Sumolabs

Jordan Willms on business, entrepreneurship, technology and the internet

web 2.0

Jul28

Become an Enterprise 2.0 expert in 5 days or less

Enterprise 2.0 is getting a lot of buzz these days. The enterprise 2.0 conference in Boston was a huge success and there is lots of projected market growth and opportunity in the niche. Forrester research has reported that Enterprise 2.0 will become a $4.6 Billion Industry By 2013. It would be lovely to get a piece (or two) of that pie.

Enterprise 2.0 -- following the trend of sticking '2.0' on everything -- is really just about bringing in web 2.0 technologies and services into the enterprise. Enterprise is a fancy term that in laymans means 'Big Corporations'. So, think "Facebook for Fortune 500 or FTSE 100 corporations". Social media and technologies in the enterprise are important because there are many value drivers for large organizations to move in this direction: Innovation, knowledge management, the enabling of new business models, better customer relationships and involvement, mobile and nomadic work environments, increased speed and agility and overall better communication and engagement for employees.

This post summarizes reading that will give you a firm footing in everything enterprise 2.0 ( And in only 5 days -- Talk about value!!! )

Day 1 - 2

First, you'll need to understand what web 2.0 is and is not. Although wikipedia provides an excellent entry on web 2.0, you'll need to read more about web 2.0 as it relates to business, economics and social culture. The Bible on this topic is Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything. I know you don't have the funds or the time to buy the book -- so I've tracked down a free summary on the web for you from Soundview summaries. That being said, you should purchase the book as it will change the way you think.

Following this summary, I suggest reading the Wikinomics Playbook (a free PDF download by the authors of Wikinomics) and read through the various case studies of businesses using collaboration technologies.

That was your Day 1-2. Pretty easy and interesting wasn't it? Let's move on to Day 3.

Day 3

First, read various definitions of enterprise 2.0 and watch a video of Vince Casarez, vice president of product management at Oracle, explains how Web 2.0 technologies, such as tags, wikis, and mash-ups, can be applied within an organization.

Next, read about the management challenges facing wide scale adoption of enterprise 2.0.

Last, get a boardroom perspective by reading CIO.com's article: Enterprise 2.0 - What is it good for? (A 12-step guide to getting the most out of Web 2.0 tools and making it safe-for-purpose).

Day 4

In order to catch up with the pulse of what is happening in enterprise 2.0, go through as much material as you can from the enterprise 2.0 conference.

David Spark has captured some great notes, as has Doug Conelius.

Also, watch the videos that have been made available from the enterprise 2.0 conference

Day 5

By Day 5, your mind should have digested a large amount of information about enterprise 2.0. Now, to bring it all together, use the Enterprise 2.0 blueprint to structure your thoughts and ideas.

To understand the market completely, register (for free) and download the Enterprise Market Map 2007 (It's 2007, but it is still relevant). Study it and commit it to memory.

And there you have it. By Day 5 you should be well versed in Enterprise 2.0, and understand how it can be used to create value and decrease costs.

If anyone has any additional valuable 'starter' resources, or can recommend quality blogs to plug into -- please leave a comment.

Feb14

Social Networking APIs mean opportunity for a better user experience

The trend moving forward is that social networking sites are moving towards opening up their systems to third party developers. Facebook, initially aimed at college students, is currently leading the pack by a long shot. This will provide countless opportunities for entrepreneurs to solve a variety of the social web's existing problems: Non-centralized authentication, and excessive data duplication.