Ann Rockley
At 04:26 PM 3/21/2004 -0500, Bob Doyle wrote:
> Hi all,
>
> I just called Scott Abel to discuss mechanics of his presentation at Gilbane, and the call turned into a long interview for our new community of practice's Executive Director.
>
> I think Scott has all the credentials - and even more excellent ideas for how - to put things together.
>
> He has organized his local chapter of STC, and is champing at the bit with ideas that the national organization should be using. All of them use the kinds of tools that we recommend to our clients. He is an inspiration for "practicing what we preach."
>
> From my twenty years of experience with the enormous (35,000 member peak) Boston Computer Society, everything Scott described rang true.
I am so glad that you found Scott a strong potential for running this community. I found his ability to strategize and reach out to people pretty phenomenal.
> We should listen carefully this Thursday to his plans, and also observe how well he listens to us in our advisory capacity. But he has my vote, and I look forward to providing him with the infrastructural tools for a community we have been assembling at CMS Review.
>
> One particular suggestion is time critical. He thinks we should rely on membership dues for only a part - perhaps half - of our financial support. The other major source would be vendor sponsorship. We all will be talking to vendors this week. Should we give them a heads up on the community idea, and solicit possible initial funding?
I like the idea of soliciting funds from the vendor community, but I'm not sure if I like to think of it as "support". Maybe sponsorship which in return gets them something that we very specifically define. I'd be a little concerned about vendors "driving" the organization. I'd rather see them as advertisers or sponsors of specific activities. We could approach them to at least them know that we are doing this and find out if they are interested in being kept informed or potentially participating in the process as we go forward. I'm also not sure if the "right" people will be at the booths as sometimes they are just sales people, though there is a good chance that at least some of them will have key people present particularly if they are presenting.
We would need to clearly define the benefits for them and I'm not quite sure we can do that in the next 2 days, but we can certainly open the doors and start generating some excitement.
> It would put us on a sound fiscal basis from the getgo and allow us to hire Scott. Remember the AIfIA founders raised the $7000 or so from personal contributions.
I think having some paid people is certainly a goal in the long term, because volunteer organizations are only as good as their volunteers and volunteers have other obligations (like earning a living or having a life) that often interfere with success.
I'd like to see us set some short and long term goals, then determine how we are going to get there and what it is going to cost to get there.
Tony Byrne
I'm glad Scott is enthusiastic, but I would like to make a plea againstvendor funding -- at least at this early juncture. More generally, I'd
like to suggest that we get a concept agreed-upon by the G23 (Group of
23) before we develop a business or organizational model. Our funding
will determine what resources we have, if any at first, to fund an ED.
About vendors:
* Vendors will use the organization to gain influence. Not in a
malicious way. They just see any support as a marketing investment and
will want a return. Any hopes for impartiality are, I believe,
illusory. This could play out in all sorts of subtle ways, like trying
to massage an event or theme that would seem to favor the approach of a
competitor.
* The user/practioner/consultant community will not consider the
organization completely impartial. This is less of an issue if we
decide to make the outfit a traditional trade association; it's a big
deal if we agree it should be end-user driven.
So I am suggesting that we
1) Agree on a mission and set of services among the G23
2) Lay out a revenue model that seems reasonable in light of #1
3) Define what resources flow out of that for administrative support.
AIfIA holds it small treasure chest for (I think) things like meeting
expenses.
Cheers,
Tony B.
Erik Hartman
Hi Bob (and others),Thank you for this invitation. I gladly accept.
I hope the scope of this community will reach beyond cms (in fact, to all digital information management systems).
With James Robertson on board usability will be an issue as well, but I would like to find out more about the expertises of other members.
Recently I joined the Dutch association of Information Architects GIA (www.gia.nl).
I know there are some Dutch pages on AIfIA, so I guess I should join AIfIA as well.
Alas, I can't meet you in LA, but I will meet Tony and Frank in April 19 in the Netherlands.
Either way, any on line alternative is very welcome.
Oh, I found something about the 12 principles of collaboration. Perhaps it's interesting for you. www.mongoosetech.com/realcommunities/12prin.html.
Cheers,
Erik
Lisa Welchman
Hi everyone,Thanks for including me in this group. I'm excited about participating and look forward to our first get together in LA. See you soon!
Lisa Welchman
Scott Abel
Wow! This sure is exciting news. I'll be in LA. I hope to finally meet each of you and put a face with each name I already recognize. What a great group of forward-thinking folks!I look forward to learning more about this initiative.
Scott Abel
Martin White
Greetings to fellow CM practionersThank you to Bob, Joseph, Tony, Bob, and Ann for the vision and the invitation. By a coincidence I am just finishing up a 40,000 word report for the Ark Group on content management, with a strong strategic/impelemention angle, and in compiling the resources section I was pondering about the lack of focus for CM practitioners.
I have just one issue to raise. The mission statement refers to independent CMS consultants. The context is that these are members not working within an organisation implementing a CMS. But there is the question of independence from vendor bias. A year or so ago I wrote some briefing papers and keynoted events for some CM vendors. This was always on an arms-length basis, but I still have people reminding me of where they saw me and then looking at the list of vendors I have recommended with a jaundiced eye. As a result I now undertake no work at all for any vendor. I'd be interested in the views of others on the list on this issue.
As some of you know I write a regular column for EContent, 'Behind the Firewall' . This is of course just intranet-related, but I'd be happy to include a reference to the new CoP if and when you feel it would be appropriate. The readership is over 12,000.
One further contribution I may be able to make. As Bob B, Tony, Eric and Howard are aware, I am the Chairman of the Online Information conference which takes place this year on 30 Nov - 2 Dec. ( Sorry Frank - exactly the same days as your Boston event - I got the dates wrong in my recent email to you!) Content Management will again be a strong theme for the 2004 event, and may be the conference could support a meeting of the CoP in some way, support in kind rather than cash I would have to add.
So for once it was worth staying up late to read my emails.
Regards and good wishes
Martin
John O'Donovan
Great news Bob - I will do whatever I can to help. Unfortunately I will not be at the conference but will be in America soon, probably in Seattle end of April / Beginning of May so may meet up with Bob and whoever is around.Cheers,
jod
Mary Lee Kennedy
Bob,Thanks for the inviation. I look forward to participating. I'm in Boston/Cambridge next week. Perhaps there's an opportunity to meet either the Sunday or Tuesday.
Mary Lee
Brendan Quinn
Hi Bob and everyone,Thanks for asking me to join this group, it sounds like fun! I like the idea of a practitioner community, we’ve needed something like this for a while.
I won’t be attending the Gilbane LA conference this week, but may be attending Seybold/Gilbane in Amsterdam next month if I can. Good luck with the meeting, if you want some virtual input I could join in from London (I could get up that early, not sure about JOD though).
Regards,
Brendan.
Jane McConnell
Hello Bob and everyone else,
Thank you for inviting me to join this group. I'm very interested.
For those of you who do not know me yet, I'm physically based in Grasse (south of France) and Paris, so will not be present at events as much as some. (My son is currently studying in LA, and I'd love to join you for the next meeting, but transatlantic costs and time will keep me home!)
The issues I encounter with my clients are often triggered by their international scope and geographical diversity. They constantly juggle viewpoints and business cultures along with languages and different degrees of net maturity in their markets. This makes content management quite complex. I have started writing a column for Intranets Today on international intranets and my next article deals with the myth of global and local content.
Contributions I can bring to this group:
- A broad view, with an international perspective (I'm an intranet generalist, not a CMS specialist)
- When appropriate, visibility in France.
- Participation of course in virtual events, web site, sharing of experience, best practices, ...
I like the idea of extending the concept to digital information management systems (suggested by Erik Hartman).
In response to Martin's comment about neutrality, the Paris Club Net (informal group, 4 years old, intranet managers from around 200 companies) is currently dealing with this issue - getting the balance right between companies (end-users) and vendors and consultants - in terms of goals, membership and activities. It's a tricky one and we don't have an answer yet.
I look forward to the mailing list invitation.
Jane
Howard McQueen
Hello everyone,I would enjoy contributing to this group and its mission. We have active projects with the World Bank, the U.S. FDA which are attempting to draw out good and better content management practices within the intranet and internet channels. Many of these projects are in "pre-implementation" stages.
I am not planning to be at the Gilbane Conference, but would be glad to participate in a real-time conf. call or whatever else is setup to facilitate communications.
My activities this Spring also include Steering Committee responsibilities for FedWeb Spring '04 (Washington, DC, May 24-26). There are pre-cons planned (5/24) and two days of activities which will showcase federal efforts relating to CM and other topics. A very few speaker slots remain open, so send me an abstract if you are open and available on 5/25 - 5/26. www.fedweb.org .
Cheers,
Howard
Dana Hallman
Hi Bob,
Thanks very much for the invitation to join the content management
community of practice, I look forward to the interaction. I am in the
throes of a content management implementation for Firstgov.gov (the
official portal for the U.S. government) website. There are many lessons
learned that we can share regarding the process of product selection and
procurement through implementation. In addition, I have been overseeing
content management pre-implementation activities at several U.S. government
agencies as part of a CM program initiative sponsored by the Federal agency
for which I work. There are definitely recurring issues that we are
witnessing across these agencies, that I'm certain others are also
struggling to address . This community of practice can provide valuable
advice for those in search of information and best practices as well as a
how-to guide for navigating the CM maze.
I won't be able to join you in LA on such short notice, however I look
forward to meeting with everyone face to face at another time as well as
interacting on-line.
Dana Hallman
Web Content Management Program Leader
U.S. General Services Administration, Office of Citizen Services
dana.hallman@gsa.gov
http://www.firstgov.gov
JoAnn Hackos
Hi Bob,
Thank you for the invitation. I'm pleased to take part. Unfortunately, I will not be in Los Angeles. Since we're hosting the Content Management Strategies conference (5th annual!!) in San Francisco in April, we're pretty busy with planning. Perhaps several of you will be attending CMS and we can host a second meeting at that time.
JoAnn
Gerry McGovern
Dear Bob,
Congratulations on the initiative. Thank you for the invite. I'd be delighted to get involved. Unfortunately, I won't be in LA on March 26.
There's an awful lot of expertise in this core group of people and I would be great to get some form of discussion group going. I think if it was well moderated it could be extremely valuable.
I'm writing this in Oslo, Norway, having just completed a two-day content management workshop. At this stage I've done workshops in over 25 countries. The problems are the same. And I find a change in thinking wherever I go. More and more organizations are treating content seriously; seeing it as an asset, not just some cost.
Organizations now recognize that there is a difference between print content and web content. They want to know how to write better web content. They want to train their people. This is a major shift in thinking. As Peter Drucker said: "We've spent the last 50 years focusing on the T in IT. We'll spend the next 50 focusing on the I."
So, it's very exciting times ahead!
Best
Gerry
