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Let's keep it personal..IBM Connect and the soul of Lotus

Today I start a new challenge,  working for an IBM Premier Business Partner called Portal in Bracknell, Berkshire.  I'll be helping their customers make, and get value from, their investments in IBM Collaboration software of all types : from transactional portal application dressed with user managed web content, through Social Software for organisations on the road to becoming a social business, and not forgetting along the way our Notes/Domino customers who've been getting value from Notes, Sametime and other Lotus products for over 20 years.  Today's the day to meet the Portal people and get connected - many of these people I have known from project work over the years and it's a great pleasure to be linking up with and working with them again.

The main thing on my mind today : the decision to embed Lotusphere 2013 inside the IBM Connect event. I have two contradictory thoughts on this :
  1. "It's not a moment too soon" : customers are confused about the term "Lotus" which has been carved out of all except the traditional Notes/Domino product nomenclature such as Lotus (now IBM) Connections.   It's not about a brand name or label, but about customer value and customers' objectives to facilitate improved productivity through better connected-ness.  We should clear away legacy brand-based approaches to realise this bigger vision.
  2. "Lotus is the philosophical heart of collaboration software" : emotionally speaking, "Lotus" represents, overwhelmingly to existing customers, the people-entry point to the enterprise at its most focused.   Lotus has never been as much a technology stack as a symbol of an approach or paradigm which is at its heart more about people than places or things.   Losing the term means more than just relabelling : it's indicative of a less "human" guiding spirit behind software and its application.
To be honest, when I examine it, I find the latter sentiment to be, er, sentimental, and over-subjective.  We all perceive the value of a "brand" but we should be realistic about its longevity, and the potential for time to dilute its meaning.  But I can fully understand how, given the history of Lotus and its fantastic customers, how that loyalty comes about and persists, especially at a time of great change and challenge.  And I also recognise that maintaining customer loyalty requires a recognition of the emotional content of that loyalty, gained along a mutual journey.  If we recognise this, and factor this into our conversations with customers, we will do fine.  If we forget it, and treat social business as an IT challenge to be solved "just" with middleware and databases, we'll fail.  How will IBM Connect announce IBM's intentions, I wonder?   I think it promises to be a great event, where IBM's technology and social business thought leadership come together, and I hope it brings to the stage both the head and the heart of collaboration.
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