Brilliant Leap

ECM in 2010- Did anything BIG happen? (Part 1)

This is one of those blog entries that's not particularly concerned with answering a question, instead it's more intent on presenting some information and letting the reader figure out what it all means. After all, you can (and should) read vendor announcements, analyst presentations, descriptions of solutions sets offered by systems integrators, "what's hot and what's not" lists etc... but at the end of the day, from where I see it, what matters is who is shopping for what, who is buying what, what's working where (and what isn't), what's being phased-out or replaced...and, of course, how this affects the demand for talent.

Though I attend vendor conferences and read a great deal, my looking glass is shaped primarily by the executives who are ECM leaders in their organizations; the consultants who evaluate, architect, design and implement solutions; developers and configuration specialists, end users who love (or hate) the solutions they've been given to work with; and the developers and administrators who bring apps to life and keep them running.

All of that being said, here's what happened (or didn't happen) in 2010 and what it might (or might not) mean:

1) ECM is dead. Long live ECM.- This little diddy got a lot of buzz this year. For anyone who's unaware, XXX is dead. Long live XXX is a spin-off from the King is dead. Long live the king. The fill-in-the blank format was brought into vogue in 2010 when Arianna Huffington proclaimed that Publishing is dead. Long live publishing and Wired magazine's Chris Anderson proclaimed The Web is Dead. Long live the Internet. So why not be cool and use the same framework when talking about ECM?

After all, it wins attention, leads people to believe you are "in the know" and part of the "smart crowd",  and it confuses everyone. I have not spoken to a single ECM professional (who was not employed by a vendor) who wanted to spend a second pondering this topic. The bottom line is that ECM did not die in 2010. Some vendors tried to give it another name, but it didn't catch. And you know what else? If everyone else wants to be labeled something other than ECM, Microsoft will cheer you on. Already a favorite in the collaboration game, Sharepoint will gladly stand up and be counted when folks go shopping for their next ECM solution.

Documentum/ EMC Proven Professional Certification- Does It Matter?

With the economy faltering and the supply of Documentum professionals at an all-time high, people are calling and asking whether becoming certified would give them an edge.

My answer is "no"; I have never had a client list it as a requirement or even as a "nice to have", and because I work on filling more than 100 Documentum-related jobs a year, I think I have a pretty good view of the marketplace. But who knows, your experience may be different.

Outsourcing a Problem for Documentum Pros?

I had an interesting chat the other day with someone who manages the EMC-relationship at a major consulting firm. He asked me point blank, "There is not much of a market for Documentum developers anymore, is there?" "That depends on how you define developer," I said, "and on what the developer knows, what kind of configurations she/he has worked in, what connectors they have expertise with..." I frustrated the man, but it is a complex question, so there is no simple answer. "Outsourcing is the problem is it not?" he said next.

"Surprise! Surprise! some more," says Gomer

Gomer was busy sipping eggnog last December, so he missed Vivismo's announcement that they will develop a Documentum- friendly tool with which to search Enterprise Content.