Enterprise 2.0 Conference, Boston MA, 14-17 June 2010 

I had the chance to catch up with Steve Wylie, who runs the Enterprise 2.0 Conference for UBM Techweb. The lineup of speakers looks great, and turnout is expected to be solid despite the economic downturn. Steve thinks that the value proposition for web 2.0 technologies has become so pragmatic and immediate that companies are willing to send their staff to attend, because payback from investment is really obvious.

Also, as Steve pointed out, large, well-established enterprise technology providers — like IBM, Cisco, SAP. and Microsoft — have architected their product offerings to integrate web 2.0 concepts from top to bottom. We may be headed for a time when every bit of software in the business sphere is Enterprise 2.0… but not quite yet.

I was glad to see that JP Rangaswami will be keynoting, given his deep understanding of the CIO role for large business. Expect to learn a lot about the plans of the major players in the market, because the keynotes include SAP, Microsoft, Cisco, Sony, Jive, and Socialtext executives, like Socialtext’s Eugene Lee. Lee’s talk caught me eye because of its focus on business value, and his perception that too much of the steam being created is about adoption:

The fact that so much of the Enterprise 2.0 industry still focuses on issues of adoption is disheartening. It indicates that many E20 implementations lack a business focus and an overall understanding of where specific pain points inside an organization actually exist. Enterprise 2.0 is dead in the water if it doesn’t help a customer book a deal, accelerate a project, or collaborate more freely in real-time.

I like the no-bullshit message that Eugene is sending: companies considering these technologies need to look to their business problems, and find solutions that help with those, instead of generalized plans for rolling out generalized technology. Look to your pain points!

I will be attending the conference, principally researching the Microstreams in Business research study I am working on this summer, since so many of the companies that I am reviewing will be attending. And the roster of talks looks great: a very busy week.