Back to Responses to the CM Community Idea
Forward to Decisions on Name and Mission
Responses to Name and Mission
Bob Doyle
Scott Abel, Tony Byrne, Bob Doyle, Frank Gilbane, Ann Rockley, Bill Trippe, and Lisa Welchman met last Friday at the Gilbane Conference and produced a list of action items for your attention.
We are especially looking for all of you to help name the organization and to redraft the mission statement.
More details are at http://www.cmsreview.com/Resources/Community/Meeting2.html
The new mailing list-serv will be up as soon as we decide on a name.
Bev Godwin
Here is my two cents.
If the group is really about automated web content management systems, it should be called that rather than Content Management.
Content Management has a much broader meaning. And so does Web Content Management, though not quite as broad.
Bev Godwin
Gerry McGovern
Dear Bob,
>From the list I prefer:
CMPractice
Here's a rough mission statement/definition:
CMPractice is a professional organization dedicated to promoting content management. Content management is the discipline of getting the right content to the right person at the right time at the right cost.
Best
Gerry
Erik Hartman
Hi all,
I'm in for Content Management, since this is 'broader' as Beverly mentioned. 'Au contraire' Beverly I really would like the community toaim for the other ECM tools, technologies and methodologies as well.
That are my two (euro)cents.
I REALLY like CMCommunity.
Erik
Tony Byrne
As you saw in his previous note, Bob D. is gathering alternative"mission statements" which we (the "G23") can modify and finalize, perhaps through the same kind of voting process that yielded you wonderful souls in the first place.
My stab at such a statement is appended below. Bob, I assume you will put all of these on the web...
BTW, am seconding Eric H's vote on CM Community.
Cheers,
Tony Byrne
--------------------------------------------
CM Community
"A community of content management practitioners"
As an industry and as a discipline, content management has recently seen substantial growth, driven by
* Unprecedented expansion of electronic information;
* Elevation of content management as an enterprise concern;
* Profusion of CM tools
Unfortunately, this growth has been accompanied by a dearth of opportunities and venues for content management practitioners to share information, practices, and concerns. As a group of CM practitioners, we seek to create a not-for-profit membership organization that would enable such sharing. Please consider joining.
Drawing on lessons from AIfIA and similar organizations, we can envision a variety of member services, including online discussion forums, knowledge wikis, professional discounts, and "summit"-type gatherings devoid of marketing hype. However, the final set of services will be decided by the community through the board of directors its members elect.
A few basic tenets have been set in advance of those elections:
* We will not accept corporate sponsorships but welcome individual members from all organizations.
* We do not envision setting formal standards but hope to accelerate the description of design patterns and good practices.
* We will not issue certifications but do plan to create new educational opportunities for members.
* We will remain independent but foster cooperation with sister groups such as AIfIA) and other associations (such as AIIM).
We imagine that such an organization will attract a diverse group of professional members. We invite project managers, authors, editors, developers, graphic/UI/experience designers, information architects, analysts, systems architects, researchers, MarCom professionals, network administrators, industry experts, students, consultants, and anyone else who cares enough about content to invest a small sum in helping to makeus all better at managing it.
Lisa Welchman
Hi everyone
CM Community is good, I think of the names listed. I'm still for getting the mission statement and general purpose agreed upon before selecting a name.
I like Tony's take on things for the most part. Are we actively excluding senior mgmt types (CIOs, Senior Managers)? Is that what we want to do? I guess the answer is yes if we are focusing on the CM practitioner.
Also, I'd like to be able to have additional tie-ins to the academic community. I like what Bob and Bob have to offer but I think there are opportunities to have different views on CM - tool focused, taxonomy focused, process focused, change-management focused, etc. I'd like to have some discussion about the roll that these academic relationships will play and some general coordination throughout the group.
Lisa
Brendan Quinn
Re: CM Community
+1 from me on this one! (to slip into apache-style voting...)
Scott Abel
I agree with Lisa. We ought not pick the name until we have the description.
And, keep in mind the purpose of a mission statement is to document the
role, or purpose, by which our proposed organization intends to serve its members. It should likely contain a brief describes what the organization will do (current capabilities), who it serves (members), and what makes it unique (differentiation from others/justification for existence).
Keep those good ideas and suggestions coming.
Dana Hallman
I get a lot of calls that go something like the following -- "I've been
tasked with this CM project that I'm not that certain about. I'm at this step in the process. I understand you've done this already. Can you help step me through this?" I guess I see a person such as the one described as a key constituent of the CM Community of Practice. That said, the following is my suggestion for a mission statement:
The purpose of the Content Management Community of Practice is to make less cryptic the processes of defining requirements for, selecting, purchasing, preparing for, implementing and maintaining a content management system.
The Content Management Community of Practice will enable even novices to the field of content management to confidently and successfully choose and implement a CMS best suited to their organization's needs. Members will also benefit from access to best practice information and real-time knowledge exchange related to key CM topics and disciplines. The goals of the CM Community of Practice will be accomplished through the provision of succinct courses of study, facilitated discussion groups, and how to guides/guidance based on the expert knowledge and practical experience gleaned from the Community's professional exchange.
I would add to the list of members, people from the technical and
management sides of the house, IT Directors, Web Managers, system
implementers, technology trainers, system administrators etc...
Dana
Gerry McGovern
I'm very much with Bev on this one.
Peter Drucker has said that we've spent the last 50 years focusing on the T in IT, and that we'll spend the next 50 focusing on the I. For the last 5 years, there has been a huge focus on the S in CMS. I think that focus is changing. I think there is now a much greater focus emerging on the C (content) and M (management).
I personally know several very big, very successful websites that run on FrontPage. Software is a very small part of the content management challenge. My definition of content management is getting the right content to the right person at the right time at the right cost. It's a publishing challenge, and publishers don't spend their days worrying about how they're going to print the stories.
While I'm at it, I don't like the word 'community'. (I prefer CMPractice.) I live in an Irish community. I am not part of a content management community. I don't mind being part of a content management profession. There's a big difference, in my view.
The people I want to impress are managers with a budget. In my experience, the word 'community' does not exactly make them run for their check books. I would like what we establish here to sound and look very serious and very business focused.
I would start a mission statement something like:
CMPractice is an organization of content management professionals. It seeks to raise awareness of content management as an essential business discipline that increases productivity and drives profitability.
Content management is the discipline of driving actions with content. It's about getting the right content to the right person at the right time at the right cost. The result is that the person acts in a way the organization wants.
If commerce is selling with people, then ecommerce is selling with content. CMPractice is in the business of enhancing the content management profession.
Best
Gerry
Bev Godwin
Now THIS is a practice I could get excited about.
Bill Trippe
Hi All,
I agree with this newer thread and emphasis. Technologies will come and go, but the problem set will remain.
More importantly, content "management" isn't tied, per se, to technology. I have worked in and with organizations who have all kinds of editorial and review processes that they conceive and plan independently of a particular technology. They then look at automated and nonautomated processes for accomplishing the task, and choose the better one--based on cost, effectiveness, timeliness, etc. It is instructive to those of us who think "computer first" that the organization's overall goal is better content at the right price, not better content through automation.
Bill
Dana Hallman
To me the S in CMS refers to the means by which the people, the processes (technical or not), the standards and policies, the information and a whole slew of other things come together to meet the end user's needs. I agree that the C and the M are critically important. I agree that software is a very small part of the "S" in CMS.
Martin White
Dear community
I think it's time we were less pedantic. I don't like TLAs (three letter acronymns) but we have one in CMS, but this can stand for Content Management Software, Content Management System, Client Management System, and Contact Management System. Interestingly if you search for CMS in Google the top hits are CMS Energy Corporation, Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services and Compact Muon Spectrometer. (yes really, have a look at cmsinfo.cern.ch/Welcome.html/ and be awe-struck with real technology). And congratulations to Tony for getting CMS Watch to #4!
I prefer CMS = Content Management System. It's about systems that enable organisations to manage content, and sometimes (maybe quite often) you may need Content Management Software to do the deed.
Which to me starts to suggest that the CMCommunity (and I can live with that - the TLA is CMC!) is an international group of professionals devoted to the development, implementation and exchange of good practice in the systematic management of content. Gerry - I'm not sure we are all 'content management professionals'. I'm an information scientist and proud of it. I would hope we are all professionals, but not necessarily 'content management professionals'. That is because there is a whole ton (2.2 kilogrammes over here) of stuff that is nothing to do with software and a great deal to do with organisational change, implementation management, business planning and a lot else. It's all very well putting all the emphasis on C=Content, but does that mean 500k page intranets with a lot of content but no management so no-one can find it and re-use it are a Good Thing? I think not.
End of late night rant
Martin
John O'Donovan
I think you have the focus right Gerry by not emphasising on solutions. I would add that the content management problem extends across systems, processes, production and consumption of content. It affects people and training to drive awareness at an enterprise level.
Just in terms of structuring thoughts, I see a mission statement as having two parts - an upfront statement of intent and then some more detail to help describe how we can help and engage with people.
For me, content management is about managing content through an entire
life-cycle from concept to publishing - through syndication and
re-purposing. And then right back to concepts again...
And don't forget interacting with audiences, user generated content and
other feedback loops.
And this applies across all media types and publishing platforms, not just the web. There are elements of Knowledge Management that are also relevant. We have found that extending your content and information management appears to bring the most benefits. I say appears because our work is not complete in this area...but well formed propositions have been made.
Could we develop the concept of someone who can generically advise on areas of content management rather than the current pattern of advising on specific implementations or systems?
One of the key concepts that we talked about in Austin was whether there was some form of CM Professional tag to add to your armoury. I understand your concerns Martin about not all being Content Management Professionals but I don't think it is a box to put people in - rather something to with and align yourself with in showing awareness of the issues.
Anyway, inputting some previous comments, my handy mission statement
generator tells me we might need the following things:
A pithy initial comment (the vision / mission)
...leading into any selection of the following to expand...
What CM might be
Why it's important
How it helps you / ROI
Areas of practice
Areas of knowledge
Best practice
Enterprise issues
People and training issues
What is a Content Management Professional
Systems design issues
Content structuring issues
A little dash of workflow and process
Organisational readiness and maturity
And who might be interested in joining, engaging with or listening to this organisation (this is developing already I see...)
We could be an organisation, a community, a practice, an institute or other. I'm not sold on community entirely because of the lack of professional overtones. Sadly Gerry is right in that this may be a consideration for senior execs.
Also some examples brought to you by those who have done this before...with some measure of success (whether this is related to the statement or not I will leave to you to decide)
http://www.dmi.org/dmi/html/aboutdmi/mission.htm
http://www.aifia.org/pg/about_aifia.php
http://www.agilealliance.com/home
http://www.sei.cmu.edu/about/about.html
Lisa Welchman
Good Morning, Afternoon and Evening (do we have representation in Asia?), [Ed. Yes - James Robertson.]
My take away thoughts and reactions to the threads before:
1. I like the idea of being a community of content management professionals.
2. I like the idea of raising the awareness of content management as a legitimate business discipline.
If we are a *professional* group, I think we will have to have a discussion about certification programs again. Sr. Managers like certification programs - it's a quick way to evaluate new hires and improve the skills of existing staff. I know we discussed this in LA some- but the "professional" assertion means that there is a CM Profession and a right and wrong way to do CM. There will be certifications if we are successful in promote our profession as a legit real one with standards. Someone will make certification programs around this (if not already). Do we want to own these programs and requirements for certification? I'm not eager to run these programs because they are time consuming and tedious to run but we will be leaving something significant on the table if we don't include them in our longer term plan.
lmw
Jane O'Connell
Bonjour from France,
Coming in after so many good thoughts... here goes for what strikes me:
I like Tony's concepts of
* individuals, not organizations
* patterns and good practices, not formal standards
* educational opportunities, not certification
Diversity of membership is critical in my opinion to having a stimulating "cross-fertilization" approach. Ref Tony's list and others. And for me, Lisa, this includes what you call "senior management types" whom I believe we should welcome with open arms if they are individuals interested in content management. I know a few, but they are still too rare. The more the better!
I very much like your focus on business, Gerry but would suggest a slightly broader orientation to your mission statement suggestion : "CMPractice is an organization of content management professionals and stakeholders. It seeks to raise awareness of content management as an essential business discipline that builds value for companies and organizations, both financial and human.
Dana, when you say "the S in CMS refers to the means by which the people, the processes (technical or not), the standards and policies, the information and a whole slew of other things come together to meet the end user's needs" I agree, but would add that it is not just users. The company or organization itself has needs from a strategic viewpoint.
How about "Content Management Strategies and Practice" as a focus for our group? Covers both high level and trenches. Membership: those who work in fields directly or indirectly related to creating, sharing, using and preserving content through electronic means.
As for a name, we could pick up on your assumption, Martin, that we are all pro's in whatever CM related role we play, and call ourselves the CM Pros. (available domains are: cmpros.org, cpros.org, cmprofessional.org (and net), cmprofessionals.org,cmprof.net (and org)). Has the advantage of combining the connotations of both community and practice.
In short, we need to be diverse in membership, be both people/process and technical focused, and keep an eye on the bottom line.
Bonne nuit from France,
Jane
