“For as long as I have been running my own business, I have advised clients who were using various IBM technologies as part of their collaboration technology portfolio. In recent years, some of these clients have started using IBM Connections. I wanted a book to give to my clients who were investigating the possibilities of IBM Connections in their work, but since there is only one book available on Connections, and that a more technical treatise on Lotus Connections 2.5 (from over three years ago), I obviously could not find one. Therefore, as you do, I wrote for my clients the book I had been hoping to find.“
Thus begins the Acknowledgements section in my next book – Doing Business with IBM Connections – which I’m almost 2/3 of the way through, and am working to get finished in time for IBM Connect 2013 at the end of January. It’s a book for business users, not the technical folks in IT. It’s very hands-on (step-by-step on how to use particular features for a particular outcome), and it’s written with the background of both Collaboration Roadmap (2011) and User Adoption Strategies 2nd Ed. (2012). I have written it in a considered way; I’m not a wild-eyed raving technologist trying to sell you the latest kit.
The core concept of the book is to take the Collaboration Scenarios approach I lay out in chapter 2 of Collaboration Roadmap (2011), and show how business people can use IBM Connections 4 to improve the way they do business. The book has 10 core chapters, each focused on one of the major collaboration scenarios. In each of these chapters there is the theory of the scenario (eg., why document co-authoring doesn’t work today using email and attachments, in Chapter 3), a real-to-life scenario (like I used in Seamless Teamwork for SharePoint 2007), step-by-step instructions on how to make the scenario work in Connections 4 (sometimes in a couple of different ways), two case studies of real organizations already using Connections for the particular scenario, and three or four advanced concepts to keep in mind to make the scenario work.
I will be self-publishing this book. To be clear, IBM did not ask me to write it. They are not going to be publishing it – it will not be an imprint of IBM Press. And while I am giving some people at IBM the opportunity to see the contents before it is published, I’m not asking for “approval” to publish the book as such. The book is written to help business users get their work done better using Connections, and I’ve written it independently of the vendor – as I do with all of my research and consulting.
How Can You Help?
If you are using IBM Connections at your organization, there are two ways you could help me get the book done.
1. I’d love to talk to you about your experiences with Connections for doing business. What’s working? What’s not?
2. I’m still looking for some case studies for various chapters. I have some great ones, but I need some more. If you are doing particularly great things with Connections in line with one of my ten scenarios, let’s have a more indepth conversation about what’s going on. Perhaps your story could become one of the 20 featured case studies in the book.
At one of the conferences I spoke at in London earlier this month I said that my blog goes quiet when I’m writing a book. My blog has been quiet for the past few months. Now you know why.
Categories: Michael's Books
Michael Sampson 
Today IBM released new Same time Chat apps for Android tablets and phone. This is the first release of Same time to have an experience designed specifically for the Android tablet. Tyler Walters, on my team, is the designer. Great job by him and the development team to produce this. This design is in line with the Notes Traveler tablet design, so you can use them side by side and have a great experience.
Hi Michael, earlier on today, I had a lengthy conversation with James Robertson, from Step Two Designs, about Social Business, social technologies and adoption techniques while we are both attending KM World 2012 this week (Last day was today…) and he pointed me to this particular blog post where you are announcing your next book adventure on IBM Connections from a business and adoption perspective. Really cool stuff! Wish you all the best as I am sure it’s going to be a smash hit!
I am wondering whether I may call your attention on our very own internal adoption program at IBM called BlueIQ that we have been running since September 2007 and which you may well be rather interested in taking a look. We developed an entire methodology around it based on a good number of different components from education & enablement, to a community of ambassadors, success stories, metrics, IT infrastructure, executive sponsorship / leadership, etc. etc. that I described over on this blog post.
You may want to go through the links and additional materials and if you think it would be worth while including in the book I will be more than happy to set up some time to get together with you over a phone call interview, skype talk or Google Plus Hangout where we could exchange some more ideas. I would be more than happy to share what we learned over the last 5 years, how we go things going, how critical the role of the Ambassadors has been all along, etc. etc. Let me know how it goes and whether you would be all right with it or not …
Thanks again and best of luck with another smashing book, I am sure! Well done!!
PS. Since I don’t have a way to receive follow-up notifications when you comment on the blog, please do share a @Mention across to my Twitter ID @elsua with your thoughts and we will go from there. Many thanks and much appreciated.
Luis – long weekend here, but quickly for today – thanks, and yes, would love to learn more.
Michael.
Hi Michael, no worries! I figured you would have been busy doing some good stuff. Happy to meet up whenever you would want to. Although perhaps this week it may not be the best of weeks since I’m on the road in 3 European countries non-stop from one place to another and would prefer if we could find some time next week, when I get back home, to get together. Timezone may be a challenge, but we could have a look. Let me know what would work best for you. Perhaps your early morning, my late evening would be good. I’d be ok with that. Let’s see if we can make it happen 🙂
And thanks ever so much, Michael, for the opportunity. Greatly appreciated!
Thanks again for your detailed response Luis, and I look forward to speaking with you next week. I’ll do pre-reading through the BlueIQ site and material.
Safe travels …
Michael.