Emerging Trends: Responsive Web Design

One of the implications of the Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) model is the need to deliver content to multiple devices with diverse form factors. Compatibility testing for web applications is no loner to restricted to browser / OS combinations. Can your content deliver a seamless experience to users on all the devices without having to develop multiple versions of your content? The answer is in Responsive Web Design. Mashable has rolled out an updated site that works very well on types of devices and is a great example of Responsive Web Design. Check out this article from Mashable and the Youtube video for a high level overview on Responsive Web Design.

If you would like to understand the nuts and bolts of Responsive Web Site, check out some detailed examples from Google.

Srinivas Krishnaswamy

From NPR: Stores Use Mobile To Make Sales On The Spot

I am reproducing snippets from an article that appeared in NPR’s All Tech Considered.

No More ‘Clunky’ Cash Registers

The women’s shoe department at Nordstrom’s flagship store in Seattle is bustling. Shoppers are trying on everything from stilettos to rain boots — and when they’re ready to buy, they can pay up right where they are.

The sales associate simply whips out a modified iPod Touch and scans the shoe box’s bar code. The handheld device contains a credit card reader, too, so the customer can just hand over the plastic and sign with a fingertip. There’s no trek to the cash register and no line to wait in.

At department stores like Nordstrom and at other traditional retailers, mobile devices are slowly beginning to supplement, and even replace, other methods of payment. In many cases, buying something is becoming more efficient and more personal.

Embracing ‘Showrooming’

Yet another change under way relates to something you see all the time: the practice known as “showrooming.” Increasingly, customers with smartphones are checking out products and competitors’ prices online as they roam the aisles of brick-and-mortar stores. And by 2016, Deloitte projects, roughly one in five consumers will be using their smartphones in precisely that way.

My Personal Take – What About Training?

I had a ring side view of how these devices are being used in stores like Nordstrom. The biggest challenge that stores are facing is reliable WiFi. It’s quite frustrating when the transaction goes on a “wait” mode as the app waits for connection. While the marketing and merchandising departments are taking the lead in pushing enterprise content to mobile devices, the training departments in retail chains are still confined to the classrooms and the back-rooms. There are unresolved questions pertaining to making mobile devices available for training, BYOD model, creating training content for mobile devices, tracking content usage, and ROI.

Srinivas Krishnaswamy

Workforce Management Trends in Retail Chains

I am fortunate enough to have a ring side view of the impact of mobile applications like The Anywhere Learner Mobile has on the productivity of frontline store employees. The users of Anywhere Learner Mobile are now seeing actionable training that they could put in practice on the job, and are seeing the value in learning best practices directly from their peers.

I believe applications like Anywhere Learner foretell an emerging drive to take a broader view by retailers (that goes beyond just training solutions) by looking at workforce management solutions that would allow them to capitalize on sales opportunities, manage optimum staff levels, differentiate with superior customer engagement, and cut workforce management costs.

RIS has come up with an insightful report recently that captures the key milestones towards maximizing the ability of retailers to handle employee, customer, and technology challenges. The milestones are:

1. Use Granular Data to create Forecasts and Schedules: This means leveraging customer counting technologies, videos based data, and algorithms to analyze how many customers are in present in what areas of the stores, how many staff with what skills may be required, and why a large presence of customers is not translating into more sales. Such questions will throw light on scheduling, training gaps, and even store layouts.

2.  Incorporate Customer measures into Workforce Calculations: Scheduling workforce is no longer just based on square footage of the store, but rather based on customer data geared towards making knowledgeable store employees available at the right time at the right places within the store. The focus on staff allocation is aimed towards addressing sales opportunities.

3. Use Mobile Deployment to increase Staff Productivity: According to the June 2012 RIS research, 19.2% of retailers are planning to deploy task management software with mobile device support by the end of this year, and another 30.8% have such a
deployment scheduled for 2013. Mobile apps can be used to deliver contextual customer information and manage operational tasks to increase workforce productivity.

4. Analyze Task Management Data to fine tune Labor  Standards:  Stores are using analytics to figure out individual productivity differences and leverage this data for shift allocation. And of course, task analysis helps in figuring out key productivity benchmarks which could then drive training.

5. Optimize Skills Mix for each Shift: Workforce management solutions provide an opportunity to analyze team dynamics and assign the most productive teams during the most productive hours. More importantly, Stores can now figure out what drives a high performance team and what causes team dysfunctions and take appropriate responses.

6. Offer Self-Service Options to Tech Savvy Employees: According to  the May 2012 RSR Research report, “The employee is the in-store brand ambassador. It serves retailers well to invest in technologies that both educate these employees, help schedule their time in the most productive fashion, and insure the tasks they are given actually get done.”

Srinivas Krishnaswamy

Learning On The Move – Aberdeen Report

Thanks to NetDimensions, I had a chance to read the Jan 2012 Aberdeen report on mobile learning. The report has unearthed useful insights that will help enterprises keep pace with the changes in the way employees learn as a result of the explosive growth in mobile devices. Here are some key extracts from the report.

1. Learning came a close second to Talent Acquisition as the key requirement for successful business execution. I have had strange encounters with large Fortune 1000 companies that insist on catering to the learning needs of thousands of employees no major investment in manpower or budgets.

2. The top three Human Capital Management (HCM) activities where mobile learning tools are used include – a. Internal Online Communities, b. Informal Learning, and c. Formal Learning. In addition, the survey data shows that 40% of best  in class organizations use mobile tools for learning, talent management, while only 11% of other organizations seem to use mobile learning. The four fold difference in usage only strengthens the case for mobile learning tools (among other factors).

3. 96% of respondents say their mobile learning tools are aimed at employees, 39% say mobile learning is available for customers and 35% say partners have access to mobile learning. I believe making mobile learning available to the extended enterprise (in addition to customers and employees) will become a source of competitive advantage and open up new revenue opportunities for the learning content.

4. Not surprisingly, a significant majority of the content delivered as mobile learning is in the form of documents and presentations. The biggest challenge when making content available on mobile devices is the complication associated with multiple platforms and device types (Tablets Vs Smartphones). I believe enterprises should have a strategy for handling content publishing and devices.

5. And finally, in response to a question about the barriers to implementing mobile HCM, companies cited insufficient budgets, lack of a compelling use case, concerns about security,  and insufficient technology infrastructure to support mobile learning.

You can read the report here.

Srinivas Krishnaswamy

On-demand Learning Through Siri – CIO’s Perspective

Earlier, I had written a post on the possibility of using Siri as a learning delivery channel for the enterprise. Check it out here. As if on cue, MIT Technology Review published a new article on IBM banning Siri for security reasons. Titled, IBM Faces the Perils of “Bring Your Own Device”, the article highlights risk-creep in enterprises as a result of Bring Your Own Device (BYOD). IBM even turns off Siri, the voice-activated personal assistant, on employees’ iPhones. The company worries that the spoken queries might be stored somewhere.

In fact, Wired Enterprise also cited the same article from MIT and has posted a blog that highlights Apple’s iPhone Software License Agreement -

“In fact, Apple’s iPhone Software License Agreementspells this out: “When you use Siri or Dictation, the things you say will be recorded and sent to Apple in order to convert what you say into text,” Apple says. Siri collects a bunch of other information — names of people from your address book and other unspecified user data, all to help Siri do a better job.

How long does Apple store all of this stuff, and who gets a look at it? Well, the company doesn’t actually say. Again, from the user agreement: “By using Siri or Dictation, you agree and consent to Apple’s and its subsidiaries’ and agents’ transmission, collection, maintenance, processing, and use of this information, including your voice input and User Data, to provide and improve Siri, Dictation, and other Apple products and services.”

The bottom line is that any new enterprise learning technology has to consider the implications for the CIO or it is doomed to fail.

Srinivas Krishnaswamy