Our Thinking

So, let me tell you a story.  This is a true story.  A personal story about a request I got from someone who is near and dear to me.

These kinds of requests are becoming more and more common and so I wanted to share what happened so that you can recognize it when somebody comes knocking on your door (or email) with a similar ask.  Who would suspect that a gift card could be the tool of a phishing attack?  You should.

Robots are transforming our world, our workplace, our work. Amazing advances in the field of robotics has machines and artificial Intelligence (AI) doing the work of humans. A recent report by the McKinsey Global Institute concluded that nearly two thirds of all jobs could have at least 30% of their activities automated by 2030.

AI is not a new topic but it’s becoming an organizational process that needs to be understood, prepared for, and ultimately adopted. As we work with clients on digital transformation and cybersecurity projects, AI is almost always a topic of interest if not intentional consideration.

From the smallest of start-ups to the largest industry leaders; all companies make a promise to their market. In some cases, they promise to simplify life, add value, or maybe provide a fun distraction. Sometimes their promises are well defined and crisp, in other cases they are accidental and unintentional.

How do they communicate this to their target audience? They communicate their promises through their branding.

For over 13 years Online has been proud to be a Genesys partner. We have helped customers throughout North America implement their Genesys solutions, map their customer journeys, and improve their overall customer experience. 

Both Gartner and Forrester research consider Genesys a leader in customer service solutions and it’s our pleasure to work with Genesys to meet the needs of PureEngage customers. 

We had a chance to ask Onliner Doug Folken, a long time Genesys practitioner, to share with us a few of his thoughts and observations on what he’s seen in the Genesys platform over the last 35 years.  Please welcome Doug to our blog – we hope you enjoy his reflection on “The Evolution of Genesys."

RSA week is always a busy time of attending presentations and training sessions, exploring the [newly expanded] Expo Hall (700+ vendors), checking out what’s new in the Early Stage Expo (aka the Sandbox), catching up with old friends/colleagues/customers, and being enticed to attend way too many parties/receptions every evening.

In a previous post we looked at Four Steps to Implementing Robotic Process Automation (RPA).  Today we will take a closer look at the first of those steps, Identify Processes, and look at how you can maximize your RPA investment by selecting high impact processes that deliver immediate ROI.

Online Business Systems unveiled their highly anticipated Digital Innovation Lab in May of 2018. The Innovation Lab connects our customers, and the difficult business problems they are trying to solve, with emerging technology. Using a set of themes, the Innovation Lab will  investigate technical trends industry experts believe will be the foundation of the next generation of digital business models.

Below is an update on some of the Machine Learning that has been taking place.....

For many years I had the privilege of playing various roles in building a community sports organization and working in sport at the provincial level, learning from coaches with immense experience, who are devoted to developing the sport community in general.

Despite being mostly retired from these roles, I still find myself applying athlete development analogies to business and professional development situations.  There is so much we can learn in business from those who are very skilled at mentoring athletes and coaches.

My first-hand experience with athletic coaches combined with my consulting role at Online has provided me with some insight I’d like to share.  In Part 1 we opened with three lessons.  Here are four more:

Last fall I had the chance to share some thoughts about the value of Agile Coaches in a post I entitled 4 Ways an Agile Coach Can Boost Your Agile Adoption.  In that post I recommended that the Scrum Master should not act at the Agile Coach – this recommendation prompted several fellow Agile practitioners to reach out to me for clarification around WHY I was asserting this recommendation.  Many of them reminded me that the Scrum Guide™ mentions that coaching is one of the foremost responsibilities of a Scrum Manager and others reasoned that an experienced Scrum Master should be able to carry out most of the responsibilities that I have outlined for an Agile coach in my blog.

This past year saw a continuation of established trends in cybersecurity. Breaches continue to rise, attackers are getting more sophisticated, and the market continues to be flooded with silver bullets that promise to solve all enterprise security problems in one fell swoop.  As an organization, Online works with hundreds of organizations, many in healthcare and have learned a few things. Here are five things we learned in 2018 that you and your organization should consider for moving forward: