Blow, Blow, Thou Winter Windby Shakespeare. Blow, blow, thou winter wind, Thou art not so unkind As man's ingratitude; Thy tooth is not so keen Because thou art not seen, Although thy breath be rude. Heigh-ho! sing heigh-ho! unto the green holly: Most friendship is feigning, most loving mere folly: Then, heigh-ho! the holly! This life is most jolly. Freeze, freeze, thou bitter sky, Thou dost not bite so nigh As benefits forgot: Though thou the waters warp, Thy sting is not so sharp As friend remember'd not. Heigh-ho! sing heigh-ho! unto the green holly: Most friendship is feigning, most loving mere folly: Then, heigh-ho! the holly! This life is most jolly. | Camomile Tea>by Katherine Mansfield. Outside the sky is light with stars; There's a hollow roaring from the sea. And, alas! for the little almond flowers, The wind is shaking the almond tree. How little I thought, a year ago, In the horrible cottage upon the Lee That he and I should be sitting so And sipping a cup of camomile tea. Light as feathers the witches fly, The horn of the moon is plain to see; By a firefly under a jonquil flower A goblin toasts a bumble-bee. We might be fifty, we might be five, So snug, so compact, so wise are we! Under the kitchen-table leg My knee is pressing against his knee. Our shutters are shut, the fire is low, The tap is dripping peacefully; The saucepan shadows on the wall Are black and round and plain to see. |
Dover Beach>by Matthew Arnold. The sea is calm to-night. The tide is full, the moon lies fair Upon the straits; on the French coast the light Gleams and is gone; the cliffs of England stand, Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay. Come to the window, sweet is the night-air! Only, from the long line of spray Where the sea meets the moon-blanch'd land, Listen! you hear the grating roar Of pebbles which the waves draw back, and fling, At their return, up the high strand, Begin, and cease, and then again begin, With tremulous cadence slow, and bring The eternal note of sadness in. Sophocles long ago Heard it on the {AE}gean, and it brought Into his mind the turbid ebb and flow Of human misery; we Find also in the sound a thought, Hearing it by this distant northern sea. The Sea of Faith Was once, too, at the full, and round earth's shore Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furl'd. But now I only hear Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar, Retreating, to the breath Of the night-wind, down the vast edges drear And naked shingles of the world. Ah, love, let us be true To one another! for the world, which seems To lie before us like a land of dreams, So various, so beautiful, so new, Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light, Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain; And we are here as on a darkling plain Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight, Where ignorant armies clash by night. | How Do I Love Thee?>by Elizabeth Barrett Browning. How do I love thee? Let me count the ways. I love thee to the depth and breadth and height My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight For the ends of Being and ideal Grace. I love thee to the level of every day's Most quiet need, by sun and candlelight. I love thee freely, as men strive for Right; I love thee purely, as they turn from Praise. I love with a passion put to use In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith. I love thee with a love I seemed to lose With my lost saints, I love thee with the breath, Smiles, tears, of all my life! and, if God choose, I shall but love thee better after death. |
I Am Not Yours>by Sarah Teasdale. I am not yours, not lost in you, Not lost, although I long to be Lost as a candle lit at noon, Lost as a snowflake in the sea. You love me, and I find you still A spirit beautiful and bright, Yet I am I, who long to be Lost as a light is lost in light. Oh plunge me deep in love - put out My senses, leave me deaf and blind, Swept by the tempest of your love, A taper in a rushing wind. | Daffodils by William Wordsworth. I wandered lonely as a cloud That floats on high o'er vales and hills, When all at once I saw a crowd, A host, of golden daffodils; Beside the lake, beneath the trees, Fluttering and dancing in the breeze. Continuous as the stars that shine And twinkle on the milky way, They stretched in never-ending line Along the margin of a bay: Ten thousand saw I at a glance, Tossing their heads in sprightly dance. The waves beside them danced; but they Out-did the sparkling waves in glee: A poet could not but be gay, In such a jocund company: I gazed - and gazed - but little thought What wealth the show to me had brought: For oft, when on my couch I lie In vacant or in pensive mood, They flash upon that inward eye Which is the bliss of solitude; And then my heart with pleasure fills, And dances with the daffodils. |
If by Rudyard Kipling. If you can keep your head when all about you Are losing theirs and blaming it on you; If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you, But make allowance for their doubting too: If you can wait and not be tired by waiting, Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies, Or being hated don't give way to hating, And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise; If you can dream - and not make dreams your master; If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim, If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster And treat those two impostors just the same:. If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools, Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken, And stoop and build'em up with worn-out tools; If you can make one heap of all your winnings And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss, And lose, and start again at your beginnings, And never breathe a word about your loss: If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew To serve your turn long after they are gone, And so hold on when there is nothing in you Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!" If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue, Or walk with Kings - nor lose the common touch, If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you, If all men count with you, but none too much: If you can fill the unforgiving minute With sixty seconds' worth of distance run, Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it, And - which is more - you'll be a Man, my son! | Jabberwocky by Lewis Carroll. 'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves Did gyre and gimble in the wabe: All mimsy were the borogoves, And the mome raths outgrabe. "Beware the Jabberwock, my son! The jaws that bite, the claws that catch! Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun The frumious Bandersnatch!" He took his vorpal sword in hand: Long time the manxome foe he sought So rested he by the Tumtum tree, And stood a while in thought. And, as in uffish thought he stood, The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame, Came whiffling through the tulgey wood, And burbled as it came! One two! One two! And through and through The vorpal blade went snicker-snack! He left it dead, and with its head He went galumphing back. "And hast thou slain the Jabberwock? Come to my arms, my beamish boy! Oh frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!" He chortled in his joy. 'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves Did gyre and gimble in the wabe: All mimsy were the borogoves, And the mome raths outgrabe. | Kubla Khan by Samuel Taylor Coleridge. In Xanadu did Kubla Khan A stately pleasure-dome decree : Where Alph, the sacred river, ran Through caverns measureless to man Down to a sunless sea. So twice five miles of fertile ground With walls and towers were girdled round : And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills, Where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree ; And here were forests ancient as the hills, Enfolding sunny spots of greenery. But oh ! that deep romantic chasm which slanted Down the green hill athwart a cedarn cover ! A savage place ! as holy and enchanted As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted By woman wailing for her demon-lover ! And from this chasm, with ceaseless turmoil seething, As if this earth in fast thick pants were breathing, A mighty fountain momently was forced : Amid whose swift half-intermitted burst Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail, Or chaffy grain beneath the thresher's flail : And 'mid these dancing rocks at once and ever It flung up momently the sacred river. Five miles meandering with a mazy motion Through wood and dale the sacred river ran, Then reached the caverns measureless to man, And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean : And 'mid this tumult Kubla heard from far Ancestral voices prophesying war ! The shadow of the dome of pleasure Floated midway on the waves ; Where was heard the mingled measure From the fountain and the caves. It was a miracle of rare device, A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice ! A damsel with a dulcimer In a vision once I saw : It was an Abyssinian maid, And on her dulcimer she played, Singing of Mount Abora. Could I revive within me Her symphony and song, To such a deep delight 'twould win me, That with music loud and long, I would build that dome in air, That sunny dome ! those caves of ice ! And all who heard should see them there, And all should cry, Beware ! Beware ! His flashing eyes, his floating hair ! Weave a circle round him thrice, And close your eyes with holy dread, For he on honey-dew hath fed, And drunk the milk of Paradise. | Lochinvar by Sir Walter Scott. Oh! young Lochinvar is come out of the west, Through all the wide Border his steed was the best; And save his good broadsword he weapons had none. He rode all unarmed and he rode all alone. So faithful in love and so dauntless in war, There never was knight like the young Lochinvar. He stayed not for brake and he stopped not for stone, He swam the Eske river where ford there was none, But ere he alighted at Netherby gate The bride had consented, the gallant came late: For a laggard in love and a dastard in war Was to wed the fair Ellen of brave Lochinvar. So boldly he entered the Netherby Hall, Among bridesmen, and kinsmen, and brothers, and all: Then spoke the bride’s father, his hand on his sword, For the poor craven bridegroom said never a word, ‘Oh! come ye in peace here, or come ye in war, Or to dance at our bridal, young Lord Lochinvar?’ ‘I long wooed your daughter, my suit you denied; Love swells like the Solway, but ebbs like its tide And now am I come, with this lost love of mine, To lead but one measure, drink one cup of wine. There are maidens in Scotland more lovely by far, That would gladly be bride to the young Lochinvar.’ The bride kissed the goblet; the knight took it up, He quaffed off the wine, and he threw down the cup, She looked down to blush, and she looked up to sigh, With a smile on her lips and a tear in her eye. He took her soft hand ere her mother could bar, ‘Now tread we a measure!’ said young Lochinvar. So stately his form, and so lovely her face, That never a hall such a galliard did grace; While her mother did fret, and her father did fume, And the bridegroom stood dangling his bonnet and plume; And the bride-maidens whispered ‘’Twere better by far To have matched our fair cousin with young Lochinvar.’ One touch to her hand and one word in her ear, When they reached the hall-door, and the charger stood near; So light to the croupe the fair lady he swung, So light to the saddle before her he sprung! ‘She is won! we are gone, over bank, bush, and scaur; They’ll have fleet steeds that follow,’ quoth young Lochinvar. There was mounting ’mong Graemes of the Netherby clan; Fosters, Fenwicks, and Musgraves, they rode and they ran: There was racing and chasing on Cannobie Lee, But the lost bride of Netherby ne’er did they see. So daring in love and so dauntless in war, Have ye e’er heard of gallant like young Lochinvar? |
My Native Land by Sir Walter Scott. Breathes there the man, with soul so dead, Who never to himself hath said, This is my own, my native land! Whose heart hath ne'er within him burn'd, As home his footsteps he hath turn'd From wandering on a foreign strand! If such there breathe, go, mark him well; For him no Minstrel raptures swell; High though his titles, proud his name, Boundless his wealth as wish can claim; Despite those titles, power, and pelf, The wretch, concentred all in self, Living, shall forfeit fair renown, And, doubly dying, shall go down To the vile dust, from whence he sprung, Unwept, unhonour'd, and unsung. | She Walks in Beauty by Lord Byron. She walks in Beauty, like the night Of cloudless climes and starry skies; And all that's best of dark and bright Meet in her aspect and her eyes: Thus mellowed to that tender light Which Heaven to gaudy day denies. One shade the more, one ray the less, Had half impaired the nameless grace Which waves in every raven tress, Or softly lightens o'er her face; Where thoughts serenely sweet express, How pure, how dear their dwelling-place. And on that cheek, and o'er that brow, So soft, so calm, yet eloquent, The smiles that win, the tints that glow, But tell of days in goodness spent, A mind at peace with all below, A heart whose love is innocent! |
Without Warning by Sappho. Without warning as a whirlwind swoops on an oak Love shakes my heart | Home Burial by Robert Frost. He saw her from the bottom of the stairs Before she saw him. She was starting down, Looking back over her shoulder at some fear. She took a doubtful step and then undid it To raise herself and look again. He spoke Advancing toward her: 'What is it you see From up there always-for I want to know.' She turned and sank upon her skirts at that, And her face changed from terrified to dull. He said to gain time: 'What is it you see,' Mounting until she cowered under him. 'I will find out now-you must tell me, dear.' She, in her place, refused him any help With the least stiffening of her neck and silence. She let him look, sure that he wouldn't see, Blind creature; and awhile he didn't see. But at last he murmured, 'Oh,' and again, 'Oh.' 'What is it - what?' she said. 'Just that I see.' 'You don't,' she challenged. 'Tell me what it is.' 'The wonder is I didn't see at once. I never noticed it from here before. I must be wonted to it - that's the reason. The little graveyard where my people are! So small the window frames the whole of it. Not so much larger than a bedroom, is it? There are three stones of slate and one of marble, Broad-shouldered little slabs there in the sunlight On the sidehill. We haven't to mind those. But I understand: it is not the stones, But the child's mound' 'Don't, don't, don't, don't,' she cried. She withdrew shrinking from beneath his arm That rested on the bannister, and slid downstairs; And turned on him with such a daunting look, He said twice over before he knew himself: 'Can't a man speak of his own child he's lost?' 'Not you! Oh, where's my hat? Oh, I don't need it! I must get out of here. I must get air. I don't know rightly whether any man can.' 'Amy! Don't go to someone else this time. Listen to me. I won't come down the stairs.' He sat and fixed his chin between his fists. 'There's something I should like to ask you, dear.' 'You don't know how to ask it.' 'Help me, then.' Her fingers moved the latch for all reply. 'My words are nearly always an offense. I don't know how to speak of anything So as to please you. But I might be taught I should suppose. I can't say I see how. A man must partly give up being a man With women-folk. We could have some arrangement By which I'd bind myself to keep hands off Anything special you're a-mind to name. Though I don't like such things 'twixt those that love. Two that don't love can't live together without them. But two that do can't live together with them.' She moved the latch a little. 'Don't-don't go. Don't carry it to someone else this time. Tell me about it if it's something human. Let me into your grief. I'm not so much Unlike other folks as your standing there Apart would make me out. Give me my chance. I do think, though, you overdo it a little. What was it brought you up to think it the thing To take your mother-loss of a first child So inconsolably-in the face of love. You'd think his memory might be satisfied' 'There you go sneering now!' 'I'm not, I'm not! You make me angry. I'll come down to you. God, what a woman! And it's come to this, A man can't speak of his own child that's dead.' 'You can't because you don't know how to speak. If you had any feelings, you that dug With your own hand - how could you? his little grave; I saw you from that very window there, Making the gravel leap and leap in air, Leap up, like that, like that, and land so lightly And roll back down the mound beside the hole. I thought, Who is that man? I didn't know you. And I crept down the stairs and up the stairs To look again, and still your spade kept lifting. Then you came in. I heard your rumbling voice Out in the kitchen, and I don't know why, But I went near to see with my own eyes. You could sit there with the stains on your shoes Of the fresh earth from your own baby's grave And talk about your everyday concerns. You had stood the spade up against the wall Outside there in the entry, for I saw it.' 'I shall laugh the worst laugh I ever laughed. I'm cursed. God, if I don't believe I'm cursed.' |
The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost. Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both And be one traveler, long I stood And looked down one as far as I could To where it bent in the undergrowth; Then took the other, as just as fair And having perhaps the better claim, Because it was grassy and wanted wear; Though as for that, the passing there Had worn them really about the same, And both that morning equally lay In leaves no step had trodden black Oh, I kept the first for another day! Yet knowing how way leads on to way, I doubted if I should ever come back. I shall be telling this with a sigh Somewhere ages and ages hence: Two roads diverged in a wood, and I I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference. | Ulysses by Alfred Lord Tennyson. It little profits that an idle king, By this still hearth, among these barren crags, Match’d with an aged wife, I mete and dole Unequal laws unto a savage race, That hoard and sleep, and feed, and know not me. I cannot rest from travel: I will drink Life to the lees: all times I have enjoy’d Greatly, have suffer’d greatly, both with those That loved me, and alone; on shore, and when Thro’ scudding drifts the rainy Hyades Vext the dim sea: I am become a name; For always roaming with a hungry heart Much have I seen and known; cities of men And manners, climates, councils, governments, Myself not least, but honour’d of them all; And drunk delight of battle with my peers, Far on the ringing plains of windy Troy. I am a part of all that I have met; Yet all experience is an arch wherethro’ Gleams that untravell’d world, whose margin fades For ever and for ever when I move. How dull it is to pause, to make an end, To rust unburnish’d, not to shine in use! As tho’ to breathe were life. Life piled on life Were all too little, and of one to me Little remains: but every hour is saved From that eternal silence, something more, A bringer of new things; and vile it were For some three suns to store and hoard myself, And this gray spirit yearning in desire To follow knowledge, like a sinking star, Beyond the utmost bound of human thought. This is my son, mine own Telemachus, To whom I leave the sceptre and the isle Well-loved of me, discerning to fulfil This labour, by slow prudence to make mild A rugged people, and thro’ soft degrees Subdue them to the useful and the good. Most blameless is he, centred in the sphere Of common duties, decent not to fail In offices of tenderness, and pay Meet adoration to my household gods, When I am gone. He works his work, I mine. There lies the port: the vessel puffs her sail: There gloom the dark broad seas. My mariners, Souls that have toil’d, and wrought, and thought with me That ever with a frolic welcome took The thunder and the sunshine, and opposed Free hearts, free foreheads - you and I are old; Old age hath yet his honour and his toil; Death closes all: but something ere the end, Some work of noble note, may yet be done, Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods. The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks: The long day wanes: the slow moon climbs: the deep Moans round with many voices. Come, my friends, ’Tis not too late to seek a newer world. Push off, and sitting well in order smite The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths Of all the western stars until I die. It may be that the gulfs will wash us down: It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles, And see the great Achilles, whom we knew. Tho’ much is taken, much abides; and tho’ We are not now that strength which in old days Moved earth and heaven; that which we are, we are; One equal temper of heroic hearts, Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield. |
Home They Brought Her Warrior Dead by Alfred Lord Tennyson Home they brought her warrior dead: She nor swooned, nor uttered cry: All her maidens, watching, said, ‘She must weep or she will die.’ Then they praised him, soft and low, Called him worthy to be loved, Truest friend and noblest foe; Yet she neither spoke nor moved. Stole a maiden from her place, Lightly to the warrior stepped, Took the face-cloth from the face; Yet she neither moved nor wept. Rose a nurse of ninety years, Set his child upon her knee— Like summer tempest came her tears— ‘Sweet my child, I live for thee.’ | Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening by Robert Frost. Whose woods these are I think I know. His house is in the village, though; He will not see me stopping here To watch his woods fill up with snow. My little horse must think it queer To stop without a farmhouse near Between the woods and frozen lake The darkest evening of the year. He gives his harness bells a shake To ask if there's some mistake. The only other sound's the sweep Of easy wind and downy flake. The woods are lovely, dark and deep, But I have promises to keep, And miles to go before I sleep, And miles to go before I sleep. |
Close to Heart
How companies can make the most of user-generated content
How companies can make the most of user-generated content
The success of online participatory media—video-sharing sites and corporate wikis alike—depends on the quality contributions of a small core of enthusiasts.
Jacques R. Bughin
Web exclusive, August 2007
Technologies that foster online collaboration and participation—for example, blogs that solicit customer feedback and wikis that allow employees to work together on documents—are gaining traction throughout the corporate world.1 Few companies, however, have a clear understanding of what inspires users to contribute to such sites. Executives might start by looking to the world of online video sharing, another fast-growing test bed for participation. McKinsey research conducted in Germany finds that motives such as a desire for fame and a feeling of identification with a community encourage collaboration and participation. Such findings, we believe, offer insights into the way companies might tailor their Web 2.0 offerings.
To learn more about what motivates people to participate in collaborative technologies, we surveyed 573 users of four leading online video-sharing sites in Germany and then examined the blogs of one of the sites.2 We observed that users cite a variety of reasons for posting content online—chief among them, a hunger for fame, the urge to have fun, and a desire to share experiences with friends (Exhibit 1).
While some users were open to the idea of being compensated for their contributions, that wasn’t a primary driver: the people we studied weren’t paid for their contributions.3
We also found that a few users posted the most popular content. Depending on the site, just 3 to 6 percent of the membership added 75 percent of the videos available for download, and videos from just 2 percent of the member base accounted for more than half of all videos viewed. (As the “long-tail” effect would suggest, half of the videos posted accounted for only 10 percent of all downloads.) These figures resemble those reported in studies of other kinds of participatory media, including wikis, bulletin boards, and photo-sharing sites, where 5 to 10 percent of the users contribute half to all of the content (Exhibit 2).4
Visitors under 25 years of age made up the bulk of the video-viewing audience we measured, but members in the 25- to 44-year-old age group contributed equally to postings—suggesting that working-age people would be open to participation in enterprise settings. A sense of sharing drives these older users, who tend to forward videos to friends even more frequently than do their younger peers. The presence of tools (such as most-viewed lists or forwarding features) that make it easy for users to see what’s popular or to send favorite videos to friends corresponded, by as much as 30 percent, with more downloads for popular videos.
These findings, consistent with our experience of participatory media in business settings, suggest that executives pursuing such projects should start by identifying and nurturing the small percentage of users who post quality content. At one cable company we studied, for example, more than half of the installers who contributed to an internal wiki said that social factors such as reputation building, team spirit, and community identification were the main factors motivating them to contribute. Only 20 percent cited the possibility of a financial bonus as their main driver.
To encourage well-connected employees to post ideas to the wiki, managers at the company examined its internal e-mail system to identify key staffers with wide social networks within it. They then encouraged these employees to post suggestions about improving the company’s processes. Identifying thought leaders and promoting their participation boosted the number of contributions and improved the quality of the postings. Other companies strive to make collaboration fun: at Google, for instance, employees place online bets on the likelihood that particular ideas will be adopted. Intuit uses a rotation program that invites selected staffers to contribute to the company’s internal online dialogues. Managers should also consider taking a page from video sites by tapping the power of tools that let users share relevant content easily. Likewise, companies should make sure that their employees can access collaborative tools with a minimum of bureaucratic hassle.
Companies will have to look beyond video-sharing sites for approaches to maximize the quality of the content. Those sites are concerned primarily with popularity, whereas corporate wikis and content sites (such as Wikipedia) gain momentum when new visitors discover and contribute high-quality content, which in turn makes the sites worthwhile for yet more newcomers. To improve the quality of internal wikis, then, companies might look to the quality assurance practices of open-source coding projects, which rely on appointed and self-appointed guardians to police quality issues. Companies should also create transparent and enforceable guidelines to prohibit unethical or illegal behavior, such as the posting of copyrighted material or proprietary secrets. They can learn from the examples of YouTube (which attempts to review content for obscenity before posting) or Wikipedia (which has committees that review entries for quality) and adopt similar review procedures for their corporate content.
About the Author
Jacques Bughin is a director in McKinsey’s Brussels office.
Notes
1 “How businesses are using Web 2.0: A McKinsey Global Survey,” The McKinsey Quarterly, Web exclusive, March 2007.
2 The survey, conducted online, was posted on major portals and Internet service providers in Germany over two weeks in October 2006. Germany is a midsize market with a competitive Internet landscape—conditions suggesting that our findings there are applicable to other markets.
3 To gain a wider audience, some sites in Europe and elsewhere are beginning to share a percentage of their advertising revenues with the top contributors.
4 Interestingly, some research suggests that, over time, participation rates throughout the user group increase. In 2004, for example, 90 percent of the contributions to Wikipedia came from just 2 percent of its users; by 2006, the top 2.5 percent of them were responsible for only 60 percent of all new content, according to Aniket Kittur, Bryan A. Pendleton, et al., Power of the Few vs. Wisdom of the Crowd: Wikipedia and the Rise of the Bourgeoisie, ACM’s SIGCHI (Special Interest Group on Computer–Human Interaction) Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, San Jose, CA, April 28–May 3, 2007.
How companies can make the most of user-generated content
The success of online participatory media—video-sharing sites and corporate wikis alike—depends on the quality contributions of a small core of enthusiasts.
Jacques R. Bughin
Web exclusive, August 2007
Technologies that foster online collaboration and participation—for example, blogs that solicit customer feedback and wikis that allow employees to work together on documents—are gaining traction throughout the corporate world.1 Few companies, however, have a clear understanding of what inspires users to contribute to such sites. Executives might start by looking to the world of online video sharing, another fast-growing test bed for participation. McKinsey research conducted in Germany finds that motives such as a desire for fame and a feeling of identification with a community encourage collaboration and participation. Such findings, we believe, offer insights into the way companies might tailor their Web 2.0 offerings.
To learn more about what motivates people to participate in collaborative technologies, we surveyed 573 users of four leading online video-sharing sites in Germany and then examined the blogs of one of the sites.2 We observed that users cite a variety of reasons for posting content online—chief among them, a hunger for fame, the urge to have fun, and a desire to share experiences with friends (Exhibit 1).
While some users were open to the idea of being compensated for their contributions, that wasn’t a primary driver: the people we studied weren’t paid for their contributions.3
We also found that a few users posted the most popular content. Depending on the site, just 3 to 6 percent of the membership added 75 percent of the videos available for download, and videos from just 2 percent of the member base accounted for more than half of all videos viewed. (As the “long-tail” effect would suggest, half of the videos posted accounted for only 10 percent of all downloads.) These figures resemble those reported in studies of other kinds of participatory media, including wikis, bulletin boards, and photo-sharing sites, where 5 to 10 percent of the users contribute half to all of the content (Exhibit 2).4
Visitors under 25 years of age made up the bulk of the video-viewing audience we measured, but members in the 25- to 44-year-old age group contributed equally to postings—suggesting that working-age people would be open to participation in enterprise settings. A sense of sharing drives these older users, who tend to forward videos to friends even more frequently than do their younger peers. The presence of tools (such as most-viewed lists or forwarding features) that make it easy for users to see what’s popular or to send favorite videos to friends corresponded, by as much as 30 percent, with more downloads for popular videos.
These findings, consistent with our experience of participatory media in business settings, suggest that executives pursuing such projects should start by identifying and nurturing the small percentage of users who post quality content. At one cable company we studied, for example, more than half of the installers who contributed to an internal wiki said that social factors such as reputation building, team spirit, and community identification were the main factors motivating them to contribute. Only 20 percent cited the possibility of a financial bonus as their main driver.
To encourage well-connected employees to post ideas to the wiki, managers at the company examined its internal e-mail system to identify key staffers with wide social networks within it. They then encouraged these employees to post suggestions about improving the company’s processes. Identifying thought leaders and promoting their participation boosted the number of contributions and improved the quality of the postings. Other companies strive to make collaboration fun: at Google, for instance, employees place online bets on the likelihood that particular ideas will be adopted. Intuit uses a rotation program that invites selected staffers to contribute to the company’s internal online dialogues. Managers should also consider taking a page from video sites by tapping the power of tools that let users share relevant content easily. Likewise, companies should make sure that their employees can access collaborative tools with a minimum of bureaucratic hassle.
Companies will have to look beyond video-sharing sites for approaches to maximize the quality of the content. Those sites are concerned primarily with popularity, whereas corporate wikis and content sites (such as Wikipedia) gain momentum when new visitors discover and contribute high-quality content, which in turn makes the sites worthwhile for yet more newcomers. To improve the quality of internal wikis, then, companies might look to the quality assurance practices of open-source coding projects, which rely on appointed and self-appointed guardians to police quality issues. Companies should also create transparent and enforceable guidelines to prohibit unethical or illegal behavior, such as the posting of copyrighted material or proprietary secrets. They can learn from the examples of YouTube (which attempts to review content for obscenity before posting) or Wikipedia (which has committees that review entries for quality) and adopt similar review procedures for their corporate content.
About the Author
Jacques Bughin is a director in McKinsey’s Brussels office.
Notes
1 “How businesses are using Web 2.0: A McKinsey Global Survey,” The McKinsey Quarterly, Web exclusive, March 2007.
2 The survey, conducted online, was posted on major portals and Internet service providers in Germany over two weeks in October 2006. Germany is a midsize market with a competitive Internet landscape—conditions suggesting that our findings there are applicable to other markets.
3 To gain a wider audience, some sites in Europe and elsewhere are beginning to share a percentage of their advertising revenues with the top contributors.
4 Interestingly, some research suggests that, over time, participation rates throughout the user group increase. In 2004, for example, 90 percent of the contributions to Wikipedia came from just 2 percent of its users; by 2006, the top 2.5 percent of them were responsible for only 60 percent of all new content, according to Aniket Kittur, Bryan A. Pendleton, et al., Power of the Few vs. Wisdom of the Crowd: Wikipedia and the Rise of the Bourgeoisie, ACM’s SIGCHI (Special Interest Group on Computer–Human Interaction) Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, San Jose, CA, April 28–May 3, 2007.
How companies can make the most of user-generated content
Applying lean to application development and maintenance
To make application development and maintenance more productive, IT managers are getting lean.
Noah B. Kindler, Vasantha Krishnakanthan, and Ranjit Tinaikar
Web exclusive, May 2007
Burdened by high costs for application development and maintenance (ADM),1 many businesses have offshored up to half of their application development to low-cost locations, renegotiated rates on outsourced projects, and tightened the governance of new projects. In spite of these efforts, the costs of developing and maintaining applications now account for about half of the average IT budget and continue to rise. Labor costs make up more than 80 percent of application development, so many organizations have already reduced head counts or labor expenses where possible. Now they must begin to focus on improving the productivity of their development and maintenance staffs. In the past companies tried many methodologies, with mixed results (see sidebar, “Software-development productivity: Traditional methods”). Companies that apply the time-tested principles of lean manufacturing, which hunt for and eliminate waste from the production process (Exhibit 1), are seeing a significant impact within a matter of months.
Although lean principles were originally developed for manufacturing environments, they are increasingly (and successfully) being applied to service businesses, especially those with many routine processes.2 Application development and maintenance is a prime candidate for lean methods not only because it involves a great many processes with the potential to be optimized but also because large differences in productivity among organizations suggest that some are far less efficient than others. In our experience, applying the principles of lean manufacturing to ADM can increase productivity by 20 to 40 percent (Exhibit 2) while improving the quality and speed of execution.
Each category of waste in manufacturing has a counterpart in ADM, which can be thought of as a kind of factory that develops new applications according to business requirements. Changes to an application’s requirements are one common source of ADM waste, causing many of the classic varieties identified in lean: designers rework their specifications, coders wait for specifications to stabilize, testers overproduce as their testing environments have to be set up repeatedly, unmet requirements pile up in a large backlog. As in manufacturing, systematically eliminating these sources of waste improves the delivery time, quality, and efficiency of the ADM end product.
Just as each element of waste has a counterpart in ADM, so too does each of the traditional principles for reducing waste:
Flow processing reduces overcapacity or excess inventory by aligning the rhythm of output with the flow of production. A release schedule helps prioritize projects, so it prevents the waste inherent in delays to accommodate new requests.
Load balancing forces the organization to make use of development staff across several locations, as well as outside vendors.
Standardization is common in most application-development organizations but can be more widely applied to reduce the waste that results when requirements are defined in an ad hoc way.
Segmentation of projects by complexity eliminates waste by helping managers to route projects to the proper resources and by avoiding unnecessary overhead for simple tasks.
Quality ownership should extend beyond the testing group to encompass the business (which must increase its discipline in specifying project requirements), the designers (who must build “use cases” fully aligned with business needs), and the coders and testers (staff resources that must be allocated more flexibly). Unfortunately, in most application-development groups end-to-end quality ownership remains fragmented across multiple functional silos and is hardly ever tied to end-to-end performance incentives.
Each of these principles requires not only changes in processes (the technical part of the equation) but also shifts in behavior and new management tools. To improve the way project requirements are communicated, for example, the business must make experts available to IT. But IT’s access to these experts often takes a backseat to more pressing priorities. Similarly, with flexible staffing ADM managers must share personnel—a practice that individual managers might resist because they have learned to rely on certain people over the years. Thus, a lean transformation requires simultaneous changes in the technical system (changes to tools, methodologies, standards, and procedures), the behavioral system (convincing staff of the value of these changes), and the management system (new roles, metrics, and incentives to encourage the shift).
A lean transformation demands a substantial investment of time, as well as a sustained focus from upper management and an ongoing revision of incentives and metrics. Implementing the lean philosophy is a continuing and long-term goal that can deliver some results quickly, but it may take years before the approach becomes a core aspect of an organization’s culture.
Applying lean
A lean transformation begins with a diagnostic phase that estimates the level of waste in ADM processes. Since most ADM organizations don’t track waste, the assessment is based on interviews and questionnaires asking how information (such as the requirements for new applications) and materials (such as the code under development) move through the system. In the parlance of lean, this diagnostic method is called a “materials and information flow analysis.” One of its goals is to discern how much time is spent productively and how much is wasted. The wasted time is then examined todiscover the root causes and to determine the opportunity for improving productivity (Exhibit 3).
A large financial institution going through a lean transformation of its application-development department discovered two primary drivers of waste within application maintenance. First, the process for defining project requirements was chaotic and inefficient, involving more back and forth than it does in organizations where processes were more efficient. IT had no standard procedure for obtaining a comprehensive description of the business’s requirements for maintenance requests, so developers had to keep going back to the business to clarify requirements—an approach resulting in delays and a lot of rework. Furthermore, there was no clear and effective way to prioritize projects. As businesses requested exceptions (for example, rush jobs), developers had to shift focus from one application to another, and some projects were never completed. The ADM department measured a project’s cost and staffing, but not waste, and had no specific goals to improve productivity. There appeared to be little quality ownership and scant incentive for individuals to exert extra effort.
After the diagnostic phase, the financial institution decided to launch a pilot program to learn how to implement the lean philosophy and to create momentum for a broader transformation of the entire ADM organization. The pilot managers, basing their moves on the diagnostic findings, decided to apply three lean principles that would help reduce waste: a process redesign for improved flow, load-balanced work groups, and end-to-end performance management.
Redesign processes to improve flow
In the pilot program, the team redesigned the application maintenance process to improve the way work flowed through the system. First, they set a schedule of bimonthly releases with clearly defined steps and a fixed capacity based on available resources (that is, designers, coders, and testers). Deadlines for final requirements from the business were clearly spelled out, as were the dates for finishing the development of code and delivering applications. This predictable schedule allowed the business to plan for current and future releases and diminished the tendency to rush late requests into the process.
The team then replaced the ad hoc prioritization practices with a formal process that involved regular meetings between the business and IT. The team also established a more formal set of procedures for handling any exceptions, such as high-priority changes that might come in after deadline.
Balance the load of work groups
This aspect of the pilot solution was based on a more flexible definition of work groups. Developers and testers were cross-trained so that they could work on projects throughout the organization, not just within the group they had focused on. This move allowed managers to use these people more efficiently; for example, when a group was particularly busy, it could borrow developers or testers from another group with available resources. Managers could also tap offshore resources and the staffs of third-party vendors to meet peak demands without hiring additional personnel in the more expensive locations.
Manage performance across the entire process
New metrics to track performance at the group and individual levels focused on measuring and reducing waste. A new management “dashboard”—essentially a spreadsheet that tracked performance and highlighted trouble spots—allowed managers to identify potential problems before they happened. In one case, managers saw that a particular task was taking longer than estimated, so they redistributed that developer’s workload and minimized the disruption. The tracking of individual performance encouraged developers to take on more tasks, since their efforts were now more visible.
The pilot surpassed expectations, boosting productivity in the targeted application maintenance areas by 40 percent in less than two months. Furthermore, IT’s business counterparts were more satisfied with the process, and employee morale was up. As a result of this successful pilot, the company rolled out process redesign, load-balanced work groups, and performance-management systems to the rest of the application maintenance organization over the following year. In addition, the champions of the successful pilot helped to extend it to other parts of IT, including the development of new applications and infrastructure provisioning, further broadening the impact of the initiative.
Priorities of a redesign will differ from one financial industry to another. For one example, see “Rethinking wholesale-banking operations.”
Overcoming stubborn resistance
Applying lean to an application-development organization is a substantial transformation taking two to three years. From discussions with chief information officers (CIOs) and other executives at 30 companies across a range of industries, we have learned that three challenges are the most difficult to overcome: changing behavior, broadening the focus from specifics to general principles, and setting up the right incentives.
Perhaps the most difficult part is changing the behavior and convincing the staff and managers of the value of lean approaches. The key to making the case for change is to demonstrate positive results in a pilot program, generally undertaken in an area open to change. The financial institution in the earlier example publicized the results of the pilot in a series of company meetings that created support and momentum for a broader initiative. In another organization, management decided to emphasize the importance of the program by appointing a senior executive, who reported directly to the CIO, as the manager of lean transformations. It also assigned specialized teams to help implement lean efforts across the organization.
A common pitfall can be fixating on the specifics of a particular lean implementation rather than the more widely applicable lean principles. At the financial institution, the bimonthly release schedule is one such specific change. Two-month release schedules may not be appropriate for dynamic environments requiring shorter times to market, but the underlying principle—establishing predictability and eliminating delays caused by the ad hoc definition of requirements—still applies. Segmenting projects by complexity and flexibility will help IT determine the appropriate implementation program for achieving alignment with the business.
Finally, no transformation can sustain itself without the proper metrics and incentive systems that ensure change. In application development, “function points” measure the level of effort devoted to a project. A successful lean transformation requires new metrics to identify waste and set goals for reducing it. Leaders must adjust incentive programs, including financial awards and public recognition, to track and reward managers and staff for meeting goals on both measures.
Addressing the barriers to change is no small feat and requires management to sustain a commitment to change. Given the urgent need to improve productivity and the opportunity at hand, a lean transformation is a journey well worth the effort.
Software-development productivity: Traditional methods
Over the past three decades, organizations have tried various methods to boost productivity in application development. Those efforts can be grouped into three categories:
Process. Standards from the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) and Carnegie Mellon’s Capability Maturity Model (CMM) index help organizations to improve quality by following uniform processes. They address one of the drivers of waste in application development: process inconsistency. CMM and other standards don’t address other sources of waste, such as ineffective alignment between business and IT, the unavailability of the right resource at the right time, or architectural complexity.
Metrics. Measuring function points assumes that the output of any application-development project can be standardized in much the same way as businesses measure productivity—for instance, the volume of calls an agent can handle or the number of applications a loan agent can process. While such metrics may be helpful in environments with stable frameworks (say, embedded-systems development or mature and well-documented applications), they don’t measure the waste that can occur in the early stages of development, such as the definition and design of requirements.
Technology. Techniques such as computer-aided software engineering (CASE) can help eliminate wasteful activities by automating some aspects of code generation, document management, and version control. However, these techniques are limited in that they do not address the fundamental behavioral and cultural changes necessary to improve productivity (for example, working with the business to improve its understanding of IT).
Return to reference
About the Authors
Noah Kindler is a consultant in McKinsey’s IT practice in London. Krish Krishnakanthan is an associate principal in the IT practice in Silicon Valley. Ranjit Tinaikar is a partner based in New York who leads McKinsey’s North American IT strategy practice.
This article was first published in the Spring 2007 issue of McKinsey on IT.
Notes
1 Application development and maintenance (ADM) is the part of IT that works closely with the business to develop new software, keep it running, and make ongoing improvements. Within this part of IT, business analysts and software developers communicate with executives on the business side to understand their requirements for new and existing applications. In most companies, ADM teams are organized around application areas (for example, customer relationship management) rather than business functions.
2 Anthony R. Goland, John Hall, and Devereaux A. Clifford, “First National Toyota,” The McKinsey Quarterly, 1998 Number 4, pp. 58–66.
Applying lean to application development and maintenance
Noah B. Kindler, Vasantha Krishnakanthan, and Ranjit Tinaikar
Web exclusive, May 2007
Burdened by high costs for application development and maintenance (ADM),1 many businesses have offshored up to half of their application development to low-cost locations, renegotiated rates on outsourced projects, and tightened the governance of new projects. In spite of these efforts, the costs of developing and maintaining applications now account for about half of the average IT budget and continue to rise. Labor costs make up more than 80 percent of application development, so many organizations have already reduced head counts or labor expenses where possible. Now they must begin to focus on improving the productivity of their development and maintenance staffs. In the past companies tried many methodologies, with mixed results (see sidebar, “Software-development productivity: Traditional methods”). Companies that apply the time-tested principles of lean manufacturing, which hunt for and eliminate waste from the production process (Exhibit 1), are seeing a significant impact within a matter of months.
Although lean principles were originally developed for manufacturing environments, they are increasingly (and successfully) being applied to service businesses, especially those with many routine processes.2 Application development and maintenance is a prime candidate for lean methods not only because it involves a great many processes with the potential to be optimized but also because large differences in productivity among organizations suggest that some are far less efficient than others. In our experience, applying the principles of lean manufacturing to ADM can increase productivity by 20 to 40 percent (Exhibit 2) while improving the quality and speed of execution.
Each category of waste in manufacturing has a counterpart in ADM, which can be thought of as a kind of factory that develops new applications according to business requirements. Changes to an application’s requirements are one common source of ADM waste, causing many of the classic varieties identified in lean: designers rework their specifications, coders wait for specifications to stabilize, testers overproduce as their testing environments have to be set up repeatedly, unmet requirements pile up in a large backlog. As in manufacturing, systematically eliminating these sources of waste improves the delivery time, quality, and efficiency of the ADM end product.
Just as each element of waste has a counterpart in ADM, so too does each of the traditional principles for reducing waste:
Flow processing reduces overcapacity or excess inventory by aligning the rhythm of output with the flow of production. A release schedule helps prioritize projects, so it prevents the waste inherent in delays to accommodate new requests.
Load balancing forces the organization to make use of development staff across several locations, as well as outside vendors.
Standardization is common in most application-development organizations but can be more widely applied to reduce the waste that results when requirements are defined in an ad hoc way.
Segmentation of projects by complexity eliminates waste by helping managers to route projects to the proper resources and by avoiding unnecessary overhead for simple tasks.
Quality ownership should extend beyond the testing group to encompass the business (which must increase its discipline in specifying project requirements), the designers (who must build “use cases” fully aligned with business needs), and the coders and testers (staff resources that must be allocated more flexibly). Unfortunately, in most application-development groups end-to-end quality ownership remains fragmented across multiple functional silos and is hardly ever tied to end-to-end performance incentives.
Each of these principles requires not only changes in processes (the technical part of the equation) but also shifts in behavior and new management tools. To improve the way project requirements are communicated, for example, the business must make experts available to IT. But IT’s access to these experts often takes a backseat to more pressing priorities. Similarly, with flexible staffing ADM managers must share personnel—a practice that individual managers might resist because they have learned to rely on certain people over the years. Thus, a lean transformation requires simultaneous changes in the technical system (changes to tools, methodologies, standards, and procedures), the behavioral system (convincing staff of the value of these changes), and the management system (new roles, metrics, and incentives to encourage the shift).
A lean transformation demands a substantial investment of time, as well as a sustained focus from upper management and an ongoing revision of incentives and metrics. Implementing the lean philosophy is a continuing and long-term goal that can deliver some results quickly, but it may take years before the approach becomes a core aspect of an organization’s culture.
Applying lean
A lean transformation begins with a diagnostic phase that estimates the level of waste in ADM processes. Since most ADM organizations don’t track waste, the assessment is based on interviews and questionnaires asking how information (such as the requirements for new applications) and materials (such as the code under development) move through the system. In the parlance of lean, this diagnostic method is called a “materials and information flow analysis.” One of its goals is to discern how much time is spent productively and how much is wasted. The wasted time is then examined todiscover the root causes and to determine the opportunity for improving productivity (Exhibit 3).
A large financial institution going through a lean transformation of its application-development department discovered two primary drivers of waste within application maintenance. First, the process for defining project requirements was chaotic and inefficient, involving more back and forth than it does in organizations where processes were more efficient. IT had no standard procedure for obtaining a comprehensive description of the business’s requirements for maintenance requests, so developers had to keep going back to the business to clarify requirements—an approach resulting in delays and a lot of rework. Furthermore, there was no clear and effective way to prioritize projects. As businesses requested exceptions (for example, rush jobs), developers had to shift focus from one application to another, and some projects were never completed. The ADM department measured a project’s cost and staffing, but not waste, and had no specific goals to improve productivity. There appeared to be little quality ownership and scant incentive for individuals to exert extra effort.
After the diagnostic phase, the financial institution decided to launch a pilot program to learn how to implement the lean philosophy and to create momentum for a broader transformation of the entire ADM organization. The pilot managers, basing their moves on the diagnostic findings, decided to apply three lean principles that would help reduce waste: a process redesign for improved flow, load-balanced work groups, and end-to-end performance management.
Redesign processes to improve flow
In the pilot program, the team redesigned the application maintenance process to improve the way work flowed through the system. First, they set a schedule of bimonthly releases with clearly defined steps and a fixed capacity based on available resources (that is, designers, coders, and testers). Deadlines for final requirements from the business were clearly spelled out, as were the dates for finishing the development of code and delivering applications. This predictable schedule allowed the business to plan for current and future releases and diminished the tendency to rush late requests into the process.
The team then replaced the ad hoc prioritization practices with a formal process that involved regular meetings between the business and IT. The team also established a more formal set of procedures for handling any exceptions, such as high-priority changes that might come in after deadline.
Balance the load of work groups
This aspect of the pilot solution was based on a more flexible definition of work groups. Developers and testers were cross-trained so that they could work on projects throughout the organization, not just within the group they had focused on. This move allowed managers to use these people more efficiently; for example, when a group was particularly busy, it could borrow developers or testers from another group with available resources. Managers could also tap offshore resources and the staffs of third-party vendors to meet peak demands without hiring additional personnel in the more expensive locations.
Manage performance across the entire process
New metrics to track performance at the group and individual levels focused on measuring and reducing waste. A new management “dashboard”—essentially a spreadsheet that tracked performance and highlighted trouble spots—allowed managers to identify potential problems before they happened. In one case, managers saw that a particular task was taking longer than estimated, so they redistributed that developer’s workload and minimized the disruption. The tracking of individual performance encouraged developers to take on more tasks, since their efforts were now more visible.
The pilot surpassed expectations, boosting productivity in the targeted application maintenance areas by 40 percent in less than two months. Furthermore, IT’s business counterparts were more satisfied with the process, and employee morale was up. As a result of this successful pilot, the company rolled out process redesign, load-balanced work groups, and performance-management systems to the rest of the application maintenance organization over the following year. In addition, the champions of the successful pilot helped to extend it to other parts of IT, including the development of new applications and infrastructure provisioning, further broadening the impact of the initiative.
Priorities of a redesign will differ from one financial industry to another. For one example, see “Rethinking wholesale-banking operations.”
Overcoming stubborn resistance
Applying lean to an application-development organization is a substantial transformation taking two to three years. From discussions with chief information officers (CIOs) and other executives at 30 companies across a range of industries, we have learned that three challenges are the most difficult to overcome: changing behavior, broadening the focus from specifics to general principles, and setting up the right incentives.
Perhaps the most difficult part is changing the behavior and convincing the staff and managers of the value of lean approaches. The key to making the case for change is to demonstrate positive results in a pilot program, generally undertaken in an area open to change. The financial institution in the earlier example publicized the results of the pilot in a series of company meetings that created support and momentum for a broader initiative. In another organization, management decided to emphasize the importance of the program by appointing a senior executive, who reported directly to the CIO, as the manager of lean transformations. It also assigned specialized teams to help implement lean efforts across the organization.
A common pitfall can be fixating on the specifics of a particular lean implementation rather than the more widely applicable lean principles. At the financial institution, the bimonthly release schedule is one such specific change. Two-month release schedules may not be appropriate for dynamic environments requiring shorter times to market, but the underlying principle—establishing predictability and eliminating delays caused by the ad hoc definition of requirements—still applies. Segmenting projects by complexity and flexibility will help IT determine the appropriate implementation program for achieving alignment with the business.
Finally, no transformation can sustain itself without the proper metrics and incentive systems that ensure change. In application development, “function points” measure the level of effort devoted to a project. A successful lean transformation requires new metrics to identify waste and set goals for reducing it. Leaders must adjust incentive programs, including financial awards and public recognition, to track and reward managers and staff for meeting goals on both measures.
Addressing the barriers to change is no small feat and requires management to sustain a commitment to change. Given the urgent need to improve productivity and the opportunity at hand, a lean transformation is a journey well worth the effort.
Software-development productivity: Traditional methods
Over the past three decades, organizations have tried various methods to boost productivity in application development. Those efforts can be grouped into three categories:
Process. Standards from the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) and Carnegie Mellon’s Capability Maturity Model (CMM) index help organizations to improve quality by following uniform processes. They address one of the drivers of waste in application development: process inconsistency. CMM and other standards don’t address other sources of waste, such as ineffective alignment between business and IT, the unavailability of the right resource at the right time, or architectural complexity.
Metrics. Measuring function points assumes that the output of any application-development project can be standardized in much the same way as businesses measure productivity—for instance, the volume of calls an agent can handle or the number of applications a loan agent can process. While such metrics may be helpful in environments with stable frameworks (say, embedded-systems development or mature and well-documented applications), they don’t measure the waste that can occur in the early stages of development, such as the definition and design of requirements.
Technology. Techniques such as computer-aided software engineering (CASE) can help eliminate wasteful activities by automating some aspects of code generation, document management, and version control. However, these techniques are limited in that they do not address the fundamental behavioral and cultural changes necessary to improve productivity (for example, working with the business to improve its understanding of IT).
Return to reference
About the Authors
Noah Kindler is a consultant in McKinsey’s IT practice in London. Krish Krishnakanthan is an associate principal in the IT practice in Silicon Valley. Ranjit Tinaikar is a partner based in New York who leads McKinsey’s North American IT strategy practice.
This article was first published in the Spring 2007 issue of McKinsey on IT.
Notes
1 Application development and maintenance (ADM) is the part of IT that works closely with the business to develop new software, keep it running, and make ongoing improvements. Within this part of IT, business analysts and software developers communicate with executives on the business side to understand their requirements for new and existing applications. In most companies, ADM teams are organized around application areas (for example, customer relationship management) rather than business functions.
2 Anthony R. Goland, John Hall, and Devereaux A. Clifford, “First National Toyota,” The McKinsey Quarterly, 1998 Number 4, pp. 58–66.
Applying lean to application development and maintenance
Shtterbugs
My Gear
Some of professional's photos on internet, worth sharing here.
http://www.pbase.com/rcalmes/august_2007_studio
Some of professional's photos on internet, worth sharing here.
http://www.pbase.com/rcalmes/august_2007_studio
Komli - PubMatic
Komli launches ad server PubMatic to help publishers maximize ad revenue
Komli Media has launched a meta ad server PubMatic.com which enables online publishers to maximize their ad revenue from their existing and new ad network relationships, while simultaneously reducing complexity. As of now, PubMatic is in a limited alpha stage which means its services would be currently available to only 100 publishers on first come first serve basis.
According to Amar Goel, founder and CEO, PubMatic.com, PubMatic allows publishers to auction ad inventory across ad networks and optimize the creatives for contextual networks. It also provides management tools that allow the publishers to view their ad inventory performance from all the ad networks on a daily basis.
For the ad networks, PubMatic helps them increase the number of publishers and also create long lasting relationships with them. “Today, a network signs up a publisher. After a week the publisher is not happy with the payouts and leaves the network. But with PubMatic the network never loses its relationship with the publisher, as the network is always in the auction,” the CEO of PubMatic has said.
Currently, PubMatic supports four ad networks — Google AdSense, Yahoo Publisher Network, ValueClick and Komli. When asked about the timeline to add other ad networks, Amar Goel has told Alootechie, “We have an aggressive timeline; it’s one of our top priorities to hear from our publishers what main ad networks they use and to add them. We would one day like to have all ad networks on PubMatic.”
Knowing that Komli, a sister concern of PubMatic, will also be competing, how would the company ensure that the other participating ad networks are being treated fairly? While responding to that question, Amar Goel has said, “If a publisher is extremely concerned about this they should just not include Komli in their ad tags and see if their payouts go up,” adding, “It’s our job to make sure PubMatic is delivering lots of value to publishers. If publishers are not getting maximize payouts from PubMatic then they will leave.”
http://www.alootechie.net/news/komli-launches-ad-server-pubmatic-to-help-publishers-maximize-ad-revenue/
Komli Media has launched a meta ad server PubMatic.com which enables online publishers to maximize their ad revenue from their existing and new ad network relationships, while simultaneously reducing complexity. As of now, PubMatic is in a limited alpha stage which means its services would be currently available to only 100 publishers on first come first serve basis.
According to Amar Goel, founder and CEO, PubMatic.com, PubMatic allows publishers to auction ad inventory across ad networks and optimize the creatives for contextual networks. It also provides management tools that allow the publishers to view their ad inventory performance from all the ad networks on a daily basis.
For the ad networks, PubMatic helps them increase the number of publishers and also create long lasting relationships with them. “Today, a network signs up a publisher. After a week the publisher is not happy with the payouts and leaves the network. But with PubMatic the network never loses its relationship with the publisher, as the network is always in the auction,” the CEO of PubMatic has said.
Currently, PubMatic supports four ad networks — Google AdSense, Yahoo Publisher Network, ValueClick and Komli. When asked about the timeline to add other ad networks, Amar Goel has told Alootechie, “We have an aggressive timeline; it’s one of our top priorities to hear from our publishers what main ad networks they use and to add them. We would one day like to have all ad networks on PubMatic.”
Knowing that Komli, a sister concern of PubMatic, will also be competing, how would the company ensure that the other participating ad networks are being treated fairly? While responding to that question, Amar Goel has said, “If a publisher is extremely concerned about this they should just not include Komli in their ad tags and see if their payouts go up,” adding, “It’s our job to make sure PubMatic is delivering lots of value to publishers. If publishers are not getting maximize payouts from PubMatic then they will leave.”
http://www.alootechie.net/news/komli-launches-ad-server-pubmatic-to-help-publishers-maximize-ad-revenue/
World War II and lost Childhood
It was last weekend on rock(gibraltar) as was to take back flight on sunday; there was nothing much to do on saturday so last time decided to climb rock(entire stay managed to climb 5 times) and visit pending tourist attractions Great Seige Tunnel and St Michael Caves. Reached Seige tunnel around 11am; spent 2 hours admiring british military engineering marvel of this 60 mile tunnels and cannons put inside them. Once was done with tunnel started for caves. Sent another 2 hours or so in caves admiring natures creation.
On way down; stopped at Herculean Pillar for a snap; it was 5pm still sunny so had to look for angle to avoind too much of sun. A 'Namaste' surprised me and turned back to find this 60+ firang gentleman;
greeting me again with Namaste. He asked me if I want a photo with pillar; he can shoot that for me with my camera. Was happy to hear hindi in a firnags mouth; allowed him;
then took his 2 photos with pillar with his cracked film camera.
Curiosity forced me to ask how he knows hindi; on way down he told his story which is defintely a sad story of a child who born in a well off family and some political and greed turbulence called World War II took away everthing from this child even CHILDHOOD and right of EDUCATION.
A Poignant Story of Tom whose father used to be a high rank officer with British India; got killed during WWII Monte Casino battle ; his mother married cousin of his father; who abandoned them soon without anything from his fathers savings. Tom and his mother had to move to engalnd after indian independance; tom had to give up his comfortable lifestyle and studies; had to take up work for daily meals.
Few years back he managed to Visit India; went to dehradun where his father was posted before went to santa monaco battle; all his childhood memories of St Thomas school people around and there house that time which now hosts brigader of army just flashed back. He went and spoke to brigader Singh explained him on his father and it used to be there govt provided house; Mr singh checked records and allowed Tom to stay there for a night; Tom literally wept that night for all the things he lost during WWII period Father Family Life Childhood and lovely dehradyn and people around. He visited his school; spoke to current principal and bought icecreams for 5th class students as he was in 5th class when they sailed for england.
He was emotional and had tears in eyes when he was talking about this deharadun visit and time spent there.
He was on rock to visit it as well as has father had stopped at gibraltar port as per one of his last mails; he was trying to feel his fathers presense there; with his meagre income he cannot visit all the places his father would have took enroute to santa monica; so he is saving money and visitng possible areas for last 30 odd years now. His mother is too old and not keeping well much; He couldnt eat in casemate square restaurants as 7GBP fish-n-chips for him was too expensive with most of money gone on travel and he was going to walk and cross to spanish la lineua city for less expensive food.
Tom is sure trying to visit places where his fathers memories exist(he showed me small rock with him from rock as memory of his father) and trying to understand what was his or his families mistake to go through all they have over last decades.
Though a cash broken guy; but that cheerful face of his made me walk with him all the way to casemate sqaure; on main street Tom was greeting jews out for prayers with a Shalom and other with a Hello. Never say over attitude type.
Am sure there are so many Toms orphaned in true sense by political greed and bloody wars fought.
Tom my friend I hope you manage to visit all places en route to santa monica ur father travelled; and enjoy his presence.
For question on what was mistake of you or your family or thins thing called Wars; no ones got a answer dear friend.
Take care.
On way down; stopped at Herculean Pillar for a snap; it was 5pm still sunny so had to look for angle to avoind too much of sun. A 'Namaste' surprised me and turned back to find this 60+ firang gentleman;
greeting me again with Namaste. He asked me if I want a photo with pillar; he can shoot that for me with my camera. Was happy to hear hindi in a firnags mouth; allowed him; 
then took his 2 photos with pillar with his cracked film camera.
Curiosity forced me to ask how he knows hindi; on way down he told his story which is defintely a sad story of a child who born in a well off family and some political and greed turbulence called World War II took away everthing from this child even CHILDHOOD and right of EDUCATION.
A Poignant Story of Tom whose father used to be a high rank officer with British India; got killed during WWII Monte Casino battle ; his mother married cousin of his father; who abandoned them soon without anything from his fathers savings. Tom and his mother had to move to engalnd after indian independance; tom had to give up his comfortable lifestyle and studies; had to take up work for daily meals.
Few years back he managed to Visit India; went to dehradun where his father was posted before went to santa monaco battle; all his childhood memories of St Thomas school people around and there house that time which now hosts brigader of army just flashed back. He went and spoke to brigader Singh explained him on his father and it used to be there govt provided house; Mr singh checked records and allowed Tom to stay there for a night; Tom literally wept that night for all the things he lost during WWII period Father Family Life Childhood and lovely dehradyn and people around. He visited his school; spoke to current principal and bought icecreams for 5th class students as he was in 5th class when they sailed for england.
He was emotional and had tears in eyes when he was talking about this deharadun visit and time spent there.
He was on rock to visit it as well as has father had stopped at gibraltar port as per one of his last mails; he was trying to feel his fathers presense there; with his meagre income he cannot visit all the places his father would have took enroute to santa monica; so he is saving money and visitng possible areas for last 30 odd years now. His mother is too old and not keeping well much; He couldnt eat in casemate square restaurants as 7GBP fish-n-chips for him was too expensive with most of money gone on travel and he was going to walk and cross to spanish la lineua city for less expensive food.
Tom is sure trying to visit places where his fathers memories exist(he showed me small rock with him from rock as memory of his father) and trying to understand what was his or his families mistake to go through all they have over last decades.
Though a cash broken guy; but that cheerful face of his made me walk with him all the way to casemate sqaure; on main street Tom was greeting jews out for prayers with a Shalom and other with a Hello. Never say over attitude type.
Am sure there are so many Toms orphaned in true sense by political greed and bloody wars fought.
Tom my friend I hope you manage to visit all places en route to santa monica ur father travelled; and enjoy his presence.
For question on what was mistake of you or your family or thins thing called Wars; no ones got a answer dear friend.
Take care.
Casual Sunday
This sunday was one of those casual ones where nothing much happened except a small talk with renuka & her friends in morning over a cup of coffee and new addiction dutch truffle.
Other than that read sunday times; have reduced my time spent on Sunday TOI after many of regular columnists are replaced with new ones whose style are yet not my cuppa of reading.
Read few chapters of subrato bagchis high perfromance enterpreuers; found it noce and practical; would say one of must reading for aspiring lot in indian scenario.
Afternoon from balcony was looking at new construction sites around; suddenly following man(dog trainer) & his dog caought my attention. He was combing his best friends fur with such love and passion; found it interesting thought of sharing here.
Other than that read sunday times; have reduced my time spent on Sunday TOI after many of regular columnists are replaced with new ones whose style are yet not my cuppa of reading.
Read few chapters of subrato bagchis high perfromance enterpreuers; found it noce and practical; would say one of must reading for aspiring lot in indian scenario.
Afternoon from balcony was looking at new construction sites around; suddenly following man(dog trainer) & his dog caought my attention. He was combing his best friends fur with such love and passion; found it interesting thought of sharing here.
Saw a piegon in neighbours balcony looking carefully at construction site nearby; may be it too is looking at his green valley 
and trying to figure out for How long it will stay green before gets converted to a concrete jungle.
Paintings put on wall
Played motogp; pirates and transformer game with pillu; he has started beating me in few of them :) BTW after he has started watching shinchan he ha stopped wearirng pants at home. Even if u put it on 10 times he will remove it 20 times :)
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