Profit Q+A: President's Guide to Collaborate '08
When Collaborate ’08 descends on Denver, CO in mid-April, the Oracle Applications User Group (OAUG) will—as in years past—be one of the marquee hosts. The 18-year old independent user group has the mission of representing the interests of the developers, managers, and users that employ Oracle Applications in the enterprise. This means making sure that users’ voices have a role in influencing future product requirements and strategy.
But it also means supporting education, interaction, and collaboration within the user community. This is what Collaborate ‘08, hosted in a partnership with the Independent Oracle User Group (IOUG) and Qwest, is all about. But with more than 7,500 attendees, 550 sessions, and 80 special interest and geographic user group meetings, Collaborate is packed with stuff do and learn. Profit Online spoke to OAUG president Jan Wagner to get his view on the role of the OAUG and what not to miss at Collaborate ’08.
PROFIT: What is the value of the OAUG being an independent user group?
WAGNER: We love Oracle, and Oracle is supposed to love us. I think it’s a good marriage. We’re still able to disagree on some issues, and we try to be a trusted advisor to Oracle. But we also are able to tell Oracle, “Okay, this was not so good,” and we have membership that says, “There’s something wrong here.”
We’re not just another add-on to the Oracle marketing. We are the advocate for the users. We need Oracle, but we would like Oracle to need us, and I think Oracle as a company benefits hearing the thoughts of active customers, customers that care about the products.
Collaborate is our show, it’s users for users, but we couldn’t run that without Oracle. We’re all using the Oracle products, so we need Oracle there to tell us the latest strategy. But we also need the users there to tell them, “That’s my experience, that’s how I implemented.”
PROFIT: I imagine the definition of a user has changed quite a bit since you joined the OAUG board in 2004. How has it changed the OAUG and Collaborate?
WAGNER: When I joined, it was fairly easy to define. It was for E-Business Suite users and our audience or our membership was E-business Suite users. But with the Oracle strategy of acquiring other products and other applications, these have gotten a lot more diverse.
An application user today is not just an E-business Suite user, but also PeopleSoft, Retek, JD Edwards--they’re all there. In the beginning, it was a little frustrating for an old organization like ours to get in line with that. But today I think we welcome the more diverse picture of the Oracle applications.
PROFIT: What advice do you give to a customer who came to Oracle thought an acquisition? How do you prepare them for Collaborate?
WAGNER: I tell people to make sure to choose sessions that they’re truly interested in. There might not be 200 people in the room, there might only be 25, but the quality of the session has nothing to do with how many people there are in the room.
The other thing I will say make sure that you, from the time you arrive, start networking. Find somebody who been to Collaborate before and ask, “What should I do, what is your advice?” Collaborate is about education and networking. If your network, you will find countless other users who are willing to help you find out what you should do.
PROFIT: What advice do you give non-technical attendees about Collaborate?
WAGNER: There’s something for all at Collaborate. But I would emphasize the Special Interest Groups (SIGs). We have about over 80 SIGs that meet on Sunday. And that covers the right spectrum, from the application upgrade SIG, the industry-focused SIGs, the Hyperion SIG--all of those who have special interests will meet there. So if you are a CIO, a business analyst, or are you a hands-on user, there will be a SIG you can attend that will be focused on exactly what your interest is
PROFIT: How about you personally? I presume you’ve been going to the show for several years. What is it that you look forward to when you go to the show?
WAGNER: We’ve been spoiled the last two years of having the Oracle president, Charles Phillips, opening on Monday evening. He’s actually used our stage the last two years to announce some big Oracle news. Two years ago it was Application Unlimited. Last year it was the Applications Integration Architecture. So we’re expecting something to be announced on our stage this year as well and I’m looking forward to hear what Charles has to tell the user community Monday evening.
From a personal perspective, as a user, I would look at Cliff Godwin who will come and talk about the upgrade to E-Business Suite Release 12. Steve Miranda will talk with our Fusion Council about Fusion. There are a lot of other Oracle executives that are giving keynotes, non-competitive sessions. I look forward to all of those.
I’m an E-business Suite user and my focus will be on learning as much as I can about where is R12 going. And in between that, I will also try to learn more about the Fusion strategy. What can I learn, what do I need to be able to do to prepare myself for Fusion in the coming years? Is the path for an E-business Suite user going to R12, or do I just stay on 11i and wait until Fusion is ready? That’s some of the things I look forward to at Collaborate.
Aaron Lazenby is Editorial Director of Profit Online.
