Improved Content Management and Communications Solutions Coming to Educause 2009

An HMO’s radio advertisement captured my attention this morning, most likely because it didn’t appear to be about healthcare. Instead, this provider touted the benefits of their new electronic medical records and the advantage this change provided trees…and patients. While this may seem like a minor advance, I suspect that anyone who has struggled to complete medical forms for what seems like the hundredth time would be elated to have a portable EMR. These seemingly small improvements can fundamentally change the dynamics of industries like medical care and education as well.

When the leaders of our nation’s colleges and universities arrive in Denver for this year’s Educause conference there will be plenty of discussion about how to better employ technology to enhance the learning process. I’m hoping there will be can equal focus on improving the efficiency of these institutions as well. During the past decade we’ve witnessed dramatic improvements in the classroom through the introduction of web technologies. Now may be the ideal time to leverage the know-how and infrastructure many institutions have developed to get these same campuses functioning more like businesses.

Content management technologies could be a good starting place for colleges to build on proven teaching practices. Today, virtually every campus uses a learning management system to manage and share content between faculty and students. In fact, these systems are often extended to serve a variety of other groups and functions across campuses. The technology and skills required to use these systems are practically identical to those needed to manage business information. As a result, many campuses could be better prepared to move their business processes to the web than they actually recognize.

So, if migrating to web enabled content services can be relatively easy for academic institutions then why are so many still trapped in inefficient business processes? One argument is that unlike many commercial organizations, colleges and universities haven’t been forced to modernize practices as quickly. Instead, they’ve focused on upgrading facilities and services, which has been more appealing to faculty and students anyway. Unfortunately, declining enrollments, reduced tax revenues and an inability to increase tuitions indefinitely is changing the economics of “do nothing” when it comes to the business side of education.

While the presence of technology alone isn’t likely to jump start business improvements, I believe there are some missing components withholding business process improvements on campus in general. One important item is a common ECM tool set. This could be addressed with a shared web user interface to access course content or business information. Recognizing that most content is still developed on the desktop, the ideal solution would also need to provide seamless access from within administrative, research and teaching applications. Shared access to a common content repository could also pave the way towards storage virtualization, helping improve content discovery and re-use as well.

Of course, just making content easier to access and share probably won’t be a catalyst by itself. High value, measurable projects need to be identified and assigned champions to ensure they succeed. Most importantly, security issues have to be addressed. After all, worries about content security and control have often been the reason that vital information has been locked away to begin with.

Common user interfaces and collaboration methods don’t have to mean uncontrolled access. Unique web services and storage “pools” combined with advanced identification technologies can ensure that business and class content don’t mix. Role-based authentication methods can even present different information based on the task an employee or student is performing. This can help ensure that information is only accessed by those who need it, and only when they’re supposed to.

As institutions have grown more complex and diverse process inefficiencies have increased. The combination of unrelenting economic pressures and the potential promise of improved web technologies may actually create the environment for change beyond the classroom in 2010. Possibly, Educause 2009 can be real starting point for practical discussions about extending the benefits of the web into administrative processes where measurable ROI can be achieved.

I suspect that a key ingredient for measurable success will be the degree to which technology vendors embrace “openness” or, a general willingness to support open standards and offer easy to use API’s to connect various solutions together. This could accelerate the transfer of knowledge and technology across the institution permitting schools to truly leverage their computing investments. It could also promote the use of shared resources from electricity to storage resulting in further cost savings and environmental benefits.

Open, customizable platforms also facilitate the migration of content and communications to new devices. Just look at the mobile ecosystem that has grown up around the iPhone for proof. (Granted, it’s an Apple-managed environment, but that was probably necessary to get things starts quickly). This can create a compelling environment for technology developers of all sizes. Those who embrace it vigorously will likely see their investments multiply.

I’m confident we’ll see signs of improved systems interoperability at Edcause this year and I’m even more excited to learn how developers are planning to leverage this opportunity both within the academic and vendor communities. Most of all, I’m looking forward to learning more about how clients are planning to get the most from their own content, communications and mobile technologies. Please drop by the Blackboard or Xythos booths this week and let me know how you’re doing it!

Business Continuity, Communications and Content Management

The panic surrounding H1N1 outbreaks appears to have diminished somewhat, but threats related to widespread pandemics and other natural disasters persist. Government and institutional leaders remain challenged to prepare and respond to these kinds of issues as communities grow more diverse and mobile. Public notices and published emergency response plans may no longer be adequate to protect today’s populations.

Mobile technologies offer freedom and flexibility for community members, but they can also complicate communications during emergencies. Community leaders can’t rely on household or employment contact data to reach everyone on time. On college campuses mobile communications are just as likely to take place via the web as they are over voice networks, especially with the growing popularity of smart phones that offer rich web collaboration. It would appear that the business community and general public won’t be far behind on this trend either.

Citizens and communities, students and schools, employees and businesses all need an easier way identify each other and communicate, particularly in the case of an emergency. Multimodal communications services can help address part of this challenge by delivering important notifications in whatever format people best respond to (voice, text, email or web). However, maintaining accurate contact records remains an issue.

It would seem that a common, trusted identity management authority delivered as a web service might help here, but the question is who can we all trust? Google, a government authority, some other organization? (Remember Microsoft Passport?)


Even when mass communications can be delivered accurately and on time, critical issues remain unanswered. How can important details be delivered effectively? What information should be shared with which members of the community? Are there better ways to guide critical resources to where they are needed most? A common web site can probably serve a community’s general information requirements, but it may not be nimble or specific enough to guide individual groups during critical situations.


While it may be impossible to anticipate all potential threats to a community or the possible response scenarios, there are processes and services that can help. Just as the web has become more collaborative and bi-directional for consumers (think Facebook) content management technologies have become simpler and more flexible for organizations to use. These web services based solutions can make developing and maintaining web sites for unique groups or communities almost as easy as writing an email. This could enable leaders to provide much more specific guidance to various groups and more easily prepare multiple scenario response options.

The combination of a mobile device enabled public joined with flexible mass communications and content management services could result in a new era better prepared to respond to natural disasters. Although there remain significant obstacles to achieving this outcome, individuals collaborating for the common good of their communities may help overcome the trust issues that inhibit contact and communication. Improved directory services and closer integration between communications and content management technologies will also improve the probability for success.

No combination of technology can eliminate the mayhem that a pandemic or natural disaster can produce. However, that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try to leverage technology improvements to help minimize potential damage and suffering. Now may be an ideal time to explore what benefits mass communications and content management technologies can provide so that you can better prepare for both your communities future and your own. I suspect that the possibility that these technologies will interoperate more effectively together in the future is a good one.

If you’re curious to take a a look at what this might become test drive the latest Blackboard Connect service and Xythos on Demand. These are both SaaS solutions that almost beg for some kind of mashup kind of integration. A smartphone focused solution, particularly the kind that can leverage geo-positioning data such as the iPhone does might represent the most intriguing combination. I hope we’ll have more to say about that at Blackboard soon.

BbWorld 2009, Learning & Content Management and Mass Communications

Yes, that’s a lot to discuss, but it was enthusiastically during last week’s annual Blackboard World conference hosted on the shores of the Potomac in our nation’s capital. Perhaps even more important was the fact that many of the 1,600+ attendees we’re also seeking ways to better leverage the combination of content management, communications and teaching and learning technologies in ways they may never have considered before. Whether this included third party software partners, open source projects from the academic community or new Blackboard services, everyone seemed to be redefining their expectations about learning platforms.


Before I share more observations from Blackboard World, I should inform readers of changes in my own charter at the company because I expect it will impact the focus of the Just Sharing blog as the year progresses. During the last month, I’ve become engaged with our company’s mass notification business, Backboard Connect, in order to assist with marketing its SaaS solutions and better integrating them with other parts of the overall Blackboard business. While enterprise content management (ECM) and mass notification may not appear to be obviously complimentary, I’m already beginning to see synergies and I’m looking forward to sharing what I learn about that in the coming months.

We’ve discussed the inter-relationships between learning and content management in this blog before. I suspect this topic is going to receive even more attention the rest of the year, if the conversations I heard at Blackboard World 2009 are any indication. Institutions are demanding more flexible solutions for managing course content as it becomes more complex and rich. It would only seem natural for them to look to the ECM marketplace to provide guidance and technology. As an integral component of the Blackboard Learn platform, Xythos has an important role to play delivering enhanced ECM functionality within the teaching and learning process and beyond the classroom as well.

Transitioning from a stand-alone ECM focused role within the company to one intended to leverage knowledge and technology across the businesses has occupied almost all of my time lately, so please accept my apologies for the recent lapse in updates to this blog. I’ll aim to publish at least a couple substantive articles each month going forward. Given the continued transition towards content enabled vertical applications within the ECM market it would seem like a natural evolution for Just Sharing to dig deeper into learning content and content distribution management in the education and government markets overall.


As I said, discussions at Blackboard World this year really seemed to highlight key changes taking place regarding how institutions consider the role of content and the different ways they would like to manage and use it. For example, I heard about more plans to virtualize content storage than ever before. Of course, this was typically followed by complaints that it’s still not easy enough for typical users to get content into to virtual repositories. (Maybe they should try Xythos Drive? We’ll explore more about better enabling content contribution via Java applets and web clients for Blackboard in the next few weeks).

Other attendees discussed their desire to link content repositories within the LMS and ECM environments to help minimize work duplication and redundant data storage. I didn’t hear as much concern about content security and compliance as I would have expected, but perhaps that was just an assumed benefit associated with data centralization? A few attendees even spoke to me about deploying common content repositories shared between distributed campuses. Clearly, the desire to reduce complexity and costs hasn’t dissipated.

It was also evident that technology and business managers were thinking about content and learning management beyond the PC. Excitement about Blackboard’s new Mobile Edu initiative was rampant and questions about integrating course delivery, deploying content and managing mass communications via handheld devices were non-stop. I concluded that if technology vendors want to succeed in the world of mobile applications there may be no better market test than higher education and perhaps parts of K-12 too. Where else can you find such a mobile customer base almost guaranteed to be using all the latest web gadgets?

Once again, BbWorld served to re-set expectations about the role of technology and communications, but this time I think as much outside the classroom as within. I suspect the event also provided a healthy stimulus for continued dialog and experimentation among attendees for the rest of 2009 as well. So, if you’re curious to learn more about Blackboard’s content management plans or how mass communications services can supplement your own content strategies, please stay tuned to Just Sharing. There’s plenty more coming! Jim