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My edventures in ebusiness:
The Story of My Experiments w/ Truth

CHRISTIAN MICHAEL SARKAR
E-mail: csarkar@onewwworld.com

EXPERTISE:

Demand Generation: combine online and off-line campaigns to create efficient lead generation programs for products and services
eCommunity Development & Management: building learning communities; creating strategic audiences receptive to related marketing messages, knowledge-sharing, and commercial opportunities
eStrategy Consulting: helping companies with e-transformation strategy development and implementation
Knowledge Management & Planning: knowledge mapping of business-critical information needs; analyzing business needs and developing cross-functional, collaborative systems.
Intranet/Extranet/Internet Development: developing transactive and content-based solutions.
Business Development: alliance/partnership development, proposal writing, delivering presentations.
Competitive Intelligence: researching and gathering business critical competitive information; creating online CI applications; developing and presenting strategic CI reports and recommendations.
Process Reengineering: optimizing work processes using high-falutin' consulting methodologies.
Corporate & Marketing Communications: stakeholder change communications; strategic communications; speech-writing; creating innovative, integrated, communications campaigns.
Teaching/Instructional Systems Design: understanding of teaching and training methodologies in corporate and academic settings.
wait, there's more!

PROJECTS:

>>>>

Latest Project: Lead on a Demand Gen Process Reengineering Team at BMC Software. My recommendations are being used in a series of "action-learning" projects based on our findings. The goal is to double the number of leads at half the cost!

Fun-in-Progress: working on building John Seely Brown's site...

Big Wish: to find a few serious sponsors to back my dotnet community idea!

A Cool Project (outside work): I got to design John Hagel's site. John is one of my web-heroes. His books are the main reason I got into the community business in the first place...

Meanwhile: I work on the development of community sites for BMC Software. I seem to spend a lot of time explaining how communities work- getting marketing, sales, and the business units all on the same page. As Manager, Online Communities at BMC, I'm the founding nerd/editor-in-chief of their learning communities http://www.bmc.com/communities. I'm responsible for the following "mind-share" sites:

www.linuxvalue.com- a site about the business value of Linux (co-sponsored by RedHat and SUSE) Over 20,000 people opted-in within two weeks of the launch of this site.

www.agilebrain.com- an e-zine dedicated to ideas for e-business

www.qualityofexperience.org - an online learning community focused on optimizing the e-business experience (site partners include: Pricewaterhouse Coopers, Sun Microsystems, Patricia Seybold Group, and Summit Strategies)

www.nextslm.org - a community providing clear, concise answers about Service Level Management (site partners include: Pricewaterhouse Coopers and Sun Microsystems)

www.dbazine.com - an online portal for database professionals (Traffic is now over 50K unique visitors per month- the average user spends just under an hour on this site! )

www.storageU.org - a fledgling online community about storage management. The site was mothballed and may come back someday (!).

The communities were featured on marketingsherpa.com "Top 10 B2B Online Marketing Case Studies"- see Case Study #7!

Nextslm.org won a marketing award from ITSMA and was named an Information Week site of the week- twice! ITSMA also features us in their best practices white paper (see page 14)!

Agilebrain.com was mentioned in the October 2001 issue of Sales and Marketing Management magazine.

I joined the corporate strategy team and completed an overdue process reengineering initiative assignment- that's all I can say about that. Every now and then I help out with webstuff on BMC.com- eg. I developed the "user experience" for BMC's first product to be sold online. I also developed their e-business solutions page, and numerous other e-business related pages.

For about five minutes I worked on a site for Jesper Parnevik, our BMC-sponsored "golfer-celebrity-dude". I thought I captured his personality... but his handlers didn't. I expect he'll get a corporate site like Tiger's. Jakob Nielsen told me that celebrity sites often have bad usability, because fans put up with it. Oh well. The rest of us don't have that luxury. There really is a bad user-experience epidemic- especially in show business, fashion, and music - all industries in which style is sometimes more important than substance. Unfortunately most creative types don't understand that online your style sucks if you can't navigate simply, easily ala Amazon, Yahoo, or the BBC...

>>>> Before BMC, I was VP, eBusiness at an Internet strategy consultancy where I:

assisted with estrategy development for a spin-off company from the Peppers and Rogers Group (the usual "content-community-commerce" type thing).

developed a website solution for a seismic signal processing company which included customizable extranets for customers, database driven pages with "edit this page" functionality, and community features such as a workshop, discussion, and permission-based marketing..

advised Holland Chemicals International on the development and implementation of their world-wide estrategy. Created a series of executive level workshops- used to educate and prioritize e-initiatives.

designed and developed a prototype of an e-commerce (B2B) website for Memphis gloves, one of the largest manufacturers of industrial gloves.

designed a site for a proposed international community/webzine sponsored by Texaco, Mobil, Exxon and Chevron.

developed content strategy, contributed numerous best-practice articles and interviews for Compaq's industry-leading e-zine, CLIP (www.clipwebzine.com - see "articles" section below) Recently CLIP was taken off the web- stupid, stupid, stupid.

developed a pilot e-commerce site for one of the nation's largest tire dealerships.

developed a strategic review blueprint for activeAnswers, Compaq's enterprise solutions web portal for corporate customers; the review includes an audit and recommendations to improve the strategy, content, and usability of the active Answers website- focused on improving the "total customer experience." Activeanswers is a vendor-based community, with all of Compaq's major partners as participants.

created specifications and pilot model for a hospital Patient Information System which enables physicians to view secure patient records and information via the internet.

designed a web-based tracking system used by a Swiss-based freight forwarding company to status, track and clear shipments across the globe.

developed a methodology and system specifications for competitive intelligence monitoring in the energy industry for a major oil and chemicals company.

developed a "best-practices" e-forum website sponsored by Compaq intended for use by CXOs.

>>>>Before that I was a freelance consultant (mostly working w/ Bechtel):

developed a transcontinental intranet linking three US multi-nationals (Shell, Mobil, Bechtel) with their alliance partners in Peru and Brazil. The website provided instant, secure access to critical plans, schedules, reports, procedures, and design and training documents. It linked 14 separate construction jobsites in the rainforests of Peru.
designed intranet site for Bechtel's Information Systems department. The site is accessed by employees across the globe and contains FAQs, problem-reporting mechanisms, on-line user support, and procedures, guidelines, and software documentation.
provided web consulting services for a subsidiary of Saipem/ENI, the Italian oil and gas multinational.
designed a technical sales website for Special Core Analysis Laboratories, Inc., a global consultant to major oil companies.
created web-enabled intelligence reports on products, countries, customers, and competitors for Bechtel's Petroleum and Chemicals Global Industry Unit.
worked with Bechtel's Latin America Operations manager to create a Project Performance Improvement Toolkit based on the quality "gap-model."

>>>>Back in 1996-1997 I took a year-long sabbatical from the corporate world to teach High School Geometry, Trigonometry, and Probability & Statistics!

>>>>My first job/"learning experience" at Bechtel included several positions over a period of seven years:

Intranet Developer, Corporate Development:

developed and designed Bechtel's award-winning intranet- BecWeb (featured in PCWeek-July 15, 1996); designed over 40 integrated sitelets for various industry units, regions, functions, departments, and disciplines.
project Manager for Mobil's first e-commerce project, a pilot program to integrate Mobil's work processes with its vendors. The web-based solution cut the cycle-time for equipment purchasing, manufacturing, and delivery by 50 percent.
developed "Implementing the Global Knowledge Network: A Methodology for the Strategic Management of Knowledge," a strategic, information management planning guideline for Bechtel; Also authored "BecWeb Implementation Plan" blueprint for the global implementation of Bechtel's intranet. Showed strategic importance of BecWeb to management by holding demonstrations for key groups and teams all across Bechtel to build support for Bechtel's web-initiatives.
developed and maintained Athena, a website with market information and competitive intelligence for use by Business Development; the website is a critical part of Bechtel's global competitive intelligence gathering process.

In addition, I served as Organizational Communications Lead on Bechtel's global reengineering initiative. Teamed with consultants from Coopers & Lybrand, Ernst & Young, and McKinsey. I held focus groups around the world to identify stakeholders and "trouble" issues; directed a series of video productions "making the case for change," which included frank conversations with customers, suppliers, and internal senior management; developed and implemented an integrated corporate change-communications plan. Had fun meeting and working w/ Fred Gluck- former head of McKinsey. Fred Gluck taught me a valuable lesson. He said something like "the sky's the limit, as long as you let other people take the credit." He was right- to this day! :-)

Prior to that, I worked in Public Relations for a year- I wrote articles in newspapers, trade journals, and broadcast media; produced a media campaign which won Bechtel the 1993 Texas Environmental Expo "enviro-communicator award; produced coordinated brochures, newsletters, and related marketing tools; wrote executive speeches on topics such as NAFTA, quality, continuous improvement, performance metrics, reengineering, competitiveness, etc.; I was Editor of an award-winning employee newsletter and I helped implement an employee television system - Bechtelvision - I was in charge of content programming (stuff like job awards, corporate news, project accomplishments, promotions, employee recognition, employee activities, and Bechtel history).

My first Bechtel job out of college was as Automation Planning & Management Support Specialist , Automation Technology. I'm still trying to figure out what that means! I was the primary writer of the corporate standard for IT planning- "Bechtel Automation Handbook"; I was Project Manager, "Automation Value Measurement Methodology project" - which developed a methodology for measuring the value of automation products and services using a value-engineering approach (this stuff is still applicable to the e-world!); Project Manager, Automation Technology HELPline Implementation project - implemented the first integrated HELPline at Bechtel to improve the quality of global service levels. I also worked on the numerous process improvement initiatives: Disaster Recovery Planning, Capacity Planning, Workstation Deployment, Project Metrics; researched and developed material for industry seminars, proposals and presentations; assisted in development of operating center budget initiatives for a $14 million operating center; organized automation technology forums on 3D modeling and automation planning for proposals; assisted in project proposal development (STAR, Conoco, Chevron, Maraven); created corporate automation training program development module using instructional systems design methodology; developed automation plans for STAR, Chevron, and Conoco projects- significantly reducing reducing capital costs.

EDUCATION:

I studied Electrical Engineering for four years, and in my final semester decided I didn't really want to be an engineer. I switched and got a degree in English Literature from the University of Houston (yes, I was an Honors nerd). I studied everything from quantum mechanics to lithography to differential equations to Walker Percy, all in preparation for the web. My Homer Noodleman cartoons appeared daily in the Cougar-- "I came to fight wickedness in high places, but they made me do the dishes."

LANGUAGES:

German, Romanian, Hindi, Bengali, Sanskrit. Studied Spanish and French.

REFERENCES:

Contact me for current references, but since the waiting-period on these is over, I can release them to the public... :-)

ARTICLES & INTERVIEWS:

"Attention, Management! An interview with Thomas Davenport"
http://www.agilebrain.com/davenport.html
How can a company capture attention in this, the age of the distracted customer? What happened to knowledge management? What next for ERP? Thomas Davenport shares his insights.

Use it or Lose it: Improving the Online Experience - an interview with usability guru Jakob Nielsen
http://www.qualityofexperience.org/nielsen.html

The Customer Revolution: an interview with Patricia Seybold
http://www.agilebrain.com/pseybold.html

The Webhouse that Ralph Built: an interview with the Dr. Ralph Kimball
http://www.dbazine.com/kimball.html

Creating The Loyal Customer: another interview w/ Jakob Nielsen
http://www.agilebrain.com/jakob.html

Considerations for Selecting Your ASP
http://www.agilebrain.com/aspselection.html
What does the Application Service Provider (ASP) model bring to your company? How do you start the selection process? Pointers to get you started.

"One-To-One With Don Peppers"
http://www.onewwworld.com/peppers.html
One-to-one marketing and customer relationship management are well-accepted concepts by now. 1to1 guru Don Peppers explains how companies like Amazon.com, Levi Strauss and Mercury Asset Management are using the latest CRM techniques to attract and keep loyal customers.

"E-Business At Warp Speed: Interview with Sanjiv Sidhu"
http://www.onewwworld.com/sidhu.htm
Is speed the competitive edge in the New Economy? Supply-Chain Management pioneer Sanjiv Sidhu, President & CEO of i2 Technologies, explains the new challenges facing the business world and how your company can survive the coming transition.

"Permission To Succeed"
http://www.onewwworld.com/permission.htm
Everything you know about Web marketing is wrong, says Yahoo VP Seth Godin. In his new book, Permission Marketing, Godin debunks popular myths and explains the best practices of Web marketing, including how to solidify customer relationships.

"Relationship Management"
http://www.onewwworld.com/crm.html
Aaaargh, not another buzzword! But Customer Relationship Management may really hold the key to your company's future.

"Building Profitable Relationships: CRM Tools"
http://www.onewwworld.com/crmtools.html
A survey of the leading Customer Relationship Management (CRM) tools to help you get closer to your customers.

"The Next CRM: Going 1-to-1 with Constituent Relationship Management"
http://www.onewwworld.com/relateto.html
Your key constituents demand a "real" relationship with your company...

"The Science Of Cyber Shopping: Interview with Paco Underhill"
http://www.onewwworld.com/underhill.html
Retail consultant Paco Underhill recently made a splash with his book "The Science of Shopping," which discusses how to merchandise successfully in both the physical and virtual worlds. In this interview, he talks about current trends in both worlds and how one affects the other.

"Casing the Competition: Interview with Leonard Fuld"
http://www.onewwworld.com/fuld.html
CI guru Leonard Fuld talks about how companies are using technology to gather competitive intelligence about their markets.

"Marketing Online: Interview with Jim Sterne"
http://www.onewwworld.com/sterne.htm
High-tech author and marketing expert Jim Sterne talks about the Internet as a marketing medium.

"Usability Guru: Interview with Jakob Nielsen"
http://www.onewwworld.com/nielsen.html
Jakob Nielsen advises companies on how to make their websites, public or internal,more user-friendly.

"You Say You Want a Knowledge Revolution: Interview with Thomas Davenport"
http://www.onewwworld.com/davenport.html
Knowledge management guru Thomas Davenport discusses the future of knowledge management in the Internet era.

"Infomediation: An interview with John Hagel"
http://www.onewwworld.com/hagel.html
Net Gain and Net Worth author John Hagel talks about his new book and the future of business-customer relationships in the Internet era. This is when I really got into communities...

Other articles which no longer exist online- (someday I'll post them on this site):

"E-Business -- An ASP Solutions Cheat-Sheet for IT Managers"
http://www.alentis.com/aspinfo.asp?aspinfoID=911
Chosen carefully, ASPs can meet the specific needs of your organization and can expand your role on the Web faster and more profitably. What's required is detailed knowledge of your eBusiness infrastructure's strengths and weaknesses and which resources can help you meet the challenge of the global, eMarketplace.

"Turning Information Into Intelligence"
Six steps to make your competitive intelligence initiative a success.

"Ideas for Intelligence"
A look at the resources that can help give your company a leg up on the competition.

"The Self Serve Intranet"
Corporate departments like Human Resources are finding that it often makes sense to let employees administer their own benefits plans. Fannie Mae's experiences with PeopleSoft show the value of this approach.

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