eweekchat

it's time for digital whiteboards to finally take off!

A3: we're looking at something like Productboard (if we place that in the collaboration space)

@usmcjost Miro for the win!

@sethaelliott I love Miro.

A3: Kapost for managing content. We are progressing to MS Teams & Sharepoint as the central hub for chat, video, file storage

A# in the vein of Digital Whiteboards, also the ability to co-author is now a must, companies embracing legacy security posture or "Just not there yet" must catch up.

We've been poking around at Threads as a Slack alternative, but it hasn't really taken off internally yet.

A3. Swit has been on my radar for a year. Brings all collaboration (communication, project management, etc.) together in one place. Organizations that rationalize collaboration tools around required capabilities see better e.user satisfaction & money saved on licenses #eWEEKchat

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DevOps tools for more operational work, providing greater viability, I think Monday.com does a great job advertising this.

A3: I know we already talked about this, but Zoom has become essential to us. Gone (for now) are the days of desk drive-bys and water cooler conversations. The culture of a company depends on those interactions. #eWEEKchat

A3: Are any of you seeing anything that has made you say 'whooa' in this area recently?

A3: Converged tools such as Slack, MS teams, etc where you can interface with multiple data sources and people at once are a must.

A3: We also use employee engagement tools like @bonusly. It's a great way for employees to show their appreciation to others, especially now that we're distributed. #eWEEKchat

A3: an increase in special interest groups on Slack has increased connection for mindfulness practices, shared interest in hobbies and keeping employees more connected from home.

A3: 'The best tool is the one you use' is a huge principal for us whether that is collaboration software, CRM etc. Adoption over the bells and whistles always

@usmcjost this is there new positioning this idea of a work operating system - smart marketing (which is expected from them)

@usmcjost A3: Watching IT use digital tools to improve collaboration is a very necessary case study in how collaboration tools are going to evolve. It's not just stuffing more video into a connection.

A3. Tools focused on enhanced analytics have a business edge (e.g. Microsoft’s offerings). By gathering and analyzing data on how end users best utilize these tools, we can redesign our collaboration working environments to improve productivity. #eWEEKchat

A3 I find the problem with most collab tools are they are purely horizontal and do not have application affinity to every user. Great for comms and office docs, but not solving the problem of doing my job in context...

@plburris Agree but IT users are the worst when looking at adoption capabilities, I always let my kids test out solutions, if they can do it we have a chance.

A3: At RingCentral use our own Message, Video and Phone capabilities all day long. The place where we are seeing the biggest change internally behavior is in co-creation tools in GSuite. Very complimentary to real time communications.

A3 Naturally, SAP as an apps company is looking at ways to bring applications in context for each employee/user into the collaboration mix...

A3: of course, i assume we all use our own products already :)

@danlahl tools like workgrid and Citrix microapps are starting to push this forward as well.

@danlahl A3. That's it! Collaboration tools for IT typically are much better because the builders of those tools -- IT pros -- understand the context in which they'll be used. Collaboration is really subtle, very context-dependent. My clients abandon these tools all the time.

a3 @usmcjost agree, data and processes must be brought, in context, into each users individual job function to address the next level of collaboration

a3 @plburris agree with you Peter, abandoning tools that have no context for each user have no use. personally or professionally!

A3 @sethaelliott Narutally :-)

What are Banks / FIs / Insurance companies which are highly regulated doing at a time like this - given security / client confidentiality considerations?

@anujaagarwal We've seen banks and insurance companies isolating infrastructure in private networks, relying on gateways, authenticated jump boxes, etc. to provide access and a security layer.

@mtjmpr Thanks... I'm guessing a lot of the organizations were just not prepared for this mass 'WFH' phenomenon

@anujaagarwal Definitely, and hopefully companies make it through and take this as a wake up call. The ability to work from home/elsewhere should be viewed as a necessity, not a perk or privilege.

A2: @uplandsoftware has a remote first culture with limited offices in the US and EMEA. I think mindsets will change during the current crisis and people can see that employees work just as hard at home as they do in the office.

Q2 HOGWASH! My team is spread all over the world, from Israel to China and India. The management of companies have to get on board with the new normal of remote workforces...

A2. This is likely based on a bad perception of what 'work' is. Work is a process, not something inherently tied to a place. As remote work becomes a norm over the next few months, we'll see focus on results/outcomes, not how many hours you spend in an office #eWEEKchat

A2: For us we have been operating as a distributed team across multiple locations from the start: Bulgaria, Berlin, London and Denver. We've also had a very liberal work from home policy and this has all driven more productivity for us personally

depends on the company, culture, and role. WFH is very prevalent in our company and we have highly collaborative and productive teams. For the most part, I think many "knowledge worker" roles can easily WFH.

A2: Strongly the opposite. We use @ApacheGuacamole for essentially everything, and now rely on it. It is true that some businesses cannot avoid requiring physical presence. For all others, it doesn’t make sense to knowingly turn away from flexibility.

A2: Having said that we obviously (given our product) have an intense OKR culture in our DNA. We see that it's highly situational in regards to whether WFH fits into both company culture and strategy-execution management capabilities

I'm seeing mixed data on that Chris...on the one hand, it's true many companies are scrambling to put in #WFH infrastructure & are not prepared. On the other hand I see customers rapidly getting better and ramping up productivity. #less #Travel

Also keep in mind these are not "Normal" WFH times with kids being out of school, sports, etc. So there are many more distractions.

A2 glad this panel is dispelling the notion of work only happening in a corporate or satellite office...

We've had a mostly remote team at @clubhouse for several years now and we haven't seen a drop in productivity (the opposite in fact). There's definitely a lot work to be done to make sure that you have the right processes in place though.

Personally I have seen a dramatic increase of video use, getting to know co-workers, their families, pets, etc. We are reconnecting humanity back into the workplace.

A2: That was actually a survey of 1,000+ workers, and half believed their companies weren't ready to go remote. With the proper tools in place, orgs can make it happen. Here's the survey info: https://www.wrike.com/blog/are-employees-ready-to-.... #eWEEKchat

@usmcjost absolutely agree - this is something that will require structural change so that labour not traditionally seen as a part of the economy (childcare, etc.) definitely ought to be. Several hundreds years late!

A2: I'd add anecdotally a guess that companies fearing WFH productivity erosion are likely to be organizations in which 'Agency' for each employee skews lower

A2. For rote activities with no physical component, no effect on productivity. For an activity that changes in response to time or context, having folks proximate can be better. But, of course, most offices are poorly managed and run!

@usmcjost so lots of videos of sap employees bringing their kids and pets to work right now. Humanizes the situation :-)

A2: Working from home with the kids in the house has a huge impact on productivity :) Maybe that's what the Wrike study was highlighting!

A2. Productivity could increase with less meetings! This pandemic has shown that many ‘would-be’ meetings can actually be resolved through IM, audio/video chat, or email. Employees can now rightfully ask: do we actually need a meeting for xyz? #eWEEKchat

@mtjmpr A2: I think this is a strong point - the infrastructure in place to create efficacy for WFH is critical

A2: WFH will become more productive as data moves to the cloud. Much of the sensor data lands in a data center today. Once policies to move that data are put in place, research from home will be easier. And likely that shift to cloud will be permanent.

21% of respondents in a recent @etrnews survey indicate they're actually planning to spend more in 2020 as a result of #COVID19 - the offset to the precipitous declines is all related to #WFH infrastructure (not just video but networking, security, VDI, etc.).

https://wikibon.com/breaking-analysis-cios-now-exp...

@kurt You need to make sure that you're over-communicating everything and have feedback loops in place for everyone. Right now we're seeing what it looks like if everyone is just thrown into the fire without thinking their processes through.

A2 I've asked 2 development colleagues about development productivity during wfh at SAP. Both report they are ahead on most of their project timelines (both run 500+ person units at SAP)

A2: using the tools we'll all talk about - and having in place a method like OKRs that is not 'command & control' and that empowers workers while enabling progress evaluation massively helps this process

There is a ton of "Real Estate" budget that can to optimizing operations if WFH can really transform certain business models.

@kurt agree - we are having Zoom video meetings just to keep things human. For me, I have a Monday noon meeting and a Friday breakfast meeting with my team - no work, just talk - video mandatory

A2: Qumulo has always had Agile dev teams face to face. They have moved seamlessly to WFH and met their biweekly releases as planned. No slow down and possibly an acceleration in productivity reported.

@kurt Love that sentiment. Over-communicating in this period is crucial

@danlahl A2. Good use of Zoom.

A2: We are hearing that productivity is still strong from many of our customers. Work has changed. For now a shared mission and good tools are a winning combination. #eWEEKchat

I've been working remotely since 2007, and have worked for remote-first companies. If the culture and infrastructure support it, remote-work is at least as productive as in-office, in my experience.

@danlahl Yep Zoom lunches, happy hours, just saying hi. We may be more connected now than ever?

A2 @danlahl Gartner is expecting database sales to retract up to 10%, so the spending decrease for CIOs is real...

@usmcjost I found out

@JosePastor We have seen the same, particularly in markets service media data to consumers, researchers working on COVID. Activity in those environments have spiked while others are more or less status quo.

@dvellante Hi Dave! Thanks for joining

@usmcjost Erik, I found out I have 2 people on my team that are Orchid experts - they are coaching me!!!

@danlahl This hits home my dad was and Orchid grower for many years!

@thomaserandall I think you're right regarding companies viewing work as being tied to a place, but I'm surprised that any would continue to hold this view in light of the current pandemic.

@mtjmpr Agreed. This is a paradigm shift in how we understand work.