ECM What does it mean?

What does Enterprise Content Management (ECM) mean? Technology? Theory?

I have always defined ECM as ….

“The Methods, tools and technologies that enable an organisation to manage, process and deliver content across the enterprise.”

To me the words in this definition are really important, the are not just a glib string of alpha characters. They convey meaning and relationship between people, process and technology. Here is some of the thinking behind the key words.

Methods = Methodology. Whether you are using MIKE2 or your own methodology, firstly it denotes that you are using a method, secondly  it has an assumption that you are competent and a practitioner in the method.

Tools = Business Classification, metadata, security modelling, business process mapping for content., just to name a few. It is the tools that make the content hang together and the tools don’t have to be tied to the technology.

Technology = Microsoft SharePoint, Documentum, OpenText, Alfresco  or your own special flavour of combination thereof.

Enables = Just what it means; The combination of Methods, Tools and Technology “enables”, not fixes or delivers.

And of course the vital component that is implied but not stated is competent and capable people. Both from a business and the ECM practitioner side. Without the people bringing this all together it is rather useless.

Content Everywhere, what do you do with it ?

Yes I do like Apple design it is sleek and really functional. The Apple nano has gone beyond just Video playback, now you can create your own videos.

What do we do with all this digital content. I was talking to my teenager this week showing her my new PDA phone with the 2 MP built in camera and I was thinking then that no matter where you go someone has a camera. Now with the nano we have mobile video as well. With all the digital cameras and now mini video capture out there we must have massive digital crypts in personal computers and hard drives around the world.

Those that are savvy have their pictures hosted up on Flickr or Picassa Web or photobucket and other digital online mechanisms. Now with digital YouTube will be even more essential for storage and maintenance of Personal Video Streams (PVS).

But there is still a vast amount of digital pictures' and now soon to be video that will spend time as the forgotten footage. Information overlaod is not decreasing it is on the rise at an exponential rate.

Insert Map, Search and Post

This is why I love Live Writer. Using Live Writer I click on the insert map do a search for New York and wow map inserted. Don’t like the initial size pull it out larger, done.

This is really easy and very productive. I am not interested in the technical wonderment of blogging anymore, I’m more interested in the content and getting it out there, when I can. Live Writer has really made this possible, it is simple elegant and complete.

I hardly need to go to the blogger web interface anymore and can do my blog entries offline. Would you like to have a look at Live Writer then go to Windows Live Writer website to know more and download, enjoy.

Browse and Search

There are two types of users in the information world. Those who browse and those who search.

The browsers are those that have been brought up on a information diet of File Servers with folder structures. Even though they may spend endless hours getting nowhere they are comfortable with the way that they go about looking for things, because they have always done it this way.

Meanwhile the searchers are frustrated with the inability to Google (or Bing) across the fields of files and folders with a single uber-like query. These users will typically go to a “zone” of where they think the information is and then drill their search from there. Or if they are smart they may use the OHI search engine.

OHI search engines are a highly complex and adaptive set of interconnected nodes powered by the most advanced neural network algorithms currently available.

Namely it is the combination of people connections and the human brain, it is the Office Human Interface.

“Hey Joe where is that document on the sales forecasting from last quarter”; click, whirr, boom, a precision answer is computed and delivered in a split second, or if the data cannot be acquired a reference node (person contact) is linked in for further query. Stunning results !

But in an age where total company time may not exceed 2.5 year on average, search is going to be a big requirement going forward.

My prediction is that with on coming generations Search will become predominate as the browsers retire out and the new collaboration software repositories such as SharePoint become more the norm. 50 years on some will be blogging about “Search and implants”.

Process and People

Once again I have been re reading around Feature Driven Development (FDD). It is an agile software development methodology and one that I like a lot in the world of process.

However I was reminded when I reopened the book “JAVA Modeling Color with UML” by Peter Coad, Eric Lefebvre and Jeff De Luca that process methodology is there to assist in the execution and production of results, not there for the sake of the process itself. After all we are all paid to produce results,  a working product fit for purpose.

Process execution just for the sake of it can soon lead to process pride. Having hundred of steps to execute in any process will soon kill productivity in any project and people will become slaves to the process rather than the process supporting the people to execute and deliver the results we need.

There is a real balance in the “enough process” that requires strong leadership and mentoring by technical and non technical management. It all comes back tot he people in the end.

Quality people can rise above bad or no process and make a difference. As I often say “Monkeys into the process still equals monkeys coming out of the process”. Focus on the people give them enough process and watch the results.