The majority of the people attending the conference were in procurement, and most worked in government, therefore they had a lot in common. We noted several common challenges among the people we talked to:

• No visibility into upcoming obligations
• Struggling with the creation of contracts
• Need help matching inbound invoices to contracts
• No way to standardize contract language

These four common challenges are major problems that affect everything from performance to contract terms. The good news is there are solutions for these problems.

For example, we’ve solved each of these problems with our Prodagio Contract Management software. We helped a large oil-chemical joint venture gain visibility into upcoming obligations with our obligation and management tools, and now they are able to manage the performance of their contracts and save millions of dollars. A national energy lab came to us for help because they were struggling with the creations of contracts, after introducing them to our templating wizard they were able to consistently produce legally verified documents in minutes and no longer had to worry about rogue contract language. A state prison system needed help matching inbound invoices to contracts, we were able to integrate our solution into their system allowing them to fluidly make matches and ensure medical services were being delivered.

These are just a few examples of how software can eliminate problems and help productivity, I’m sure if you search the internet you would be able to find even more examples of what business solution software can help with.  With all the solutions out on the market the problem then becomes narrowing down the list of software products and getting buy-in from the right people.

Overall it was a great NCMA World Congress. Pete and I learned a lot from all the people we talked to, and hopefully we helped some of them realize there is a simple solution to some of their contracting problems.

Aaaachoo!

There are two major schools of thought in naming networked computer devices.  There is the abbreviation and sequence based method used by many large organizations, and the theme based method.

Often in large organizations server and network device naming conventions are determined in a committee and include a list of abbreviations that make it easy for staff to determine a devices location and purpose.  It’s effective.  It’s also boring. In small organizations it sometimes falls to the imagination of the systems administrator.  Some systems administrators are more creative than others.  Some naming conventions can be entertaining, while others embrace the science fiction cannon.

Throughout my career I’ve worked for companies big and small and have seen all kinds.  I thought I’d share some of my favorites.

Back in the early days of Dell Computer, many servers were named after trees.  I recall ELM and CHERRY being important systems in my working life there.  At a business I worked for we used the planets for our server names; MARS, EARTH, VENUS, PLUTO.  Those were the heady pre Y2K days of building Active Server Pages in IIS 3.0.  One senior exec had staff affix Styrofoam models of the planets on the computer monitors for “wow-factor” in hosting tours with prospective clients.

I’ve seen cheeses used as server names.  “Can you log into CHEDDAR?” and “ I can’t access COLBY” were occasionally heard in the office.  Who moved my cheese, indeed.  I’ve also seen wine used.  But wines can have long names, and be difficult to spell.  There’s car names, cities visited, islands around Java, towns in Baja, and flavors of ice cream.

I’ve seen the entire universe of Lord of the Rings / Star Wars / Star Trek naming references.  I think at some point every company has had a server named DEATHSTAR.  Naming a server TRIBBLE is cute, but try telling your VP of marketing to run his demo off of the LEGOLAS or SAURON servers.  – It gets tricky.

There are also many comic book characters, cartoons, and more recent pop culture references sprouting up as we speak.  American Idol contestant names?  Celebutantes? Vampire movie characters? The Smoke Monster from Lost?  The new iteration is just around the corner folks.

The usual method for tracking anonymous emails is to look at the header of the email. If the email is sent using a mail client like Outlook, Lotus Notes, Iphone, etc. the email header will have the router/computer ip address. If the email is sent directly from a web interface, like logging into gmail.com or yahoo.com, then the ip address of the router/computer will not be present in the header. Tracking these kinds of emails can be very tricky, but not impossible.

Most often when you get an anonymous email from a web interface, you might be able to come up with a “Suspect List” of email addresses. If you have this “Suspect List” of emails you can use a tool called SpyPig to track it. SpyPigis a very simple online program, which helps you to request a read receipt for the email you sent. In addition to sending the read receipt, it also gives you the ip address of the pc/router from which the user opened his email. SpyPig does not need registration; just follow the directions in the SpyPig Farm.

SpyPig works by attaching a specific html img tag src with a SpyPig generated url to identify your email. All you have to do is copy the generated image into the email you are sending and send the email. The email header the recipient receives will read SpyPig Notification [oink@spypig.com] – hiding your identity (like a spy!). Once the recipient opens the email and downloads the image (depending on security settings the image may not be downloaded automatically) a read receipt email will be sent back to you. The read receipt email will have the recipient’s ip address and domain, date and time, and location – all the information you need to identify the anonymous sender.

So how does SpyPig work? What happens internally to generate this informative read receipt is very simple. When the recipient opens the email and the image is downloaded, an http request is sent, which has the client ip address. SpyPig then includes this information in an easy-to-read receipt email for you.

This same technique can be used for tracking emails. Suppose you received an anonymous email from user xyz.unknown@gmail.com. You suspect that your friend ‘Mike’ (whose personal email is MikeSmith@gmail.com) is the author of this email. Using SpyPig, send one email to the anonymous email id and also send another email to your friend. Be sure to use two different subject lines so you can later tell the returned emails apart. If both emails are opened and the read receipt contains the the same ip address, you can conclude that both these email ids are accessed from the same computer or router. You can then conclude that “Mike” was the one who sent you the anonymous email, meaning he might have a virus or might not be a good email friend.

What about homes using routers? The home router ip address is fairly static. I have a home router and I have the same ip address for at least one week.

Curious to see what the read recipt looks like? See the sample below.

Remember, this method works only if the anonymous user opens his inbox.

Email Title: Test

Sent by You: Wednesday, May 12, 2010, 2:25:47 PM (GMT -5:00)

Opened by Recipient: Wednesday, May 12, 2010 3:12:54 PM (CMT -5:00)

Recipient Location: Houston, Texas, United States (May be inaccurate)

Recipient IP:75.185.xxx.zzz – Houston.hfc.comcastbusiness.net

Recipient Browser: Internet Explorer 7.0 – possibly used within another application such as Outlook (Windows) (Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 7.0; Windows NT 5.1; Trident/4.0; SU 3.28; InfoPath2; NET CLR 2.0.50727; NET CLR 3.0.4506.2152; NET CLR 3.5.30720; AskTB5.4; MSOffice12)) URL: [Information not available]

Jamie is taking it to the streets in his show on ABC, he’s building an army of followers via Twitter, and he’s put together a petition to take to the White House.  He started with one family and one school, and is building from there!

The task is incredibly daunting; we’ve got an immense amount of inertia in our daily lives toward eating what is easy over what is good for us. In the end, our national diet is horrible for our national health. Numerous sources say we’re raising the first generation of children that will not live as long as their parents.  Diabetes and heart disease are running rampant.

This pattern is ubiquitous and far-reaching.  Not only is it present in our homes and rushed business dinners, it is prevalent in our schools as well. Jamie has documented children in schools eating pizza for breakfast, chicken nuggets for lunch, then chicken nuggets or pizza again for supper when they get home.

Sometimes a business process can become just as unhealthy and difficult to change as a nation’s eating habits!  The parallels between the two are closer than they may first appear.  Schools, like businesses,  have rules and regulations with which to comply, budgets to meet, and even customers to satisfy — the parents!

Whether in schools or in business, you first have to see there’s a problem before you can effect change.  Once you have identified a challenge, you need a champion to pursue the issue.  Even with a herculean champion, there are an astonishing number of challenges!  Difficulties range from simple organizational myopia (“I don’t see anything wrong with how we do this.”) to budgetary blockades  (“It will cost a lot of money to make that change!”) and even far beyond.

Changing your business may seem a grueling ordeal.  As you work through the obstacles, it may seem you are making no progress at all.  It may seem you will never reach your goal.  At the end of this path, if you are willing to push through and get things done the right way, it pays off.  Your health improves–whether physically or financially–and you can again grow and thrive.

Do you see an issue that needs fixed? Maybe you’re continually missing a chance for a discount or simply can’t provide information back to your customers in a timely manner.  Gather some supporters, do some research.  Find a colleague or two at your company to support your goal of doing business better.

Maybe you can even mention Jamie’s uphill battle as a way to break the ice!

Groundwork Open Source is now offering their Enterprise edition as a VM Appliance, a standalone server, and now on the cloud via Amazon EC2. The new EC2 version can result in Beacon users ability to monitor their Prodagio or EMC Documentum repositories in under an hour.

First, to successfully match customer expectations you must identify ALL possible stakeholders, anyone that could have an interest in the undertaken project or be affected by it. This can present challenges when stakeholders need to be identified by your client, which is outside of your direct control. There are times when clients, as main stakeholders do not identify - willingly or in good faith – everyone who could be affected by the outcome of a project. Most of the time, such stakeholders and their direct interests will be uncovered the hard way during the implementation, resulting in direct or indirect additional pecuniary costs. So, early identification of stakeholders is important.

Second, now that you think you know your stakeholders, this is not enough. Their interests in the project along with their power to affect change that may impact overall project performance needs to be known. From here, knowing who to talk to and what you need in order to proactively, efficiently and effectively manage, direct and influence your stakeholders is crucial.  I highly recommend that you document these objectives and goals.  Stakeholder could produce roadblocks in the future, and by documenting these objectives, you can effectively create a method to recocile them.

Stakeholders can make or break your project, but understanding how to met their expectations will help score high in customer satisfaction in this ongoing, never ending, challenge.

Now I recognize I’m late to the iWhatever game, and by that I mean I haven’t personally owned an iPod or iPhone, so this new found fascination might be “old news” for some out there. What impressed me the most about the iPad was Apple’s accomplishment in making a complex technology straightforward for the end user. From the moment you take it out of the box and turn it on, you realize that you are holding something that has a lot of power and functionality but it was so simple to access.  The iPad gives you the ability to do so much without even opening up a user guide. Need to take notes during a conference…there is a built in notepad with a handy keyboard; want to quietly read the paper at a coffee shop…you can do so with ease and without the hassle of flimsy pages; you-tube videos (or any video) – you can watch easily and clearly on the big screen; need to make changes to the presentation that was just emailed to you – you can do it without logging on to a computer. Apple was able to take many different features and literally put them right at your fingertips, giving me and any other iPad user a simple power that is hard to describe. 

This product and kind of technology was not developed overnight; it evolved. Apple invested time, research, and intelligence to arrive at the point where they are now with the iPad – which is ease, efficiency, and usability right out of the box. I do not label myself as an Apple junkie, nor am I a follower of brands, but it is apparent that the robust technology that makes the iPad (not to mention the iPhone and iPod) so user friendly is not something can be duplicated overnight, it took time, testing and continuous growth from the original product. 

My great experience using the iPad reminded me of a discussion I had earlier this week with a company. If the iPad was at one end of the spectrum, this company’s situation was at the complete opposite.  This company was going through a transition from one major ERP to another within a very short period and planned to set up all functionality under this new ERP. The company invested over $30M to replace their existing ERP and any technology that wasn’t built by the new ERP was tossed out. 

They decided they were going to build an AP Automation solution in the ERP; which really meant a custom-built solution integrating 5 different products: scanning, Advance capture, 3rd party workflow, Repository and BPM tool under this new ERP. Integrated solutions for these five elements have existing for years, but it was perceived that the value of putting everything under the ERP Banner would be the “solver of all problems”; perception reinforced with the distribution of pins that said “Why not ERP?” 

Several months of custom construction lead to a 1^st release with very rudimentary capabilities: few invoices displayed on a screen at a time, no status information was provided, no workflows were yet built, no foreign tax configurations had been applied, etc…these were all problems that they never had before. Instead of making life easier, this effort arose new problems making this client realize the tremendous challenge associated with building something from scratch or almost.

From a business standpoint, their solution came down to reinventing a system that they already had and were happy with.

Completely rebuilding something that already exists with the goal of having it work the same exact way…is not innovation, it’s duplication. This client learned firsthand the value of what it takes to build a product.

 Even if you have all the spare parts that make an iPad, it takes a lot more than parts to build an iPad, it takes talent, domain expertise, focus… Even if you have the financial means to rebuild a technology or solution, is it a journey you really want to embark on? Or would you rather just unload it from the box and be ready to go?

The New Year’s Resolution works like this, every year at the stroke of midnight you kiss your partner and declare something you are going to change…usually something that will better YOU in some way – exercise more, drink less soda/beer, eat baked potato chips instead of fried, etc.

Earth Day Resolutions work the same way, except there is no kissing (I guess you could go kiss a tree, or a baby seal if there is one lying close to you…but that might be weird) and instead of doing something that will better you, you make a change that will better the Earth…or at least the part of Earth in which you live in. It doesn’t have to be something extravagant, just something simple that you can work into your daily life and keep up.  The goal is by Earth Day 2011 you are still doing your 2010 resolution and are ready to add on to it!

This year I am going to cut down on the amount of paper I use at work. At home I don’t use much paper – I read my newspaper on the web, I read my pop culture magazines on the web, I use reusable grocery bags (much sturdier and much cuter than the plastic or paper kind), and I use cloth towels instead of paper towels. The paper I do use gets put in the community recycling bin. At work, it’s a different story, I am a paper monster! Need something edited? – give it to me in paper form. Going to a meeting? –bet you will find me in the room with pen and paper in hand! If I run across a useful article – I’m printing it out and filing it under “potentially useful stuff” and I’ll probably never look at it again. I’m like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde – at home I’m very conscientious about my paper consumption but at work it’s like I can’t get enough!

Starting today, I’m going to do my work electronically – after all, I work for a company that strives to be green, we sell software that makes switching from paper to electronics easy and we are making strides to offset our carbon footprint. It’s time I start living up to my company’s standards before my paper wasting ways are discovered and they call me out for the wasteful worker I am! Oh the shame.

So how am I going to achieve this goal? Well, for starters, I’m going to start taking notes on my computer – My notes will be much easier to find when they are organized into neat folders on my computer than in one of the 5 spiral notebooks I have sitting on my desk right now.  I’m no longer going to print out articles and file them away – I’ll mark them as ‘favorites’ on my web browser or .pdf them to a folder on my computer. Finally, I’m not going to have co-workers print out their documents for me to edit – I will have them send it to me in an email and I will edit it right there on the computer. This last step might take some time to adjust to, but I’m sure I can handle it.

I’ve always had better success with my Earth Day Resolution than my New Year’s Resolution and I’m sure this year will be no different. So what’s your Earth Day Resolution going to be?  Need ideas? Here is a site that lists some pretty handy ones: http://www.therenewableplanet.com/blogs/the_daily_green/archive/2009/04/22/earth-day-resolution-ideas.aspx

While traditional meetings and brainstorming sessions are both important and efficient, it is also important to schedule time to kick back a little, with a gathering that doesn’t have the traditional protocol of a “company meeting”. The reasons to schedule these kick back times can range from presenting new and exciting company news, to calling attention to a team effort that was well done.

Whether it’s an extended lunch with catered sandwiches, a cake and ice cream social, or something more extravagant – making time to celebrate achievements while on company time helps build team unity and motivation, it also provides a casual environment for co-workers to discuss what has been happening on their side of the cube. Yes, conversations about who would win in a fight if it were Thundercats VS Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles might happen, but new solutions on how to solve certain issues and new ideas about upcoming projects will also be discussed. These casual problem solving and idea generating conversations often don’t happen in traditional meetings where employees feel pressure to say the right thing at the right time, but in a relaxed environment, co-workers will feel more comfortable discussing the ideas they’ve been trying out in the privacy of their personal cube. The new ideas generated by these casual conversations will motivate employees to go back to their desks the next day and try a solution that they hadn’t heard of or put effort into an idea that they hadn’t thought of.

Imagitek gave this casual, non-traditional meeting a try. After some exciting news, Prodagio team members were surprised with an in-office wine and cheese pairing. With Leibman’s Niki Newman, a real sommelier, as our leader we gave our eyes a break from the computer screens and put our nose and taste buds to work. It was a great casual environment to congregate, Niki would explain the notes in the wine and how it paired with the cheese , then the team had time to chat. (See pictures here) At first conversations centered around how the Rosemary Asiago Cheese and the Hopler Gruner Veltliner would be perfect for an evening by the pool or on a boat. By the end of the gathering, co-workers were chatting with each other about problem solving techniques, new features they’d like to see, and small milestones that different projects had passed. (Ok, and there were some conversations about Star Wars…but that’s to be expected). Overall though, in this casual setting we were able to talk freely amongst ourselves about things we had in common – our contribution to and ideas for the company.

Yes, the traditional meetings are necessary for the productivity of the company, but occasionally switching things up and providing an environment where employees are able to casually talk amongst themselves is a great way to boost morale and open up lines of communication that will generate new ideas and solutions.  And a glass of wine never hurts!

Google launched orkut.com in 2004, and like many Google beta web applications membership was by invitation only. The initial membership base was primarily American, but largely due to word of mouth more and more Brazilians became members. By 2010 close to 50% of Orkut traffic was Brazilian while only 2.6% was from the USA. This dramatic yet organic (membership was invitation only) shift of the user base from the US to Brazil resulted in Google actually moving the Orkut operations completely to Brazil.

Both Google and Spinal Tap can teach us a lot about how a customer base can shift product development.  The real-life Google watched customer trend and followed the user base to Brazil, where Okurt is still successful.   The fictional rock group Spinal Tap listened to feedback and found success in Japan, after flopping in the US. How well you listen to customer feedback and follow customer base can make or break you. Just like the ending of This is Spinal Tap, you can be invisible in one country yet adored in another, but it’s how you deal with it that matters.