Wikis were back on the front page again this past week. There was an article in KMWorld magazine by Cindy Gordon, called Wikis - a disruptive innovation.
Not surprisingly, innovation is ranked as a top priority by CEOs. It is Ms. Gordon's contention (and probably an observable fact) that most companies focus on practices that sustain innovation rather than seek disruptive innovation (a concept written about in depth by Clayton Christensen that deals with the somewhat natural law that new markets can be created at the low end of existing markets, but which can disrupt and compete favorably with longstanding market leaders - hmmmm - have to work on the elevator speech on this).
Wikis, which allow all users to contribute to the content of their pages make for an excellent collaboration tool. I've long thought they belonged in business and have opined a few times in this blog. According to the article, wikis are catching on in some larger corporations. Yahoo and Google use wikis, as well as Bank of America and others. Microsoft plans to include wiki capabilities as a part of Sharepoint 2007, and Gartner had predicted in 2004 that "a third of mainstream collaboration software products will support wiki-style interaction by 2006."
While I like wikis and what they can accomplish, we're nearly mid-way through 2006, and I'm not sure that last prediction will play out. However, use is on the rise.
A very agreeable comment made was that "organizations continue to spend millions of dollars on content management infrastructure solutions, rather than putting more power in the hands of their users to collaborate effectively together."
Are wikis the solution? Time will tell. I think there is room for both content management and wikis in an effort to break down silos and enhance collaboration within an organization. There are likely other tools that will all be a part successful collaboration, including (perhaps) corporate blogs.
Meanwhile, it looks as if wikis continue to increase in use, and are moving more and more into business.
Wikis are surely opening up the possibilities now. No wonder enterprise content management providers are considering wiki an important feature that they want to offer their clients.
What would be interesting to see is how organizations are going to integrate the wiki model into their existing Content management system. Guess this would give one more reason for ECM players to tell their clients to upgrade!
Posted by: Vijeesh Papulli | July 04, 2006 at 11:59 AM