Hello to our community members: I and the other members of the SDN and BPX team would like your feedback on the benefits you gain and the role you see for these communities... I believe there are three big categories where SDN and BPX provide benefits to our members, both as individuals and as companies. I'd like to hear examples supporting this hypothesis, other benefits not noted here, and also contrary opinions about what are the real benefits of our communities and what should be the roles we (the SAP Community Network team -- the group that manages SDN and BPX behind the scenes) play. The three big categories of benefits and roles as I see them: 1) Accelerate and broaden your success. A. Help you optimize your core IT by comparing with and using others' best practices, beyond basic implementation. B. Help you achieve faster time to productivity on Netweaver and other SAP technologies (overcome challenges and issues in implementation or optimization) by applying SAP and others' solutions and approaches. In part, by connecting experts who have been there before with beginners or people who are implementing something new to them, to spread knowledge and learnings thru experience. C. Help you extend your SAP implementation both broader and deeper by seeing the value of other modules you may not have implemented yet (MDM, BI, NW04, xApps...), and by connecting with other heterogeneous (non-SAP) systems and components. D. Help you better prepare for future IT roles both at the company level and at the individual professional skills level. 2) Foster (co-)innovation. A. Provide insight into emerging trends, either thru articles and blogs where trends are discussed explicitly, or by you noting hot spots in technology or practices on your own. B. Give customers access to our partner solutions (Systems Integrators and ISVs with technology add-ons, etc.) to help both the customers/users and the partners. C. Connect our expert users with each other so SDN and BPX members can collaborate and co-innovate together. D. Connect our community members with SAP experts in Product Management and Development groups, so you can provide inputs to product direction, and so SAP gets the benefit of real-world experience in setting priorities for development. 3) Drive value to customers, SIs, and other software solution provider ISVs. A. Raise visibility of individuals and partner companies in the marketplace thru articles, blogs, forums, wiki. B. Provide a way (thru our point system and other mechanisms) to establish credibility as SAP and NetWeaver experts. C. Give wide access and visibility to our members (again, as individuals, as customer companies, and as partner companies) to larger market opportunities thru our global reach to nearly 600,000 individual members in 200 countries and territories globally. D. Provide an opportunity for financial benefit to flow to and among members of the community. What I've listed above is just a starting point in the discussion.
Can you offer examples where SDN or BPX has helped you or your company in one or more of these ways? Can you add to the list where you think I've forgotten a positive impact of the SDN or BPX community to its members? Can you offer a contrary opinion and example where you think one of the above is mistaken? What have you been able to achieve -- that you wouldn't have otherwise -- as a result of participation in the communities of SDN and BPX?
