when developing for the Web.

What Web Standards mean for the organization:

Having a codified and enforceable set of Web standards helps raise
consistency and quality which can contribute to a better user experience. Complete Web Standards also improve the internal Web development environment by reducing the opportunity for conflicting editorial, structural, or technical approaches to Web development. The practice of establishing Web Standards provides an opportunity to bring together often competing Web stakeholders in a forum where disparate needs and production practices can be aired, aligned, and replaced by a consistent and effective set of Standards. Web Standards are best set by a team of Web experts with informed input from all organizational Web stakeholders.

Stump the Consultant

Lisa Welchman — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 10:20:53 -0800

Web Teams Should Stand Alone

Lisa Welchman — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 07:08:41 -0800

Lisa Welchman asserts in this Econtent Magazine column that Web teams deserve their own functional area, separate from and equal to marketing and IT.

The Second Revolution: Why the UK Government Beats the US Government on the Web

Lisa Welchman — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 07:34:44 -0800

Last week I had the pleasure of attending the Web4Dev conference at the United Nations (UN). I was speaking on Web Governance best practices with a great panel of folks. Just 5 years ago, trying to get anyone to consider establishing formal Web Governance was quite a challenge. So, the entire morning was very satisfying for me. You can check it out on UN TV. The session was moderated by Julius Gwyer who is the Web Governance Officer for The World Bank. There were a lot of great speakers and case studies presented but by far the most compelling talk for me was the keynote given by Dr. David Pullinger who is Head of Digital Policy for the UK government.

Having worked on Web management and Web Governance issues for US government Web sites for many, many years, I was eager to hear the talk from Dr. Pullinger regarding the UK government's Web site consolidation. I remember in early 2007 hearing how the UK government had decided to close the majority of its Web sites and funnel traffic and content to a set of core Web sites focused on the needs of citizens and businesses. Subsequently, I've heard some anecdotes about the implementation of the plan but not a formal report. Dr. Pullinger's report last week addressed both the genesis of the strategy and the status of the implementation.

The guiding principle behind the UK efforts is that citizens and businesses should not have to understand the bureaucratic organizational structure of the national government in order to find information or otherwise have their needs met online. Dr. Pullinger also explained the motivations behind the formal policies for the Governmental Web consolidations. It was then reported that the UK government has been closing more than one Web site per day since 2006 for a total of 696 site to date.

If the guiding principle behind the UK Web site consolidation sounds familiar to some, it is because some of strategies and tactics that came from the interpretation of the US E-gov Act of 2002 are very similar. In fact, the UK Directgov Web site is analogous in many ways to USA.gov and the UK Businesslink is also analogous to Business.gov in the US. To be fair, though, I must point out a key difference between the UK sites and the US sites: for the most part, the US sites act as a portal linking out to other sites instead of consuming the content of other sites; the UK approach is to shut down sites, normalize the content, and perform a strong contextualizing editorial function by actively placing links to that content in appropriate places on their one-stop sites. Admittedly, a big difference. And, interesting debates could be had regarding which approach is more effective. I think both approaches can work if well executed.

But the key point that determines whether either national approach will be well executed lies not in what is trying to be achieved but in the governments’ levels of seriousness about Web management and Web Governance in particular. I think that the UK will be more successful than the US when it comes to government Web site quality because the UK is strategically managing and governing the Web, the US is not. The UK let 1,000 Web flowers bloom, noticed it was a weed patch and started pruning. The US let 1,000 Web flowers bloom and is just letting it all grow wild, to the detriment of those trying to get information or otherwise interact with government.

Most recently US government Web growth is being made under the guise of “transparency” as communications-focused US government Web managers cling to easy-to-implement Web 2.0 technologies. I’m all for open communication and the transparency of government, but making new Web sites or layering bloated, poorly organized sites with a new face of Web 2.0 isn’t meeting the mission. Citizens and businesses need clear, easy access to information and services from governmental organizations on the Web. That must be the priority.

Of course, it’s easier to start up a new venture then to police and correct an overburdened, poorly-managed large Web site. I understand the temptation to flee to the brave new world of Web 2.0 and abandon or ignore the low quality Web 1.0 sites. But that’s the easy way out, and the way that leaves citizens and businesses short-changed. There is a lot of valuable information on those sites. There is Information that citizens need in order to make decisions related to their family's health and education, and information that businesses need to operate legally. Transparency includes providing easy access to these deep repositories of information as well as the more interactive capabilities of the currently popular Web 2.0 technologies.

Upholding this agenda requires coordination and cooperation of Web stakeholders across the US government and that requires leadership. The US government needs to establish a framework for Web site decision making, establish clear Web policies, provide direction for Web standards, and recommend best practice for the management of federal Web sites. This can not be a grassroots effort but must be a formal effort. The Web Content Managers Forum and the Federal Web Managers Council are excellent starts. But there needs to be a higher-level effort to establish government-wide Web Governance-- not just mechanisms to ensure effective Web Governance in individual departments, offices and agencies.

The leadership for this government-wide Web Governance effort must come from the top. Whether that is the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) or the White House is of no real importance. Relying on government agencies and departments to police themselves when it comes to Web quality and Web policy compliance is not a strategy but wishful thinking. This has been shown by the lack of compliance to already existing Web-related laws and regulations. There are no enforcement mechanisms and no realistic guidance given regarding how government Web site managers are to uphold policies. Formal Web Governance would provide both of these.

The Web is new. Managing a set of Web sites as large as the set of sites the US government manages is a new practice and needs to be examined and best practices established.

The US would do well to follow the UK lead and conduct an audit of US sites and create an informed senior task-force to establish formal Web Governance practices, draft a strategy to clean up the waste US government agencies have left on the Web, and set the agenda for more informed, higher quality Web development moving forward.

Dumbing It Up: Explaining Web Site Management to Senior Leadership

Lisa Welchman — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 18:06:42 -0800

Web Tools & Rules

Lisa Welchman — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 13:16:04 -0800

I'm really excited that on April 6th, Tony Byrne, Founder of CMS Watch, and I will be giving a class which focuses on advanced topics in Web Management. The class will be held in Washington, DC and is called Web Tools & Rules: Beyond the Basics. We'll be focusing on Web Governance (that's the rules part) and Web Analytics Tools. We'll also do a little bit of Web tools and Web Governance basics in the morning to level out the knowledge field for everyone. So, even if you don't think you are "beyond the basics," come anyway. We'll also have time for active questions and answers about some of the topics you may find immediately challenging.

We picked these two areas because we feel that, given the state of the economy, it's important for organizations to manage their Web sites in a mature manner such as implementing proper Web Governance practices,which helps to reduce internal redundancies and the waste associated with ongoing turf battles regarding Web ownership; and, focusing on proper measurement and the tools required to achieve that end. Understanding what your users want, what they are doing on your Web site and the value and risk that brings to your business is a key factor when consider how much to invest in some the latest Web technologies.

Tony and I have collaborated on various consulting engagements since 2001, but this is the first time we'll be teaching a joint class and I'm excited about that. It's one of those things we've been talking about doing for years and have finally gotten around to doing.

I hope that those in the DC area (and anyone else who wants to visit the US Nation's capitol) will sign up for the class. It's always fun working with Tony. And I think that our combined areas of expertise will provide participants with a complete view of the current Web management landscape - both tools and rules.

Hope to see you there!

Web Tools & Rules

Lisa Welchman — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 06:18:31 -0800

Managing the Web: The Fundamentals of Web Operations Management Pre-Conference Workshop

Lisa Welchman — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 17:57:58 -0800

It’s Time to Manage the Web

Lisa Welchman — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 07:25:15 -0800

I’m excited because today the Internet Strategy Forum (ISF) released its 2009 Corporate Internet Executive Report. WelchmanPierpoint underwrote this research because we believe that 15 years into mainstream Web adoption, organizations are still treating the Web as if it were some cool new gadget. We believe that 15 years is enough time for playing around. The Web needs to be managed.

Talking about “management” as it relates to the Web does not make me a popular lady, especially today when the focus is on Web 2.0 and innovating through Web-based technology. While I am a huge advocate for innovation and change, I assert that organizations will be unable to fully leverage the power of Web-based technologies if they do not properly manage their Web infrastructure. Management does not mean stifling creativity or communication. It means providing an appropriate administrative and technical foundation so that Web content contributors and developers can be free to collaborate and spin the Web without putting themselves, their organizations or the public at risk. It’s about risk mitigation and quality control. Those aren't sexy words but they're important when it comes down to the bottom line.

The ISF research provides valuable insights into the challenges facing Internet Strategists (those top tier folks who run the Web) in all types of organizations. Based on the findings and our experience working with large, complex Web sites for over a decade, we believe that organizations can make a giant leap forward and create competitive advantage by supporting and rewarding those who lead the Web in their organization and thereby appropriately supporting the development of the Web for their organization.

According to the research, many top-tier Web professionals feel under-supported. They feel that their pleas to senior management for fiscal support fall on deaf ears. And, what’s worse than a lack of financial and human resources, many feel that the most senior management of the organization do not support their efforts to manage the Web strategically. What we hear in the trenches most often is that the C-Suite just doesn't "get it."

This must change. Can we make 2009 the year the Web grew up? Or, are we going to continue on this dead-end path?

Take a look at the survey results. You can download a free 4 page brief here on our site. Or check out the full report (and the ISF) on their Web site.

Keynote Address: A Gossamer Ceiling for Corporate Internet Executives?

Lisa Welchman — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 09:01:45 -0800

Managing the Web: The Fundamentals of Web Operations Management Pre-Conference Tutorial

Lisa Welchman — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 08:53:40 -0800

Managing the Web in a Recession

Lisa Welchman — Mon, 19 Jan 2009 04:11:17 -0800

Now that the year is in full swing, we're starting to hear murmurings from our clients that their Web budgets are being cut. In the United States, most cite the recession as the impetus behind Web budget cuts. We think that cutting Web budgets with other operational expenses is an error. Take a look at our paper “Managing the Web in a Recession” for our take on the special role organizational Web sites play during financially difficult times and why this is the time to exploit the capabilities of the Web.

It Could Happen to the Web

Lisa Welchman — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 05:22:01 -0800

This morning I saw this piece of news on the National Security Archive Web site. The National Security Archive is a an independent non-governmental research institute and library located at The George Washington University in the US.

Apparently the White House has not been doing stellar email records management. This issue was first surfaced last year and has reached its culmination in the courts. So, now, White House employees must allow their desktop computers to be searched for the missing emails from 2003-2005. And this statement has surfaced:

"The White House admitted it did nothing to stop people working in the White House from disposing of memory sticks, CDs, DVDs and zip drives that may have been the sole copies of missing e-mails on them."

When I first read about this issue last year, I remember noting that the same thing could happen around Web content. Look at the statement below and fill it in for your own organization:

(Your organization) admitted it did nothing to stop people working on its Web site from disposing of memory sticks, CDs, DVDs and zip drives that may been the sole copies of missing (Web content) on them.

Sound like a familiar story? Let's hope that organizational Web Managers and Web Records managers, particularly those under special constraints by the law (like Federal Web Managers), take this as a wake up call.

Managing the Web in a Recession

Lisa Welchman — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 13:45:57 -0800

On December 1, 2008, the National Bureau of Economic Research indicated that a recession began in the United States in December of 2007. While many economic experts and pundits had been speaking of recession for over a year, the official pronouncement, coming on the heels of one of the worst economic downturns in U.S. history, has left many organizations vulnerable and, in some cases, fundamentally at risk or irreparably damaged. Whether an organization is for-profit, non-profit, or governmental, it is now bracing itself for the possibility of being forced to meet or exceed its business goals and objectives with fewer human and financial resources.

What This Reduction Means for Organizational Web Managers and Web Sites
Traditional business wisdom recommends that organizations either maintain or increase investments in their marketing and sales efforts during a recession. Doing so, the recommendation asserts, helps maintain or increase brand recognition. In addition, it maintains or increases market share for products and services, or otherwise supports other organization objectives. In short, investing in Marketing and Sales helps an organization sharpen its competitive advantage. However, the same camps that offer this “spend more on marketing” advice also indicate that it’s important to examine an organization’s core operational expenses and reduce costs...

Download attachment below for full text version.

Pushing the Football Down the Web

Lisa Welchman — Sun, 11 Jan 2009 08:20:18 -0800

As is often the case with me, let me start out with a disclaimer: I know next to nothing about American football. What I do know I learned from downloading “Football for Dummies” to my Kindle and reading half of the introduction. That said, I watched an entire football game yesterday because my son wanted me to and, living in Baltimore, I felt moderately inclined to support the Baltimore Ravens in their attempt to reach the Super Bowl. Why do they call it the “Super Bowl?” I looked on Wikipedia and the answer of why the Super Bowl is called the Super Bowl makes about as much sense to me as the game of football.

What I can say is that the game has changed since I was a girl. When I was a girl, there was a lot more butt slapping and arm punching. Now, it seems, that congratulations are given via chest bumps, jumping on people, and (I think this part is the same) back-slapping by coaches. There are more hugs too, and tears, come to think of it. That’s nice.

But what’s really different about football is the existence of the NFL Web site.

Despite my football ignorance, you can tell a lot about the game from the site. Like, there are two sides, just like in the U.S. presidential election. There are the “Blue Teams” and they are called the National League and then there are the “Red Teams” and they are called the American League. I can’t tell if there is a Football Electoral College though. After the Super Bowl is over, do all the coaches and retired players get together and decide who really won? If there is a tie, do the Hall of Famers act as Super Delegates and cast the deciding votes?

But, back to the NFL Web site.

Like the game it promotes, the NFL site is busy with a very complicated playbook of e-commerce, RSS, streaming media, photos, stats, blogs. That seems to make sense. The game is complicated too. And, I’ve got to say the on-site play-by-play coverage was much more fascinating to me than the game itself. Of course, I’ve seen this type of real-time push technology before (at least I hope it was push technology). The online play-by-play consisted of a mini football field some bars and x’s, and real words underneath explaining what happened (what are on air sportscasters talking about?). It all looked like a Gantt chart with words and tasks under it. That I can understand. But this little tidbit of functionality was extra fun: there must have been some kind of 5 second broadcast lag because I managed to astonish my son several times by being very accurate about calling the play before it occurred. “Yeah, I bet he’ll only make it to the 43 yard line.”

So the site had the full playbook of structured content authoring and delivery. I like structured content. That’s why I like the Web 2.0 technology trend so much. Everyone thinks it’s all about freedom and collaboration and it is…but that’s freedom of expression. The structure of every blog is about the same. Posts, comments, sharing, permalinks, et al. You turn them on, you turn them off but it’s a pretty limited world of interactions. It’s that very structure and control that allows such broad participation. Structure and control allow the Web 2.0 game to be played. We've all got the playbook and the rules and standards and we just go at it.

I'm sure the NFL Web team has their problems. All Web sites are held together with a few smart people and a lot of wishful thinking. And, it appears that the NFL site might not be much different. After I got tired of being a Football seer with my son (actually he looked over my shoulder and I was outed), I went out of bounds and started looking at the Web page source code. When looking at the source code on the home page, I found this tell-tale comment:

“//moved all the functions into s_code_common.js until we can overhaul this atrocity”

Oh well. Like the Tennessee Titans, we all have our atrocious moments.

Lisa Welchman's 2009 Web Management Predictions

Lisa Welchman — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 06:22:55 -0800

It's the end of the year. So, I think I'm supposed to predict some things that will happen in 2009. Here are four predictions that are really just self-serving wishes but that's OK. They are not just self-serving but everybody-serving:

CEOs and CIOs will finally pick up the clue phone that has been ringing off the hook for the last 10 years and figure out that the true information age has arrived and start funneling resources that were once dedicated to more "traditional" paper-based collateral and information asset development into pure-play digital information (you know, the stuff that will never hit paper). Web people will be worshiped for the deitites that they are and given huge pay increases.
Zero Waste Content Management will prevail: The economic downturn that is happening in lots of places globally will force organizations to stop being sloppy about Web management practices. It's expensive to run 8 different Web content management systems to support a single site. It's wasteful to sit around fighting with colleagues about who "owns" the Web site instead of spending that same time making a better Web site.
Getting Outed: Some organizations will get busted for having a bad Web site. I'm not talking about the server going down or a little news article outing them for unfindable content that blows over quickly. I'm talking about being outed for creating risk to customers or citizens by having conflicting or outdated information on their Web site. Am I wishing this on someone? Maybe.
Peace and Love will Prevail between IT and Marketing: Information Technology departments and Marketing Communications teams will join hands, sway, and sing Kumbayah around their Web sites. Finally. The Chief Information Officer will look deeply in the eyes of the Chief Marketing Officer and say: "I love ya (wo)man!" Am I wishing this on someone? Yes!

Web Governance

Lisa Welchman — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 10:19:18 -0800

Your Cheatin' Art

Lisa Welchman — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 04:18:29 -0800

I never cheated in school. Never. I slacked from time to time, but no cheating. I thought that was the norm - but apparently not. My mind has been overwhelmed by all the governmental and corporate lying, cheating and stealing being exposed via the media. Seems like a new story everyday. But it was extra sad to read this article by Charles Euchner in "The American ." According to some of the statistics in the article, we seem to be breeding a generation of cheaters. The central example in this article is about plagiarized or written-for-hire Art History research papers. According to Mr. Euchner, these types of cheating practices have been made more attractive and tempting by the expedient and impersonal nature of the Web. Apparently professors and teachers are fighting back. They are using various Web-based technologies to catch the cheating students.

There are a lot of interesting legal, moral and philosophical issues to consider in this high-tech cheating scenario, but what captures my attention are the policy-related solutions universities and colleges are considering to help control these burgeoning cheating practices. Solutions range from establishing honor boards and honor codes to stiffening the consequences for cheating. While this might help some, all educational organizations might want to consider examining the basic definition of what constitutes cheating within the context of what has been made possible by new technologies.

In my experience, a lot of organizations, including educationally focused ones, have underestimated the need for deep policy revision as it relates to the use of Web-based technologies. The invention of the World Wide Web offers a serious movable type-type change in information dissemination and communications. This milestone, at the very least, warrants the establishment of an organizational policy task force. This task force would examine how policies and standards may be impacted by the new types of communications and transactions now possible given the existence of the Web. Subsequently, policy revisions should be made to ensure that colleges and universities are protecting their own interests and the interests of those they educate.

And one small tip: when reconsidering policies, universities and colleges should make sure that the room isn't full of only attorneys, Deans, and other ivory tower types, but also students and technologists who can "school" these academics on Cheating 2.0 and the other twenty-first century possibilities of the Web.

Managing the Web: The Fundamentals of Web Operations Management

Lisa Welchman — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 18:38:27 -0800

Europeana User Inexperience

Lisa Welchman — Sat, 22 Nov 2008 05:24:28 -0800

I hate to wag a finger and say "tsk tsk ." Well, I don't really hate to but I know people hate a blabber-mouth-know-it-all-busy-body. So, I try to limit it as much as possible. HOWEVER, when I saw this article about the crashing of the new Europeana Web site, I felt I had no choice.

I love the Europeans. A few weeks ago when I was in Europe on a brief trip, they were very nice to me. But, it's not just me that loves the Europeans. Lots of people love the Europeans. But, especially, the Europeans love the Europeans. So, the Europeans should have known that if they put up a Web site about The Europeans, that lots of people would want to go look at it. That's just Lisa's common sense Web site visitor analysis.

But, let's push common sense aside and be slightly more scientific. One of the cornerstones of sound Web Operations is Web Measurement. From where we sit, Web Measurement has three basic components:

Web Usability Program
Strategic Business Metrics
Web Analytics

With all due respect, The Europeans messed up here by not attending proactively to arenas of Web Usability and some of the basic aspects of Web Analytics. Simply put, they could have found out what kind of interest the world might have in the Europeana Web site by conducting some basic focus groups, a questionnaire perhaps, asking stray Europeans on the street and some Americans too--since, American Web-clicking seemed to have contributed to the servers crashing. Then they wouldn't have been so surprised at what happened on their servers, maybe.

You know, Europeans have those good French Fries with mayonnaise. I would have gone to a focus group about Europeana if they served French Fries with mayonnaise or something else European like wine, or small servings of tasty and sexy looking food on nice plates.

After finding out that lots of people would go to the Web site to download the Mona Lisa, they should have then thought about how many hits per hour their Web network and server infrastructure was going to have to support and built accordingly. This didn't happen. Or, maybe it happened and they didn't do a good job .

I'm not going to comment on the user experience of the Europeana Web site itself because, at this writing, I can't get on the Web site because it's down. But it seems to me that being able to get on the Web site would be a Web Usability fundamental. Call me crazy.

If I seem a little harsh, I'm sorry. But, I must say that I feel a little betrayed. This, from the place where you can take a train from top to bottom on a single ticket? This, from the place where people wear tailored clothes? This from the place of superior, moody films? This from the land of chocolate truffles!

This, from the land of The Europeans?

Tsk- Tsk.

The Webmaster is Dead - and Good Riddance!

Lisa Welchman — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 08:27:41 -0800

When at the jboye08 Conference in Aarhus last week, I uttered the sentence: "The Webmaster is Dead." I knew that couldn't be an original statement. So, I searched around and found that a few folks had already started the Webmaster swan song years ago. There is this 2006 post from Control-Escape. The post laments the demise of the jack-of-all-trades, do-it-all Webmaster. You can almost hear the heart-breaking violins swelling in the background. Yes, there is still room for everyone to be their own do-it-all Webmaster. But organizations with substantive mission critical Web sites must take a more sophisticated approach.

So, then, I uncovered this post from Françoise Nonnenmacher who said in 2001:

"With only one home page and many different purposes, the web site needs a real manager, not only to take care of the unity of the look and feel (interfacing with the marketing team) and the smooth rollout of new content and services (managing the technology), but also to ensure that the site is always valuable for its visitors."

I like Françoise's statement.

What a great description of a Web Product Manager-- the 21st centuries' "Webmaster." I suggest we kill the term Webmaster. The term has outlived its usefulness. It is quaint. And, for those of us that have held the job title, harkens back to a very exciting time where we pretty much did whatever we wanted in our own little sandbox--just like children. Well, it's time for the Webmaster to grow up, dust off the sand, and start managing the Web. Let's put the term "Webmaster" to rest. Respectfully put it in the WWW Hall of Fame along with the blink tag, and the giant, clickable image map homepage.

Building an Effective Web Team

Lisa Welchman — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 13:27:21 -0700

So, on Sunday, I'm off to Aarhus, Denmark to participate in the jboye08 conference. This is one of my favorite events of the year for a variety of reasons-- most of which have to do with the the other speakers and participants. There's always an interesting, international mix of speakers. And, the participants are derived largely from jboye's communities of practice in Denmark. So, they are educated about Web Operations Management and ask really great questions.

This year I'll be giving a pre-conference tutorial on Building an Effective Web Team. Over the years I've seen Web Teams in all shapes and sizes, from the lone Webmaster to large, dedicated Web Divisions with scores of employees. But when looking at all of these different manifestations, I've discovered that there are four key functions that must be covered in order to properly manage a Web site:

Administrative Program Management - responsible for ensuring funding, administrative support, and management for Web Program;
Product Management - responsible for designing and driving the Web presence in a consistent manner that meets the organization’s goals;
Web Infrastructure Management - responsible for maintaining the set of standards, tools and applications which support the day to day operations of the site; and,
Managed Publishing - responsible for outreach, communications, training and technical support of all Web contributors.

I'll be discussing each of these facets in depth next week in the tutorial and also sitting on an expert panel with Martin White from Intranet Focus and Nicolai Porsbo from the Danish Broadcasting Corporation.

Should be lots of fun!

If you can't make it all the way to Aarhus, check out or Web Team Intensive. It's a quick way to iron out the kinks in your own Web Team and you don't have to go all the way to Aarhus!

Are Web 2.0 Technologies the Mortgage-backed Securities of the Internet?

Lisa Welchman — Thu, 23 Oct 2008 09:31:01 -0700

Let me be clear at the beginning: I do not dislike the “Web.0s.” I am wary of them. That’s different than not liking them. I’m excited by the possibilities of the maturing Web. I want to lean into the expanding Web with Twittering, wiki-ing, cloud computing abandon, and tap dance across the Semantic Web in a beaded gown.

But, I can’t.

I used to think that my neutrality on the Web.0 matters was an indication that I’m getting old. But now, while in the cold bath of a global economic meltdown, I’m re-evaluating my wet dishrag attitude toward Web 2.0, Web 3.0 and the ever-looming nirvana of the Semantic Web. They are powerful. They scare me and just like the too-good-to-be-true mortgages we had here in the USA, the new Web.0s promise a sort of Utopian world of collaboration and sharing that seems like it too could end badly. Especially if we don’t tend to and honor the fundamentals of Web Management.

Before I go on, let me give you some more background about me, so you know a little more about where I’m coming from. I am a semantic geek. I got a degree in philosophy in college-- but not the soul wrenching existential kind of philosophy where you wonder about yourself and get depressed. That kind of philosophy is for humanities sissies.

I studied metaphysics, specifically ontology, and semantics and philosophy of language. I had a boyfriend in college not because of my enormous wit and other questionable charms but because I knew what a Turing Machine was (and had an opinion about it). And, more importantly, the work I do on the Web is all about “the bones”: infrastructure process, governance, classification and structure, clarity and precision. How do you deliver the right “stuff” to the right person, at the right time, down the delivery channel of their preference, with style and quality so organizations can make money or further their agenda or whatever they are looking to do? That’s the cool stuff to do on the Web. Thinking about Web design all day is for sissies.

Given this background you would think I’d be all over the Web.0s. And I would be, except I think some folks are getting on board a little too quickly for my taste, without first tending to the Web Fundamentals. Web 2.0 as it’s done in a lot of organizations is built on a Web infrastructure that doesn’t respect the fundamentals of Web management or relies heavily on the movement or actions of forces which are beyond an organization’s control. It seems foolhardy, unnecessary and at times reckless for folks to jump into Web 2.0 and Web 3.0 when they can’t even do Web 1.0 soundly.

We work with organizations that don’t really know what is on their Web site or are struggling to harness the actions of their internal Web development teams. Their Web sites have taken on a life of their own. The sites are OUT OF CONTROL. Hundreds of thousands or millions of pages and content objects. Thousands of applications. It’s like the site has become The Borg and it’s sucking in content and applications and assimilating them into some undefinable entity that is minimally within the organization’s control. Then, the Web Team or someone in senior leaderships turns and looks at us and says wistfully: “We want to do Web 2.0. How can we do that?”

Organizations are jumping on the social media train without stopping to understand fully the consequences of deploying those powerful technologies. And even if the consequences are understood, few are able to deploy and maintain the technologies with any sense of quality or compliance. In going ahead and moving forward anyway, they are exposing their organizations to the risks of brand degradation, lost credibility, and in some cases, legal liability. It’s one thing (maybe) for an individual to expose themselves on the Web and quite another for an organization to do so. It is irresponsible.

So, enough griping. What are the fundamentals of the Web Management? Here’s my offering, my stab at what ought to be considered some good Web Management Fundamentals. The stuff you should just do, like save regularly, have 3 months worth of expenses in an account you can access easily, living within your means, and having an age-appropriate balanced investment portfolio.

1. There should be some relationship between any piece of content or application on a Web site and a strategic organizational objective. This is true for intranets, extranets, and Internet Web sites. If it’s not helping to get some quantifiable job done, take it off the Web.

2. An organization should always know what people and what systems are controlling its Web presence, and be aware of and manage its identity in the Web cloud. Minimally, an organization must understand who is controlling and making strategic and tactical decisions for Web sites. More difficult, but equally essential, is being aware of your organizations’ place and identity and reputation in the global Web cloud. Organizations can not afford to find out via the media that their sites contain flawed information or that they are being flamed off or mis-quoted in some obscure corner of the Web by an irate customer on some blog.

3. An organization should maintain high quality standards for Web content, data and applications, and build the internal management infrastructure to deliver to that standard. The days of doing the Web on the cheap with a couple smart young Web geeks in the corner is gone. Get a real manager to run the Web Division, fund the Web program, staff your Web team properly, and product manage your Web properties.

4. Understand what you’re getting for your efforts. Organizations need to get a solid return on investment for their efforts. The return need not be monetary but it ought to be appropriate to tactics derived from the strategic organizational objective. The most effective way to measure and evaluate the effectiveness of what you are doing on the Web is to measure the efficiency of your development process and technical delivery systems, and measure the satisfaction of your customers and users. Then determine your level of success, monetary or soft based on numbers, not coolness of the final product. If it’s not hitting the target, change.

I would say if you’ve got these 4 basics well in hand then you can afford to get starry eye’d about Web 2.0 and Web 3.0. If not, don’t expose yourself to the collaboration game. You're not likely to win. The price is too high. Go back to the fundamentals.

Back to Fundamentals

Lisa Welchman — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 05:52:43 -0700

Fundamentally, what we do for our clients is not particularly complicated. When someone in my family asks me what I do for a living, I say: We help organizations apply traditional, tried and true business practices to Web site management. At the end of the business day, organizations are trying to sell, inform, educate, influence-- you name it. The fundamental objectives are the same as they have always been. And fundamental rules of engagement still apply.

If you detach strategy from execution, your (Web) product will miss the mark
If you don't know who's in charge of governing (Web) product development, then different offices and divisions will create development redundancy and waste time and resources arguing about who's supposed to be setting the agenda for the Web.
If you produce a low quality (Web) product, you will put your organization's bottom line at risk. Whether that bottom line is fiscally tangible or something else like organizational credibility.
If you don't measure the quality of your products, your customers' satisfaction with your products, and the return on investment for product development, you are likely to spend too much and gain too little.

What we do: "Web Operations Management"-- is just a fancy way of saying "sound operational practices." Any business artifact ought to be conceived, managed, developed and measured with an eye towards quality and effectiveness. Take away Web 2.0. Take away earning billions with e-commerce. Take away the information super highway. How about: on the mark strategically, governed properly, quality execution and well-measured. The rest of the stuff, like Web 2.0 and 3.0 will fall in where it ought to and when it ought to.

So, for those out there who are still flying by the seat of their pants when it comes to Web site management and running for the next, coolest Web trick, wake up, look at the current outcomes in the global economy and learn something. While I won't pretend that a poorly managed, short-sighted Web site management will bring down the global economy, it could bring down your business.

Cutting off the Long Tail

Lisa Welchman — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 06:44:43 -0700

Let me say upfront that I have absolutely no problem with long tails. When I was a girl, I had a pet poodle and despite all the pet owner peer pressure to have her tail bobbed, we didn’t do it. I had a poodle with a long tail. So, I’m all about the long tail. Except when it comes to most Web sites. Most Web sites need their long tails cut off.

I studied the Pareto Distribution in college enough to know that I didn’t want to be a statistician. Nonetheless, I was interested to see the concept pop up in Chris Anderson’s well-known 2004 Wired article . Basically, the concept is that given any large set of information, the usage pattern will be structured such that a small percentage of the information will be used regularly and a large percentage of the content will be used infrequently. Most people call it the 80-20 rule.

Chris Anderson’s point was that, for organizations that sell media and entertainment online, this could be and is turning out to be a financial boondoggle as Web shoppers start to buy obscure albums, old TV show episodes, etc. online. This gives online media stores a competitive advantage over the traditional brick and mortar stores. Lots of online stores carry no physical inventory. So, they can afford to store and sell lots of titles that even your local Barnes and Noble or Borders can not cost effectively get on their gargantuan but finite sales floor.

Chris Anderson even wrote a book on this I must say I haven’t read yet. That book is in the long tail of the pile of books next to my bed. But my point isn’t to argue with anything Chris has to say. What gets my goat is how Web Managers use the long tail concept to explain away grossly bloated, poorly maintained Web sites. Web sites that don’t sell anything, don’t add much value to the organization and sometimes are so messed up that they are a liability.

Most organizations like to speak politely of their basically trashed up Web sites as Web sites with “Long Tails.” Here’s how the conversation goes:

Innocent Web surfer lost on a Web site: Gee, there sure seems to be a lot of irrelevant stuff from 1998 on this Web site. Wow! Look at these pictures from the 2000 Holiday party…that guy sure looks like he had too much to drink!

Web Manager: Oh, no…that’s not irrelevant stuff or embarrassing photos. It’s a “Long Tail.”

Innocent Web surfer lost on a Web site: Whew! That makes me fee better. I feel a lot better being lost in a cool sounding thing like a “Long Tail.” Before I talked to you, I just thought I was on a messed-up Web site.

Don’t get me wrong. A non-ecommerce Web site with a long tail can be of value-- particularly if the site has structured, categorized, searchable and retrievable information. That’s a fancy pants way of saying that people can actually find what they’re looking for.

But, we know that’s not most Web sites.

For most Web sites, the “long tail” just amounts to a bunch of junk. Most organizations running around talking about their “long tail” just have a bunch of outdated information and tools on their Web server they never got around to removing: an accumulated mass of yesterday’s Web content and applications which usually make for a bad user experience and increased liability for the organization. Calling it a “long tail” is just putting lipstick on a pig. If you are an organizational Web Manager, you know what’s lurking on that server. Find the garbage and get it off before one of your customers or competitors finds it.

Building an Effective Web Team Pre-Conference Tutorial

Lisa Welchman — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 13:09:54 -0700

Web Operations Management and Web 2.0: An Interview with Lisa Welchman

Lisa Welchman — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 09:21:34 -0700

David Hobbs interviews Lisa Welchman about the strategic importance Web Operations Management and its relationship to Web 2.0 on The Content Wrangler's site.

Welcome to WelchmanPierpoint

Lisa Welchman — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 12:36:29 -0700

It feels like 1996 or so which is when we still used to put things like "Welcome to our Web site" on homepages. But, I think "welcome" is the appropriate message here; we've got a whole new Web site and a whole new name!

We've spent the last few months or so having to follow some of our own recommended best practices when it comes to Web design, governance, information architecture, Web strategy, and CMS implementation. We also broke some of those rules and paid the price.

Not only did we bring our existing site into the 21st century in its look and functionality but we also changed our name. Welchman Consulting is now WelchmanPierpoint. I've been working with Christine Pierpoint for the last three years and last year was happy to make her a partner in the business. We also brought on 5 other people last year and haven't looked back. So look everyone up in the "Our Team" section of the site. I think we've got a great group.

We may have grown but the core driver for the business is the same as ever: helping people manage their Web sites. Fifteen years into mainstream Web adoption, folks are still having trouble figuring out how to manage their Web sites-- the basics. Over the years I've been gathering together a core set of best practices for Web management and we've pulled them all together and established methodologies for a field we call Web Operations Management (WOM). It's an evolving field and one we hope to lead in the years to come. Take a look in the Knowledge Base for the WOM Primer if you are interested in the details. You can also subscribe to our blog feeds and our newsletter. Or, just visit our site regularly to find out if we've learned anything new.

In the coming year we will be partnering with our good friends at CMS Watch to provide online training in Web Operations Management and sponsoring a number of in-person training events as well as our regular set of speaking engagements. So, we hope to see you online and on the road.

Welcome.

Best Practices in Federal Web Governance

Lisa Welchman — Sun, 31 Aug 2008 19:32:26 -0700

Principles of Web Operations Management Pre-Conference Tutorial

Lisa Welchman — Sun, 31 Aug 2008 19:01:21 -0700

Planning for & Evaluating CMSs - How to Get Started

Lisa Welchman — Sun, 31 Aug 2008 18:38:29 -0700

CMS Industry Update

Lisa Welchman — Sun, 31 Aug 2008 18:27:15 -0700

Good Governance: Make Your Website Work

Lisa Welchman — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 19:37:51 -0700

Web 2.0 and Web Operations Keynote Address

Lisa Welchman — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 19:23:43 -0700

Symposium Networking Event

Lisa Welchman — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 19:15:53 -0700

Principles of Web Operations Management (WOM) Pre-Conference Tutorial

Lisa Welchman — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 19:08:20 -0700

Building an Effective Government Web Program

Lisa Welchman — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 19:00:58 -0700

Keynote Address: How Many Webmasters Does it Take to Screw in a Lightbulb?

Lisa Welchman — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 18:58:25 -0700

Web Governance Tutorial: Figuring Out Who is in Charge

Lisa Welchman — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 18:53:05 -0700

Content Management in the Enterprise Keynote Address

Lisa Welchman — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 19:36:51 -0700

Web Governance: Successful Models

Lisa Welchman — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 19:27:00 -0700

Stump the Consultant

Lisa Welchman — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 19:18:50 -0700

Web Governance: What Is It and How It Impacts the Quality of Your Web Site

Lisa Welchman — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 19:09:20 -0700

Principles of Web Operations Management Pre-Conference Tutorial

Lisa Welchman — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 18:57:10 -0700

Why Authors Hate XML

Lisa Welchman — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 18:53:26 -0700

Zero Waste Content Management

Lisa Welchman — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 18:39:45 -0700

How Much Management Does Your Content Need?

Lisa Welchman — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 18:33:54 -0700

Planning and Preparing for a CMS

Lisa Welchman — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 18:14:31 -0700

The Importance of Web Governance

Lisa Welchman — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 18:14:46 -0700

Erik Hartman of Hartman Communicatie interviews Lisa Welchman about her vision of web governance for the Dutch Web site Computable, in anticipation of the Hartman Event on September 18. The original interview in Dutch is available at Computable.

Web Operations Management Primer

Lisa Welchman — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 10:09:28 -0700

Web Operations Management (WOM) as a practice takes Web management out of the arena of daily management, mini-projects, and silo'd technology implementations and moves it into the more mature operations arena.

The Problem

As the broad use of the World Wide Web enters the middle of its second decade, it is becoming increasingly essential for organizations to gain better operational control of their online products and services. Traditionally, organizations of all sizes have managed their Web properties in a largely ad-hoc manner—usually leveraging the expertise of a few highly skilled knowledge workers and technical resources to maintain basic Web site production, editorial, and transactional control. This control extends to such tasks as Web server maintenance, content maintenance, search engine integration, and the establishment of applications that facilitate the perceived mission and/or commerce goals of the organization. This tactical approach to Web management has proven effective to a certain degree, as most organizations have managed to establish and maintain a Web presence when desired.

However, after ten or more years of ad-hoc management, many of these public-facing Web sites do not reflect a high-quality standard. Some sites are even an outright embarrassment or legal liability to organizations as they may contain out-of-date, misleading, or otherwise inaccurate content and broken or poorly architected applications. Currently, few organizations can claim to have or execute effectively on a multi-year Web strategic plan. Sometimes these risks and limitations stem from technical constraints but, more than not, it is due to the lack of consideration given to the Internet and Web within an organization’s overall strategic planning process. The Web is managed as if it were a less important version of a traditional business artifact, i.e., a technically rich brochure or a virtual storefront, rather than being managed as if it were one of the most powerful business tools an organization has to leverage.

Despite the lack of strategic planning, the pervasiveness of the Web as an organizational communications, collaboration, and transactional tool continues and Web content and applications continue to proliferate—with or without senior management and strategic oversight. However, under the guidance of sophomoric management efforts waste runs rampant:

Purchased but unimplemented or poorly implemented Web-related software (content management, search engines, portal, enterprise content management, etc.);
A large commitment of financial and human resources to the development and maintenance of Web products that may or may not be meeting the organization’s strategic objectives; and
Stove-piped and redundant content and applications development.

Outside of the enterprise, there are very few articulated Web management best practices. In particular, there are no best practices in place for learning how to discern:

How well an organization’s Web properties support and promote an organization’s overall strategic objectives
The appropriate framework with which to govern Web properties in order to reduce organizational waste and liability
The correct way to form and staff a Web division responsible for daily Web product management
The best mechanisms to measure the effectiveness and quality of Web products

Some quality attention has been paid to certain aspects related to these concerns. Tactical projects related to software application deployment, graphical user interface design, and search engine optimization most likely are in play, along with many others. But, for the most part, these efforts relate directly to the Web site itself and have less to do with the dynamics and management of personnel and programs within the organizations that are supporting and managing the Web as a product. This lack of emphasis on product management and operations is readily apparent in the general low quality of Web sites and in the pervasive dissatisfaction and frustration of operational Web personnel we see in our consulting practice, across the board in every vertical market.

Largely missing in the arena of Web operations are basic business practices such as business process management, governance, strategic planning, product management and the calculation of return on investment—activities that are the foundation of most other mature product development processes. It is vital that organizations put these basic operational mechanisms into place in order to control and manage their Web products with better quality content and applications, strategic aims, and fiscal control. While the Web and other Internet-based technologies will continue to be prevalent, we believe that organizations that are able to establish operational control and accountability mechanisms for their Web products will have a competitive advantage over organizations that continue to operate what is sometimes a key business asset with little or no strategic intent. That’s because businesses with operational control of their Web products will be able to react more effectively to new, relevant technologies and market demands and opportunities.

Web Operations Management (WOM) is based on the principle that the Web is not a project with a clear beginning and end, but rather is an integral component of an organization’s business operations. Depending on the organization, the Web serves many functions, with marketing, product support, recruitment, customer relationship management, commerce, supply chain management, distribution, and knowledge management being among the most common. WOM as a practice takes Web management out of the arena of daily management, mini-projects, and silo’d technology implementations and moves it into the more mature operations arena. It is here where an organization understands what resources it is investing in its Web products and is allowed to manage those products in a less reactionary and more strategic manner through the application of traditional business planning and budgeting processes.

An effective Web Operations Management approach addresses four separate but interrelated dimensions:

WOM Strategy
Web Governance
Web Execution
Web Measurement

When examined as a set, the range of these four dimensions allows for strategic and operational planning as well as the specific tactics required for the proper development of quality Web products.

WOM Strategy

The translation of high-level organizational mission into actionable and measurable guiding principles for the management of Web properties. Evidence of sound WOM Strategy includes:

Guiding Principles
Metrics
Formalization of Authority

Web Governance

How decisions are made and implemented with respect to the content, data, and applications associated with organization’s Web properties. Evidence of sound Web Governance includes:

Governance Framework
Web Policy
Web Standards

Web Execution

The day-to-day management of the Web product; in particular, the organization of Web teams, the distribution of Web functions and the allocation of resources in support of Web initiatives. Evidence of strong Web Execution includes:

The existence of a Web Division with:
- Administrative Program Management
- Product Management
- Project Management
- Support and Training
- Editorial & Technical Infrastructure Teams
- Managed Publishing

Web Measurement

Ongoing evaluation of the quality, value and strategic success of your Web products. Evidence of sound Web Measurement practices includes:

Web Usability Program
Strategic Business Metrics
Web Site Analytics

Getting Started with WOM

Addressing each of the four dimensions of Web Operations Management in a comprehensive manner will ensure that an organization is actually managing its Web products strategically and is not just “counting hits” and “keeping the site up.” A good place to start is to develop key milestones and objectives for each of the four Web operations dimensions. Here are a few key points to remember when embarking on the development of a WOM Strategy:

Charge Senior Managers with Participation and Guidance –The development and execution of a WOM Strategy is not a function to be taken on by a by a first-line manager or individual contributor. Developing a WOM strategy requires a high-level understanding of the organization’s objectives as well as the managerial authority or influence to effect sweeping process and organizational change across the entire enterprise. Therefore, such tasks should be initiated at the highest level of an organization required to effect real change.

Expect Significant Change – The development and implementation of a WOM Strategy is not a simple undertaking. While understanding the longer-term strategy for Web operational success is crucial before embarking on change, the execution of that full strategy will most likely occur over a number of years. It will also likely include the development of new organizational programs and processes or, at the very least, require the significant modification of existing organizational programs and processes.

Be Prepared for Cultural Backlash – Some effective, mature business practices run counter to “Web culture”—a culture that fosters and promotes constant innovation and a lack of repeatable processes. Senior mangers should be prepared for some resistance to the standardization of certain Web functions in their organization. They should also anticipate the need for putting in place mechanisms that will help retain high-value personnel who may be dissatisfied with the installation of more structured Web-related business processes.

Intranet Governance

Lisa Welchman — Wed, 04 Apr 2007 11:18:13 -0700

In the March/April 2007 issue of Intranets, Lisa Welchman discusses how intranet Web governance tends to be ad hoc though formal Web governance is needed.

So What About Metadata?

Lisa Welchman — Tue, 26 Feb 2002 09:55:05 -0800

These days, it seems that metadata is a term that is bandied about by everyone. What exactly is metadata, why would you want to have it on your Web site and what does it have to do with content management?

Understanding the Complete Web Lifecycle

Lisa Welchman — Tue, 28 Aug 2001 10:02:34 -0700

The amount of time that Web production groups spend not producing is high. A lot of production personnel's time is spent running interference or solving problems that have occurred as a result of a lack of standardized workflow.

The Commercial Web: The Marriage of Marketing and IT

Lisa Welchman — Sat, 28 Jul 2001 09:54:07 -0700

The rise of the commercial Web has forced a new kind of partnership between business Marketing and IT organizations. We discuss how Web content management systems can improve the frequently volatile dynamics of this new union.

Effective Web Content Management: Different Sites, Different Methods

Lisa Welchman — Thu, 28 Jun 2001 11:16:14 -0700

Today, more than ever, there are a number of different products and strategies available for getting your Web content development and production processes streamlined and under control.