Can you imagine a time when you might save the cost of plane tickets, travel time, and a real life, in-person experience, to attend a meeting entirely on your computer? As a software veteran who assisted with the creation of virtual tradeshows in the mid-1990's, I can assure you that thoughts of any viable virtual reality for association conferences have been far from my mind in recent years. However, as Moore's Law predicts (and Kurzweil's accelerating change concepts further embellish), technology only continues to get better, faster, and cheaper. Maybe a virtual meeting in the near future isn't so far-fetched.
Most people have heard of the game "Second Life" by now. It is a simulated, digital world accessible through your computer, where it's not unusual to see characters (also called avatars) created by people, reflecting anything from a whimsical, cartoonish portrayal of themselves, to a vision of what they perhaps wish they looked like (and, in most of those cases, I doubt few actually do). During the odd time or two when I've been curious enough to try the game, I was shocked at the complexity of behavior I saw online.
However, to my surpirse, I've heard of many recent examples of these virtual worlds being used for far more than play. In fact, the U.S. Federal Government has used Second Life to train soldiers on how to operate a bomb disposal robot. That certainly holds more credibility than witnessing Second Life being used as an artificial dating site or an outlet for repressed behavior. I guess things are advancing.
In recent market research I have conducted with associations and the leaders who run their meetings and educational programs, statistics of interest in the virtualization of meetings are growing (46% of leaders believe their attendees "would rather have increased options to attend meetings and conferences virtually..."), but still not overwhelmingly. And when it comes to networking, leaders clearly state that technology will never replace in-person dialogue (only 17% of leaders "believe their attendees would rather network with technology than in real life"). So there is a dichotomy in response: the desire to attend virtually exists, but the primary benefit of in-person networking remains a physical world reality. What jumps out as intriguing to me is that based on what I have observed, Second Life is probably more beneficial for virtual interaction ("networking") than anything else I've seen it used for!
One of the facts about any shift in using technology to replace a former physical activity is that education, awareness, and proof are needed, before the support and the desire to transition to something new becomes evident. The proof remains to be seen. Simply by exploring a few of the virtual tradeshow experiences that are out there right now leads me to believe that effective virtual interaction is indeed getting closer.
http://www.goexhibit.com/demo/
http://vshow.on24.com/vshow/on24
As we consider remote content access options at OASIS in the future, it's helpful to keep an eye on this type of development and its uptake in the market. Cool stuff, indeed.
Thursday, September 3, 2009
Wednesday, August 12, 2009
OASIS Product Management Mantras, Fin
In closing....
The bottom line, which spans across every single one of the mantras previously mentioned, is that good product management decisions yield efficiency on all fronts. This includes efficiency across team interaction, feature output, software usability, and customer process. If efficiency is created, countless interrelated objectives also become possible. Some of the more visible pain points that we hear in our industry everyday—such as the desire to have greener processes, the objective to foster remote education, and the need to reduce operational cost—are natural beneficiaries of efficiency. It is our goal for OASIS to ensure that efficiency is created in our product, but most importantly, for our customer.
The bottom line, which spans across every single one of the mantras previously mentioned, is that good product management decisions yield efficiency on all fronts. This includes efficiency across team interaction, feature output, software usability, and customer process. If efficiency is created, countless interrelated objectives also become possible. Some of the more visible pain points that we hear in our industry everyday—such as the desire to have greener processes, the objective to foster remote education, and the need to reduce operational cost—are natural beneficiaries of efficiency. It is our goal for OASIS to ensure that efficiency is created in our product, but most importantly, for our customer.
OASIS Product Management Mantras, Chapter 10
Ensure that everyone (and everything) communicates openly … and remains open to change.
No process, person, or solution is ever perfect. Not even the best-designed product will survive without change and careful refinement over time. One challenge of software development is that foundational technologies advance so quickly, even though it is so easy to build a complex application on top of a particular platform or framework. Often, this development happens reactively, in response to immediate, perceived issues. Because of this, some of the smartest decisions that can be made include the use of best-of-breed design patterns that aren’t bound to a particular technology. Instead, well-selected design (and development) patterns ensure that an application’s distinctive competencies are transferrable, and may be considered to be portable for future technology decisions … with a predictable amount of work. Under the current OASIS design mantra, all decisions that are made related to the next-generation application are built upon best-practice agreements made across the product team early and often. This permits individual teams to run lean, as the former point suggests (since these agreements are known, documented, and communicated widely), but also ensures that architects and key decision makers have been involved with the foundational decisions from which all other concepts are derived. This empowers our teams to run effectively and autonomously, and ensures that decisions which get made today have consideration for the future. Change happens. The OASIS product team strives to be ready when it does.
Since not all change can be predicted, and even the best use of design patterns cannot avoid a certain amount of encapsulation in a particular technology, it is imperative to also acknowledge that the concept of open communication also applies to the software application itself. In a recent survey we conducted, a trend emerged early (and remained consistent) which confirms that “open, service oriented data accessibility” is a top-priority for modern software consumers. This includes concepts like web service availability and API-based access to the application. We will remain aware of these opportunities and ensure that open communication is a universal goal in all of our product management decisions.
No process, person, or solution is ever perfect. Not even the best-designed product will survive without change and careful refinement over time. One challenge of software development is that foundational technologies advance so quickly, even though it is so easy to build a complex application on top of a particular platform or framework. Often, this development happens reactively, in response to immediate, perceived issues. Because of this, some of the smartest decisions that can be made include the use of best-of-breed design patterns that aren’t bound to a particular technology. Instead, well-selected design (and development) patterns ensure that an application’s distinctive competencies are transferrable, and may be considered to be portable for future technology decisions … with a predictable amount of work. Under the current OASIS design mantra, all decisions that are made related to the next-generation application are built upon best-practice agreements made across the product team early and often. This permits individual teams to run lean, as the former point suggests (since these agreements are known, documented, and communicated widely), but also ensures that architects and key decision makers have been involved with the foundational decisions from which all other concepts are derived. This empowers our teams to run effectively and autonomously, and ensures that decisions which get made today have consideration for the future. Change happens. The OASIS product team strives to be ready when it does.
Since not all change can be predicted, and even the best use of design patterns cannot avoid a certain amount of encapsulation in a particular technology, it is imperative to also acknowledge that the concept of open communication also applies to the software application itself. In a recent survey we conducted, a trend emerged early (and remained consistent) which confirms that “open, service oriented data accessibility” is a top-priority for modern software consumers. This includes concepts like web service availability and API-based access to the application. We will remain aware of these opportunities and ensure that open communication is a universal goal in all of our product management decisions.
OASIS Product Management Mantras, Chapter 9
Run lean … this includes teams, specifications, features, and nearly everything else involved in output.
This point is a perfect complement to the former. In order to achieve efficient, continual output, a product team cannot be laden with excessive processes and unnecessary constraints. Certainly, some processes are necessary to keep the product organized and operational. The Agile software development methodology, although perpetually driving progress forward, has many standard operating procedures. However, running as lean as possible achieves certain benefits through quick, intelligent decision making, the ability to self-correct, and a means to design from common sense instead of “design by committee." To quote a decent article I read not too long ago, “a camel is a horse designed by committee.” OASIS shall become a race horse … and a fast, efficient one at that.
This point is a perfect complement to the former. In order to achieve efficient, continual output, a product team cannot be laden with excessive processes and unnecessary constraints. Certainly, some processes are necessary to keep the product organized and operational. The Agile software development methodology, although perpetually driving progress forward, has many standard operating procedures. However, running as lean as possible achieves certain benefits through quick, intelligent decision making, the ability to self-correct, and a means to design from common sense instead of “design by committee." To quote a decent article I read not too long ago, “a camel is a horse designed by committee.” OASIS shall become a race horse … and a fast, efficient one at that.
OASIS Product Management Mantras, Chapter 8
Ensure that development output happens frequently … at the expense of formality and even some bugs.
In any organization, but especially at a small, lean organization, output matters more than almost anything else. This is our individual, internal measure of efficiency. In the Agile software development language, this correlates with a high “velocity” of software feature output. Without requiring a casual reader to understand the nuances of Agile software development, there are some very relevant by-products of this concept that are easily understood. For example, continual output fosters frequent input from users. This input, in the form of usability testing, customer feedback, and analysis of software usage trends (analytics), can be integrated into all future product plans. When this occurs, the benefit is immediate. Short feature release cycles are supported by tangible, real-life data on what has previously been successful. The voice of the customer is reflected in subsequent output almost as quickly as it is received. When this occurs, even the occasional bug or issue is forgotten in the face of how radically the software advances, and how revolutionary the features become for all customers. Oh, and even the bugs are corrected quickly.
In any organization, but especially at a small, lean organization, output matters more than almost anything else. This is our individual, internal measure of efficiency. In the Agile software development language, this correlates with a high “velocity” of software feature output. Without requiring a casual reader to understand the nuances of Agile software development, there are some very relevant by-products of this concept that are easily understood. For example, continual output fosters frequent input from users. This input, in the form of usability testing, customer feedback, and analysis of software usage trends (analytics), can be integrated into all future product plans. When this occurs, the benefit is immediate. Short feature release cycles are supported by tangible, real-life data on what has previously been successful. The voice of the customer is reflected in subsequent output almost as quickly as it is received. When this occurs, even the occasional bug or issue is forgotten in the face of how radically the software advances, and how revolutionary the features become for all customers. Oh, and even the bugs are corrected quickly.
OASIS Product Management Mantras, Chapter 7
Make sure that both you and your users can sum up your product’s key features … in 30 seconds.
This concept is also known as The Elevator Test. This is a great test for pitching your product, feature, or idea. Imagine that you are riding in an elevator with somebody that you just met, and that person happens to ask you what your product or feature “does.” You are traveling only a few floors with this stranger … could you successfully convey your concept in that short time? If the answer is “no,” then something is not right. In an enterprise-grade, robust product, this may not seem like an easy task. However, even SAP has a clear tagline. Clarity of explanation should arise from clarity of feature set scope. Clarity of feature set scope arises from clarity of user goals. Clarity of user goals arises from an acute awareness of real customer problems. This is a paramount goal in all future OASIS development. That is, to ensure that features reflect best-case solutions to real, proven customer problems. In many cases, less becomes more. This ensures that only the most valuable features, which solve the most common and the biggest customer problems receive the most attention.
This concept is also known as The Elevator Test. This is a great test for pitching your product, feature, or idea. Imagine that you are riding in an elevator with somebody that you just met, and that person happens to ask you what your product or feature “does.” You are traveling only a few floors with this stranger … could you successfully convey your concept in that short time? If the answer is “no,” then something is not right. In an enterprise-grade, robust product, this may not seem like an easy task. However, even SAP has a clear tagline. Clarity of explanation should arise from clarity of feature set scope. Clarity of feature set scope arises from clarity of user goals. Clarity of user goals arises from an acute awareness of real customer problems. This is a paramount goal in all future OASIS development. That is, to ensure that features reflect best-case solutions to real, proven customer problems. In many cases, less becomes more. This ensures that only the most valuable features, which solve the most common and the biggest customer problems receive the most attention.
OASIS Product Management Mantras, Chapter 6
Keep your product fun, innovative, and modern … but remember that some things deserve to be simple.
Technology will never stop evolving, and occasionally there will be cutting edge, contemporary graphical user interface concepts that will amaze us all as they are released. However, this bullet can best be illustrated with an example. A current, sought-after trend in so-called modern web application development is the autocompletion textbox. This Ajax-based concept (which really just means lots of updates, with no page refreshes) allows a field to suggest previously entered terms, which could successfully complete what the user is presently typing. Would it make sense to utilize this concept in a location where every entry was expected to be unique? No! Certainly, you could try to implement this feature as overkill, just in case two users were “kind of” trying to say the same thing. But that would just not make good sense. It might actually slow things down and confuse some users. That would be bad. With any new concept or metaphor that arises, this is a worthwhile consideration to make. If the feature doesn’t clearly add value and efficiency in a particular location, adding it risks losing value.
Technology will never stop evolving, and occasionally there will be cutting edge, contemporary graphical user interface concepts that will amaze us all as they are released. However, this bullet can best be illustrated with an example. A current, sought-after trend in so-called modern web application development is the autocompletion textbox. This Ajax-based concept (which really just means lots of updates, with no page refreshes) allows a field to suggest previously entered terms, which could successfully complete what the user is presently typing. Would it make sense to utilize this concept in a location where every entry was expected to be unique? No! Certainly, you could try to implement this feature as overkill, just in case two users were “kind of” trying to say the same thing. But that would just not make good sense. It might actually slow things down and confuse some users. That would be bad. With any new concept or metaphor that arises, this is a worthwhile consideration to make. If the feature doesn’t clearly add value and efficiency in a particular location, adding it risks losing value.
OASIS Product Management Mantras, Chapter 5
Cater first to your users with the least ability … they will dictate an exceptional level of usability.
While I worked in the E-Comerce industry, there was a prevalent mantra which arose as a result of how the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) legislation impacted (and benefitted) all electronic commerce. Users with disabilities impact software decisions in an immensely favorable manner. A significant amount of planning went into ensuring that any software path or process was accessible by impaired users, who utilized browsers that included screen scraping applications, which translated text into a computerized voice. This literally means that entire features were planned, from their inception, to accommodate users who might only be able to “see” a screen as a robotic voice that reads it to them. This technology is incredible! These ADA requirements, which were often nonnegotiable, led to an absolutely fantastic end product for all customers. If an application is so accessible as to accommodate a digital-voiced narrator, it is certainly able to accommodate nearly every other user on the planet. Navigation paths, alternate text-based descriptions, user intefaces, buttons, and graphical decisions become so well thought out, that they can’t help but become successful for all users. Coremetrics clickstream analysis proved that if we could cater to a browser which was a screen readers (literally), there would never be a lack of related, successful user activity across the board. When I saw regions of an E-Commerce site that were highly tuned to accommodate ADA considerations, there was never a lack of traffic, use, and (I suspect) efficiency.
While I worked in the E-Comerce industry, there was a prevalent mantra which arose as a result of how the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) legislation impacted (and benefitted) all electronic commerce. Users with disabilities impact software decisions in an immensely favorable manner. A significant amount of planning went into ensuring that any software path or process was accessible by impaired users, who utilized browsers that included screen scraping applications, which translated text into a computerized voice. This literally means that entire features were planned, from their inception, to accommodate users who might only be able to “see” a screen as a robotic voice that reads it to them. This technology is incredible! These ADA requirements, which were often nonnegotiable, led to an absolutely fantastic end product for all customers. If an application is so accessible as to accommodate a digital-voiced narrator, it is certainly able to accommodate nearly every other user on the planet. Navigation paths, alternate text-based descriptions, user intefaces, buttons, and graphical decisions become so well thought out, that they can’t help but become successful for all users. Coremetrics clickstream analysis proved that if we could cater to a browser which was a screen readers (literally), there would never be a lack of related, successful user activity across the board. When I saw regions of an E-Commerce site that were highly tuned to accommodate ADA considerations, there was never a lack of traffic, use, and (I suspect) efficiency.
OASIS Product Management Mantras, Chapter 4
All necessary options should be visible, intuitive, and accessible … think one degree of separation.
Kevin Bacon was not too far off the mark: there really are no more than six degrees of separation between you and just about anything you’d care to be in touch with—even in a software product. However, that is not to say that everything needs to coexist in the same screen real-estate. Immediate goals naturally lead to secondary, related goals. It is entirely possible to map out how goals cascade into one another. Within this view of an application, smart decisions about how to create interface flows can be made. In Agile software development, this might reflect a necessary concept of a “genealogical” map of story relationships. (For the layperson, a story translates into a contained, feature-requirement in product development—these are typically small, self-contained, and able to be described in a sentence). A recent story exercise we went through on the Product team yielded 43 stories within the first two days. It might make perfect sense to show how these stories are interrelated in some kind of a family tree. These series of relationships will most certainly positively-affected decisions about how to create software-level, graphical user interface navigation and paths between objectives.
Kevin Bacon was not too far off the mark: there really are no more than six degrees of separation between you and just about anything you’d care to be in touch with—even in a software product. However, that is not to say that everything needs to coexist in the same screen real-estate. Immediate goals naturally lead to secondary, related goals. It is entirely possible to map out how goals cascade into one another. Within this view of an application, smart decisions about how to create interface flows can be made. In Agile software development, this might reflect a necessary concept of a “genealogical” map of story relationships. (For the layperson, a story translates into a contained, feature-requirement in product development—these are typically small, self-contained, and able to be described in a sentence). A recent story exercise we went through on the Product team yielded 43 stories within the first two days. It might make perfect sense to show how these stories are interrelated in some kind of a family tree. These series of relationships will most certainly positively-affected decisions about how to create software-level, graphical user interface navigation and paths between objectives.
OASIS Product Management Mantras, Chapter 3
Ensure that a minimum value product has been defined … and stick to that vision, especially at first.
Following on the heels of the last topic, another concept introduced to me by Softletter is closely related. When creating a new product or feature set, always focus on defining what the minimum value product (MVP, according to Softletter) is. This set of decisions related to “what is mission critical” ensures that you work to define the stories which must be developed first to make an initial release successful—and it also drives a clear rank and prioritization for those tasks. This step cannot be overemphasized because when reflecting on a true minimum for your product offering, you are simultaneously focusing on items with critical value, avoiding feature bloat, allowing real-life usability to shape future iterations, and adhering to the “less is more” philosophy without even trying. Keeping software simple at first also allows usability to be more malleable. In the case of developing for a wide array of users and platforms, testing and improving upon an initially focused feature set is far easier than a bloated application. Additionally, it is entirely possible to redefine a minimum value product at each stage of development, thereby reaping the same benefits across iterations.
Following on the heels of the last topic, another concept introduced to me by Softletter is closely related. When creating a new product or feature set, always focus on defining what the minimum value product (MVP, according to Softletter) is. This set of decisions related to “what is mission critical” ensures that you work to define the stories which must be developed first to make an initial release successful—and it also drives a clear rank and prioritization for those tasks. This step cannot be overemphasized because when reflecting on a true minimum for your product offering, you are simultaneously focusing on items with critical value, avoiding feature bloat, allowing real-life usability to shape future iterations, and adhering to the “less is more” philosophy without even trying. Keeping software simple at first also allows usability to be more malleable. In the case of developing for a wide array of users and platforms, testing and improving upon an initially focused feature set is far easier than a bloated application. Additionally, it is entirely possible to redefine a minimum value product at each stage of development, thereby reaping the same benefits across iterations.
OASIS Product Management Mantras, Chapter 2
Don’t show more options than necessary ... but ensure that if more options are needed, they are available.
Coe-Truman is an organization that has successfully catered to many of the most prominent associations in the science, technology, and medical space. We have unquestionably created some great, industry-leading features in our software. Nevertheless, there are, at times, conflicting opinions about how a certain feature should be implemented. This can lead to a tug-of-war of sorts if we are not careful … a proverbial case of catering to one set of demand, only to backtrack and try to appease another set of related (but different) demands, later. A successful way to manage this effect in a SaaS (Software as a Solution) system is to ensure that there is careful consideration for doing only what is essential and universally valuable in any given region of our software. This is not to say that extended, specialized features cannot also exist. This is to say that no single user should ever be confused by a particular feature-set they have arrived at in our software. Quite simply, if more options become necessary, they should be available if they are carefully planned. The location of their availability should be situated in a separate, focused region of the application that may be arrived at intuitively. Again, even when features exist in a specialized location in the application, there should be careful consideration for doing only what is essential and universally valuable in that region … even when the request seems complicated.
Coe-Truman is an organization that has successfully catered to many of the most prominent associations in the science, technology, and medical space. We have unquestionably created some great, industry-leading features in our software. Nevertheless, there are, at times, conflicting opinions about how a certain feature should be implemented. This can lead to a tug-of-war of sorts if we are not careful … a proverbial case of catering to one set of demand, only to backtrack and try to appease another set of related (but different) demands, later. A successful way to manage this effect in a SaaS (Software as a Solution) system is to ensure that there is careful consideration for doing only what is essential and universally valuable in any given region of our software. This is not to say that extended, specialized features cannot also exist. This is to say that no single user should ever be confused by a particular feature-set they have arrived at in our software. Quite simply, if more options become necessary, they should be available if they are carefully planned. The location of their availability should be situated in a separate, focused region of the application that may be arrived at intuitively. Again, even when features exist in a specialized location in the application, there should be careful consideration for doing only what is essential and universally valuable in that region … even when the request seems complicated.
OASIS Product Management Mantras, Introduction & Chapter 1
Introduction
In the perpetual quest to make highly-efficient, usable, relevant, and downright enjoyable software, Coe-Truman Technologies has recently taken a major stride forward in how it approaches its software vision. Led by our Chief Product Officer, Todd Wyder, we have pursued many parallel paths of self-education, in order to become more capable and impactful with every single feature we plan and release. While pursuing this aggressive objective, we have performed field studies and taken on homework assignments which are (considering this is still “work”) pretty awesome. From collaborating on a thorough review of CNet’s Webware Top 100 supplemented with a careful study of UseIt.com 10-Best-UIs, to pondering SlideShare’s course on Designing Rich Web Applications and freaking-out at how relevant 37 Signals’ Getting Real felt even in the first two chapters ... we are clearly on a mission. We subscribe to Pragmatic Marketing and Softletter, whose concepts fit right into this vision as well.
What follows here is a personal self-reflection from me, your OASIS product manager, on concepts that you can expect to see evolve exponentially in our software in the days to come. This article is a compendium of some of our recent education, but distilled (therefore, I have clearly borrowed from my influences in presenting this). I am excited, and I hope that our users begin to feel this excitement and know that great things are brewing in our laboratories. We love serving our associations and their individual quests for community-born, specialized knowledge. Effectiveness and efficiency in our software can drive these goals forward, and this inspires us.
If you don’t know how to use it, don’t need to use it, or don’t want to use it … don’t work on it.
First and foremost in any product manager’s mind is the concept of feature uptake and acceptance in the market. Just as we ensure that there is solid market demand for our software and related features, it is absolutely imperative that we ensure that every member of our team know how to use, need to use, or want to use our very own software. Considering that we serve a specialized industry comprised of the various doctors, scientists, engineers, and specialists who form our partner associations, I believe it is mandatory that every single one of us want to use and know how to use the software we create. In no uncertain terms, this means that our software must be intuitive, efficient, and fun. This strikes me as the most important concept we can follow in this regard. We are developing a product that no one individual on the Product Team may ever truly need to use as a meeting owner (we are not meeting managers by trade, after all. But without question, every single one of us should want to use, and know how to use, our own product. Wanting this knowledge because our software is efficient and elegant will result in us knowing how to use it ... exceptionally well, in ways that can drive best-practice decisions for our customers in the future.
In the perpetual quest to make highly-efficient, usable, relevant, and downright enjoyable software, Coe-Truman Technologies has recently taken a major stride forward in how it approaches its software vision. Led by our Chief Product Officer, Todd Wyder, we have pursued many parallel paths of self-education, in order to become more capable and impactful with every single feature we plan and release. While pursuing this aggressive objective, we have performed field studies and taken on homework assignments which are (considering this is still “work”) pretty awesome. From collaborating on a thorough review of CNet’s Webware Top 100 supplemented with a careful study of UseIt.com 10-Best-UIs, to pondering SlideShare’s course on Designing Rich Web Applications and freaking-out at how relevant 37 Signals’ Getting Real felt even in the first two chapters ... we are clearly on a mission. We subscribe to Pragmatic Marketing and Softletter, whose concepts fit right into this vision as well.
What follows here is a personal self-reflection from me, your OASIS product manager, on concepts that you can expect to see evolve exponentially in our software in the days to come. This article is a compendium of some of our recent education, but distilled (therefore, I have clearly borrowed from my influences in presenting this). I am excited, and I hope that our users begin to feel this excitement and know that great things are brewing in our laboratories. We love serving our associations and their individual quests for community-born, specialized knowledge. Effectiveness and efficiency in our software can drive these goals forward, and this inspires us.
If you don’t know how to use it, don’t need to use it, or don’t want to use it … don’t work on it.
First and foremost in any product manager’s mind is the concept of feature uptake and acceptance in the market. Just as we ensure that there is solid market demand for our software and related features, it is absolutely imperative that we ensure that every member of our team know how to use, need to use, or want to use our very own software. Considering that we serve a specialized industry comprised of the various doctors, scientists, engineers, and specialists who form our partner associations, I believe it is mandatory that every single one of us want to use and know how to use the software we create. In no uncertain terms, this means that our software must be intuitive, efficient, and fun. This strikes me as the most important concept we can follow in this regard. We are developing a product that no one individual on the Product Team may ever truly need to use as a meeting owner (we are not meeting managers by trade, after all. But without question, every single one of us should want to use, and know how to use, our own product. Wanting this knowledge because our software is efficient and elegant will result in us knowing how to use it ... exceptionally well, in ways that can drive best-practice decisions for our customers in the future.
Monday, August 10, 2009
Instant Meeting Signage Updates: Fact, Not Fiction
Imagine that your team has just finished setting-up your session break-out rooms at the McCormick Place Convention Center in Chicago. This is a massive facility, and countless hours of your team’s hard work designing, printing, and setting-up signage provides ample visual proof that this is, in fact, your largest meeting of the year. Actually, make that your largest meeting ever. Suddenly, you learn that a room needs to be moved due to technical issues. Then you learn that two speakers have cancelled and alternates will be filling-in. The frustrating news continues, and the madness is escalating all around you. Now a choice: Would you prefer to scramble to redesign, reprint, and replace all of those signs? Realistically speaking, how can you? All of your staff are already inundated, and far too busy to assist. However, what if your only task was going into your meeting content management system and rekeying a few lines of data—thereby updating all of your signage digitally … and immediately? For the American College of Cardiology, partnered with Coe-Truman Technologies OASIS platform and Freeman Audio Visual Solutions, it was actually that easy.
In the age of high-tech hardware, software, and people it is only logical that talented providers find a way to bridge the information gaps between critical systems. However, it requires qualified and reliable partners to play well enough together to make this happen. Fortunately, all OASIS customers have access to a system that exposes all of its essential meeting data through industry-standard web services, meaning that any OASIS data can connect directly into other systems. This makes data updates and synchronization a breeze. Freeman Audio Visual Solutions represents one of the largest onsite technology providers in the world, but that isn’t the only partner that OASIS has successfully integrated with in this fashion. OASIS web services have integrated with other, smaller onsite audio-visual vendors just as effectively, proving itself as a system designed for this type of open collaboration. When AHA used MEvents for one of its meetings, OASIS was capable of integrating and empowering their meeting signage updates as well.
"The ability to integrate OASIS data with our audio-visual vendor at our annual meeting is game-changing. Not only were we able to directly feed up-to-the minute session/speaker/room information from OASIS to the digital displays this year, I can envision many more ways in which attendees and speakers will benefit in the future from creative uses that will happen as a result of the integration."
Speaker-ready room and session break-out room signage can be updated immediately when OASIS is connected to your on-the-ground audio video system. Most customers quickly realize that this is what digital signage was designed to do! If you think this is a process that requires excessive planning and expertise, think again. ACC was able to accomplish what they needed simply by providing Freeman with the OASIS web services API documentation, coupled with a series of short phone calls to their OASIS account representative. Freeman is so committed to this as a viable, successful process that they recommend the solution to any customer they encounter who uses OASIS and has an interest in digital signage.
In an economy where budgets are thin and resources, even temporary meeting staff, are hard to come by, why not consider utilizing technology to assist your on-the-ground meeting process? OASIS web services are truly a bridge to empowering your association to use its data in a highly-connected fashion. Freeman Audio Visual Solutions, MEvents, and other vendors have all proven that OASIS is built to integrate. Contact us today to learn how to make this solution a reality for your next meeting.
In the age of high-tech hardware, software, and people it is only logical that talented providers find a way to bridge the information gaps between critical systems. However, it requires qualified and reliable partners to play well enough together to make this happen. Fortunately, all OASIS customers have access to a system that exposes all of its essential meeting data through industry-standard web services, meaning that any OASIS data can connect directly into other systems. This makes data updates and synchronization a breeze. Freeman Audio Visual Solutions represents one of the largest onsite technology providers in the world, but that isn’t the only partner that OASIS has successfully integrated with in this fashion. OASIS web services have integrated with other, smaller onsite audio-visual vendors just as effectively, proving itself as a system designed for this type of open collaboration. When AHA used MEvents for one of its meetings, OASIS was capable of integrating and empowering their meeting signage updates as well.
"The ability to integrate OASIS data with our audio-visual vendor at our annual meeting is game-changing. Not only were we able to directly feed up-to-the minute session/speaker/room information from OASIS to the digital displays this year, I can envision many more ways in which attendees and speakers will benefit in the future from creative uses that will happen as a result of the integration."
–American College of Cardiology
Speaker-ready room and session break-out room signage can be updated immediately when OASIS is connected to your on-the-ground audio video system. Most customers quickly realize that this is what digital signage was designed to do! If you think this is a process that requires excessive planning and expertise, think again. ACC was able to accomplish what they needed simply by providing Freeman with the OASIS web services API documentation, coupled with a series of short phone calls to their OASIS account representative. Freeman is so committed to this as a viable, successful process that they recommend the solution to any customer they encounter who uses OASIS and has an interest in digital signage.
In an economy where budgets are thin and resources, even temporary meeting staff, are hard to come by, why not consider utilizing technology to assist your on-the-ground meeting process? OASIS web services are truly a bridge to empowering your association to use its data in a highly-connected fashion. Freeman Audio Visual Solutions, MEvents, and other vendors have all proven that OASIS is built to integrate. Contact us today to learn how to make this solution a reality for your next meeting.
Thursday, July 30, 2009
Grounded
Many of us have experienced the dreaded announcement from the cockpit: “Ladies and gentlemen, due to inclement weather at our destination, we will have to wait just a short time (yeah, right) until we are given clearance for take-off. Our spot at the gate has already been taken, so please remain seated, with seat belts fastened, until further notice. If you’ll please draw your window shades to keep it cool …” Keep it cool? Typically these delays have allowed me to finish a book or more. How’s that for cool? Travel only seems to get more difficult. In fact, according to a recent air travel forecast, travel conditions and regulations aren't the only things getting tougher … airlines are eliminating unprofitable routes (domestic capacity has been reduced by 12%) and since April, 2009 alone, domestic, economy-class fares have increased in cost by 8.2%. Gas prices will continue to climb back up (jet fuel costs 58% more than in March, 2009) and the vicious cycle of a sluggish economy's effect on travel will continue. What say you, fellow conference planner? This certainly doesn’t sound like great news. At least, not great news in the short term until we develop a way to overcome enough regulation to follow China’s lead in pursuing standing room-only fares. Yikes.
The meeting lifecycle is such that many parts of the process are most beneficial when conducted in-person. In fact, all qualitative input I’ve ever had related to the meeting planning process indicates that people would much rather perform program and session planning activities in-person, even if the technology was competitive and conducive to allowing a remote planning session to occur. There must be something about gathering around a board full of cards or post-it notes that holds a certain, nostalgic charm. Or rather, there is something about simply being there that will never be replaced. I can’t imagine anyone ever uttering “I guess you would have had to have virtually attended” in lieu of “been there.” But in the future, this might actually be the mindset….
It is critical that the modern, cost-conscious association discover new options for preparing, planning, and disseminating their meeting collateral and program plan. It is also essential that the association create ways for their attendees to benefit and save time using technology. For an organization who has never worked with a packaged, robust meeting content management solution before, gathering awareness of how such a solution can provide cost savings and efficiencies requires education. Here are a few ways your association might consider helping those members and leaders, who will sometimes remain “grounded” in the future as travel becomes tougher.
If you have never heard of a digital poster before, then you probably don’t realize that not only can it save you exhibit floor space because it’s, well, digital, but it can also serve as content that may be accessed remotely and live on long after your conference. In many cases, if video presentation is captured well, feedback suggests that the digital poster is every bit as effective as attending a poster presentation in-person, from an educational perspective. A recent US Department of Education study presented at the annual CESSE meeting indicates that e-learning actually has better outcomes and retention than in-person. Don’t tell that to your on-the-ground attendees! The point is, digital posters are accessible, enduring multimedia and just plan effective.
One of the most common pre-conference, preparatory meetings is the program planning meeting. This meeting typically serves as the formation of the educational tracks of your conference. Although your association may choose to continue doing much of this work in-person, online session building tools exist, which allow remote attendees to see the updated session plan in real-time and even contribute session updates via the Internet. For even a modest-sized association, the session grid is not something that could be easily communicated any other way but visually. A well-executed online session builder allows meeting planners, both present and remote, to share in the collaboration of building a session plan. If you’ve never seen a digital session grid, you would be interested to know that you can observe a complete view of a meeting’s session plan in real-time through the Internet … and drag-and-drop to change your program plan, also in real-time. Sounds exciting? It is. A digital session grid is a different kind of collaboration than a post-it note board.
Finally, members need to benefit from the use of technology as well. For the increasing number of members who might choose to arrive on the first day of a conference and leave prior to the last networking reception in order to save a night or two on hotel costs, offering optimized program visibility and the ability to wisely choose how to spend their time is essential. If you already have an online view of your entire session grid, shouldn’t members be able to benefit from that data as well? Of course! An online view of “my meeting” is a concept that, if well-executed, can add value to an attendee’s time. For instance, navigating all available sessions, selecting those which look interesting, and accessing select session information on a mobile device or on a personal calendar can cut down on the amount of legwork attendees have to do on the ground. Furthermore, peer interaction and networking is essential at conferences; an online view of the meeting can foster peer and exhibitor interactions in order to make the most of limited networking time.
There are many software packages out there which can accomplish some of these tasks individually. It is important to remember that there are cost-savings to be had when you discover a solution which integrates many of these capabilities into a single solution. Benefits from keeping your meeting data centralized and having these types of features integrated into a “one stop shop” will save your association countless headaches when trying to bring it all together. Even more cost-savings can be had when you aren't required to task your already burdened IT department with implementing new software. A key component to consider in this regard is whether the software is available as a service. It takes a certain amount of experience to support an infrastructure that can make all of these technologies play well together and be delivered as a service offering. OASIS, by Coe Truman Technologies, has been bringing these solutions to life for hundreds of association meetings for nearly 15 years. OASIS is a service-based solution (SaaS) so benefits can be achieved faster than you ever thought possible. Your members and attendees will thank you. Even the remote ones.
The meeting lifecycle is such that many parts of the process are most beneficial when conducted in-person. In fact, all qualitative input I’ve ever had related to the meeting planning process indicates that people would much rather perform program and session planning activities in-person, even if the technology was competitive and conducive to allowing a remote planning session to occur. There must be something about gathering around a board full of cards or post-it notes that holds a certain, nostalgic charm. Or rather, there is something about simply being there that will never be replaced. I can’t imagine anyone ever uttering “I guess you would have had to have virtually attended” in lieu of “been there.” But in the future, this might actually be the mindset….
It is critical that the modern, cost-conscious association discover new options for preparing, planning, and disseminating their meeting collateral and program plan. It is also essential that the association create ways for their attendees to benefit and save time using technology. For an organization who has never worked with a packaged, robust meeting content management solution before, gathering awareness of how such a solution can provide cost savings and efficiencies requires education. Here are a few ways your association might consider helping those members and leaders, who will sometimes remain “grounded” in the future as travel becomes tougher.
If you have never heard of a digital poster before, then you probably don’t realize that not only can it save you exhibit floor space because it’s, well, digital, but it can also serve as content that may be accessed remotely and live on long after your conference. In many cases, if video presentation is captured well, feedback suggests that the digital poster is every bit as effective as attending a poster presentation in-person, from an educational perspective. A recent US Department of Education study presented at the annual CESSE meeting indicates that e-learning actually has better outcomes and retention than in-person. Don’t tell that to your on-the-ground attendees! The point is, digital posters are accessible, enduring multimedia and just plan effective.
One of the most common pre-conference, preparatory meetings is the program planning meeting. This meeting typically serves as the formation of the educational tracks of your conference. Although your association may choose to continue doing much of this work in-person, online session building tools exist, which allow remote attendees to see the updated session plan in real-time and even contribute session updates via the Internet. For even a modest-sized association, the session grid is not something that could be easily communicated any other way but visually. A well-executed online session builder allows meeting planners, both present and remote, to share in the collaboration of building a session plan. If you’ve never seen a digital session grid, you would be interested to know that you can observe a complete view of a meeting’s session plan in real-time through the Internet … and drag-and-drop to change your program plan, also in real-time. Sounds exciting? It is. A digital session grid is a different kind of collaboration than a post-it note board.
Finally, members need to benefit from the use of technology as well. For the increasing number of members who might choose to arrive on the first day of a conference and leave prior to the last networking reception in order to save a night or two on hotel costs, offering optimized program visibility and the ability to wisely choose how to spend their time is essential. If you already have an online view of your entire session grid, shouldn’t members be able to benefit from that data as well? Of course! An online view of “my meeting” is a concept that, if well-executed, can add value to an attendee’s time. For instance, navigating all available sessions, selecting those which look interesting, and accessing select session information on a mobile device or on a personal calendar can cut down on the amount of legwork attendees have to do on the ground. Furthermore, peer interaction and networking is essential at conferences; an online view of the meeting can foster peer and exhibitor interactions in order to make the most of limited networking time.
There are many software packages out there which can accomplish some of these tasks individually. It is important to remember that there are cost-savings to be had when you discover a solution which integrates many of these capabilities into a single solution. Benefits from keeping your meeting data centralized and having these types of features integrated into a “one stop shop” will save your association countless headaches when trying to bring it all together. Even more cost-savings can be had when you aren't required to task your already burdened IT department with implementing new software. A key component to consider in this regard is whether the software is available as a service. It takes a certain amount of experience to support an infrastructure that can make all of these technologies play well together and be delivered as a service offering. OASIS, by Coe Truman Technologies, has been bringing these solutions to life for hundreds of association meetings for nearly 15 years. OASIS is a service-based solution (SaaS) so benefits can be achieved faster than you ever thought possible. Your members and attendees will thank you. Even the remote ones.
Learning From Each Other
I had the chance to recently visit with a client of ours during their program planning meeting. The meeting attendance was impressive: a consortium of some of the best-and-brightest at one of the leading medical associations in the world. There were individuals in the room I’d met before: an austere, stern doctor from a local hospital who was somehow even able to remain gruff in communicating the great news that he’d received a position as a department chair at an East Coast university. I congratulated him and indicated what a great place I considered that city and university to be. “That’s not my motivator, he replied briskly before walking away. There was the ever-present Doogie Howser stand-in; a prodigal, man-child doctor whose colleagues kept highlighting how smart he was—ever exaggerated by the fact that he was the spitting image of college buddies during our sophomore year (and I can assure you, none of them were “prodigal” on a daily basis). Yet at twenty seven, he is a leader in a major medical society. Impressive. There was the diligent, steadfast Middle Eastern doctor who looked somehow saintly in her hooded veil, as she works until long after midnight (I can attest, I stepped out for a breath of fresh air before bed after reading, and she was still in the lobby working just as hard as when I left her at 6:30 that evening). It made me pause to appreciate how committed all of these individuals are at staying focused on the reason they flew across the country, perhaps world, to be together. To properly answer my own question instilled by the terse doctor of the group, "What is their motivator?” The answer remains simple: to learn from each other. And, in turn, to help others.
This is an association at its core. As a software vendor, it is often easy to become caught up in the fact that all of the bits and bytes can feel more important than the member-user of our product. In fact, for association software vendors, the problem of appreciating this realization is often compounded by the fact that our buyer is most often not any real recipient of the knowledge-based collateral which our system manages. The buyer is most likely the administrator of this system, serving the members, yet providing a barrier between the software vendor and the true heir to the value of the product. I can definitively state that any supplier of association software, at any level, should consider attending a true member-focused event at least once a year to be reminded of the diligent individuals who benefit from their product offering. Certainly, not all associations that are gathered in a room, exhibit hall, or tradeshow floor are in the business of saving lives like my doctor friends mentioned above. However, regardless of whether you are talking to über-skilled hypothalamus-only brain surgeons or a trade group comprised of change-sorting apparatus-operators (I made those two up; they very likely exist), it is imperative to remember that they are serving a group of committed members whose goal is to become more effective, more efficient, and more educated. Association-lead meetings could never have a bad outcome, if done effectively. They serve each other, and the general public inherently benefits as well.
This brings me full circle to my own role in this whole process. As a product manager for software which serves associations, it is important that I set some of my metrics and measures for success around some of the many intangible variables which I have described above. "Have I made my end-users more effective and efficient at reviewing and planning quality programs for their members? Has the content and collateral, which our system manages, been able to be distributed to the most accessible, syndicated, enduring content channels? Have continuing education credits-earned increased as a result of a process that our system has helped to impact? Were members, who were unable to attend, able to take advantage of any of this knowledge remotely, using our technology?” Many of these questions might be answered with a simple “yes” or “no;" however, it makes sense to search for ways in which the true success-metrics we bind to our product take some of these considerations into account. I think that I will have my work cut out for me. In this particular case, attending a member event not only helped the members to learn from each other… I most certainly learned something as well.
This is an association at its core. As a software vendor, it is often easy to become caught up in the fact that all of the bits and bytes can feel more important than the member-user of our product. In fact, for association software vendors, the problem of appreciating this realization is often compounded by the fact that our buyer is most often not any real recipient of the knowledge-based collateral which our system manages. The buyer is most likely the administrator of this system, serving the members, yet providing a barrier between the software vendor and the true heir to the value of the product. I can definitively state that any supplier of association software, at any level, should consider attending a true member-focused event at least once a year to be reminded of the diligent individuals who benefit from their product offering. Certainly, not all associations that are gathered in a room, exhibit hall, or tradeshow floor are in the business of saving lives like my doctor friends mentioned above. However, regardless of whether you are talking to über-skilled hypothalamus-only brain surgeons or a trade group comprised of change-sorting apparatus-operators (I made those two up; they very likely exist), it is imperative to remember that they are serving a group of committed members whose goal is to become more effective, more efficient, and more educated. Association-lead meetings could never have a bad outcome, if done effectively. They serve each other, and the general public inherently benefits as well.
This brings me full circle to my own role in this whole process. As a product manager for software which serves associations, it is important that I set some of my metrics and measures for success around some of the many intangible variables which I have described above. "Have I made my end-users more effective and efficient at reviewing and planning quality programs for their members? Has the content and collateral, which our system manages, been able to be distributed to the most accessible, syndicated, enduring content channels? Have continuing education credits-earned increased as a result of a process that our system has helped to impact? Were members, who were unable to attend, able to take advantage of any of this knowledge remotely, using our technology?” Many of these questions might be answered with a simple “yes” or “no;" however, it makes sense to search for ways in which the true success-metrics we bind to our product take some of these considerations into account. I think that I will have my work cut out for me. In this particular case, attending a member event not only helped the members to learn from each other… I most certainly learned something as well.
The Show Must Go On
Difficult financial situations will always remain depressing. We’ve all noticed the precipitous decline in market value, stability, and personal wealth over the past months. It’s not just occurring locally either; this trend has now spread worldwide. Wants and needs have suddenly become painfully polarized, whereas in better times they would have overlapped in a much more satisfying manner. Education and obtaining best-practice knowledge definitely fall within the "needs bucket" however, these budgets are typically some of the first to be cut. Can you imagine this scenario?
"Well, there is a technique available—albeit cutting edge—that could save 6% more lives a year if understood and used properly … but we just can’t afford to send you to the conference to learn about it.”
Suze Orman probably doesn’t need to be around to remind you that this would be a “good debt” to incur.
Never before have there been so many reasons to make an investment in opportunities and technologies that will streamline effort and cost required to stay connected, educated, and ahead of the competition. Demand for education has certainly not declined proportionally with market financial trends: ACCME reports that CME-related activities are up 20%, participant volume is up 5%, and credit issuance is up 4% in 2008 (outdated material -- anything for 2009?). These trends certainly don’t describe a recession. Nevertheless, Las Vegas has seen 402 conferences cancelled from October, 2008 to mid-March, 2009 (at a cost of $166 million to the local economy) and the city has suffered a loss of an equivalent 95,000 hotel rooms. Now, these trends certainly do describe a recession. What is the gap? Where is this demand going? (Hint: It’s probably not to Atlantic City, just because it’s a little less chic.)
The fact is that the demand for knowledge and education will never change. However, the way in which people approach getting this information will change in a highly reactive fashion. Technology has enabled many advances in the ability to not only conduct research, to network and to attend “virtually,” but also to reduce costs like print and travel. Sounds like a solution, right? However, how many association events can you name that are suddenly taking place on Facebook with a overwhelming success? The proof is in the reality: it is much easier to identify ideas that feel like slick wins than to actually execute and deliver.
“You only find out who is swimming naked when the tide goes out.”
Proven technology is hard-to-come-by since technology is always changing. The organization that I work with, OASIS, has been the leading provider of abstract submission, invitation, and event content planning software for over twelve years. That is a long time! Although the initial benefits that are apparent from using OASIS include gained efficiencies, such as reduced staff involvement and travel cost from an online abstract submission and review process, the visible member benefits are clear as well. OASIS offers tools such as Digital Posters, which offers the ability to have access to multimedia presentation content without ever leaving home. Remember the Facebook example? In comparison, associations are using and loving Digital Posters today. In fact, the European Congress of Radiology is not only using it to allow attendees to participate from home, but also to show their poster long after the congress. This is a concept that works immediately.
Another consideration when making a reactive change in a volatile economy is choosing your battles wisely. If the strength of your organization is not running complex technology, why bother to start now? OASIS is delivered as a service, meaning that your already stretched-thin team will not have the burden or overhead of additional IT infrastructure and cost. It seems smarter to focus energy on delivering the best programming content possible, which is what your members need now, more than ever.
In a chaotic world, being idealistic about how to stay afloat simply will not work. Your organization and members require substance that is proven and allows your organization to retain the essence of what an association stands for: access to community and collective knowledge. OASIS can help you save cost and gain efficiency to survive the storm. Send me a note or a comment today. I’m excited to share all the different ways in which OASIS is preparing to help your association stay not just afloat—but ahead—in these trying times.
"Well, there is a technique available—albeit cutting edge—that could save 6% more lives a year if understood and used properly … but we just can’t afford to send you to the conference to learn about it.”
Suze Orman probably doesn’t need to be around to remind you that this would be a “good debt” to incur.
Never before have there been so many reasons to make an investment in opportunities and technologies that will streamline effort and cost required to stay connected, educated, and ahead of the competition. Demand for education has certainly not declined proportionally with market financial trends: ACCME reports that CME-related activities are up 20%, participant volume is up 5%, and credit issuance is up 4% in 2008 (outdated material -- anything for 2009?). These trends certainly don’t describe a recession. Nevertheless, Las Vegas has seen 402 conferences cancelled from October, 2008 to mid-March, 2009 (at a cost of $166 million to the local economy) and the city has suffered a loss of an equivalent 95,000 hotel rooms. Now, these trends certainly do describe a recession. What is the gap? Where is this demand going? (Hint: It’s probably not to Atlantic City, just because it’s a little less chic.)
The fact is that the demand for knowledge and education will never change. However, the way in which people approach getting this information will change in a highly reactive fashion. Technology has enabled many advances in the ability to not only conduct research, to network and to attend “virtually,” but also to reduce costs like print and travel. Sounds like a solution, right? However, how many association events can you name that are suddenly taking place on Facebook with a overwhelming success? The proof is in the reality: it is much easier to identify ideas that feel like slick wins than to actually execute and deliver.
“You only find out who is swimming naked when the tide goes out.”
– Warren Buffett, 2001
Proven technology is hard-to-come-by since technology is always changing. The organization that I work with, OASIS, has been the leading provider of abstract submission, invitation, and event content planning software for over twelve years. That is a long time! Although the initial benefits that are apparent from using OASIS include gained efficiencies, such as reduced staff involvement and travel cost from an online abstract submission and review process, the visible member benefits are clear as well. OASIS offers tools such as Digital Posters, which offers the ability to have access to multimedia presentation content without ever leaving home. Remember the Facebook example? In comparison, associations are using and loving Digital Posters today. In fact, the European Congress of Radiology is not only using it to allow attendees to participate from home, but also to show their poster long after the congress. This is a concept that works immediately.
Another consideration when making a reactive change in a volatile economy is choosing your battles wisely. If the strength of your organization is not running complex technology, why bother to start now? OASIS is delivered as a service, meaning that your already stretched-thin team will not have the burden or overhead of additional IT infrastructure and cost. It seems smarter to focus energy on delivering the best programming content possible, which is what your members need now, more than ever.
In a chaotic world, being idealistic about how to stay afloat simply will not work. Your organization and members require substance that is proven and allows your organization to retain the essence of what an association stands for: access to community and collective knowledge. OASIS can help you save cost and gain efficiency to survive the storm. Send me a note or a comment today. I’m excited to share all the different ways in which OASIS is preparing to help your association stay not just afloat—but ahead—in these trying times.
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