Enterprise Collaboration and Virtual Teams Report (February 27, 2008)

The Technology Trends of Enterprise Collaboration and Virtual Teams

• Topaz Technology will be demonstrating its line of business application integration tools at the SharePoint Conference 2008 next week. "Attendees will get a first look at new technology that will make structured data in SAP and Oracle seamlessly available in Microsoft Office SharePoint Server (MOSS). This SOA architecture will significantly reduce development costs and time for IT administrators seeking to customize line of business solutions for simplified data access."


• Microsoft unveiled Small Business Server 2008, for organizations with up to 50 PCs. It offers Exchange 2007, Windows SharePoint Services 3.0, support for the latest mobile devices, and better security, among other things.


• Webber Wentzel Bowens, a corporate law firm in South Africa, migrated its email from Notes to Exchange 2007 over a weekend, using archiving software from ZANTAZ and migration tools from TransVault.


• NextPage released the NextPage Information Tracking System, for tracking and managing documents in the enterprise. Key capabilities: proactive tracking ("tracks files through their entire document lifecycle -- moves, copies, saves, renames and emails. In addition, to tracking information wherever it is stored on the desktop, scattered shared drives, email attachments and removable media"), classification, policy management, monitoring and reporting, and more. Available immediately.


• Customers wanting to embrace SharePoint have to figure out architectural, technical and strategic issues before moving ahead. Some of these topics will be discussed at the SharePoint Conference 2008 next week in Seattle.


• Mindjet MindManager 7 won Collaboration Product of the Year in the Intranet Journal awards. "What started out as a simple mind mapping software years ago when I first wrote about it has become a full-fledged collaboration solution, rich with possibilities because of its tight integration with business applications and existing technologies such as web services, RSS, and enterprise data sets. Its core identity remains the mind map because they do it so well. It is insanely easy to use and can turn a boring meeting with spotty note taking and unclear responsibilities into a highly participative, creative, and well-documented session with clear action items."

Insights on Being Productive and Effective as an Individual

• Bob talks to David Allen about life, health and handling stress. On staying healthy, David says: "I have managed to eliminate or certainly get to manageable levels, the source of most stress for most knowledge workers, which is basically getting everything out of my head and managing externalized systems so that my extended brain is kept pretty intact and current. That frees up a lot of focus. I think that to a large degree, it’s not the prime thing, but it keeps me all right."


• Mindjet reported on its recent global productivity survey of 2000 knowledge workers, and said that it is feasible for people to save 3-5 hours a week in certain work activities by using better tools, such as the MindManager mind mapping tool. "MindManager has paved the way for individuals and organisations to take control of information overload to more effectively drive strategic change and results. As measured in the Mindjet Value of an Hour client pilot program, Mindjet calculated that individuals can increase productivity by at least 3-5 hours per week. UK knowledge workers found that by using MindManager they could achieve significant time savings during their working week For instance, 3.01 hours per week saved when running meetings, 2.80 hours for information Management, 1.97 for collaboration and communication and 3.88 for project and task management."


• Tony Buzan has an archive of articles on mindmapping and a collection of videos.


• Tips on getting your email to zero: (1) think about the role that email plays in your work, (2) coach those you work with re the best way to get in contact, and (3) experiment for a week working with email in a different way. "I've found that the less I am checking email, the more focused I can be at the rest of my work. Each person has a different context and set of expectations so you'll need to figure out an approach that fits the culture of your work place. If you spend more than 2 hours a day on email, a serious detox may be in order and it will be very, very difficult to coach those around you. It will feel unnatural to not be checking email all day long. "


• Focus on what's important right now, and give up the phantom of multitasking.

Other Noteworthy Insights

• Walt Mossberg likes what he sees in the new Lenovo X300 (see also ComputerWorld).


• Apple refreshed its MacBook and MacBook Pro line of laptops, with better specs. Rod is unimpressed

Comments

[Mark Hurst]

Michael, thanks for the link to the multitasking piece.

You might also like to read through my book "Bit Literacy: Productivity in the Age of Information and E-mail Overload", which has a number of tips on managing digital information, including e-mail.

[Mike St. Pierre]

Thanks for the linkback to my article on getting the inbox to zero. I like your content and will check back from time to time.

Mike St. Pierre

[VicGee]

As a MindManager user I agree it's a great tool, I use it often, but on the collaboration front? Not unless your co-workers also have MindManager.

A new type of mind mapping software has grown steadily over the last year or so: Web-based mind mapping.

I recently pulled together in one place the details of all of the browser-based mind mappers, over at
http://www.mind-mapping.org/web-based-mindmappers/ There are 11, plus some collaborative diagramming tools that are can support mindmapping as well.

These pages show what's free (and how much the subscriptions are for the others), what can import and export MindManager maps and, of course, where to find them. All allow sharing maps, even if not all your collaborators have the right software. Most let you collaborate with others in real time and from different locations when working on a mindmap.

In some contexts, confidentialty will need to be considered. Then, a .mmap file from MindManager, zipped up, encrypted and emailed may be a safer alternative.

Vic
http://www.mind-mapping.org
The master list of mind mapping &
information management software

[Michael Sampson]

Thanks Mark, Mike and Vic.

Mark ... your book is on my shelf. It is full of good information.

Mike ... likewise.

Vic ... good call on the web-based mindmapping. I have seen Mindmeister used to good effect in this context.

Best to you all,
M.

[Brant Williams]

Hi Michael,

Thank you for the Topaz Technology post. I've seen their technology work...very compelling stuff. They can do in 45 seconds what used to take a days and days of expensive dev work.

If anyone here is going to be in Seattle at the SharePoint conf this week, you can check out their booth.