WebEx: Ideas in Motion

Around the World in 24 Hours, the WebEx Way

Here is a quick glimpse of my calendar for today October 31, 2007

10:30 AM (IST): Seminar in Bangalore (India) on Software-as-a-Service
2:00 PM (GMT): Meeting in Manchester (UK) to review a video production
9:00 AM (PDT): Doctor's visit
10:00 AM (PDT): Staff meeting in Santa Clara, CA (USA)
3:30 PM (EDT): Customer meeting in McLean, VA (USA)
1:30 PM (PDT): Project review meeting in Santa Clara, CA (USA)
5:30 PM (PDT): Halloween!  Trick'or treating with a Ghost and a Corpse Bride
10:00 PM (PDT): Going to sleep in my own bed after having been in 4 time zones on 3 different continents ... Priceless ... What Would I Do Without WebEx?

View my story or share your own story at http://www.mywebexmoment.com

-- Jan Sysmans, Director, Marketing, WebEx

Plan For The Little Disruptions -- Part 1/4

In the world of disasters, huge calamities – like the firestorms that swept Southern California - get a lot of attention. However, it is more likely that a company will suffer many smaller disruptions in any given year, not a major calamity. 

Small disruptions take many forms: a snowstorm that closes highways on the day of an important meeting, an employee who gets sick and can not (or should not) come into the office, a key executive stranded in an overseas airport. All can throw business for a loop. 

And while many business continuity plans are focused on the major calamity and thus on how to recover the company's infrastructure, maintaining employee productivity when employees can't get the the office is in many cases an afterthought. Worse, many company's see it as a cost of doing business. And it does not have to be this way. Tools exist that not only make employees more productive on a day-to-day basis, but also can make unplanned business disruptions less, well, disruptive. This is the first part of a four part series in which I explain the scope of what kinds of things can happen, and how using WebEx to telework can significantly reduce the pain of these unforeseen occurrences. In the first part, I invite you to listen to a podcast we recently published on this topic.

Watch for part 2 of 4 on Monday.

-- Jan Sysmans, Director, Marketing, WebEx

Keeping it Simple at Sales 2.0

Less is more. Give something away.  Above all, make it easy and don't forget the metrics. Sage advice for today's salesforce, coming from the Sales 2.0 conference.  Earlier this afternoon, Anthony Lye talked about Social CRM, and gave a little preview of Oracle OpenWorld. The conference is going to be wrapping up in about an hour, be sure to check back here for the news on the end-of-day sessions.

Colin Smith, Dir. Corp.Communications, WebEx

Stay Curious

Sound advice from Gerhard Gschwandtner, Publisher of Selling Power - another one of the sponsors at the Sales 2.0 Conference today at the St. Regis hotel in San Francisco.  Highlights from Gschwandtner's breakout session and a lunchtime speech that focused on the state of the industry, all right here.

Colin Smith, Dir. Corp. Communications, WebEx

Sales 2.0 Conference

WebEx is a platinum sponsor at today's Sales 2.0 Conference in San Francisco, and we wanted to give everyone a virtual peek at some of the sessions focusing on how the latest technologies have impacted the sales cycle. salespeople, and everyone's overall ROI.  One of the keynoters this morning was our own Stu Schmidt.

More later...

Colin Smith, Dir. Corp. Communications, WebEx

Selling on the Edge of the Envelope

Last week, I had the privilege of speaking at the Web 2.0 Summit in San Francisco on Sales 2.0, and the technology platform that enables an organization to make the transformation to a more competitive sales team. (presentation)

You might imagine that at a conference with 1,000 of the most leading-edge thinkers on Web 2.0 and next-generation technology, there was some skepticism when I started talking about sales, and how you sell in a Web 2.0-enabled, collaborative world. Interestingly, though, the theme of the conference was “the edge,” which the conference moderator, John Battelle, explained as finding the leading edge of not just technology, but also business models, innovation, impact, or any other dimension one could imagine.

I’m not only a fan, but also a frequent user of many Web 2.0 technologies in my day-to-day business (and personal) life, and I will be the first to tout the advantages of using many of these tools to get something done, or to make information more accessible. And I often push the edge of technology. But the question I had to answer to this group was “How does Sales 2.0 push the ‘edge’?”

No, it’s not the technology edge. Nor is it the coolest use of some tool. Nor is it the best mash-up (OK, maybe it really is…).

It is, however, using technology – or more precisely, a combination of technologies – to push innovation by bringing these technologies together on a platform (WebEx Connect) to bring the power of collaboration into a value-creating business process, in this case, sales. Or, in other words,  pushing the edge of how Web 2.0 technology can be used to create even greater business value.

The processes, measurement, and powerful buyer engagement created by a Sales 2.0 organization have the ability to turn an effective sales organization into a competitive weapon for a company.

The technology platform is what makes this possible.

If you want to learn more about Sales 2.0 and what it can do for your sales organization, you can listen to our three-part podcast series on the Sales 2.0 funnel, aligning how you sell to how your prospect buys and how to measure a Sales 2.0 organization. Or you can watch our two-part webinar series on what a Sales 2.0 organization looks like and practical tips for becoming a Sales 2.0 organization.

Or you can attend the Sales 2.0 Conference on October 30 in San Francisco, where we’ll be discussing more about leading sales organizations and how they help their companies compete in the new collaborative world of business.

I hope to see you there!

 

McKinsey looks at innovation management

The McKinsey Quarterly has a good interview (registration warning) with Gary Hamel and Lowell Bryan on innovation management and building organizations for a century in which managing the old way is a going out of business strategy.

Gary Hamel has a new book, The Future of Management, due out this month. Lowell Bryan, a director at McKinsey, co-authored Mobilizing Minds with McKinsey principal Claudia Joyce.

Most of the interview focuses on how to bridge the gap between people and technology (i.e. Internet, Enterprise 2.0) and globalization. I found the observations useful reminders on how managers fall into common traps. Quoting Gary Hamel from the interview:

In a market where talent is largely a commodity and can be bought anywhere, the secret sauce is creating an environment in which you push that frontier out, in which you can steadily raise the returns on human capital. The combination of technology and talent is a powerful catalyst for value creation, but to take advantage of the Web’s capacity to help us aggregate and amplify human potential in new ways, we must first of all abandon some of our traditional management beliefs—the notion, for example, that strategy should be set at the top.

"Hiring and retaining top talent" is one of those managerial platitudes that finds itself in every corporate mission statement. As if companies go out looking for laggards. The mission statement for HR (please excuse the management-speak) should now be "to find and fill gaps in our human capital portfolio that complement and augment our highly valued investments."

To make an observation on deconstructing hierarchical management: when you set the creative and motivated free to develop new ideas, eventually you'll run into moments of conflict and indecision. Good managers diffuse the conflict and drive the decision without anyone knowing it has happened.

Michael Caton, Collaboration Evangelist, WebEx

WebEx Oracle Mashup

Today WebEx and Oracle announced an alliance to deliver Oracle’s on demand CRM via the WebEx Connect platform. WebEx is now offering Oracle’s Siebel CRM on demand service through the WebEx Connect application ecosystem. In an Infoworld article also published today, Josh Greenbaum, principal at Enterprise Applications Consulting said there is a lot more that can be done with WebEx's ability to "get to the desktop." "The fact that WebEx has a platform for SaaS delivery is one of the best kept secrets," said Greenbaum.

And as pointed out in a DMNews story, “Salespeople will be able to use the Oracle application throughout the sales process for marketing, tracking and closing on campaigns. CRM on Demand by Oracle also helps users demonstrate, present and forecast sales processes. The application provides sales management tools, sales dashboards, forecasting capabilities and real-time process management. Oracle Siebel also tracks WebEx meetings and prospecting activity automatically, generating integrated reports.”

CRM on Demand by Oracle is available today, but if you want to learn more about accelerating sales cycles with collaborative CRM, join us at a free webinar on November 6^th.

Colin Smith, Dir. Corporate Communications, WebEx

"Software" vs. Services

The battle of "software" vs. services is definitely heating up as "software" companies try to figure out how to reconcile an inefficient business/innovation model with a future that will be about value driven services. 

SaaS has a lot of attributes in its favor, pricing, flexibility, openness, and perhaps the most important, is speed to effectiveness for workers. Anyone that has subscribed to a service can describe the immediacy of the return on the investment, no waiting 6 months to get it deployed and then 2 more years for the technology to become cost effective. 

Traditional on-premise software has too many barriers to ROI. The developer model has changed from selling productivity to selling the next version. Software buyers purchase one version then, while waiting 4 or 5 years for the next version, end up paying for the privilege of upgrading to the forthcoming product every 2 years. 

With SaaS, innovation is on-going and continuous. SaaS proves its worth through innovation every day. Customers want to see their technology investment continuously help them drive business innovation, rather than wait to innovate on 5 year cycles. For that reason SaaS has to be continuously adapting, enabling our customers to be nimble, efficient, and driving market changes. 

Maybe we should stop calling them software companies and start calling them insurance companies? 

Colin Smith, Dir. Corporate Communications, WebEx

Cost Benefits of Going Green

With today's oil pricing development, oil futures soared to $85 per barrel on news of decreasing oil production in non-OPEC countries, the ROI arguments for going green got another boost. Yes, this is likely a blip, but it also provides another example of the instability of oil prices. You'll likely see more news about this on blogs today, as today Oct. 15th is Blog Action Day for the environment.

At WebEx we like to point to the environment benefits of using technology to reduce energy use, but most companies will see economic benefits as oil prices continue to fluctuate. While airlines do a good job hedging fuel costs, that won't last forever in a market in which oil prices have continued to trend up for several years as oil demand continues to rise. Companies should get started using collaborative technologies, such as web conferencing and virtual workspaces, to help reduce travel costs.

Telework and telecommuting is another way companies can commit to the environment. While it doesn't necessarily help the corporate bottom line, it does help the household bottom line for employees, who save on gas, tolls and auto maintenance. Commuting costs continue to rise, this latest news is certain to push up prices at the pump this week. Furthermore, many more states and municipalities have begun looking at road usage fees (may require registration) to fund needed infrastructure improvements and discourage driving.

Of course, telecommuting has numerous business and quality of life benefits. The work day generally starts earlier and ends later since workers spend less time spent sitting in traffic. They also appreciate having the flexibility to run out to pick up children from day care without worrying about incurring fees when they run late in traffic.

Update: For a view of how to individually make a commitment to the environment through a call to action, check out this post from Cisco colleague Christian Renaud. Christian has devised a strategy to keep from flying that people can use to weigh the necessity getting on a plane.

Michael Caton, Collaboration Evangelist, WebEx