01.31.12
Customers Demand Wireless
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Do you know anyone who does not have a cell phone? Do you know anyone that does not have a smartphone? Chances are that almost everyone you know has a smartphone and consequently more power in their hand than the astronauts had when they landed on the moon. The folks you know are just like your customers. This means that your customers have great power. This, in turn, means that your organization has a great responsibility.
Your great responsibility is to meet your customers on their terms. They are connected and eager to stay current. They want the pictures and the videos. They want to know what is happening all over the world, especially if they’re affected. So, some of that is your responsibility. You must recognize the importance of your customer relationship and keep them informed in an entertaining manner.
For Enterprise Architects it is easy to recognize the value of the technologies that have expanded the opportunities to communicate with customers. It is not so easy to determine how to creatively use the new technologies.
For many organizations there is a movement towards applications to run on smartphones and tablets. This is seen as a way of meeting the responsibility of a business to step up to the new methods of communications with their customers.
But so far, most applications have a strong resemblance to a corporate web site. The designers are taking a successful model of an internet browser function and transferring it over to smart devices.
It is time for the Enterprise Architects to show their value to the business and help to better define how this new and fantastic change in human behavior can benefit a business organization. This is a tough challenge for those that have primarily come from a technical background.
My reflection on the best way to move forward is to first recognize that the change where everyone is connected has had a much greater impact on society than did landing a man on the moon. Now everyone has access to the enormous amount of accumulated knowledge on the internet and the vast numbers of social contacts available on the internet.
Each organization needs to determine how they are plugged into the lives of their customers. It may be different for each customer. Then they need to provide the delivery that is best suited for each customer. This is much more than simply determining what services can be delivered. This delivery boarders more on maintaining a conversation where both parties in the conversation are engaged in the subject matter and both gain from the experience.
Enterprise Architects are well-aware of the continuing evolution of technology. They creatively look for technology convergence that can provide breakthroughs in thinking. We are at one of those convergent junctions today. What is about to happen will give non-professional information technologists control of their use of automation in their business. No longer will they simply peer through windows and see only what applications let them see. They will be able to go inside, see how things work, and control their automation. – Enterprise Architects Masters of the Unseen City
Closing the Business / IT gap.
