Web 2.0 in the Enteprise and What Google is doing about it- but what about adoption?

I went over to the InformationWeek website to read the article about how most business Tech Pros are wary about Web 2.0 Tools in th Enteprise and then ran into this article from Reuters annoucing a partnership between IBM and Google that will allow IBM WebSphere users to choose from 4,000 existing Google Gadgets services -- mini-Web applications that adminstrators and/or users can add with the click of a button onto public sites or internal office intranets/portals. This move i believe will lead to a much bigger use of Google Gadgets in enterprise environments that are traditionally resistant to the use of such applications and others will follow- an interesting question of course is how Microsoft's SharePoint services will follow.

From the first article on tech pros being wary of adoption Web 2.0 the following issues were raised:

• concerned about security > Well the new IBM implementation of Google Aps will manage the security issues, and the use of the gadgets can be audited and tracked. When things are build into the software there is a much easier business case to make



• return on investment > Well there are many types of ROI statements one can make from productivity gains to increased sales- but the bottom line is how much is this going to cost me and what are the returns on that cost- well with this anoucement Google Gadget features are available at no cost to companies who have purchased WebSphere Portal Version 6.0 and also customers of WebSphere Portal Express



• Concern about staffs' skills in implementing and integrating new Web tools > seems like plug and play with the Google integration into IBM- and it even goes beyond easy install for the technical folks- The end user decides: We no longer need to go off and call a technician," Larry Bowden, vice president of the IBM Lotus division for portals and Web services said. "The power has been turned over to the people who know best. You know best."

Collections of easy-to-install widgets, portlets, web parts etc. are not new to enterprise portal software suites- they are standard built in offerings. i have been integrating content into portals for many years and we have had partnerships with all the big portals- IBM Websphere, Microsoft SharePoint, Oracle, Plumtree, BEA etc. Although we have had successful implementations- it seems that in the long run, all of them still suffered from one big issue- user adoption.

I agree that companies like the ones mentioned in the article on Web 2.0 "shouldn't bet on employees flocking to these tools without a push". Adoption campaigns are key and in today's world you need to find the early adopters and make them the mouthpiece of what you are trying to achieve. The article mentions that Procter & Gamble is running an internal marketing campaign with the tagline "connect, converse, accelerate" as it rolls out real-time communications, a collaborative content portal, and desktop search. According to the article, Steve Ellis, executive VP of Wells Fargo's wholesale solutions group says that the Wells Fargo, IT and business departments are working together to develop only those applications employees need most and it seems that they have management support all the way because they are not 'bothering to cook up a dollar value for each collaboration app'. "I can just go out and tell our boss I know we'll be better off."- Lucky them would be great to learn more about how they got to that stage- or is their management just more enlightened?