In the first session after lunch on Tuesday, the talk is about enabling the Smarter Workforce. Speakers from Colgate Palmolive and David Jones are sharing their stories.

Maree Foti, HR Manager, David Jones (Australia)
– “Transforming an Australian Icon.”
– David Jones is a retail operation in Australia. Has been around for 175. Still trading under its original name. 36 stores across Australia, with 8000 employees.
– Challenges in retail: (a) structurally – dealing with onilne retailing, (b) macro economic – GFC has led to significant issues, and (c) operations.
– One part of success is cultivating great employees, with high engagement and strong retention.
– … From recent internal survey data, communication was very important.
– … From the survey, employees wanted more information, more open communication, more opportunities for two way communication.
– … Business case – enhance communication, build collaboration, increase engagement and retention, and more. Got the go ahead for a pilot with 1,000 employees – called the new environment built on IBM Connections as The Thread.
– … Results – The Thread has become a valid communication channel within 3 months, people are referencing The Thread as a place to get / give information, and leaders are writing some of the most popular blogs.
– Key focus areas – bringing the platform to life (show and tell), great content, and identifying key players to drive adoption.
– adoption strategy – leadership support. Approaches – meetings with executives, showing the platform, explaining what we wanted them to do.
– workshops – on adoption (to form an Adoption Strategy, based on what people / teams / groups / departments would use IBM Connections for), workshop with Marketing (for branding), workshop with IT and HR.
– … decided that profiles were key to adoption.
– … 10 weeks before release – drafted the adoption strategy. Approaches – creating curiosity, profiling novel concepts, establish mandates, etc.
– … 7 weeks before release – lots of live demos. Led to lots of discussion. Agreed that on launch there would be 20 communities, plus some other moderated / restricted communities. Ran some training workshops.
– … 6 weeks before release – regular demonstrations across the business. Allowed early adopters to get access to the platform, for new communities.
– … 4 weeks to go – CEO said it is coming.
– … 3 – 2 weeks – teaser campaign.
– … 1 week to go – a variety of activities, about it coming, including CEO blog endorsement.
– … at launch – updates screen savers to point to The Thread. Sent out information about how to access The Thread.
– overall: took a fairly structured approach to ensure it all worked.

Linda Van de Wiele, Associate Director, Colgate Palmolive
– Take Control with a Dynamic Workforce: Colgate-Palmolive
– $16.7 billion in sales, 39000 Colgate people, 223 countries.
– end state objectives – same systems, same information, same processes, same performance, everywhere.
– Ian Cook, CEO – set the direction about having to collaborate as an overall team.
– Collaboration portfolio – a wide range of collaboration tools from IBM.
– … We need to share information, not silo it. Technology has moved on …
– Business challenges – thousands of customers, short visits with customers, need to get information out to channels quickly, country specific information, quick and access to information.
– … for sales teams, purchased iPads and developed a mobile application. Also used the IBM Connections app.
– … enables better decisions to be made. Maximizing time with clients.
– … offline access is very important for these people. Wireless is not always available or good enough.
– … getting good feedback from users across the world.
– Released the app – but had low adoption after a year. Had to get users to understand the benefits of social business.
– Created an advocates program, supported by the CIO. Started with 20 advocates, with 1 meeting a month. After 6 months, has grown to over 100 advocates. Now trying to get advocates from every business unit across the world.
– Created a Colgate Mobile Application Center – a one-stop-shop for all Colgate Mobile questions. Can get approved apps for Sametime, Connections, etc. Also has a community for discussion. Apps are personalized to an individual, as well as to the type of devices they have.