Reliable and secure communications technology is vital in a marketplace where the workforce is becoming increasingly mobile. In this new culture of connectivity, CIOs have an opportunity to make a difference in their company’s strategy and embrace this challenge, or risk being left behind as competitors pass them by.
A recent surveyNortel Networks Ltd. completed with IDC reports that in less than five years up to 40 percent of the workforce will be hyperconnected, demanding everywhere, all-the-time communications. Not only will these individuals be emailing colleagues or using IM while on the go, they will also be tapping into social networks and online communities such as blogs, wikis, and online forums to improve business communications.
According to the IDC study, two-thirds of the individuals surveyed use text or instant messaging for both work and personal use, and more than one in three organizations use social networks and online communities for some form of internal or external communication.
This group, called the “hyperconnected,” will be addicted to a variety of technology offerings and, in the future, will demand more high-bandwidth mobile applications like video and Web 3.0 from employers to support their business and personal needs.
Next-gen mobile communication devices like the iPhone, and new media platforms like YouTube Inc. , Twitter, and Second Life, are increasingly being used to communicate in the global marketplace. This demand from employees and customers adds complexity and pressures to the enterprise network and, in turn, challenges the CIO who is responsible for keeping his finger on the pulse of societal trends.
In order to compete in the global marketplace and take maximum advantage of this new “culture of connectivity,” corporate management and IT executives need to re-examine their current IT investments and business technology strategies.They must find ways to leverage tools, such as unified communications, and modify personnel policies, security regimes, and overall business practices to turn the challenges of hyperconnectivity into opportunities that drive bottom-line results.
Why is it important for CIOs to adapt to this changing environment? It’s nearly impossible not to and still run a successful business. Enterprises are going to have to compete for talented employees. As baby boomers retire, corporations will find themselves increasingly competing for talent, and this new breed of hyperconnected individuals will expect to work in a rich communications environment.
These workers, whether they are in or out of the office, will expect 24/7 access to information stored on the company’s enterprise server and multiple devices, such as PCs, laptops, and PDAs. Access to these new communications solutions, such as secure wireless Internet access, virtual meeting and telepresence capabilities, and Web 2.0 applications, will become a strong determining factor in their decision whether or not to accept the job.
With all the complexity surrounding them, the end goal for CIOs remains simple: to provide information securely and reliably, ensuring that, while being constantly connected, employees are still being productive.
I agree with you that we are getting where it's not hyper-connected but hyper-addicted with a "productivity" mask.
This is huge problem since companies that don't control their employees and let them run into the technology world, thinking that anything you do with it HAS to be productive. Sometimes it doesn't work like that.
In Todays "IT" enabled world it is no wonder we have become 'Hyper Addicted" rather than Hyperconnected and these are the monsters of our own creation :)
Whatever the criticisms maybe regarding this characteristic,it is something we will have to live with and also gear up our Infrastructure to support it too.
The good part is that notification & resolution of business critical issues gets taken care of more efficiently and within a short duration , thus reducing the after effect on the business.
As Mr. Roques mentioned in his post we need to increase the awareness and also imbibe the culture to ensure that the technology is used in a effective manner to meet the business needs.
There is thin line between connected & hyperconnected. Everyone needs to draw these lines based on individual priorities and role in the organization.
"This group, called the “hyperconnected,” will be addicted to a variety
of technology offerings and, in the future, will demand more
high-bandwidth mobile applications like video and Web 3.0 from
employers to support their business and personal needs."
Are most of them hyper-connected or are we mistaken addiction for connectivity? I think this is a valid question that needs addressing in modern day work place. If not the CIO would go crazy trying to meet everyone hyper-connectivity needs.
A well balanced and focused worker that is hyper-connected, could be very productive, this shows in the ROI, but a worker addicted to joining in on all the variety of tech widget and web 2.o network, would under perform and would be more of a danger to the company than an asset. The CIO in this case should call in a therapist, to treat the addiction instead of feeding the addiction by providing more gadgets. Addiction is counter productive and could be fatal to business bottom line.
I agree with you that the present digital landscape poses a serious challenge to CIOs, a fact which was also re-echoed by Chevron CIO Gary Masada. I believe the fundamental aspiration of any enterprise is productivity and this should not be diminish in the midst of all the information overload which according to this report will cost a whooping $650 Billion on the economy this year!
Whilst the Web 2.0 era has thrown the gauntlet to be infinitely connected, we should not allow a bunch of "hyper-connectors" to extend the workplace to include Baseball arenas! I think the modern CIO as you stated in your concluding sentence, should focus on making information easily accessible and flowing within pre-defined perimeters. Enterprises have ethics and it will be good if so call 'hyperconnectors' know that!!!
I completely agree with this. Technology by itself can be taken the wrong way. Corporations need to work on the culture and training to make sure that employees use the technology properly - and that doesn't include staying on top of every single problem using their blackberry; micromanaging is proven to be unsuccessful.
With the emergence of Enterprise 2.0, companies should make sure that blogs, tweets and other social network tools don't get carried away. Work on creating proper procedures that add value to the company, if not, what's the point?
Having a blog to go with the trend is useless if it's not adding value to the bottom line.
I have an iPhone, which replaced my Blackberry, which replaced my RIM pager.
My RIM pager only accepted text messages via email channels. If something went wrong in the data center with one of my applications, it would send an email and open a help ticket and that help ticket would be tracked and checked and double-checked and escalated until it was completed. 24 by 7. Months at a time.
The RIM was a pretty rare device to possess in the company. They were expensive. If you had one, it meant you were a cog. It served a vital purpose.
Once Blackberries became the standard and anyone could make a case for having one, it got ugly. No longer was I just getting a message from the automated system, but my boss was too, which meant he would send me a message about the message and expect a reply and if that reply was too long in coming I would receive a follow-up message asking if I'd gotten his previous message. Sometimes he would copy his boss on the messages, which meant I'd get a copy of a message from his boss to him asking to be apprised of any changes in status of the problem.
Before they had Blackberries, they slept through the night and never knew there was a problem until it was reviewed in the morning -- after it had been solved. With this newer technology, they took ownership of the problem lest they get a message from someone in the vast network of question askers (who seemed to multiply like fruit flies) and not have a ready answer for it.
Eventually, the CIO and the VP of development enacted "no device" rules in meetings because they couldn't get anyone's attention long enough to work through an agenda.
What CIOs should be paying attention to is the value of the communication moving through the "hyperconnected" set. Sure, the young kids like letting everyone know exactly what they are doing on a minute by minute basis, as well as knowing how everyone else in their "crew" are spending their own moments, but what value is it adding to the business? What information is escaping a company into the ether of ethernet? Facebook missives aren't liable to add to the bottom line. Nor will they shape an employee into 160 lbs of profit raking metal.
If anything ever screamed "moderation", this hyperconnectedness does. It's self serving. People become busy with the menial and lose time to think the really good things they are paid to.
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