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Technology
Don't wait to pick the low-hanging fruit.
Most experts believe that collaborative technologies will have settled into
a new state of equilibrium within three years, with more clearly defined segments,
more mature infrastructure, and tools and applications that deliver more measurable
value. Jim Lundy, a Gartner vice president, predicts that a few dominant suite
vendors will provide the overall platform both for popular collaboration features
such as Web conferencing and workspaces, and for newer technologies such as
presence engines, which let people know instantaneously who is reachable via
instant messaging. In turn, those common platforms will be useful to in-house
developers and to enterprise-application and other software vendors, who will
embed collaborative features into their industry- or process-specific applications.
Convergence will continue along multiple lines, according to Coleman at Collaborative
Strategies. First, synchronous and asynchronous tools will be more commonly
combined within an application or through a portal. Although workers might rely
on workspaces much like Honeywell's TeamRooms for sharing documents and files
asynchronously, they may occasionally wish to chat while there. Workspaces that
include presence engines (e.g., Beverly, Mass.-based Groove Networks Inc.) permit
that today. In fact, presence engines are emerging as a powerful way to consistently
embed time-saving, real-time communications into otherwise asynchronous or automated
business applications, from logistics management to sales and customer service,
notes Jeanette Barlow, market manager for IBM workplace client technology.
Audio, video and data conferencing will also continue to converge. Many more
organizations will rely on in-house Web-conferencing systems, drawn by the control
and cost savings they will afford compared to hosted models, especially once
these systems support Voice over IP as a standard feature. VoIP may be the development
that causes companies to go from piloting Web-conferencing systems to fully
deploying them. Says Jim Freeze, a senior vice president at Centra: "Today,
the majority of Web conferencing uses IP to control sessions, push slides and
keep everyone in sync. But the audio conference is a separate hookup. Over time,
most of the audio will take place over IP. The cost savings will be enormous."
Meanwhile, CIOs will be faced with some difficult decisions as they work to
rationalize their current collaboration tools while building a more useful and
standardized platform for the future. Gytis Barzdukis, director of office system
product management at Microsoft, thinks individual productivity may suffer,
at least in the short term. "Personal productivity has been improved through
technology. Now we're looking at team and organizational productivity."
Ask your IT staff:
What will we lose if we eliminate the ad hoc collaboration tools we currently
use?
Ask your business managers:
Are you willing to sacrifice some individual productivity to further the goals
of your business unit?
Ask your telecom staff:
What is the best way to deliver audio conferencing services and why? How will
VoIP affect these services?
Karen S. Henrie has been researching, analyzing and writing about information
technology and business strategy for nearly 20 years.
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Enterprise Technology 
