Wait…don’t we already know everything about Enterprise Systems adoption? Why would I want to submit a paper by March 1st, 2012 to the Enterprise Systems Adoption and Business Models track (Call for Papers here) at AMCIS 2012 in Seattle?
Because Enterprise Systems are entering a dramatically new phase of cloud-deployment, software-as-a-service, and open technologies that are much more deeply connected to the outside world. The traditional problem of matching complex enterprise system to complex organizations is being transformed by new options that transcend or supplement the usual SAP and Oracle offerings. It’s an exciting time to re-open the traditional adoption and implementation questions, with an eye towards a future of fundamentally different Enterprise Systems business models that could change everything.
So don’t miss out. Check out our Call for Papers, and consider this range of possible topics. Questions? Ask me, or any of our fine co-chairs.
· motivation and justification for ES adoption,
· alignment between ES and adopting organization,
· barriers and impediments to ES adoption success,
· risk factors in ES adoption,
· critical failure factors for ES adoption,
· critical success factors for ES adoption,
· understanding of ES adoption success,
· evaluation and benchmarking of ES projects,
· multi-cultural and multi-national issues,
· multiple stakeholder perspective in ES adoption and use,
· business model frameworks,
· impact of new trends within the software industry on business models,
· business model innovation for standard software companies,
· implications of shorter product lifecycles on business models,
· SaaS related business models,
· open source software related business models.
I recently joined the International Journal of Electronic Commerce as an editorial board member, and its new web editor. Which is cool, because IJEC is still the #1 rated e-commerce journal in the universe. But it’s also cool because I had the chance to relaunch IJEC’s online presence with its first new website since the late 1990′s.
So far, it’s a somewhat minimalist update. It uses open technology (WordPress), making it easy to add new capabilities as we go along. It gets a modest 1000 or so monthly visitors from 70 countries.
It’s the largest content-based site I’ve ever done – almost 500 pages – so previously unknown bulk import and backup plugins have become my good friends. I even get that little pang of nervousness in the pit of my stomach when I hit the ‘update’ button, so you know it’s for real.
Except for much better search engine results on article and author names, there’s no dramatically new power yet. I look forward to hearing from you about what interesting new capabilities we should add. We technology academics are famous for always having the worst, most outdated technology (I’m not naming any names, um, AIS) but let’s break that cycle, shall we?
The Steve Jobs story has something for everyone.
He was a revolutionary who embodied the American Dream; design was his weapon.
He was a self-made man whose success came from building products, not by gaming the system. He was counter-cultural; a dropout; a drug user; the darling of Wall Street; and the arbiter of good taste. He was somehow able to hold together earnest working class values, engineering values, elitist values, and Buddhist values.
It was not just his success, but how he succeeded. Entrepreneurship, innovation, building a better mousetrap, the startup in the garage–this was what America was supposed to be good at. Apple was a story of disaster and salvation. Maybe America is yearning for this particularly strongly right now.
I think his biggest achievement was how he made the revolutionary potential of digital technology real. That’s hard to do. Entire industries–technology, music, movies, personal communications–have been remade for the better. It’s not obvious that without the interventions he personally led, these revolutions would have happened.
His legacy will last longer than his products if the digital revolution continues; if the industries and institutions that desperately need re-inventing are revolutionized in Chairman Jobs fashion by his disciples and admirers. In the days to come, perhaps it will be TV, or financial payments, that are turned inside-out. Will commerce, education, government, or health care eventually follow?
His uniqueness and rarity, so celebrated over the past few days, illustrates how long and difficult a road it will be for America to revive its traditional hopes and dreams. There aren’t many Mr. Jobs lying around.
Thanks Mr. Jobs for letting me play with one of your Apple II’s when I was 15, and a 128K Macintosh when I was 17. That was awesome.
Strange coincidence: The two technologies that influenced my life the most were born on the same day. As me.
The Bomb
On August 6, 1945, the first atomic bomb attack was unleashed on Hiroshima. Nuclear weaponry, and the stranger-than-fiction doctrine of Mutually Assured Destruction, was one of my first sustained intellectual interests. I remember a presentation in a 10th grade essay contest on “How to Survive a Nuclear War for Less Than $10,000” (it lost to an elucidation of the joys of stamp collecting, my first taste of intellectual martyrdom). I volunteered for UCSC’s Nuclear Policy Program (run by this guy) as an undergrad, and became a bit of an expert on tactical and battlefield nuclear weapons. I dragged my wife to Cold War locations around the country–Oak Ridge, Los Alamos, the Titan missile silo in Arizona, even the first nuclear power plant in Idaho. Thank goodness the Trinity detonation site in New Mexico is only open twice a year, or I would have dragged her there too.
First Website Ever!
On August 6, 1991, the first website was published. The Internet in general, and the Web in particular, were the technologies that elevated my childhood obsessions with TRS-80 pocket computers, VIC-20s, and Apple IIs to the level of world-changing forces. I signed up for my Ph.D. in Computers, Organizations, Policy, and Society at UCI a few years before the Web began, but by the time I left the Internet was open to everyone, and the Web was big money. My Ph.D. work was still pre-Web (ethnographies of manufacturing information systems being the hottest topic I could think of in those ancient times), but then moved on to mobile technology, open technology, and my current obsessions with online business. Launching a new website to 2 billion+ people still gives me a thrill, and showing others how to do it is one of my most satisfying teaching tasks.
As all early historians and players of Civilization know, for human society in the long run it’s always about technology–the Stone Age, the Bronze Age, the Industrial Age, etc. Digital technology dominates and shapes our world, through globalization, financial markets, social networks, and surveillance, with a force even greater than nuclear technology in its day. As I get older, I think more about how digital technology supports, and could possibly change, the most powerful human institution for shaping our future: for-profit business.
When I was a kid reading my International Herald Tribune from cover to cover, or writing my Model United Nations resolutions, I didn’t have an inkling of the kind of societal challenges we’d face in the United States–environmental unsustainability, a threatened middle class, corruption of the democratic process, financial speculation, and perpetual warfare to name a few. When the Cold War finished, I too thought it might be the End of History. Incorrect.
On August 6, 2011, I spent the day hiking in the Mokelumne Wilderness. Not that long ago, at least part of our society was wise enough to realize there are places where technology (and business) shouldn’t apply. I wonder if our society is wise enough today to make those decisions. Maybe it’s darkly appropriate that my spouse gave me Vonnegut’s Slapstick, or Lonesome No More to read on my birthday, an autobiography of the future last President of the United States.
Happy birthday to me.
Compared to old school Yellow Pages and newspaper ads, local businesses are facing a confusing new world of marketing across Google, Facebook, Yelp, Twitter, Groupon, email, and tons of other online services.
I gave a short seminar recently on how to create a simple internet marketing plan, with tips and priorities for local businesses. The slides are free to use for non-commercial purposes.
From the discussion yesterday at the San Francisco SEACC (Southeast Asian Community Center) Small Business Assistance Program Workshop, you can see how local businesses are struggling to connect with customers. Small businesses are being bombarded with sales pitches from internet brand names and startups.
Kelly Lam, owner of a local Vietnamese restaurant, told the group how a paid Yelp business account brought in far more customers than local media ads. But she really has to work it. She religiously reads customer reviews at the end of every day, even if she gets home at 7 AM! She responds to the negative reviews immediately, and feeds customer ideas back to her staff. A local caterer brought her more business too, but only on the condition that she had at least a 4 star Yelp rating–evidence that customer reviews are starting to affect business relationships. With Google Places moving into the local review space, Kelly’s work days might be getting even longer.
And yes, I know it’s strange for a geek like me to talk marketing. But no matter how simple the packaging (for example, Google Places for Business, AdWords Express, or Facebook for Business) there’s an unavoidable level of geekiness in this new marketing world. However, fear not: no matter how many Yelp or AdWords cost-per-impression vs. cost-per-click discussions I have, I won’t be dressing like a marketing expert anytime soon!
Perhaps the correct title is more like Your 30 minute introduction to Online Business, but below are the slides for this morning’s talk on Becoming an Online Millionaire (and Other Fantasies Partially Based in Reality).
It includes a simple version of the online business framework to be featured in my upcoming textbook, tentatively titled Online Business: Fundamentals and Getting Started. Look for it in all fine collegiate bookstores either in Spring or Fall 2012, depending on my summer work habits.
[Original becoming an online millionaire talk slides]
[Version 2 of Online Millionaire slides from June 13 MGEM session.]
Thanks to social media, any clear separation we might have once had between technologies of intimacy, and technologies of broadcast, is gone. Lured at first by the promise of exclusivity, then by the efficient management of friends and family, essentially every American between 13-30 now willingly shares intimate details of their lives on the most easily accessible media platform in human history. As a facebook commenter might say: hahahahaha!
I’ve found quality guides online for how to protect your privacy on facebook and other social media (the ‘how’ to protect yourself), but I haven’t found as good an overview of the potential risks, and how real they are (the ‘why’ to protect yourself, and ‘where’ to focus your efforts). So I put together these slides for a panel on “Privacy and Security with Social Networking” at USF’s CIT.
[social media risks talk slides]
One theme is that while elaborate privacy settings are nice, when damaging information gets into the wrong hands, claiming that the post was only intended for ‘friends’ has never worked as a defense.
[Note: the books I referred to during the discussion were Alone Together by Turkle and The Facebook Effect by Kirkpatrick. The site that demonstrates there is no limit to what people will post was failbook.com.]
Building a culture where faculty share teaching tips is one of the goals of USF’s new Center for Teaching Excellence. (Why I would be invited to help build such a center is a source of amusement for my students, but let’s move on…) When asked to share a teaching technique that has worked for me, I had trouble thinking of one. I think that’s because any teaching success I’ve had is more due to ‘good defense’ (avoiding mistakes) than ‘great offense’ (using really effective teaching techniques).
What’s good teaching defense? For me, it’s ORE:
- Organization – stick to a posted schedule and syllabus; all materials and handouts easy to find online; tell people what they are supposed to do
- Responsiveness – respond to all student requests quickly; be willing to make appointments on short notice
- Enthusiasm – be genuinely passionate about the subject matter; care about the student’s success after the course is over
Organization and responsiveness are mostly under my control, so that helps. Enthusiasm comes naturally for some courses, but if it isn’t there I need to create it. That’s not always easy. Take my current course, an introduction to information systems and operations management. I had to find a way to make quality and process improvement interesting for me, or else it was going to be death for my students. Now I look forward to seeing them fix burrito assembly, and other vital business processes.
If these three ‘defensive’ pieces are in place, I feel like students are almost always willing to forgive any mistakes in my teaching.
As far as teaching ‘offense’ is concerned, I’m not sure yet whether my new approaches are working. I’m increasingly intolerant of learning activities that don’t directly contribute to useful deliverables (and no, exams don’t count as a useful deliverable for any business activity I’ve ever seen). I try never to ‘lecture’ for more than 15-20 minutes at a time (not always successfully), and while we use diagrams and websites I almost never read off of pre-canned slides anymore.
Since I’m working on a book to support an entirely new way of teaching business students about technology (by starting their own online business, as opposed to learning a bunch of information systems definitions), I obviously care about teaching. I’m just not always confident enough to say ‘this really works’.
Watson’s easy victory against the best humanoid Jeopardy! players in the world has prompted completely opposing visions of the future. One version is Terminator around the corner: self-aware machines enslaving the human race even sooner than we feared. The other version is misguided science: the finest technological minds of our generation devoted to winning a glorified pub quiz.
I called it a celebration of both machine and human intelligence, though it’s probably more accurate to call it a clarification of what each side is good at. Deciphering the natural language clues of written Jeopardy! (Watson still can’t handle the audio and video clues in real games) is a huge accomplishment for a computer, even an 80 teraflop one. But the fact that a single human brain can still be competitive in retrieving facts against many millions of dollars of hardware, thousands of processors, years of development, and a few dozen genius researchers shows that our humble human neurons still pack a powerful punch–and use about a thousand times less energy to boot.
I give IBM credit for stirring our imaginations, and for open-sourcing a large chunk of the software (the Apache UIMA project). But as for Watson technology solving medical problems, as impressive as the technology is, we’re still talking fact retrieval. If the correct answer involves judgment and reasoning, we’re going to need an upgrade.
I tried to say as much during this local TV news appearance about Watson’s Jeopardy! game (.mp4 video file). Talking supercomputers is, of course, every geek’s dream on Valentine’s Day.
I’m excited to be part of the Editorial Team of a JAIS (Journal of the Association for Information Systems) special issue on expanding the frontiers of IS research. The objective for this special issue is to think big–to take the big ideas from our field and solve big problems. It fits perfectly with my quest to get our discipline off of its obsessive focus with CIO issues and the IT function. The world is digitizing, and we need to be out there helping to do it right, not stuck in a functional silo that is rapidly becoming a commodity.
The deadline is March 28, 2011. Take advantage of this great opportunity and submit your masterpiece!
About Me
J.P. Allen is Associate Professor of Information Systems at the School of Management, University of San Francisco.
