how to create a knockout social business and collaboration strategic plan.pdf

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How To Create A Knockout Social Business And Collaboration Strategic Planby Philipp Karcher, September 26, 2014

For: Application Development & Delivery Professionals

Key TaKeaways

a strategic Plan Coordinates The Many Moving Parts Of social BusinessThe strategic plan is a tool to drive alignment around the business and technology objectives and coordinate work streams.

Develop social Business Plans Using POsT: People, Objectives, strategy, TechnologyForresters structured approach advocates selecting vendors only after understanding stakeholder needs and setting clear objectives on where and how to deploy social business and collaboration technologies.

Understanding People and Getting Them To Buy In Is Critical To successSocial business success is almost entirely dependent on the network effects that come from broad-based adoption by all employees.

Prioritize The Cloud, Mobility, and Integrations That simplify switching Between ToolsA well-constructed information workplace simplifies access from multiple devices and allows people to retain a consistent context while switching between applications.

2014, Forrester Research, Inc. All rights reserved. Unauthorized reproduction is strictly prohibited. Information is based on best available resources. Opinions reflect judgment at the time and are subject to change. Forrester, Technographics, Forrester Wave, RoleView, TechRadar, and Total Economic Impact are trademarks of Forrester Research, Inc. All other trademarks are the property of their respective companies. To purchase reprints of this document, please email [email protected]. For additional information, go to www.forrester.com.

For ApplicAtion Development & Delivery proFessionAls

why ReaD ThIs RePORT

Social business and collaboration programs can redefine work by changing the way employees connect with each other and the information they need to do their jobs. However, programs fall flat when firms approach them as purely technology solutions without clear business objectives and stakeholder support. Having a documented strategic plan that all stakeholders agree on can make the difference. This report for the collaboration leadership team is a how-to guide for creating that strategic plan using Forresters proven POST people, objectives, strategy, technology methodology. This report was originally published on August 24, 2012; Forrester reviews and updates it periodically for continued relevance and accuracy, and this time found that only light changes were needed, and updated it accordingly as of September 2014.

table of contents

why you Need a strategic Plan For social Business

A strategic plan Will Help Unite the social Business team

Follow The POsT Methodology To Construct The Plan

step 1 people: Analyze employees needs And Barriers And Get stakeholder Buy-in

step 2 objectives: Agree on the Business And technology objectives

step 3 strategy: Focus efforts, Assemble resources, And Align Work streams

step 4 technology: implement And operate the technology platforms

recommenDAtions

Make social Business and Collaboration a Business-Level strategy

notes & resources

Forrester recommends the following reports.

related research Documents

setting the technology Foundation For your social Business And collaboration strategyJuly 29, 2013

monitor the performance of your social Business And collaboration programmarch 11, 2013

social Business And collaboration success Hinges on effective change managementFebruary 4, 2013

how To Create a Knockout social Business and Collaboration strategic Planstrategic plan: the social Business And collaboration playbookby philipp Karcherwith rob Koplowitz, Art schoeller, stephen powers, and steven Kesler

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How to create A Knockout social Business And collaboration strategic plan 2

2014, Forrester Research, Inc. Reproduction Prohibited September 26, 2014

why yOU NeeD a sTRaTeGIC PLaN FOR sOCIaL BUsINess

Social business technology removes barriers between workers and knowledge and between workers themselves, making it easier for employees to access knowledge and people from many sources when and where they need them to make decisions.1 A social business and collaboration program is an ambitious technology undertaking with strong implications for business stakeholders and technology management that requires a coordinated approach best captured in a strategic plan. A good strategic plan for social business and collaboration increases the likelihood that you:

Understand the requirements and barriers. Sound strategies are grounded in an understanding of what employees are already doing and what they need from social and collaboration tools to be successful. Avoid false starts by kicking off a stakeholder intelligence-gathering process to determine the needs of different business stakeholders and employee groups.

Align around shared objectives. Agreeing on what you will do is important. Agreeing on what you will not do is just as important. It is the agreement as much as the objectives themselves that will drive adoption and success. Use the plans development process to identify and get agreement on the objectives of your social business program.

Coordinate all the work streams. Social business programs have many moving parts. The strategic plan is a single place to name and sequence the things that must come together: desktop, data center, application, security, policy, training, evangelism, and ongoing optimization. The strategic plan keeps the team grounded as priorities change.

Deploy the right technology platforms. Ultimately, the technology is what people will touch and either love or hate. The social business program must have a view of what Forrester calls the

information workplace a set of integrated applications and services to facilitate collaboration, communication, and content access available on the platforms and devices of choice.This requires a cogent and achievable technology blueprint and a clear road map to get there.

a strategic Plan will help Unite The social Business Team

Because social business programs touch every employee, they can be highly charged initiatives. In the decade of strategic planning work we have done with clients, we find that different lines of business, departments, and even individual employees have varying motivations for using social and collaboration technologies. Often, they point a finger at technology management, insisting that standardized platforms like SharePoint are ill-equipped to meet their needs. Just as frequently, we find discord within technology management. Technology management shops defined along regional or business-unit lines often engage in religious wars over the types of technology platforms theyll use to support social business objectives.




A strategic plan focused on business outcomes can help defuse these tensions. This means the plan must acknowledge and support different stakeholders objectives while focusing on measurable business results (see Figure 1). To go beyond technology tools to a pragmatic social business and collaboration program, you must pull together a team dedicated to success over the one to three years a global program can take, including:

Business stakeholders to establish the goals and sponsor the changes. Sales executives, human resources (HR), communications, marketing, and product development are examples of stakeholder groups that should be involved in identifying specific initiatives and assessing the business case. Their participation is critical to sell the value of collaboration to the business and to overcome politics and funding hurdles for projects.

Technology management-business liaisons to audit user needs and coordinate efforts. Successful social business programs fund a new role that Forrester calls the social business analyst to work closely with business groups and process owners. At Cisco Systems, 12 people have this job. At UBM, a lone social community manager handles the load. At Electronic Arts, the role is housed in learning and development. At IBM, its a massively distributed volunteer organization. A social business analyst can be very process-centric or very people-centric, depending on the culture of the firm.2

Technology management stakeholders to draw up and implement the collaboration architecture. Enterprise architects work with technology management service owners including the desktop, data center, and collaboration applications to review existing strategies, evaluate technology solutions, and ensure adherence to integration standards. Network analysts address performance/latency issues, and security analysts pay attention to protecting assets and privacy.3

Owners of customer-facing processes when integrating customer data into employee systems. If the program includes empowering employees to act as brand ambassadors, then clearly the customer service process owner must get involved. Likewise, if customer communities become part of the product development process, then the knowledge gained should be incorporated into the product planning processes. Technology management increasingly plays a critical role in these endeavors.




Figure 1 Social Business Initiatives Arise From Multiple Sources

Source: Forrester Research, Inc. Unauthorized reproduction or distribution prohibited.73062

PR

R&D

Customerservice

Marketing

Division X

Division Y

IT

HR

Blog

Twitter

Facebook

Online customercommunity

Product feedbackand ratings

Ideation

Collaborationplatform

Recruiting

Improve customer and investor communications to inuence buyingbehavior.

Initiate faster response to customer difculties and improve customersupport to increase customer satisfaction levels and improve brandloyalty.

Engage customers to drive brand loyalty and evangelism.

Increase sales by engaging with potential customers through an onlinecommunity, helping them answer product questions.

Encourage customers to provide feedback and product ratingsthrough online sales channels.

Track ideas in a simple system that allows employees to submitsuggestions on how to improve products.

Increase productivity by allowing employees to easily shareinformation and stored content.

Reduce hiring costs by using social networks to source talent.

Example sourceof initiative Example initiative Business objective

Sales Social listening Accelerate deal ow by electronically monitoring government RFPsites.

FOLLOw The POsT MeThODOLOGy TO CONsTRUCT The PLaN

Forrester developed the POST people, objectives, strategy, technology approach as part of Groundswell, our book on social marketing. Using a structured approach that begins with a careful look at the audience is the best way to avoid jumping straight to technology choices that may or may not work. Take each step in turn:

1. People. Analyze employees needs and barriers and get stakeholder buy-in.

2. Objectives. Agree on the business and technology objectives.

3. Strategy. Focus efforts, assemble resources, and align work streams.

4. Technology. Implement and operate the technology platforms.

step 1 People: analyze employees Needs and Barriers and Get stakeholder Buy-In

The biggest obstacle to success with any social business initiative is underestimating how hard it is to get people to change the way they work. This is particularly important with social business and collaboration. Unlike projects with a limited audience or an audience compelled to use the




application like ERP or CRM social business success depends almost entirely on the network effects that come from broad-based adoption by all employees. Kick off a stakeholder intelligence process, and:

Determine the needs of employees to identify and overcome barriers. You want information on what employees are doing today, what they might do differently given the chance, and what would motivate them to change. Analyze asset databases and activity logs to get aggregate data on adoption, or host focus groups to identify cultural and motivational barriers.4 But to really understand what people are doing and need, borrow a page from the market research handbook and survey a representative sample of employees (see Figure 2).

For social marketing projects, focus on the needs of customer-facing employees. Focus on the needs of employees who use community tools, social analytics, and listening platforms.5 Interview stakeholders in marketing, customer service, product development, and sales to gather their requirements. Often, the collaboration leadership team can identify quick-win opportunities to better integrate social marketing tools with core CRM systems to capture customer insights.

Recruit business stakeholders to drive adoption and change. Strong executive sponsorship (at the vice president level or higher) from the outset is critical to getting participation from stakeholders. Our research suggests that winning the support of middle managers who are typically saddled with day-to-day operational performance objectives is also critical to changing frontline employee behaviors involving processes or practices that require more effective collaboration.

And of course, factor in the needs of technology management stakeholders. In some ways, this should be the easiest part of the program getting the technology team onboard with the changes needed. But of course, that isnt always the case. To create a burning platform for technology change, lead with your employee intelligence on whats broken or your business stakeholder agreement on whats important in the program. Dont be afraid to make social business your CEOs problem: CEOs are looking to get the most out of employees, and a great social business and collaboration solution is an important foundation for that productivity.




Figure 2 Choose The Right Techniques For The Accuracy And Turnaround Time You Need


More fact-based, less opinion-based

Lower cost, faster turnaround

Workforcesurveys

Conductstatistically validsurveys

Include allrelevant groups

Employeefocus groups

Identify likelysegments

Findrepresentativeemployees andmanagers

Businessinterviews

Managers andemployees

Includeenthusiasts andlaggards

ITinterviews

Key stakeholders Business liaison

staff

A fact-basedconversation

Bias-free analysis

Validatingsegments

Turningsegments intopersonas

Quickassessments

Key issueidentification

Quickassessments

Tough politicalsituations

The personalcontext

Facts fromemployees andgroups notincluded

Details on eachgroup, scenario,and employeetype

A business orworkforce pointof view

Traditional needsassessment techniques

Quantitativetechnique

Techniques

Best for

What itmisses

step 2 Objectives: agree On The Business and Technology Objectives

Social business strategy must focus on helping the organization achieve its goals and objectives. Political, organizational, and regulatory factors might limit the scope, but the team must come to agreement on the objectives and measures of success. The collaboration leadership team should:

Articulate and socialize a compelling, achievable vision of the future. Start with high-level objectives like making it easy for employees to find and connect to experts and expertise and giving them what they need to have excellent internal and external meetings (see Figure 3). With these objectives in mind, document a high-level vision of the desired end state, and affirm what social business and collaboration means for corporate, business-unit, and functional business strategies.




Define the scope of the social business and collaboration program. How much are you going to tackle? If its an overhaul of the entire email, collaboration, and content delivery systems, be prepared for a long slog. But if its to add social collaboration on top of a set of existing services consolidated or not then the program might move faster. Similarly, if you need an enterprise deployment before getting anything out of it, that can be hard to justify. But if you can bring teams up piecemeal and show success early via pilots, you might build support faster. There is no single answer, but a strategic plan must still define the scope of each project and how success will be measured.

Identify and agree on the objectives. There are two kinds of social business and collaboration objectives to focus on: 1) productivity objectives that apply to all information workers, and 2) process objectives that improve a core business activity. Productivity objectives finding experts and expertise, holding great online meetings, and locating relevant content matter to most employees using computers and smart devices. Process objectives are more nuanced; examples are eliminating a bottleneck in a customer onboarding process, accelerating a sales proposal timeline, or optimizing product launches in a global marketing organization (see Figure 4). Social business analysts must look at the key points where knowledge is transferred, where employees need information to make decisions, and where the snags are in those workflows.

Set up metrics for adoption and use. Adoption and frequency of use are clear indicators that employees find value in the tools. Set goals against baseline adoption benchmarks to ensure that stakeholders expectations are appropriate. Work with business sponsors to determine what other metrics are important and how you will measure them. If your program is targeted at improving a specific business process, then use outcome metrics. At a consulting organization, the metric might be the close rate from putting forth better proposals faster. At a loan processing center, this might be faster exception handling by using social tools to find the right expert.

Figure 3 Examples Of Collaboration Vision Statements


Employees are empowered by technology to solvecustomer problems.

The need to share not the need to know is thedriving force in our business culture.

Employees communicate, share knowledge, and formrelationships within and across the extendedenterprise.

Communication and collaboration tools areaccessible on every device from every location.

We relentlessly eliminate bottlenecks in processesthat involve people by monitoring and optimizingthe information flow.

Workers can find and access the information theyneed to take the next best action.

Employees can find and connect with each otheracross geographies, business units, and ranks.

Remote workers and distributed teams cancollaborate as effectively as teams in a single office.

Employees do not find technology to be a barrier ingetting their work done efficiently and effectively.

Customers are part of our product development andcustomer service processes.

Our close partners find it easy to work with us usingcollaboration and communication tools.

Our employees are strong advocates for ourorganization, products, and services.




Figure 4 How Objectives Lead To Strategic Analysis


Table of contents

1 Project staffWhos involved and what their roles andresponsibilities are

7 Mobile supportDevices, apps, and delivery approaches

2 Employee requirementsAn assessment of the needs of differentemployee groups

8 Security and complianceSecurity implications, policy requirements,agreement process

3 Business objectivesA catalog of the goals and desired outcomeswith business sponsorship

9 Social collaboration evangelismNew roles and responsibilities for communityleaders and social analysts

4 Business case and metricsA description of the costs and financial orbusiness benefits; along with outcome metrics

10 Training and change managementA formal description of how employees willlearn about and master the new tools

5 Technology work streamsDesktop, data center, security, network,applications, etc.

11 Communications strategyCommunication plans for employees and forbusiness and IT stakeholders

6 Technology architectureThe core technologies, including the role of cloudand platforms

12 Schedule and road mapTiming, workstream dependencies, phases,financing timing

step 3 strategy: Focus efforts, assemble Resources, and align work streams

With objectives agreed on and a vision for success, you need an action plan to achieve it. Here are the critical elements that go into the strategic plan (see Figure 5):

Prioritize social business and collaboration initiatives. Having identified various opportunities to improve how employees work collaboratively and access information to make decisions, some scenarios will float to the top as having the greatest output (impact on achieving objectives) for the least input (risk, investment, effort, and complexity). Start categorizing initiatives along these two axes. This will help you drive social business and collaboration with both big-picture solutions and small but high-impact fixes.

Identify which technology stakeholders and work streams must come together. Social and collaboration technology touches many parts of the technology stack. Look at where investments fit into the timeline with existing initiatives already in flight and discuss any technology dependencies and issues you foresee. One federal government agency CIO learned late in the strategic planning process that they couldnt proceed without first upgrading the identity management systems, thus delaying plans and disappointing stakeholders. Dont overlook the unique security, privacy, and compliance considerations that need to be addressed.




Hire dedicated people to support social business and collaboration workloads. Were seeing more organizations create full-time community leader positions. If you dont have certain necessary roles, youll need to retrain existing resources, solicit involvement from resources outside of technology management, or hire to fill the gap. If you dont have the right resources in place, focus on other areas of social business and collaboration functionality and hold off on an enterprisewide social strategy until you can do it right.6

Plan change management programs that incorporate communications and training. Social business done right changes the way people work. Your strategy should involve executive-level communication of the vision and why the success and growth of the organization depends on it. This includes formal communications as you roll out the technology and direct involvement of senior executives. Have a plan to generate employee awareness of the tools, convince employees that the benefits of the new tools are worth the effort to use them, and provide them with training on how and when to the use them.7

Figure 5 Social Business Strategic Plan: Table Of Contents


Table of contents

1 Project staffWhos involved and what their roles andresponsibilities are

7 Mobile supportDevices, apps, and delivery approaches

2 Employee requirementsAn assessment of the needs of differentemployee groups

8 Security and complianceSecurity implications, policy requirements,agreement process

3 Business objectivesA catalog of the goals and desired outcomeswith business sponsorship

9 Social collaboration evangelismNew roles and responsibilities for communityleaders and social analysts

4 Business case and metricsA description of the costs and financial orbusiness benefits; along with outcome metrics

10 Training and change managementA formal description of how employees willlearn about and master the new tools

5 Technology work streamsDesktop, data center, security, network,applications, etc.

11 Communications strategyCommunication plans for employees and forbusiness and IT stakeholders

6 Technology architectureThe core technologies, including the role of cloudand platforms

12 Schedule and road mapTiming, workstream dependencies, phases,financing timing

step 4 Technology: Implement and Operate The Technology Platforms

With a solid grasp of stakeholder needs, clear objectives on where and how to deploy social business and collaboration, business sponsorship secured, and resources aligned, its now time to pick the technology foundations for the information workplace:




Determine the core platform technologies. Forrester groups collaboration technologies into four areas: email, document-based, real-time, and social. A broad offering of pre-integrated technologies represents a compelling starting point, particularly if some of the relevant technologies are already in your portfolio. There are likely a limited number of vendors that youve already made a big bet on in your enterprise. Discuss which products you plan to use and where youll need to augment the best-of-breed platforms with point solutions (see Figure 6).

Take advantage of software-as-a-service (SaaS) and the cloud to improve collaboration. Besides their economic benefits, cloud solutions are well suited for access via multiple devices and for intercompany and Internet-based communications all important considerations for improving collaboration among partners and mobile employees. Weigh these advantages against the tradeoff of losing the ability to highly customize the environment and integrate with back-end line-of-business systems today. Some categories like email, webconferencing, and file sync and share are more readily suited to the cloud than others.

Mobilize everything. When your most productive employees use three devices or more to get work done, you need to source from vendors that support the most important mobile platforms with native apps and cloud services. Also, consider the strength of your vendors mobile apps whether their breadth of functionality allows employees to be as productive as possible when away from their computers, and whether they take full advantage of mobile device capabilities like touch and location awareness to deliver a great user experience.

Start with better integration of existing tools. One of the benefits of a well-constructed information workplace is that people retain a consistent context even while switching between applications such as email, document management, and chat. Pursue integrations that improve this click-through success, and implement collaboration technologies within core line-of-business applications like CRM. Integrate social technology outputs or analytics into customer service, marketing, and sales systems.




Figure 6 Which Of These Do You Need The Most?


How often do you use the following communication tools or services for work?

Email

Calendar

Instant messaging

Web meeting or webconferencing

Team document sharing sites

File sync and share

Social networks

Video chat

Internal blogs or wikis

Microblogging

83% 10%

58% 22%

30% 20%

11% 33%

15% 21%

14% 21%

14% 21%

9% 23%

10% 20%

13%9%

Base: 4,791 North American and European information workers

Daily Less than daily

Source: Forresters Forrsights Workforce Software Survey, Q4 2013

R e c o m m e n d at i o n s

MaKe sOCIaL BUsINess aND COLLaBORaTION a BUsINess-LeveL sTRaTeGy

Social business and collaboration is a business strategy with a strong technology component. Therefore, technology management and the collaboration leadership team responsible for the strategy must go beyond understanding collaboration technology to developing skills in selling ideas, counseling others, and influencing business decision-makers:

Present a rock-solid business case. Its no longer sufficient to portray the generic benefits of collaboration technologies. Gather input from business stakeholders on business priorities and from employees on what they need from the technology toolkit to be successful. Gather input from business analysts and applications professionals about processes or practices that are broken, ailing, or costly to execute. Understand the cost of inefficient knowledge processes by analyzing cycle times, lost opportunities, and/or financial impact.




Design for integration. The information workplace vision is about providing knowledge workers with the right information at the right time in the right context. Under this framework, social business and collaboration touches the broader portfolio of workforce technologies. Pick applications designed for integration from the outset, but dont hinge your strategy on creating a horizontal platform that will meet the needs of everyone. Pursue big-picture changes as well as more narrowly scoped projects that still help the business advance toward its goals.

Make continuous improvements. Becoming a social business is an iterative process, not an overnight transformation. Some social and collaboration technology solutions will redefine the way employees work. Others will be a disappointing failure. Dont look at them that way. Treat every pilot as an experiment, structuring the experiment so you will know why it failed and accounting for the obstacles that came in the way when you repeat it next time. Make the intelligence-gathering process and talking to business stakeholders and employees a core component of your social business strategy.

eNDNOTes1 Social technologies are more than just tools to simply connect employees. Social software plays a much

bigger role as part of what Geoffrey Moore calls systems of engagement context-rich apps and smart products to help a business employees, partners, and customers decide and act immediately in their moments of need. These systems make it easy for knowledge workers to use information while working with others to address business and customer issues. See the August 24, 2012, The Social CIO report.

2 For a description of roles that go into a social business staffing plan, see the August 24, 2012, Staffing For Social Business And Collaboration Success report.

3 For a description of roles that go into a social business staffing plan, see the August 24, 2012, Staffing For Social Business And Collaboration Success report.

4 Stakeholder intelligence efforts should include analysis of the four barriers to social and collaboration tool adoption: technological, motivational, behavioral, and cultural. See the August 24, 2012, Analyze What Your Social Business And Collaboration Stakeholders Really Need report.

5 Forrester has been helping marketers with social marketing since 2007. For more information on this important work, read Forresters book Groundswell and the related research. Source: Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff, Groundswell: Winning in a World Transformed by Social Technologies, Harvard Business School Publishing, 2008 (http://www.forrester.com/groundswell).

6 When clients broach the question, How many people will be required to support collaboration? the inevitable response is, What do you intend to do with it? Depending upon the breadth and complexity of the deployment, staffing can vary wildly. For advice on how to map roles to functional areas, see the August 24, 2012, Staffing For Social Business And Collaboration Success report.




7 Many organizations tend to focus on formal planned instruction online or face to face, but most learning actually happens informally on the job with employees asking their co-workers for help or searching for information themselves. Employees can benefit from training that shows them how to use the tools, but they will look to their peers for help applying those tools in their jobs. Make sure your program accounts for the roles of coaches, mentors, and also communities as a way for employees to teach each other and share best practices.

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Why You Need A Strategic Plan For Social BusinessFollow The POST Methodology To Construct The PlanMake Social Business And Collaboration A Business-Level StrategyEndnotes