I hope you are enjoying some downtime and taking a holiday break this month. Here at Smart Enterprise Exchange it’s been especially busy as we enhanced and migrated to the new community platform. Please take a virtual tour of the site and visit our new discussions, blogs, groups and content.

As you travel the site, you will find reports from our recent European live events in London; Mannheim, Germany; and Rome, as well as slides from our Bangalore, India, Live Exchange. This month we will host events in the U.S., including Sacramento, Calif., Phoenix and Chicago.

Additionally, be sure to tune into a recently conducted audiocast panel discussion on the topic of Optimal Automation with IT executives in the healthcare, human resources and financial services industries. Later in the month, we feature a series of video interviews with your CIO peers discussing collaboration trends. You will find insightful best practices from public-sector CIOs in Canada and private-sector executives in New York that reflect the global thinking of our membership.

In case you missed Tom Davenport’s July column on Optimal Automation, Tom offers a calm, practical voice in hectic times like these. He builds on the basics — process automation and knowledge management, for instance — yet finds new twists and approaches to adopt. His perspectives about corporate decision making should resonate with all business leaders who are struggling to make sound choices and plans amid uncertainty. In particular, his four-point call to action requires CIOs to become active partners in the decision-making process and provides tools to keep the company on the right path. For all these reasons, I’m pleased Tom will be available on the site to answer questions from members for a few days in September. Look for more details and dates soon.

If you’d like to participate more actively in Smart Enterprise Exchange, please join one of our existing special-interest groups — such as public-sector CIOs; members who are based in London or India; or anyone interested in mainframes, service management or Web 2.0. If you have other topics of importance, form your own group, ask a question, post a blog or download a presentation from one of our events.

As you can tell, there are many ways to get involved in the new Smart Enterprise Exchange, and we hope you’ll find it to be a uniquely vital business tool and a vibrant community resource.

Paula Klein

Editor and Community Manager

Smart Enterprise Exchange

Our last Online Smart Enterprise Exchange brought together about 100 IT and business executives for a lively online discussion about being able to innovate in a difficult economy and the role of IT automation on productivity. J. Michael O'Dell, CIO, Pacific Coast Companies Inc. (PCCI) and Vercie L. Lark, CIO, Embarq, were among those speaking and answering questions from our participants about a wide range of topics.

Rather than recapping the presentations (you can download the podcast here), I'd like to share some of the questions and comments we received because I'm sure you have similar experiences and concerns. What's more, you may be surprised at some of the responses.

For instance, if you think that worker productivity has suffered as a result of the economic downturn, think again. More than half (55.6 percent) of the 21 respondents to an informal poll question during the exchange, said that poor productivity was not the case at their business. According to one participant, a systems architect for a leading U.S. logistics company, "If anything, the economic downturn has stressed the importance of productivity for the workforce. The consensus [among business leaders] is that increased productivity — thanks to automation — proves the value-add for our workers." As workers see the return on their investment, he said, "They are driven to maintain the momentum."

In fact, many businesses are continuing the process automation efforts they already have under way even though there might be fewer resources available. The majority (42.9 percent) of those responding to the online poll said the economy is not having an impact on their plans.

"Primarily, we believe that our current processes and automation plans are well executed and this will continue for the foreseeable future," said the logistics IT manager. "Of course, we continually evaluate those efforts to determine where additional cost savings could be realized. We look closely at the expected ROI to determine which areas are automated first."

When it comes to ROI, half of the participants said the average length of time their current IT projects have to demonstrate payback is one year or less — much shorter than in the past.

However, one attendee asked whether the projects are actually less than one year in duration or whether they are being split into subprojects with staggered delivery and ROI for each. "Net present value (NPV) / ROI for automation can look great on paper but is difficult to achieve because the business has to take tough actions to achieve the bottom-line benefit," the consultant said.

Several people said they are reevaluating their project portfolios and reprioritizing requests. One person noted that "ROI is both industry-specific and initiative-specific. Depending on the type of automation, you could see a range of values." Short ROI cycles provide more successes in a given period, and "everyone likes to be associated with them," another participant added.

The impact of automation on customer experience was also discussed. "It's important to ensure that these initiatives do not have a negative impact on the company image in the eyes of the customer and your local operating communities," one manager said. "It's a fine line to walk — are businesses being viewed as a responsible corporate citizens if we are downsizing as a result of automation?"

Smart Enterprise Exchange will continue to explore the topics of IT Productivity and Optimal Automation with additional best practices, insights and resources beginning in May. If you would like to contact any of our speakers or forum participants, please let me know ateditor@smartenterpriseexchange.com.

Paula Klein
Editor
Smart Enterprise Exchange