Why it's OK for social collaboration to encourage shadow IT
By Matt Kapko as written on cio.com
The use of unsanctioned social collaboration tools in the enterprise can be a real challenge for any IT organization, but they also often spark productivity and help teams focus. In fact, many CIOs and IT professionals say workers who use apps such as Yammer and Slack can both raise the threat associated with shadow IT and drive productivity gains. Companies must understand the unique strengths and weaknesses of popular social tools if they want to see real value, according to business leaders.
Social collaboration apps compound the effects of shadow IT, according to Brian Kelley, CIO of Portage County, Ohio. When employees "go rogue" and veer away from traditional or sanctioned corporate communication tools, enterprises lose access to important records, he says. "Business leaders can reduce the risks and hidden dangers … of shadow IT by bringing it into the open," Kelley says. "This will require better aligning the business with IT, improving communication with managers, and reducing the complexity of IT procurement."
"Shadow IT happens when users are not happy with existing solutions the company has put in place and are striving for process improvement and efficiency," says Doron Gordon, CEO of IT service management company Samanage. "The harder it is for teams to communicate effectively the more likely they are to seek out a resolution on their own."
Social collaboration, shadow IT and freedom of choice
Different teams within a company often have different needs, but workers should not have complete freedom to pick and choose their own tools, according to Gordon.
"Teams should be allowed to identify and solve problems on the ground," says J. Colin Peterson, CEO of J - I.T. Outsource, an IT support firm for small businesses. However, "[t]here should be consensus on the process and the tools that are used. Otherwise it is bedlam."
In fact, Peterson says, IT professionals should insist that their staffs use approved tools. CIOs need to focus on workflows rather than adopt lenient technology policies to appease a minority of people on staff, according to Peterson. "My suggestion is to create a situation that makes it impossible to complete work without the approved apps," he says. "Figure out why you have people going rogue, determine if the benefit realized is real, implement where necessary, and disallow other applications."
Mike Micucci, senior vice president of product management at Salesforce.com, says employees are most efficient when their collaboration tools connect directly to business processes or functions. "The end goal is to provide employees with access to a fully integrated suite that enhances relationships between colleagues and builds a more productive organization," he says.
Collaboration tools should reach across departments, offices and regions, according to Micucci. "In my experience, the impact of a social network that unifies the whole organization always outweighs any specific feature preference by one group or another."
Some CIOs cautiously embrace shadow collaboration
Not everyone agrees that IT should be so strict about the social collaboration apps their staffs use.
Marcus Schmidt, senior director of product management at enterprise tech firm West Unified Communications, says apps that enter the enterprise as shadow IT can morph into structured, managed solutions. Single applications with multiple sub-groups, channels or rooms for teams are always preferable, he says, because IT staff can manage employee access and view participation metrics in a single dashboard. "Ultimately, the key to success with social tools is to maximize adoption across the team. That is nearly impossible if there are multiple, competing shadow IT solutions."
Once a collaboration app catches on with a dedicated set of employees, it can quickly spread to other members of the same line of business and result in different apps being used across the enterprise, according to Karim Sadroudine, director of innovation ecosystem at BroadSoft, a unified communications software maker. Unfortunately, it's a trend that's very difficult to contain, Sadroudine says. "I cannot think of an example where a mass movement for a tool or application in the enterprise was ever successfully controlled."
Restrictions on corporate Internet access, and the use of personal email and popular apps such as Facebook are mostly futile attempts to prevent workers from using the tools they prefer, according to Mark Montini, chief results officer at marketing tech firm M2M Strategies. Businesses should endorse their preferred apps and attempt to drive adoption, but also encourage employees to leverage new tools that could prove to be valuable and eventually make it onto the preferred list, he says. "When businesses attempt to control social collaboration in the workplace, it serves to undermine the principles that drive social collaboration in the first place," he says. "The key is to contain, not control social collaboration.
Social collaboration apps are increasingly pervasive in the enterprise, and they often boost the use of shadow IT, but that's not necessarily a bad thing, according to Andrew Horne, IT practice leader at CEB, a technology advisory firm, who calls the trend a "healthy development."
"Often, the problem with collaboration isn't the tool itself but that the team isn't ready to collaborate," Horne says. As such, IT leaders need to prioritize their efforts around supporting collaboration, not forcing employees to use a specific tool.
EU Model Clauses and HIPAA BAA update now available for all Yammer customers
Post was written by Juliet Wei, senior product marketing manager for the Yammer team.
Yammer’s mission is to enable open team collaboration, and we recognize that sharing goes hand in hand with the right levels of privacy, security and compliance. With more than 85 percent of the Fortune 500 using Yammer to collaborate, our goal is to provide customers with industry-leading privacy and security commitments.
Today I’m thrilled to announce that Yammer has achieved a major compliance milestone to enhance its commitment to the protection of personal data for European customers. Effective immediately, all customers can obtain a Data Processing Agreement with the European Commission’s standard contractual clauses for data processors, known commonly as the “EU Model Clauses (EUMC).” This provides customers with an alternative to transfer personal data from the European Union to the United States.
Additionally, the standard HIPAA Business Associate Agreement (HIPAA BAA) for Microsoft enterprise online services is now available for Yammer customers.
Organizations want a collaboration platform that gives them the right levels of privacy, security, and compliance. The EUMC and use of the standard HIPAA BAA for Microsoft enterprise online services are part of Yammer’s ongoing investments to deliver the protection customers need to collaborate with confidence.
—Juliet Wei
Source: https://blogs.office.com
Wednesdays with Will: Microsoft Dynamics CRM & Office 365 – Working In Perfect Harmony
By William Marchesano, Technology Advisor & Evangelist
Welcome back! Last week we talked about the recent expansion in Office 365 to include Dynamics CRM. This week we are going to discuss how you can enhance your experience in Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online with Microsoft Office 365. Separately, they work well as standalone solutions, solving different day-to-day challenges. Put them together, though, and you have managed to enhance both of these valuable business tools for the user as well as the administrator.
Over the past 3-4 years there has been prevailing sentiment for businesses to move to Microsoft Office 365. The most common, and logical, starting point for an organization would be their email (Exchange). Gone are the days where you have to buy new server hardware every few years, allocate the space in your office for said hardware, buy new software to upgrade, and pay for an anti-spam solution to keep you safe. Oh, and let’s not forget the maintenance that goes along with keeping it running in good order. All the above challenges have been either eliminated or reduced by Office 365 Exchange Online. There are also other parts to the solution such as file sharing (SharePoint/OneDrive), video conferencing (Skype For Business), crowdsourced collaboration (Yammer), and the tried and true Office Suite (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, etc.) that can be consumed through Office 365 as well.
As you know, much like Office 365, Dynamics CRM Online is also a platform that was designed to improve efficiencies in accomplishing daily tasks as well as enhance collaboration between your employees. In addition to that, Dynamics CRM is a process driven user experience tool that gathers analytics for business intelligence. These qualities are important when you are looking to implement a sales automation, marketing automation, or services automation solution for your organization. Dynamics CRM was designed to be used for these functions out-of-the-box. Yes, customization is required to make it hum along to the rhythm of your particular business but all the major pieces to make it work are there. But how does it all tie into Microsoft Office 365?
Let’s start with the reasons why your users will love it. All the featured applications I mentioned above (Exchange, SharePoint/OneDrive, Skype For Business, Yammer, and Office Suite) are logically integrated and used throughout the Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online experience. Through Dynamics CRM Online you are able to synchronize emails, tasks, contacts, and appointments with Exchange Online and your Outlook. Documents that you save in Dynamics CRM pertaining to an account or opportunity are also synchronized and saved to SharePoint. You have the ability to click on a phone number in Dynamics CRM Online to make a phone call by using Skype For Business. One of the best new features, Office 365 Groups, allows non-Dynamics CRM users a single location to share documents, conversations, meetings, and notes with Dynamics CRM users. This would be helpful in the scenario of sales opportunity where the input of non-CRM users could be instrumental in winning a deal.
From an administrative perspective, Dynamics CRM Online is a familiar experience if you are already using Office 365. This is because Dynamics CRM users can be created and managed through the Office 365 admin center portal. You have the ability to do many other things through here such as manage billing and licenses, manage passwords, view self-serve service health, track planned maintenance, or leverage the Message Center. The Message Center is a great resource because it can tell you how to fix or prevent issues, plan for service changes, or just to stay informed of new or updated features. You can even request service to resolve an issue through the Message Center.
In the coming weeks, we will continue to go deeper into how these tools will apply in different scenarios such as sales automation, marketing automation, and services automation. I hope you enjoyed and found this week’s article informative. If you’re interested in some how-to related CRM material, check out blogs by my colleague Ben Ward here. Till next time…
About the author:
Will has over 16 years of experience in business development, team management, and project management. Will has worked at Managed Solution for over four years and is currently advising businesses on best CRM practices and implementations. Will’s focus is on process improvement and analytics specializing in Customer Relationship Management (CRM). Will is a Microsoft Certified Professional, with certifications in Presales Technical Specialist – Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2013, Sales Specialist- Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2013, Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2015 Application, Sales Specialist- Office 365, Sales Specialist- SMB Infrastructure and Sales Specialist- Datacenter.
Other articles by Will Marchesano:
For information on deploying Microsoft Dynamics CRM in your organization, please call us at 800-257-0691.
Pepperdine University’s Graziadio School of Business and Management enrolls approximately 2,000 students, many of whom work full time. Connecting and engaging busy students can be challenging, so the business school took a page from Fortune 500 companies: it uses Yammer to foster collaboration, enhance learning, and forge tighter relationships among students, faculty, staff, and increasingly, alumni.
The Yammer Solution
In 2010, the school integrated Yammer into Graziadio’s Learning Environment and Network (GLEAN). Since then, Yammer has been virally adopted by most business school students, faculty, and staff.
“We knew students wanted broader engagement, but we did not anticipate how much they’d help each other with logistical questions, IT support, business contacts, professional advice, and moral support,” says Director of eLearning Susan Gautsch. “We also didn’t anticipate the social power of Yammer, which psychologically bridges online and face-to-face experiences. It creates a strong sense of community, regardless of students’ schedules or where they’re studying.”
Students from Graziadio’s Master of Science in Organizational Development program, who come from six countries and only meet five times over two years, stay engaged using Yammer: one class of 35 students has collectively posted 6,000 messages over an eight-month period.
One popular Yammer implementation is what the business school calls Peer Connection. “It’s student driven,” Gautsch explains. “They use it to get to know each other and set up affinity groups.” For instance, students join the Marketing group to network and swap ideas about industry news and course topics.
The school’s faculty also put Yammer to good use. Many have set up private Yammer groups to facilitate and deepen class discussions. Another popular program is Classrooms Across Borders, a way for faculty to share their expertise. Students can follow topics or professors, who post open questions or share articles to generate online discussion. “It’s a great way for faculty to have more of a presence, to get what they do out there to the wider student body,” Gautsch observes.
Yammer is also popular with staff. Academic advisors use it to communicate broadly, answering questions and sending out updates on everything from upcoming meetings to traffic snarls that may make it hard to get to campus. “Our deans are getting online more and more to engage with students and alumni, which they appreciate,” Gautsch observes. She adds that, “Alumni are a growing part of our network, since students who use Yammer want to keep using it to stay engaged with the university after they graduate.”
THE RESULTS
An end to communication silos. Yammer allows faculty, staff, and students to communicate across departments and campuses.
Deeper connections. Professors and staff use Yammer to expand on classroom discussions and tighten ties with students and each other.
New networking opportunities. Full- and part-time students make cross-program connections and network with alumni through topic-driven conversations.
An ever-growing data repository. Due to its search functionality and ease of contributing content, Yammer is a valuable living knowledge base.
ABOUT YAMMER
Yammer (https://about.yammer.com) is a best-in-class Enterprise Social Network (ESN) used by more than 500,000 organizations worldwide —including approximately 85 percent of the Fortune 500 —to connect and communicate. Yammer brings together employees, content, conversations, and business data in a single location. Founded in 2008, Yammer was acquired by Microsoft and is available with Office 365, to deliver a comprehensive, seamless social experience across the applications people already use.
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