Enterprise 2.0 Success Stories on the new Sharepoint

I have written about Sharepoint and enterprise 2.0 several times on this blog, (e.g., Knowledge Management 2.0 and Microsoft Office SharePoint Server (MOSS), and the Fast Forward one, Microsoft and Enterprise 2.0. There has been much discuss of the capabilities, pro and con, but what about actual implementations. Thanks to Paula Thornton for pointing me to these case studies from the Microsoft site, Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 customer evidence.

Mary Kay was the featured case study of the month. They report that the new Sharepoint allows them “to leverage the content indexing and search platform functionality. The company now has robust, easy-to-use search functionality that will scale along with its global IT improvement and integration efforts.”

The examples also include Del Monte that “will implement a product life cycle management solution for its formula change using the workflow capabilities of Office SharePoint Server 2007” and CGI that is “using Office SharePoint Server 2007 to provide a collaborative workspace solution where staff can jointly work on proposals using the document life cycle management capabilities.”

These all sound like good uses of Sharepoint that fit within the enterprise 2.0 or at least enterprise 1.5. Since I do not know the cases directly I cannot comment beyond what I read on the Microsoft site but they pass the reasonableness test. For people who are already invested in Sharepoint, it seems to be a good idea to explore its use as a platform for enterprise 2.0 applications. enterprise 2.0 enterprise 2.0 enterprise social media

Comments

[Olivier Amprimo]

Bonjour,

The cases you mention to illustrate your post relate to what MOSS has to offer: document life cycle management. That's not a surprise as it has been developed by people dealing with knowledge management with a librarian background (for instance the great Mary-Lee Kennedy, in Boston now).

Now when it comes to the 2.0 features, I think a lot of people make a mistake considering MOSS is 2.0 in its latest version. It's pretty much 2.0 compliant but to a certain extend. Okay, there are wiki and blog and social-bookmark feature in MOSS 2007 but is it sufficient? Is 2.0 all about tools? I don't think so personally but if so, is MOSS the best tool? When one benchmark the functionalities of the wiki and blog contained within MOSS with existing solutions live for months, the comparison is not in favour of Microsoft. Their functionalities are so poor that one can legitimately wonder why they are here.

Is it because the market is 2.0 that they incrusted 2.0 features? That probably is the best answer. Microsoft wrapped their document management app up to keep selling a cash cow product. Cool for them, but what about users, organisations and employees?
Users will have to use poor tools and not be in a position to complain of the functionalities' dryness. Organisations will miss the opportunity to enlarge their providers, ending being locked in a 100% MS world, missing the innovation and financial benefits of a sound competition. That's not really 2.0 in essence, pretty much 1.0: "use it and shut up".

Anticipated consequence is that companies will invest loads in a solution that shall most probably make their employees unhappy on the long term. Microsoft kills two birds with one stone:
1 - Legitimately expected productivity from social tools will not be here and consequently there is a risk that the 2.0 market collapse the same way as the KM one did.
2 - In a knowledge economy, an unhappy employee is a non productive employee.

Instead of pursuing this quest of the off-the-shelf all in one IT solution, people would probably have more benefits in picking the best dedicated solutions available, smartly combine their functionalities and work on a nice integrative interface. For instance, Sharepoint (for structured document management only), Movable Type (for conversations only), Confluence (for co-writing only) along with Cogenz (for shared bookmarks only) can easily integrate and provide superior productivity outcomes.

Of course blogs, wikis, social-bookmarks are 2.0 but mashup too. If organisations want to go down all the 2.0 way, they should also consider social tools mashup, just like internauts do/did in the wild wild web ... and for the very same reason: efficiency.

[jheuristic]

Hi --

Not sure about all the '2.0' hubris, but can say I have been a heavy user of SharePoint for years and could not imagine how to work without it. SP 3.0 will knock-your-socks-off. For a free trial use Apptix.

http://www.sharepointsite.com/

To sign-up call:

Michael Jakubik
Sales Executive
Apptix Incorporated
(201) 809-1714 (Direct)
(703) 890-2801 (Fax)
michael.jakubik@apptix.com

-j

[Didier Masse]

Dear Bill,

I would say that I am using MOSS and I can tell you that I am totally satisfied of that product. It's pretty much 2.0 compliant, and it works very well when all your network is based on a 100% Ms Solution.

[Bill Ives]

Didier, John , and Olivier - Thanks for your input. It is a topic which evokes strong opinions in both directions.

[Gemini]

In my opinion, MOSS is THE most powerful KM system till date. I have worked on various applications including MOSS, Lotus Notes, and those based on Open Source. I have found that MOSS is the best when it comes to power and ease of use. Indeed a true KM system.