Presentation to a focus group of business SMEs

1. Online Business Portal For Small
And Medium Sized Enterprises
Brian Makepeace
Rob Bourne
Carleen Walker
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2. Workshop Agenda
 Introductions and project background
 Overview of UEL defined requirements
– Refreshment break
 Critical discussion breakout sessions
 Project roadmap
– Lunch
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3. Introductions and Project
Overview
Presented by
Brian Makepeace
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4. Agenda
 Introductions
 Project aim
 Objectives
 Benefits
 Plan
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5. Introductions
 Brian Makepeace
– UELconnect
– Finance and Projects Manager
– http://www.uel.ac.uk/uelconnect/staff/brian_makepeace.htm
 Rob Bourne
– UELconnect
– Learning Technologist
– http://www.uel.ac.uk/uelconnect/staff/rob_bourne.htm
 Carleen Walker
– UELconnect
– Projects Administrator
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6. Project Aim
 To increase UEL engagement in knowledge
exchange activities by developing a
networking and business resource portal for
small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs)
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7. Project Objectives
 Develop a system that provides online facilities for
SMEs to collaborate and share best practice with
other SMEs and the University of London
 Incorporate relevant business resources for SMEs
 Link this system to information about UEL’s courses
and consulting services
 Provide an access point for UEL
graduates/entrepreneurs to engage with SMEs (local
business contacts, job opportunities, internships)
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8. Project Benefits
 Provide free to use business portal for SMEs
to facilitate
– Networking and links to other SMEs, UEL
academics and graduates
– Accessing business information resources
– Skills development through access to UEL course
offerings
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9. Draft Project Plan (09/10)
 Agree Requirements July
 Functional Specification Aug
 Prototype development Aug
 Prototype review and sign off Sep
 Develop solution Oct
 Testing Nov
 Implementation Dec
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10. Overview of UEL defined
requirements
Presented by
Rob Bourne
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11. Agenda
 Setting the scene
– Social networking principles
 Potential platforms
 Requirements walkthrough
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12. Setting the scene
 Social networking
 Six degrees of separation
 Social capital
 Wisdom of the crowd
 Architecture of participation
 The power of niche
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13. Potential Platforms
 Linking in to existing social networking sites
– Linked in
– Facebook
 Open source solutions
– Boonex
– ELGG
– Drupal (CMS)
– Wordpress (Blogging software)
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14. Requirements walkthrough (1)
 Social Networking - Creation of sustainable
communities
– Individual networks linking in to wider networks
– Private groups to knowledge share/network
– Public access groups
– Method to capture business information and
individual users
– Identification of SMEs by physical location*
– Content seeding by UEL
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15. Requirements walkthrough (2)
 Content portal - Resources that have
business benefits to the SMEs
– Ideally involve low levels of manual interpretation
– Identification of specific resources
– Logical categorisation of content
– Peer review of content e.g. amazon ratings type
system
– Jobs boards to advertise positions
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16. Requirements walkthrough (3)
 Tool kits - Either hosted and integrated or
raised for awareness
– IPR/copyright resources
– Links to comms tools
– Web conferencing and collaboration solutions
– Resources for getting the best out of these tools
– Blogs wikis, project management tools
– CRM
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17. Requirements walkthrough (4)
 Dissemination of job/internship vacancies
– Structure of the request of internships
– Mechanisms for companies to target specific
individuals
– Traditional mail shot approaches
 Short courses
– Linking in to UEL offerings
– Potential for feedback with regard to new courses
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18. Requirements walkthrough (5)
 Work based learning
– Promotion of UELconnect activities in this area
 UELconnect consultancy services
– Link to our consulting services
– Context specific linking to our services
– Focus on knowledge exchange
– Showcase of developed products
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19. Requirements walkthrough (6)
 Sustainability
– Utilise feeds to refresh content
– Repeat funding rounds available in terms of
Challenge funding
– Promote contribution from SMEs with seeding,
link baiting
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20. Critical discussion
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21. Activity outline
 Two groups facilitated by UELconnect leads
 Session purpose
– CRITICALLY discuss the proposed requirements
– PROPOSE new requirements
– DEFINE importance
 Pull together the ideas
– This requirements document will then be pulled in
to a functional specification for the solution
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22. Roadmap
Presented by
Rob Bourne
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23. Roadmap
 Platform vision
 Next steps
 User group/focus group
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24. Platform vision
 What do we envisage the final product to be?
– Do you think this would be beneficial to you?
– Any other ideas?
 Is this worth doing?
– Are we replicating existing systems?
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25. Next steps
 Build
– Test
– Evaluate
– Update requirements/spec
 Build
– Test
– Evaluate
– Update requirements/spec
 Build
– Test
– Evaluate
– Update requirements/spec
Ad infinitum
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26. User group
 Main focus of the project is knowledge
exchange
 Disseminate project outcomes
 Form a sustainable user group of interested
parties
 Communications in terms of project progress
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