Thursday, September 2, 2010

Getting the Most out of CubeTree #4: Peer to Peer Support

Getting the most out of CubeTree can be as simple as allowing your users to innovate and use collaboration tools to improve existing job processes.

I've run into two situations where groups of physically separated users are using CubeTree to facilitate peer to peer support during live calls with customers. One at a customer site with a group of support representatives and the other internally with our own lead generation team.

Each uses CubeTree Groups before and after calls as a single, central location to store all of the materials and pertenant information. During calling hours, they use the Group Chat feature to stay connected in real-time which they have found is especially useful since they need to connect across time-zones and geographies.

Product experts from outside the teams are easily added to the conversation through CubeTree. I saw questions being asked by customer facing front-line reps directly to the product experts, while the customer was on the phone! It significantly improves the quality of the conversations and response times in a way that does not disrupt anyone's workday. A product expert can 'lurk' on the chat or the Group Wall and become active when a question is posed, while also working on other projects. It allows groups to create true, cross-functional collaborations, in real-time where results and timeliness matters most.

Using the native Group Chat application also has the advantage that the transcripts generated during the call becomes a part of the social enterprise and doesn't need to be downloaded, imported or otherwise manipulated in another system to be useful. It's simply there, on-line and discoverable when new reps start their shift, follow up reports need to be written or if someone else is interested in the conversation.

By choosing to collaborate in real-time with cross functional team members this way, the two groups are rapidly accelerating information transformation and enhancing existing processes that formerly involved traditional send and respond collaboration tools, like email. The benefits to both groups are higher productivity, increased customer satisfaction, reduced redundancy and improved communications.

Friday, August 27, 2010

Getting Started and Activity Report Enhancements

Display the Getting Started Panel

The Getting Started Panel appears at the top of the Home page for the first 5 logins of a new user. Site admins can now re-enable the Getting Started Panel at any time, for all users in the organization, by using the "Display Panel" action on the Admin > Invitation page.

Individual users can Hide or Dismiss the panel from their Home Page by using the appropriate controls on the right side of the Getting Started Panel.

Summary Activity Report Enhancements

Activity statistics for Blogs and Discussions have been added to the existing Monthly and Weekly Activity Summary Reports that Site Administrators can generate. Blog activity is the the number of blogs created plus edits to blogs for that period. Discussion activity is the number of discussions created plus posts to a discussion for that period.




Improved Roll Over Badge

Previously, our "Roll Over Badge" (the dialog that pops up when you move your mouse over someone's name in the feed) had Name, Title and Status information. To provide additional usability, new information and contact links have been added to the badge. This includes the following:

  • View: Wall: a link to quickly view the member's Wall
  • View: Info: a link to quickly goto the member's Info page
  • Email: a quick way to launch your email client with the member's email address to send them a quick personal note.
  • Instant Messaging: accounts from your Profile and your current IM status.
  • Phone: contact numbers from your Profile.

The user's name, department and latest status update also continue to appear in the badge.

Tuesday, August 24, 2010

Sparking a Culture of Collaboration

As a new employee to SuccessFactors (I recently joined through the acquisition of CubeTree) there are a lot of new people to meet and new processes to adopt. Coming from a acquired organization, fitting into an organization of over 1200 people, can be a challenge. Finding the right people, working on the right projects, sparking the right collaborations are the concerns I hear from my co-workers on BOTH sides of the equation. Fortunately, the company is using CubeTree internally as enterprise social software and we are able to use it to connect people, initiate conversations, explore the new company culture and start working together. What follows are a few of the experiences people have shared with me about using CubeTree to create a culture of collaboration at SuccessFactors.

Finding the right people to work with on a project is a fairly typical challenge for a new employee in any organization. Beth, in Product Management, needed to work on a new integrated product demo. Coming from an acquired company, the first thing she did was perform a search in the SuccessFactors CubeTree for existing demos. In addition to the demos, she found a discussion thread in the feed and was able to connect with the publisher, Jake, who turned out to be the demo expert at SuccessFactors and a critical partner for Beth's project. The two were able to continue collaborating right away on the new joint product demos and quickly formed a group with all the Solutions Consultants who are responsible for demo delivery.

Who's who in the new company? For Shelby, Director of Customer Success, the first time she met anyone in person from any of the companies SuccessFactors acquired this year (CubeTree and Inform) was at an industry event in NYC. But it turned out that it was just too many people to meet at the busy event and it wasn't possible to make all the connections she wanted. When she returned to her office she started following some of the new people on CubeTree and vice versa. By connecting with new co-workers on-line she now understands who does what and how they fit into the new organization.

"Without CubeTree, I'm not sure how I would have gained that knowledge so quickly. Now, every opportunity I have to initiate a communication that requires follow-up and collaboration, I think how can CubeTree help me do that?"
-- Shelby, Director Customer Success.

Another team within the SuccessFactors Customer Success organization also started using a CubeTree Group to share best practices and information. They use the Group Chat to communicate in real time while on the phone with customers. With all the reps live on the chat it's simpler and faster to transfer a customer to the right regional support person. The result is quicker service and a warmer hand off for the customer.

Ross, an executive from CubeTree, needed to decide how to participate in Industry events at the new company. Using CubeTree he was able to find the project groups for events already underway; including the agendas, plans and registration lists. With this information, Ross was able make informed decisions about participation in the events, start identifying customer meetings, and engaging the event teams. With information already shared on CubeTree, Ross and the event teams then spent more time and energy focused on executing the events and less time having to bring each other up to speed.

Using enterprise social software to combine two companies into one after an acquisition can help build a culture of collaboration. A collaboration platform like CubeTree makes it much easier for individuals across the company to make connections with new co-workers and spark new ideas. The benefits include increased information sharing, better decision making, reduced redundancy and a faster ramp to productivity.

Friday, August 20, 2010

Group Chat Enhancement

Toggle Between Chat and Transcript View - We've added navigation to the top of the Chat screen to allow users to toggle between an active Chat and the Transcript of the Chat from within the Chat window. The Chat view shows all comments made during the current session. The Transcript view shows all comments made during the current chat AND all previous sessions.

Chat View

Transcript View

Changes to Email Settings

Monthly Emails - Monthly Email notification have been removed from CubeTree. If you were subscribed to them you will no longer receive them. The Monthly Email alerts section has also been removed from the Account > Email Preferences page.


User Feedback

Submit Feedback on CubeTree - Last week you may have experienced some technical difficulties submitting input on CubeTree through our Feedback tool. We're happy to report Feedback is back up and running smoothly. You can access it from the link on the right side of the screen. By clicking the Feedback link you can submit new feedback, browse all users' input and submit your vote for which feature enhancement we should tackle next. We'd like to hear from you!