The ipod has really changed the way we use music - we’ve got 3 in our household (4 if you count my original 40 gig hard drive version that died). But the potential for the iphone to change the way we get and consume web based information is vast.

So, you’ve gotta get mobile. Thankfully, it is easier than you might think thanks to MoFuse.com

As I blog on Wordpress, less than 2 minutes later I have m.justindavies.com.au as well as http://justindavies.mofuse.mobi and an iphone specific URL at http://justindavies.mofuse.mobi/iphone

As a tip, if you create your own address off your domain as I have done (m.justindavies.com.au), remember to add the cname record at your domain so it will work.

Importantly with any web presence, you have got to track it - and this is where mofuse excels providing great stats tracking. I suspect we will see lots of growth in iphone related traffic. For more on the topics of tracking users, please see my Feedburner post.

So, comments please. Where do you think the growth in online traffic for the iphone will come from? And how will it drive the way we use mobile phones in the future?

In the last few days and in various meetings I have had, it has clearly reinforced the challenge of getting people on the bus with software and information management initiatives.

Nowhere is this more difficult than in the growing beasts that are international companies. No longer does the mantra apply “think global, act local” explicitly in relation to software and systems, as organisations seek to refine the best of the knowledge they have into common ways of doing things.

So, there are some barriers to break down:

1. Not invented here. Obvious enough problem… but confounded further with Point 2.
2. The system we use was invented here, in fact, I invented it…. compounded further with…
3. I like the way our company did things before the takeover…. compounded further with…
4. Those guys are in another part of the world, and they think differently to us (these types of cultural differences are very real)

For more reading, see my post on people, process and technology.

I’ve got to say I have an interesting concern - but a sense of delight at the possibilities - about the speed and capacity of change of Enterprise 2.0. Let me explain…

In the world of application development, there is a serious and mounting argument from the rapid development / iterative prototyping camp versus the waterfall (requirements, design, build, test, deploy, support) purists. When it comes to applications that affect corporations - that is, across the enterprise - I am a firm believer in the latter.

Iterative development is great when there are only a few people involved - or a small point solution that only affects a few people. When you start getting more people involved, the challenges go up.

The challenges include:

• People - commitment to using a new process and a new underpinning system - and a common way of doing so
• Process - is the process we are using common to all? Do we all do our own thing?)
• Technology - solid analysis of the problems and a clear view of how to resolve them with technology

Now with Web 2.0 / Enterprise 2.0, the beauty is that these applications are breaking new ground in making the process neatly tied up in the applications and making it really simple for people to follow the process without having to think too much about it - or having to refer to training manuals or help guides. However, the ease of picking one up, configuring them differently according to different needs - but at the same time missing the opportunity to apply them consistently is the challenge.

The takeaway points to consider:

• If you are going to go for a Web 2.0 application, do document your processes and make sure people apply it consistently within the organisation
• Software developers can learn from the myriad of Web 2.0 projects smart ways of developing inviting interfaces and very simple and fast sign up and use approaches
• The next raft of successful enterprise scale applications from the Web 2.0 environment will make a dent on traditional software only when sold, implemented and supported like enterprise software

All comments welcome!

When someone suggests they want a portal the very first question to ask is, “what does a portal mean to you”.

Portal, like CRM - and many other terms in IT - tend to be all encompassing words designed to solve a complex raft of problems.

“We can’t get to our information easily” “I spent ages trying to find a document that I know is here somewhere and gave up” “We have heaps of copies of the same document” “I want a dashboard or traffic light to let me know when problems have emerged so I can immediate action” “I am sick of signing in to lots of different systems”

There is actually a fair bit of complexity in this - but the answer seems to be Portal (or intranet / new enterprise content management system - take your pick).

Same with CRM:

“I can’t get a single view of our customers” “..no one understands who is doing what with whom” “I was trying to cross sell and they already told us they can’t buy it” “The client told me that they were already dealing with another of our divisions and our company should already have a heap of information on them already”

Again, complex issues - people, process and technology at play again.

So what do we do? Start with the business problems to be solved, then resolve the process issues - and then the technology solution becomes much more simple - and effective.

Any experience good or bad? Do share….

IF you are thinking of refinance mortgage, be careful. It is still a mortgage loan in the end. With every mortgage, there are always the chances of foreclosure.

I was speaking with a friend today who was feeling pretty frustrated. You see, he had purchased a CRM product for his business, but it wasn’t doing what he wanted. The vendor had considered that he had done his part - sell the product, install it on site, provide the user documentation, all thumbs up….

What the client actually needed was:

1. Assistance to clearly understand how to implement CRM as a strategy

2. Get the people on the bus committed to the approach

3. Define the new processes, and define these into an agreed requirements document

4. The vendor to configure the application to meet the defined requirements

5. The vendor to train the users and the administrator in exactly how to make CRM technology deliver on the CRM strategy

6. The vendor to come back and check / realign things after staff have been using it for awhile

My recommendation to you - be very, very wary of buying any software that runs across your business without buying implementation services (not just technical ones, but solid business analysis).

So, what is your experience? Please share the good, bad and the ugly, I’d love to get your feedback….

See my post on people, process and technology for more on getting software implementation right.

If you have ever found peformance issues and the reasons being given seemingly incredibly complicated, then perhaps distilling the essence back to the number only may be the answer you are looking for.

For example, let’s say sales performance is down. A person can provide any number of reasons, incredibly well argued, as to why their sales performance is off. Or why they missed their last deal. And if they are any sort of sales person, they should be able to be pretty persuasive in their argument as they probably have been constructing in their minds for some time!

So how do you reshape the nexus of this? Well, get back to the numbers and the causal factors of success.

Step 1: Fishbone the profit and loss statement to look at where the revenue comes from

Step 2: Drill into the customers spend to determine which customers, what product lines, and which sales when.

Step 3: Determine the causal steps ie activity, necessary to get the success you need. For example, to sell $10 million of a service, you may need to have generated a sales pipeline of $30 million if you close 1 in 3.

Step 4: Determine the metrics that make sense around the steps to get to the target. For example, to get to $30million pipeline, you may need to have qualified $60 million of opportunities. If each deal is $10 million, it is 6 deals. You then track activity to create deals - number of presentations, meetings, sales calls, product demonstrations, roadshows and events.

Step 5: Turn the above into simple numbers next to boxes and track that against performance. This will in turn drive activity that leads to success and also may provide some focus to improve success rates on each successive step.

Used correctly, the above approach can move to an empirical analysis of activity that reinforces the right behaviours, and also how you can help along the way, and quickly ends long and unfruitful discussions.

If you have had a good experience - or a not so good experience - in applying metrics to your business, please leave a comment, I’d appreciate your feedback.

If you have found yourself in a situation where the process seems to change, accountabilities are uncertain and deadlines are missing, then perhaps you have a people, process and technology problem. Getting all 3 aligned is absolutely essential to ensuring a change process will work.

And they have to be resolved in that order.

1. People - what are the key issues: who owns the process, who is involved, what are their roles, are they committed to improving it and working together and importantly are they prepared to do the work to fix the problem

2. Process - a process can be defined as starting with a trigger event that creates a chain of actions that results in something being prepared for a customer of that process. Starting at high level and identifying the key big steps is important to see the process from end to end. Then moving into more detail to capture the various layers involved and various exceptions. Focussing on the high frequency (Pareto principle) transactions can have significant benefit to standardising the process. But also remember that it can be the non-standard transactions where service is slipping most or the potential for significant failure in the process may exist.

3. Technology - Now that people are aligned, and the process developed and clarified, technology can be applied to ensure consistently in application of the process and to provide the thin guiding rails to keep the process on track - to make it easier to follow the process than not do so.

Of course there is much more to getting a technology project right - but get the above 3 sorted out and you will be a long way down the path to project success.

Got any experiences or tips you’d like to share? I am keen to hear from you, so please add a comment….

With bad credit, credit cards are usually proven useless. A Mastercard is not meant for credit card consolidation. A credit card should therefore be used sensibly.

In a meeting today I was talking with a client who has a particularly dry sense of humour, and a great philosophical perspective on ensuring successful delivery of projects. We were talking about change management.

His simple and insightful comment was this:

“You have two tools you can use for change management - they are a carrot and a stick. You can dress it up any way you like, call it anything you like, and do as many Powerpoint presentations as you like - but at the end of the day, every change management process is about a combination of a carrot and a stick”.

I’ve got to agree…..