Partnering, Integrating, To Make the Complex Simple

Terri Griffith

Professor/Author/Speaker
Simon Fraser University

Terri Griffith holds the Keith Beedie Chair in Innovation and Entrepreneurship at Simon Fraser University’s Beedie School of Business. She spent two decades in the Silicon Valley and, in 2012 was honored as a Woman of Influence by the Silicon Valley Business Journal. Terri helps her students and their organizations accelerate performance and prepare for the futures of work. Through her speaking, writing, teaching, and research, she brings evidence-based leadership and innovation to high-tech, education, and global agribusiness organizations. She inspires and coaches groups on negotiating change and uniquely mixing existing and new capabilities. Her most recent work uses a “bottom-up” approach to automation, including artificial intelligence. Her award-winning book, The…...

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In the recent top rated book, Simple Rules: How to Thrive in a Complex World , Donald Sull and Kathleen Eisenhardt offer that, “When many parties must work together, simple trumps complex” (p. 44). This is a beautiful fit for the future of work, a future made up of complex work, performed in complex ways. Freelancers, contractors, and global project work, all intermingle with traditional organizational forms. Rather than try and understand all the complexities yourself, partner with those who do -- and do it in a simple way. By simple in this instance I mean push decision-making to where the information is, close to the work itself.

Complex Work and Partnerships Require Simple Rules and Direct Connections to Feedback

This is such a strong idea that Sull and Eisenhardt use it as the conclusion of their book:

..simple rules work because they provide a threshold level of structure while leaving ample scope to exercise discretion....

Close to the facts on the ground, individuals can draw on their judgment and creativity to manage risks and seize unexpected opportunities. The latitude to exercise discretion not only makes simple rules effective, it makes them attractive. People [and organizations, my addition here, but also covered in the book] thrive when given the opportunity to apply their judgment and creativity to the situations they face from day to day. And if they benefit from simple rules, they are more likely to use them and use them well" (p. 228).

The “threshold level of structure” is what keeps the ground-level decision making from just being tactical. Key is that the structure is understood and committed to across all actors. Nilofer Merchant talks about the value of co-creating strategy so that the vision and the tactics are tied across all levels of the work from inception. Co-creation can support commitment and innovation. Sull and Eisenhardt provide detailed notes on the value of working throughout the organization as rules are created -- and are clear that strategy and execution cannot be separated.

The Future of Work Is Complex, But the Underlying Technologies Can Help

Internet enabled collaboration, product development supported by real-time data, The Internet of Things. These all mean we spend more time and effort checking and connecting with data and others throughout our days, and nights. The process is not simple, but it could be simpler. Some organizations have found ways to leverage the complexity of data in ways that simplify the work.

Pulse Mining Systems

Pulse Mining Systems provides integrated business management tools to mining companies. (I’m looking forward to writing a more historical piece remarking on how much mining has taught us about management.) They offer resources for operations, human resources, marketing, and more. The key is that they don’t do it alone -- and their tools aren’t meant just for executives or data scientists.

I spoke with Rob Parvin, then their visualization and analytics manager. I was looking for an example of the value of offering access to operational data to people doing the work, but I found much more. Yes, he described examples where mines with five kilometer conveyors are progressing from manual reporting to real time, sensor-based, feedback to the shift managers. Yes, maintenance and staffing decisions are made with better data. (More on those soon.) But what surprised me was how they were creating these opportunities.

Pulse Partners to Co-Innovate

Pulse partners to simplify both their strategic decision making and how they then take action on that strategy. They co-innovate -- work with their strategic clients -- to identify the specific information needed by the client for decision making (going for simple rather than complex), key metrics, and prototyping. The product is eventually rolled out as a general offering -- but with the knowledge that it’s a tool that’s valuable in the industry and works. The implicit rule is that products are co-developed rather than created away from the work itself. They’ve been able to create early versions in as little as three weeks.

Pulse is able to move this quickly because they’ve partnered with two analytics companies rather than trying to build out their own capabilities (implicit rule: Don’t reinvent the wheel). They work with Birst (see an earlier mention here) and Tableau to provide analytics and visualization building blocks that are rapidly prototyped and tested in the field. The complexity is managed by focusing on pre-built, reusable capabilities. The partners are bound by a common interest in answering operational questions.

In prior posts I’ve written about how we can lead by letting go (of old school management techniques), but that creates an image of chaos for some. Instead, let’s think about a structured handoff of responsibility. We are unlikely expert in all the areas where we need expertise. Pulse has found like-minded partners. SAP has done the same with their co-innovation labs. Each seems to have developed simple rules of organization to handoff pieces of the innovation process to partners with appropriate skills.

My Own Simple Rules

Rereading Simple Rules: How to Thrive in a Complex World, and considering the issues in the context of our quickly changing work environment, has inspired me to think about my own simple rules. I work with a variety of audiences interested in designing organizations for innovation and offer a process for creating designs unique to their settings (I’m in full agreement that the local creation of the rules is an important piece of the process). That said, I think there are a few rules many can work with and I share them here in hope that you will help me improve them.

• Base decisions on data, with decision makers as close to the work as possible.

• Build teams with diverse skills, but common interests - highlight the interest.

• Bundle similar work, and where possible, pass off to automation.

• Be transparent and pay attention to what others are sharing with you.

Sull and Eisenhardt use the second half of their book to discuss how to refine and improve your rules. The above are just a start for me, are they also an interesting start for you?

Two Must-Attend Sports Business Conferences in July

Russell Scibetti

Founding Editor, The Business of Sports
The Business of Sports

My name is Russell Scibetti and I have an extensive background in sports business, including CRM and database marketing, interactive and digital marketing, social media, corporate sponsorships and activation, and applied market research. From 2007 to 2014, I worked for Arizona State Athletics, Comcast-Spectacor (Philadelphia Flyers) and the New York Jets to manage and implement CRM, database marketing, market research and other technology-based sales and marketing initiatives. In 2014, I joined KORE Software as their VP of Product Strategy, where I am responsible for the strategic vision, planning and development of the KORE ProSports Ticketing, Sponsorship and Suites/Premium software products. I earned my MBA in Sports Business from the W.P. Carey…...

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I know I should have posted this weeks ago, but better late than never. Two of my favorite events of the year are coming up next month, both in San Francisco. Sign up now before they close registration!

ALSD (Association of Luxury Suite Directors) – July 6-9

This is the 25th anniversary of the premium event for the premium industry, and this year it also includes:

• Sports Sales Boot Camp (July 6)
• Sports Venue Design & Build Forum (July 7-8)
• Corporate Ticket Impact Conference (July 9)

For more information and to register, visit www.alsd.com.

SEAT (Sports & Entertainment Alliance in Technology) – July 19-22

The 9th Annual SEAT Conference features in-depth, actionable case studies and discussion panels across six different technology-centric tracks:

• CIO Venue Technology
• Collegiate Industry Leaders
• CRM/Database Marketing, Loyalty & Analytics
• CXO Strategy
• Digital Marketing, Social Media, Analytics & Mobile
• Game Day Presentation/Broadcast & Fan Engagement

For more information and to register, visit www.seatconsortium.com.

That’s it for today. I will be speaking at both of these events, so I hope to see many of you there!

Is It Time for a Chief Brand Storyteller?

Gavin Heaton

Founder
Disruptors Co

Gavin is the Founder of Disruptors Co, one of Australia’s leading independent strategy and innovation companies. Gavin advises firms on strategy, marketing, product development and innovation. He is also a member of the Orbits program, the influencer network of  award winning analyst and advisory firm, Constellation Research. Gavin advises boards and leadership on innovation strategy, marketing, data-driven product development and corporate venturing. Gavin is on the board of Vibewire, a youth-led social enterprise based in Sydney, Australia and on the Technology Advisory Group for Good2Give – the workplace giving platform. ...

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This great presentation on content marketing and storytelling by Jonathan Crossfield got me thinking. What is it about brands, storytelling and technology that we continue to struggle with – and why is this struggle so pervasive?

Now, I see a lot of content marketing every day. There are newsletters, infographics and blog posts. Sometimes there are videos. Podcasts. Quizzes. Surveys. The variety is rich … but the quality? Well, often the quality leaves much to be desired.

Who can we blame?

Content marketing – like all marketing – has many masters. There are the internal subject matter experts to please. The brand and reputation folks to appease. And let’s not even bring up compliance/corporate affairs. Or Legal. Imagine having to include them!? Then there are the representatives from sales, product, engineering and finance – after all, someone has to pay for this.

Eventually, someone will create the brief and the creative process will kick in. It could be internally created or pushed out to an agency. There will be drafts, revisions and feedback. There will be interpretation.

And then one day there will be an approval … and your content marketing baby will be pushed out into the world. Will it work? Will it deliver a bounty?

Too often our marketing efforts end up a pale imitation of the original idea. After review upon review, interpretation upon interpretation, much of the spark and energy is lost.

It makes me think that we need a new custodian. A Chief Brand Storyteller (CBS). Someone who ensures that the story we want, need and should tell, remains intact. The CBS would:

• Prioritise our audiences over our processes
• Reclaim our business narratives from the tyrannies of product form and function
• Remind us that our purpose is to serve customers, guide them, delight and surprise them.

And the CBS would also have an important technology role. So many of our brand and business narratives are generated, delivered and amplified through technology – and this impacts the story and the storytelling. The CBS needs to help brands re-imagine storytelling for our times. And this may, perhaps, be the most important aspect.

Technology and Business Intelligence – Not Always Good Partners

Partner, Sensei Marketing
Partner, Sensei Marketing

Sales & marketing veteran with almost 30 years’ experience and now 1800 digital projects to his credit for clients including Morgan Stanley, AOL, Hyatt Gaming Management, Snyder's of Hanover, Hitachi, the Home Depot, Kraft Foods, Drees Homes, American Idol, and hundreds more, including leading agencies around the North America.     ...

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There’s no question that the Internet, social media, and digital technologies have changed the business landscape and the manner in which it operates. From the way business communicates with – and advertises to – consumers to how it conducts market research, and from the manner in which it hires new employees to how those employees are managed, today’s business blueprint is significantly different that it was just 15 years ago.

But is change always a good thing?  The Internet has provided smaller businesses the opportunity to compete with larger brands and has certainly provided a more direct and meaningful exchange with a business’s audience. But are we becoming too focused on the technology of the day? Are we forgetting the basics of marketing?

Creativity Often Hindered by Technology

Gannon Jones, the head of brand marketing at MillerCoors, offered this warning: “Technology can act as a barrier to creativity and will never replace great ideas.  As reported by Marketing Magazine, Jones, in speaking to a group of business executives, stated that, “Technology is actually starting to get in the way of creativity. It’s causing us as marketers to fixate on the technology and the data.”

Here at Sensei, we’ve seen customers follow either Big Data or social media viral trends only to be questioned by their CFOs when the results have to be justified. Be it amassing vast amounts of consumer data or attempting to repurpose the Ice Bucket Challenge model, too many marketing teams are fixated on technology and social media trends and forgetting what makes marketing truly work.

We know that online reviews on sites like Yelp and Google can have a positive effect on sales but businesses are resorting to buying positive reviews instead of earning them. Marketers are keen to surf the Internet for clues on optimizing their search engine results and forget that greater organic traffic can be earned by simply delivering creative, informative, and useful content to consumers. Marketers are quick to push us to build Facebook pages for their businesses without first understanding if their consumers want to engage with them on the social media network or if their purchase decisions may be influenced by their presence on that site.

Recently, we encountered a business whose head of social media was a statistician, not a marketer. Not that we have anything against statisticians; they’re an important part of the marketing team. However, ideas driven by numbers and stats often fail to inspire long-term attention from consumers and less often drive any form of real innovation.

Mr. Jones suggested that the basis of effective marketing is content, not technology, but I think that’s an oversimplification. Content can be driven by technology and consumer data as much as it can from innovative ideas crafted by artistic directors. Marketing success is not found in content but in knowing what type of content sways the purchase decision of consumers.

Consumer Data vs. Consumer Engagement

“What tends to happen and what we have seen in recent years, is that there’s a fundamental disconnect in the way business leaders think about data, and how technology leaders think about it,” suggests business analyst Fatemah Khatibloo in an interview with CMO.  “We see lots of lost opportunities. There has been a focus on big data projects and platforms and solutions by technology teams, or vendors are wooing marketing leaders, but they’re not so good at solving business problems. Business and technology are not working together towards a common purpose, which is using that data for customer engagement. We see lots of lost opportunities. There has been a focus on big data projects and platforms and solutions by technology teams, or vendors are wooing marketing leaders, but they’re not so good at solving business problems. Business and technology are not working together towards a common purpose, which is using that data for customer engagement.”

In our push to use technology to gain a larger market share and lower costs, we’ve begun to rely too heavily on technology and marketing automation.  Sharing a story from his past experience while employed by Kraft Foods, Mr. Jones referenced the “reams of [consumer] data” that Kraft had collected, which it failed to convert into true business opportunities.

What Kraft needed to know was simple: Did its consumers have children and was the process of cooking an enjoyable experience or not? Knowing the answer to these two questions was central to understanding what motivated purchase decisions but the data scientists collected so much information that answering these simple questions was nearly impossible.

Sensei Debates

Is the growing reliance on technology creating a generation of ineffective or less creative marketers?

Share your thoughts in the comments below.

Sam Fiorella
Feed Your Community, Not Your Ego

The post Technology and Business Intelligence – Not Always Good Partners appeared first on Sensei Marketing.

Lifesciences IoT opportunity – will privacy issues slow it down?

pending

Guy Courtin was formerly Vice President and Principal Analyst at Constellation Research covering Matrix Commerce and how the Internet of Things drives the evolution of commerce.  Guy has over 15 years experience in the technology space and specifically in the supply chain space. Most recently he was the Vice President of Research at SCM World. Where he focused on the service providers that empowered supply chains. Prior to SCM World, Guy held numerous senior positions. He was responsible for product marketing at RSi, a retail supply chain solution provider. There managed RSi’s go to market strategy around their leading cloud based supply chain solutions. He also spear headed Progress Software’s supply chain group. Where he was responsible for driving revenue and market share as well…...

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This week I met with an executive from Biogen. We spent time discussing their business, the usual areas where covered: how they were dealing with the patent cliff, their diversification of offerings, how they were working internationally to name a few. But the one area I found intriguing was how IoT impacts the pharmaceutical space. IoT presents two interesting opportunities for pharmaceuticals.

The first opportunity for pharmaceuticals with IoT is in the supply chain. ​From manufacturing, to storage and distribution, IoT holds great promise. No surprise as we see a large majority of manufacturers leaning on IoT to provide data that leads to greater efficiencies within their supply chains. For heavily regulated industries such as pharmaceuticals, IoT promises greater visibility and enhanced track and trace, key operating issues facing companies with sensitive inventory. ​

Unlike a clothing manufacturer where a defect lot can lead to lost sales or a public relations nightmare (think Lululemon’s recall with transparent yoga pants), the fallout from pharmaceutical defects is potentially much more serious. Patients may suffer serious medical consequences, and manufacturers or distributors may face heavy fines and even arrest. Pharmaceutical companies, if they aren’t already, should evaluate IoT solutions that enable secure handling of their products. For example, sensors that monitor how a product is handled through the transportation nodes. These sensors can relay back to the manufacturer if the product was transported at the proper temperature and if the container properly handled. Pharmaceutical companies may also leverage sensors to detect and reduce product tampering. Of course sensors can also be used in the manufacturing process to measure and optimize the factory process.

The second opportunity for pharmaceuticals with IoT is baking IoT capabilities directly into pharma products. This is an area where there is enormous potential for insights, but also presents an ethics and privacy red flag. Companies like Merck are already talking about and exploring the development of “digestables.” That is right, IoT enabled drugs or devices that consumers would eat. The hope is that the data that we can extract from these products revolves around how the drugs interact with our bodies, how are they truly interacting and simply if they are being taken properly (read as doctors tell us to!). From a medical devices perspective we already see companies like Boston Scientific who make pace makers that are IoT enabled. Anyone who is a fan of the HBO show, Homeland, knows the potential risk that poses!

Much of this is only being tested in the labs or thought about in development meetings, but it does bring up the question about privacy. An enormity that might hold back IoT is how is the data going to be handled and protected? There are already rumblings around simple data that our iPhones or Fitbits collect about how many steps we took today, our heart rates or how many calories we burned. What happens when there are devices that are throwing off data about the health of our intestines, how often we go to the bathroom or if we are showing early signs of diabetes? Richie Etwaru has a wonderful model for IoT where as the IoT enabled product gets physically closer to a person’s heart, the greater the possible issues, especially around privacy. Digestables might be just a few inches away from the heart…from the inside.

Pharmaceutical companies should absolutely explore IoT. When it comes to managing their supply chains, they are a prime candidate to take advantage of the visibility and monitoring IoT offers. The more contentious issue is when pharmaceuticals start to productize IoT, how will they handle personal information collected from these IoT medical devices? We may see regulations akin to HIPAA emerge to protect personal information collected via biomedical IoT devices. Pharmaceutical companies should start preparing for these issues today.

55% of Enterprises Predict Cloud Computing Will Enable New Business Models In Three Years

• 69% of enterprises expect to make moderate-to-heavy cloud investments over the next three years as they migrate core business functions to the cloud.
• 44% of enterprises are relying on cloud computing to launch new business models today, predicting this will increase to 55% in three years.
• 32% are using cloud computing to streamline their supply chains today. Senior executives predict this figure will increase to 56% in three years, a 24% increase.
• 59% say they use cloud-based applications and platforms to better manage and analyze data today, reflecting the increasing importance of analytics and big data enterprise-wide.

These and other insights are from a recent Oxford Economics and SAP study of cloud computing adoption, The Cloud Grows Up. You can find the study here (no opt-in). In late 2014, Oxford Economics and SAP collaborated on a survey of 200 senior business and IT executives globally regarding the adoption and use of cloud technology. Oxford Economics’ analysts compared the latest survey with one completed in 2012 looking for leading indicators of cloud adoption in enterprises. They found many C- and VP-level executives are taking a more pragmatic, realistic view of what cloud technologies can contribute. Enterprises are moving beyond the hype of cloud computing, putting in the hard work of launching new business models while driving top-line revenue growth.

Oxford Economics has made two interactive infographics available from the study here. The first details cloud adoption, and the second, on how enterprises see cloud computing changing their business models over the next three years.  As cloud platforms and applications become a scalable, secure and for the most part reliable, once-elusive enterprise goals and new business models become attainable.

Key take-aways from the study include the following:

• Top–line growth (58%), collaboration among employees (58%), and supply chain (56%) are the three areas enterprises expect cloud computing to impact most in three years. The greatest gains will be in the areas of supply chain (a 24% jump), collaboration among employees (20%) and increased agility and responsiveness to customers (17%). The following graphic compares where enterprises are seeing cloud computing’s impact today and a prediction of each areas’ impact in three years.

• Developing new products & services (61%), new lines of business (51%) and entering new markets (40%) are three key areas cloud computing is transforming enterprises.  With a 35% increase, developing new products and services is the most dominant strategy enterprises are relying on to grow their businesses. See the comparison below for further details.       

• 58% of enterprises predict their use of cloud computing will increase top-line revenue growth in three years. 67% see the cloud changing skill sets and transforming the role of HR. The following graphic illustrates the first of two interactive infographics Oxford Economics and SAP are providing with the report. You can access the infographic here.

• 74% of enterprises say innovation and R&D is somewhat or mostly cloud-based. 61% say they will have developed new products and services in three years as a result of adopting cloud technologies.  The following graphic illustrates the second of two interactive infographics Oxford Economics and SAP are providing with the report. You can access the infographic here.

• Enterprise cloud security strategies are maturing rapidly. From 2012 to 2014, strategies for ensuring the security of API and interfaces increased 24%, from 20% to 44%. Additional concerns that increased include virus attacks (up 19%), and identity theft (up 16%).  The following figure compares the top concerns enterprises have in the area of cloud security.

• 31% of respondents say the cloud computing has had a transformative impact on their business.  48%, nearly half, state that cloud computing has had a moderate impact on business performance. The majority believe cloud computing will have a significant impact on top-line revenue growth in three years.

• 67% of enterprises say that marketing, purchasing, and supply chain are somewhat and mostly cloud-based as of today. Cloud-based adoption has reached an inflection point in enterprises, with functional areas having the largest percentage of workloads running on cloud-based apps. Enterprise senior executives see the potential to improve innovation, R&D, and time-to-market via greater collaboration using cloud technologies.

Filed under: Cloud Computing, Enterprise Cloud Computing, Louis Columbus' blog, SaaS, SaaS Economics, SaaS Forecasts Tagged: Cloud Computing, cloud computing landscape, Louis Columbus' blog, SaaS, Software-as-a-Service

6 Pillars of Ecommerce Customer Experience - Video

Vice President and Principal Analyst, Constellation Research
Constellation Research

Role: Vice President and Principal Analyst focusing on the IOT of Customer Experience and how the cloud is driving more flexible, agile, and robust customer service and customer experiences. In-app or in device customer service is the future. Coverage Areas: Next Generation Customer, Digital Marketing Transformation Bio: As a Vice President and Principal Analyst at Constellation Research, Inc, Petouhoff works with Fortune 100 and 500’s Senior Leadership teams to create strategic customer experience (marketing, sales and service) solutions which engage customers, build brands and grow businesses. Combining her experience as a former Forrester software analyst, PWC systems integrator and change management consultant, Petouhoff leads executive workshops to discuss to not only…...

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Did you know that most brands are not achieving their ecommerce goals? In fact, only 37% of ecommerce professionals surveyed by Constellation Research evaluated their brands as 'effective' at reaching their ecommerce goals. 

Brands that do not effectively engage customers face dissolution as customers migrate to more engaging alternatives. 

Ensure your brand effectively engages customers and builds loyalty by following these six best practices.  

Continuity of Customer Experiences Drives The Future of Commerce

Future of Work: What Does The IBM and Box Partnership Mean?

Alan Lepofsky

Vice President & Principal Analyst
Constellation Research

Alan Lepofsky - VP and Principal Analyst, Constellation Research. With almost two decades of experience in the collaboration software industry, Lepofsky helps organizations improve the way their employees work together to get their jobs done. Lepofsky’s primary research area The Future of Work, focuses on: integrating collaboration and business processes (Purposeful Collaboration), structuring work via Social Task Management, leveraging analytics and digital assistants to work more productively, the strategic impact of mobile computing on business transformation, and measuring workforce culture based on Digital Proficiency instead of age. Twitter: @alanlepoLinkedIn: https://ca.linkedin.com/in/alanlepo     , Title: Big IdeasIntelligent Collaboration: The Intersection of…...

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This Does Not Impact IBM Connections Files: The primary focus of this partnership is not related to IBM’s collaboration portfolio: IBM Connections, IBM Verse, Notes/Domino, Sametime, etc. Yes, there is some integration between the two companies today, such as Box integration in Connections Communities, but this announcement is more about IBM’s Enterprise Content Management (ECM) and Analytics capabilities. (see below) In January, IBM announced IBM Connections Files, which is essentially a Box like tool, but to be clear, IBM is not replacing that product with Box.

Insights Into Business Content: Over the last few months, IBM has made several announcements regarding integration of 3rd party content with IBM’s tools. For example, the partnerships with Twitter and Weather Channel. Box represents another large repository of content that several IBM customers rely on. Therefore, combining Box’s content-centric workflows with IBM’s analytics (IBM Watson) and governance (StoredIQ) capabilities, makes a lot of sense. This gives Box a great additional set of capabilities while IBM gets to deploy their tools against a large new source of (customer) content. Questions still remain as to what the combined solutions will cost, and what hosting options will be supported.

Let’s Get Vertical: Both IBM and Box have successful go to market strategies around vertical solutions such as healthcare, finance and manufacturing. This partnership will allow both vendors to tap into the customer base of the other. For example, a healthcare customer currently using Box to store medical records (or Xrays) will now be able to leverage IBM’s Analytics and Case Management capabilities to derive insights from that data.

Mobile Computing: Both IBM and Box are investing heavily in mobile access. IBM has recently partnered with Apple to create several applications which they call MobileFirst for iOS. As mentioned above, Box has a strong customer presence in those same verticals, so if Box integration is added to those iOS applications, Box customers will get a seamless file-centric experienced embedded in this applications.

That raises the question as to why IBM is using Box for file-sharing features of these applications instead of IBM Connections Files? The answer is most likely that Box, available for many years, has a significant head-start obtaining customers in these industries verses IBM Connections Files which has just recently launched. IBM is doing what works best for customers, realizing that if they don't, those customers will look elsewhere. As the Box/IBM announcement is not exclusive, I predict IBM will announce additional file sharing integrations/partnerships, including better integration with their own collaboration tools.

Developers In The Mix: One of the most interesting parts of this partnership is that Box’s APIs will be added to IBM BlueMix, their cloud based application development platform, or PaaS. That means developers building applications on BlueMix will be able to easily add Box’s features to their applications. This is a big win for Box, as it dramatically extends their reach to a large partner ecosystem. Here is example code from IBM developerWorks, Integrate Cloud File Storage and Sharing into your Bluemix App with Box

Keeping Things Secure: In 2013 IBM acquired Fiberlink, developer of the MaaS360 mobile management and security suite. Today MaaS360 supports secure file sharing for Box, so this is another synergy point between IBM and Box which they will continue to build upon.

Files. Files. Wherefore Art Thou Files? What about future hosting implications? Today Box’s infrastructure is hosted by Equinix. Perhaps a move to Softlayer could happen, but that is not part of the current announcement.

Summary

It’s certainly an interesting time in the enterprise file market.

A few years ago large enterprise software vendors such as IBM, Microsoft and Google did not really offer their own enterprise file storage solutions. To fill that gap, stand-alone vendors such as Box and DropBox stepped in and secured large customer bases that the enterprise software vendors are certainly envious of. But as file-sharing become a key part of organization's collaboration strategies those companies realized they required enterprise grade solutions. Fast forward to today and the large vendors now offer solutions such as IBM Connections Files, Microsoft OneDrive, Google Drive, Citrix Sharefile and Salesforce Files as integrated parts of their collaboration platforms; while Box, DropBox, Egnyte, Intralinks, Huddle and other stand-alone file sharing vendors continue to enhance the file-sharing specific elements of their solutions.

The trend now is to combine the best of both worlds. It seems like almost weekly there is a press release about a new integration or partnership between one of the enterprise software platform vendors and one of the stand-alone file-storage vendors. The key is that these partnerships need to go beyond the basic “you can open file X from inside platform Y”. Today’s Box and IBM announcement provides a foundation for more advanced integrations built to solve specific industry solutions leveraging the best of both IBM and Box. However, it’s important to move beyond the press release stage and deliver real code soon or customers (and analysts) will quickly look for alternative approaches. I look forward to seeing demos of the IBM + Box solutions soon.

BTW, I'd be negligent as an analyst if I didn't notice that both companies have 3 letter names and blue logos, so the partnership is a natural fit. (don't quote me on that one!)

Microsoft Dynamic’s Strategic Alliance with Lithium

Vice President and Principal Analyst, Constellation Research
Constellation Research

Role: Vice President and Principal Analyst focusing on the IOT of Customer Experience and how the cloud is driving more flexible, agile, and robust customer service and customer experiences. In-app or in device customer service is the future. Coverage Areas: Next Generation Customer, Digital Marketing Transformation Bio: As a Vice President and Principal Analyst at Constellation Research, Inc, Petouhoff works with Fortune 100 and 500’s Senior Leadership teams to create strategic customer experience (marketing, sales and service) solutions which engage customers, build brands and grow businesses. Combining her experience as a former Forrester software analyst, PWC systems integrator and change management consultant, Petouhoff leads executive workshops to discuss to not only…...

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It’s true – to deliver on a brand promise of excellent customer experience, it takes a village.  And it makes perfect sense that Microsoft Dynamics has created a strategic alliance with Lithium, a community platform vendor. What does this mean? Microsoft Dynamics will integrate Lithium’s social interactions and community data into Microsoft Dynamics CRM. This partnership will allow Microsoft Dynamic’s customers to nurture better relationships with their customers, especially because and peer-to-peer communities are critical to building customer loyalty. With this additional visibility into what’s happening through their CRM application, businesses have a more complete, 360 degree view of the customer.

What’s interesting is that in the old days, product development used to be done by a vendor themselves. Today, the market is moving so fast, smart vendors are realizing that product development is really more about partnering with partners who specialize in a particular aspect of technology vs build it themselves. These specialized capabilities can complement what a vendor is already offering without the headaches of building from scratch.

Looking forward to some case studies and the successes from this strategic alliance!

@drnatalie, Covering Marketing, Commerce, Customer Service, Communities, Digital and Social Media to Create Better Customer Experiences