Since the arrival of online commerce 15 years ago, there have been few technology trends that have the potential to revolutionize the retail industry like the ones we see in mobile computing, social networking, and cloud computing. Today’s piece looks into the ways that retailers can shed a more conservative, traditional mindset and embrace new ways for deploying new apps, delving into practical insights for creating innovative, API-enabled applications. More specifically, how leveraging the move to the cloud can serve as the smartest decision in blowing out one’s API strategy.

Think Modular and Act Entrepreneurial, on the Cloud

Many retailers are very conservative when it comes to technology adoption, and they to closely control where new apps are deployed. Due to our limited budget, we didn’t have a choice but to embrace a new way for deploying the new apps.

Had we done it the old way, we would have acquired and configured the database, application, and web servers ourselves. We would have had to negotiate a long-term hosting agreement worth millions of dollars, and the agreement would have to go through a lengthy legal and executive approval process. Instead we acted like a startup and launched our API service and the API-enabled applications on the cloud, outside of the confines of our firewall, with the help of a technology partner. We bought capacity only to the level that we needed and as the services gained customer adoption, we added more. With this strategy, we were able to avoid high, upfront fixed costs and turned them into variable expenses.

Don’t Build Everything from Scratch

Some retail technologists see any initiative as an opportunity to re-engineer and rebuild. We didn’t have that luxury. We also realized that we already had valuable digital assets and enabling applications available, in-house or externally through our partners. The constantly updated movie library was already there. Our store locator engine was built. We had a transaction engine and a payment gateway. What we needed to do was create a common API service layer that would enable new applications to access those services consistently, for many more customers (millions), and in a way that we could monitor analytically for future improvements.

We looked outside of our organization and found a SaaS vendor whose technology enabled us to create this API service layer quickly, get them up and running on the cloud, and use analytical reporting tools to monitor traffic and the conversion data. We also used the same Graphical User Interface designs across different consumer devices, making only minor tweaks for usability. The key is to leverage existing solutions to accelerate time to market before your customers leave you. Without technology from this vendor, it would have taken us five to ten times as long to deliver what we wanted to.

In my third and final part of this series, I’ll discuss the strategic benefits that can result from extending the reach of APIs to developers and partners.

Since the arrival of online commerce 15 years ago, there have been few technology trends that have the potential to revolutionize the retail industry like the ones we see in mobile computing, social networking, and cloud computing. As retail executives, we are challenged to deliver innovative applications that satisfy the customers’ demand for commerce content and transactional ability from anywhere, using any of the always-connected consumer devices: smart phones, set-top boxes, and even internet-connected picture frames. Furthermore, due to the great recession, the notoriously limited retail IT budget is now even tighter, so we have to deliver these applications at little or no additional cost.

As someone who has been in the same boat, I want to offer, over a series of posts, several practical insights for creating innovative, API-enabled applications. I believe the time to take action is now, and if we do things smartly, limited budget or aggressive timeline should not be an impediment.

Find the Perfect Entry Point, Not the Perfect Roadmap

The company that I worked for rented movies and games through retail outlets. We needed to act fast to counter the challenges posed by our competitors who were delivering the goods by mail and digitally via the web and set-top boxes.

Instead of doing lengthy research to discover the perfect product roadmap, we decided to focus on enabling developers and partners to innovate on our core service. We quickly launched a very focused API service as an entry point, and developed a simple iPhone app as a proof-of-concept for building an application on that API.

Then, working with our partners, we quickly created and released an application that the customers can use from their mobile devices or set-top boxes. Using this application, the customers can search for movie titles, browse for recommendations, and decide whether they want to watch the movie immediately through their set-top box, browser, or pick up the movie from the closest retail outlet.

The most critical decision was to not wait too long to make a decision. Once customers were using the initial app, we enabled them to give us feedback that we monitored closely, which in turn allowed us to iterate and improve upon the initial entry point.

In my next entry, I’ll look into ways that retailers can shed a more conservative, traditional mindset and embrace new ways for deploying new apps.

Organizations have long faced liability in an environment of e-mail, instant messaging, blogs, and downloads. Critical dependencies and vulnerabilities abound. But a fairly recent, yet established, challenge has materialized in the workplace: that of social networking. In addition to high profile sites such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, et al., there are countless other sites – some friendly, some professional, and some neither friendly nor professional. For an exposure to the latter, just try Googling “vent your job,” “rant about your job,” etc.

In the recent past, it was enough to have a prudent e-mail policy as part of an Acceptable Use policy for information systems at large. Most of it was obvious, though necessary: no harassment, no abuse in terms of too much personal e-mailing of family and friends, no e-mailing of negative views, such as political or corporate, and no posting of any kind to questionable forums – under the aegis of the corporate domain. That is, don’t use your corporate e-mail or user account for anything that could adversely reflect on the organization or you as a representative of that organization.

But today, often in the lag of policy, social networking has employees toggling between “friending” on Facebook, Twitter, etc. one moment, and “businessing” on corporate systems the next. In the case of small businesses, many find themselves taking advantage of social networks in the interests of client-building, marketing, communication, and general exposure. This is inexpensive and efficient – but here, the blend is a blur.

Of course, social networking has that universal business peril: wasted time. But this switch between friending and businessing can pose an extreme peril to any organization’s #1 asset – its reputation – in an age that grants enormous power to individuals. For example, Genesis HealthCare System, of Ohio, recently had to counsel healthcare professionals not to make negative postings online; personnel were discussing patients and referring to them by room number. Going the other way, employees too often have the temptation to bring an inappropriately lighter sensibility to business communications, having just exited the “party” of social networking.

Another peril in the blend of friending and businessing is the security concern. There is a proliferation of sites that offer to import contacts from other systems – be it your corporate account or other social networking sites. This blending of corporate and personal contacts can group people together for communications that may be inappropriate for either half of the group. These sites can also deliver malware, which in turn can monitor keystrokes, steal sensitive data (one need only refer to the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse, and its Chronology of Data Breaches report, for a little perspective), and can direct users to other websites of further harm. Beyond, these activities can consume bandwidth and crimp resources better devoted to legitimate business, robbing Internet speed for other employees and online customers. Organizations must understand that when employees access outside systems, they risk exposure of confidential information, and open a possibility for hacking, spyware, viruses and, ultimately, potential lawsuits.

In the same vein, organizations must also look at how employees are accessing what they access. Today’s blended environment includes personal and business assets: In the era of remote and home offices, employees access corporate networks with their own PCs and laptops. Are these computers secure? Do they have virus protection? Is it updated? How often? Just as importantly, when employees take corporate laptops offsite, do they utilize them on secure WiFi networks? If a corporate laptop prompts for a download and update, does the employee know enough to vet and accept, or decline, the update? Would some employees decline a legitimate security update?

In a furtherance of blending, consider data’s portability: CDs, DVDs, thumb drives, mobile phones with huge storage capacity… who is transporting your organization’s data, and how? If an employee takes data off-site, is there a standard operating procedure for how that data is transported? Must the employee utilize a company asset for a critical transfer? Or is it enough that the employee shows up “with the goods”?
So – what to do? Companies are varied and no “one-size-fits-all” solution exists. Small Business, with limited budget, is exploiting social networking for all it’s worth; it is free, far reaching and effective. Some big companies are totally down on it as their client base, boards, and senior management can have a more conservative business sense. But in either case, smart organizations have always leveraged and protected content (information, business data), as well as the blended environment of personal and business assets. They now must do so with an immediacy for modern awareness, issues and resolutions. In this blending of the corporate and public domains, and of corporate and employee assets, a robust Acceptable Use policy and its maintenance have never been more important.

Fortunately, for diverse organizations, there are more options than extreme positions of green-lighting all social networking access, or red-lighting any access at all as a total denial. There is also the option to manage limits in between. Subsets of users can have partial or all-access; different sites can be available to certain users according to their role in the organization; some users may indeed have no access; and there may be conditional access based on projects and temporary need. The leading cause of data breaches is negligence, according to CIOZone, making control and education paramount. So, by adding necessary precautions and education, you should be well-poised for what some call “The Wild West” of social networking.

In getting there, IT Governance (Business) must engage. It is Business, after all, that owns “business” – the doing – even in a tech company. Business must understand the payoff and the perils, the benefit to risk, and must insist on a fully qualified user body and a regime of standards in service to present and evolving realities. Everyone needs to be a mini-security officer: Every activity must be viewed through security’s prism. IT must help to shape policy, in fully informing and serving Business, by making known the risks and exposures, and IT can enforce compliance to standards through regularized training and monitoring of activity. But the important thing is to mount a new awareness and to hammer policy and plans into shape based on your organization’s needs, vulnerabilities, size, budget, culture, etc. A good planning and policy panel is a Business Implementation Team (BIT), comprised of qualified Business, IT, and User counterparts.

In the realm of risk, unmanaged possibilities become probabilities. Security is only as good as its weakest link: an untrained or uncaring employee, a laptop with disabled virus protection, a data breach, a damaging Facebook post, or a ranting Comment to a news article by Firstname_Lastname@YourBusinessDomain.com – these can do extraordinary damage. Failed events and circumstances have a common point: It’s the failure to identify a true need – resulting in the denial of an appropriate solution.

Today and tomorrow, prudent business needs to managing an accelerating, even forced, evolution of critical technical empowerments and their best use. Organizations need to manage their progression through a world of accelerative change. A good part of this will be directing their employee’s use of, or avoidance to, social networking and other outside sites. Further, there should be a regularized schedule for review and updates to Acceptable Use policies and reinforcing training. Organizations should also survey their blended assets for protection, update, and best use.

In today’s blended environment, don’t wait – your domain hangs in the balance.

David Scott is the author of the MBA-text,  I.T. WARS:  MANAGING THE BUSINESS-TECHNOLOGY WEAVE IN THE NEW MILLENNIUM, and is a business consultant. For more information about him, visit his homepage or professional profile on The Business Forum.

You’ve decided on the software you need, the business side has bought into it, and you’ve even picked your integrator. Now the hard work begins: Making sure that your software deployment strategy sets your company up for success, and that means making sure business, IT and implementation partners are all speaking the same language when needed.

The implementation of packaged software is the implementation of a business solution. In order to be effective there must be alignment between Business and their IT partners (internal IT organization, Implementation Partners). Collaboration is a key enabler for alignment. However, being in the same meetings or having the latest collaborative technology does not ensure collaboration. It first begins with all the partners having common understanding and language. Consider the following illustration:

First, we need to understand that Business, IT, and the Implementation Partner are coming from different perspectives. Every party has a knowledge gap to address. Business best understands their existing business model and the underlying success drivers. The Implementation Partner understands the packaged software and has multiple years of implementation experience. IT best understands how technology supports the existing business model as well as how best to utilize existing corporate IT technologies. Alignment is generated only when a common understand of the business model, packaged software, and technology capabilities are shared by all three parties. When this alignment occurs there is effective communications and faster decision-making. Decisions move implementations forward.

Following is a recommended set of steps to develop a common understanding for effective collaboration:

1. Document existing business processes

It is an area that I see many packaged software implementations lack. The typical challenge I hear is “Why document my existing business processes if I know they are changing?” Here are my reasons:

a. Business users usually do not have a consistent understanding of their business model. Going through the exercise of documenting business process will highlight these differences and drive deeper understanding.

b. Documenting the existing business model will enable you to highlight the EXACT organizational changes that will occur. How can you manage organizational change when you do not have a clear understanding of what’s changing.

c. Business process maps can be a key source of information to quickly educate IT and the Implementation Partner on the existing business process model.

2. Educate IT and the Implementation Partner on the existing business model

Business should take a formal, iterative process to educate IT and the Implementation Partner on the existing business model. The entire project team should be involved in this training and should progress from a solution-level overview to a detailed business-role level.

Following is a suggested approach for conducting this training:

3. Complete packaged software training BEFORE the Implementation Partner arrives

Just as it is important for your Implementation Partner to understand your business model and your language it is important that Business and IT have an understanding of the packaged software and its language. Effective communication is a two party effort. Taking the required packaged software training before the arrival of your Implementation Partner will enable you to more effectively work together.

4. Have the Implementation Partner conduct supplemental packaged software training

Education is an iterative process – you will never learn everything you need to know for support packaged software in one class. Packaged software provides provide foundation training. I always say that the Implementation Partner completes your packaged software training. Implementation Partners have hands-on experience with configuration and maintenance of packaged software solutions.

5. Implementation documentation should be more business-oriented

Nothing encourages alignment more than being able to think like your end customer. Too often we create project documentation that focuses more on technology than business reasoning and justification. There are times were I am guilty of moving too quickly from what needs to be done to how will it be done without understanding why does it need to be done. At the end of the day we build software to drive business results.

“You can go into any IT organization and throw a stick and find a tool they’ve purchased that they aren’t utilizing,” she said. “Let’s actually take a good review of what we’ve already got.”

And isn’t January a great time to do that, even as we embark on those other new year resolutions to drop some weight, ask for a raise or spend more time with family?

If you’re looking for a little inspiration, we have a guest post from a Rahul Pitre on the Bookworm Blog, who advises how IT can safely expand their role without taking on much extra work using Microsoft Office Live Small Business. Or Mr. Denny has outlined his professional goals for 2010: Some might be worth mirroring in your own career.