Social Business strategist, podcaster, blogger, founder of Social Connections and conference speaker
I adore this montage from IBMConnectED 2015! So many awesome friends and colleagues.
Thanks to Oliver Heinz for taking such great photos and to Panagenda for sharing.
Saturday at IBM Connect. It’s all about the people, man…
The conference proper starts on Sunday, but there is no doubt that Saturday is one of the key days of the week for me, and the reason why I fly out on Friday (and thanks for allowing me do that, Philippa!). From soccer to Mai Tais, to BALD and the ESPN party, it’s a day that revolves around meeting, greeting, reminiscing, remembering, laughing and hugging. In short it’s what makes this less a business conference and more an annual reunion for so many.
I was recently asked to list out my main ‘support network’ for an application process, and rather than being a bunch of folks that live in my neighbourhood, town or even country, most of those named were amazing friends that I see at most once or twice a year and usually on the Boardwalk at IBM Connect. This is family, friends and work all wrapped up into one great big melting pot. From the inevitable hug from the yellow-clad Mat Newman, to the gentle ribbing from Darren Duke, to dinner with Michael Sampson, to… well, there are too many such interactions to mention here. I regularly get asked why Connect is a must-not-miss event, and whilst the sessions, showcase, meetings, networking and so on all play a part, the Saturday gatherings are so much more.
It was darn good to see everyone, and to be back here at the Dolphin. I’ve missed the place.
Before I wrap up, I wanted to say a well deserved ‘congrulations’ to Niklas Heidloff, who was named as the Penumbra Group’s Prism award winner for this year. Always given to an IBMer that has gone ‘beyond the call of duty’ to help business partners and the community generally, the Prism award list over the years has told the story of those that have broken out of the lawyer-constrained corporation that IBM can occasionally be, to be a colleague, an advocate and a friend to those on the outside. Over many years, I can heartily say that Niklas has been all of those and more. I’d say without him, we’d be unlikely to still have OpenNTF, and probably would not be seeing the surge toward considering Connections as an app dev platform.
Well done Niklas, and thank you!
Humans of New York, I am scheduled to be in town next week for SugarCon 2013 and for a visit to a long-term customer in Midtown.
Therefore, good friend Victor Toal and I thought it was high time for another NYC LotusBeers session. The plan is to meet at 8pm on Wednesday, 10th April at The Pig ‘n’ Whistle on 2nd. All are welcome!
Let us know if you can make it via email, DM or by leaving a comment. Hope to see you there!
P.S. Given the re-branding effort, I wonder if these sessions should become known as IBMSocialBeerz? 😉
I appreciate the willingness of so many IBMers to be social and collaborate with those outside the organisation.
I love the way that they will go beyond the call of duty and step in to help with issues or discussions.
I adore that so many are willing to find information and share it privately or publicly via social tools and IBM cloud platforms.
But…
I just wish that there was one network that all IBMers (or at least all ICS staff) used rather than a combination of:
Connections is an awesome platform when used properly – and that typically means one instance for an entire organisation or community.
I would love to see IBM pick one platform (my preference would be to use the Connections instance on ibm.com) as the place to collaborate with the ICS community (partners, customers, press, analysts – everyone), make sure it is running the latest, greatest version of Connections, and then stick with it!
Do you agree? If so, which platform would you pick? Please leave a comment!
If you don’t take part in the monthly IBM Collaboration Solutions monthly community webcasts then you are really missing out. Run by the wonderful Joyce Davis, they’re great opportunities to catch up the latest news regarding ICS/Lotus products, to hear from those active in the community and to have an opportunity to feed back on your own opinions and views.
This month’s webcast featured IBM Champion Simon Vaughan from Cardiff University, Baan Slavens from IBM and Eric Otchet presenting on Lotus Notes Traveler 8.5.3 Upgrade Pack 1:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1aVCI9fJt60
Make sure you register for August’s meeting! All the details are shared on the IBM Social Business blog.
We’d been having a few debates online over the past few months about how to grow the IBM Connections community.
It’s already pretty strong, and has definitely grown in size as new versions of the technology have been shipped by IBM – the number of practitioners working with Connections 3.0.1 is a world away from those that were around with Connections 2.0 for example. However, there’s definitely room for improvement!
So if you’re interested in Connections, here’s some things you can do to get involved:
I’m sure there are plenty more, but that’s a good start!
One of the topics that is being discussed is to have a common hashtag that we use for all Connections-related content to make it easier to find on social media like Twitter and LinkedIn, as well as in Google Searches and on sites such as StackOverflow. The hashtag needs to be instantly recognisable but also short. It is also suggested that we have two, one for general Connections content, and one for specific development-related information – think the equivalent of #domino and #xpages. We’ve had a few suggestions as to what might work, and have opened a poll in the LinkedIn group:
What hashtags should we use on Twitter and in blog posts for IBM Connections (in general) and for IBM Connections Development?
- #ibmconnections & #ibmconnectionsdev
- #ibmcon & #ibmcondev
- #ibmcnx & #ibmcnxdev
- #connections & #connectionsdev
- Something else
We’d love as much feedback as we can get so that we can make the right decision on this and that it really is a community decision. Please do take the time to vote!
In closing, there is already a fantastic Connections community out there. Sure it isn’t as big as the Notes/Domino one right now, but it is active, energetic and growing fast. If you’re interested in Connections and Social Business in general, there is no time like the present. Get stuck in, and you are sure to recoup far more than you yourself put in. After all, that’s the whole point of Social, right?! 😉
[Originally posted on The Connections Blog where there were 37 comments]
For our third IBM Social Business Briefing (aka Wicked Wednesdays) on 25th April at Royal Exchange in London, we felt the time was right to move the discourse from thought leadership and education to a more practical footing.
Of course, we still leveraged the superb network of independent thought leaders who we are lucky to have at our events BUT at this latest event we changed / evolved the format.
On this occasion I framed the discussion on the emerging role of the Community Manager (seen by some as the ‘rock star of the Enterprise’) and then actually used a collaboration platform to discuss, collaborate and innovate around the chosen topic.
The objective or rather the output of the debate was not simply to gain a better understanding of this subject (the fastest growing job role in Social Business) but also to create a job description for the role of Community Manager which could then be downloaded and iterated by users.
To help us achieve this we introduced attendees to the Collaboration Garden – a place where the Wicked Wednesday discussion and collaboration goes on in and around the physical events.
Once inside the Garden, users could not only record their opinions and raise questions but they could also examine (through the software) the potential responsibilities and attendant tools on hand to assist a Community Manager with user adoption – e.g. gamification and social media feeds.
The overall sentiment was that this was our best Wicked Wednesday to date and pointed the way forward for future events. Weaving the use of the collaboration platform into the discussion from the start had a number of important effects:
Wicked Wednesdays are all about sharing and collaborating with those who attend the latest trends, twists and turns in the Social Business journey. We take risks at this event; we have to in order to keep things fresh and real. So it was particularly gratifying to hear that the new format was warmly welcomed by those involved.
We are planning our next Wicked Wednesday/Social Business Briefing to take place in June and in keeping with our need to innovate we are experimenting with moving the venue from the Royal Exchange to a comfortable, friendly, coffee shop in the city which should be fun.
For more information, feel free to contact us directly.
I have had a PMR open for some time relating to a bit of a known issue with Custom themes and Connections communities.
There was an issue where you would create a custom theme :
In my case I also customised the coloured community themes also:
When clicking on forums, blogs etc the theme was stripped out displaying:
It appears there was a step missing from the wiki!!
http://www-10.lotus.com/ldd/lcwiki.nsf/dx/Defining_a_community_theme_ic301
Step 1.d – d. Remove the file theme.css from the corporateTheme directory
In my case I had based my custom theme on the default theme and had used it as the default Community theme (which has no theme.css), so all communities with the default theme appeared correctly.
BUT, I had also lightly customised the coloured community themes – removing (or renaming) the theme.css from each coloured theme has resolved the issue.
Thank you mr Kieran Reid for investigating and confirming this was the issue.
[Originally posted on The Connections Blog by Sharon Bellamy where it had no comments]Folks, whilst I admire your efforts to prove that Lotus software is still being purchased by customers, please can you consider refraining from phrasing your posts as “selling” Lotus?
This falls into a trap that Lotus sales folks often slide into – focusing on the license sale, not the value delivered by your solutions.
What is interesting is that customers are choosing to “purchase” solutions based on Lotus technology. Talk about the value that they’re gaining from your work, the innovative technical and business solutions you’re building, and the way in which Lotus technologies are benefiting their business.
In the long run, this is a much more strategic approach and one that will benefit the whole community long-term rather than a very short-term burst of posts that people soon ignore.
[Just my 2 British pence, as ever…]
As one of the community advocates for the Lotus Technical Information & Education community, I am delighted to pass on the news that there is a new landing page for the community, pulling together all the key resources for the community:
We at Collaboration Matters are delighted to be part of the Lotus Technical Information and Education Community, and to act as Community Advocates, encouraging others to participate in the Lotus community and to create shared content.
To that end, I’d like to bring your attention to the next community webcasts, taking place on 23rd June at 10AM ET/3PM UK and 8PM ET/1AM UK. I will be participating in the call and will be sharing my story with the community.
If you’d like to join, add it to your calendar today. Details are below the fold:
Dear Community Member: Join our June Lotus Technical Information and Education community meeting! Meeting Agenda
For more information about our community, visit our blog, Facebook page, Web Conference Information (URL same for both calls):
Phone Conference Information:
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The organisers of the Web2.0 Expo event coming up soon in Berlin have just announced that they are making a lounge available for community events:
Community Lounge
Web 2.0 Expo Europe is the gathering place for the European community and beyond to come together and discuss what’s happening, and what’s about to happen, on the Web and in our community. In that spirit, we offer you our Community Lounge – a place to hang out, network and hold meetings.
Offerings:
* Wireless available in the room
* Conference style seating for up to 30 people
* Cafe style workspace seating
* Power for up to 15 laptops (first come, first serve)
I think this is a great idea for both this conference and for others we attend (hint, hint!)…