Forrester: Enterprise Content Management Misstep
April 14, 2017
I have stated in the past that mid tier consulting firms—that is, outfits without the intellectual horsepower of a McKinsey, Bain, or BCG—generate work that is often amusing, sometimes silly, and once in a while just stupid. I noted an error which is certainly embarrassing to someone, maybe even a top notch expert at mid tier Forrester. The idea for a consulting firm is to be “right” and to keep the customer (in this case Hyland) happy. Also, it is generally good to deliver on what one promises. You know, the old under promise, over deliver method.
How about being wrong, failing, and not delivering at all? Read on about Forrester and content management.
Context
I noted the flurry of news announcements about Forrester, a bigly azure-chip consulting firm. A representative example of these marketing news things is “Microsoft, OpenText, IBM Lead Forrester’s ECM Wave in Evolving Market.” The write up explains that the wizards at Forrester have figured out the winners and losers in enterprise content management. As it turns out, the experts at Forrester do a much better job of explaining their “perception” of content management that implementing content management.
How can this be? Paid experts who cannot implement content management for reports about content management? Some less generous people might find this a minor glitch. I think that consultants are pretty good at cooking up reports and selling them. I am not too confident that mid tier consulting firms and even outfits like Booz, Allen has dotted their “i’s” and crossed their “t’s.”
Let me walk you through this apparent failure of Forrester to make their reports available to a person interested in a report. This example concerns a Forrester reviewed company called Hyland and its OnBase enterprise content management system.
The deal is that Hyland allows a prospect to download a copy of the Forrester report in exchange for providing contact information. Once the contact information is accepted, the potential buyer of OnBase is supposed to be able to download a copy of the Forrester report. This is trivial stuff, and we are able to implement the function when I sell my studies. Believe me. If we can allow registered people to download a PDF, so can you.
The Failure
I wanted a copy of “The Forrester Wave: ECM Business Content Services.” May I illustrate how Forrester’s enterprise content management system fails its paying customers and those who register to download these high value, completely wonderful documents.
Step 1: Navigate to this link for OnBase by Hyland, one of the vendors profiled in the allegedly accurate, totally object Forrester report
Step 2: Fill out the form so Hyland’s sales professionals can contact you in hopes of selling you the product which Forrester finds exceptional
Note the big orange “Download Now” button. I like the “now” part because it means that with one click I get the high-value, super accurate report.
Step 3: Click on one of these two big green boxes:
I tested both, and both return the same high value, super accurate, technically wonderful reports—sort of.
Step 4: Click on the download PDF
Step 5: Click on this weird little icon which means download the “real” PDF
Step 6: Now click on English, the only language available
Step 6: Enjoy this error because the Forrester enterprise content management report delivery system does not work.
Because the screenshot is difficult to read, here is the text of the error message:
An error occurred while loading the PDF
PDF .js v1.0.606 (build: c6c4583)
Message: Unexpected server response (404) while retrieving PDF
“https://kloudrydermcaasicmforester.s3.amazonaws.com/mcaas/Reprints/RES132386.pdf”
I am confident that Forrester and Hyland will discuss this minor problem. If I were Hyland, I would not be pleased with Forrester’s implementation of the report delivery. Hyland probably paid thousands to Forrester, an outfit which cannot make a simple PDF download work. Forget the stupid user experience and interface. Forrester seems unable to implement content management. And this outfit is an expert in the field?
Wow. My former boss at Booz, Allen & Hamilton would have been a bit testy if I had failed in this manner. Hmmm. Testy might be the wrong word. How about “ballistic”? Right, not “testy.”
Careless, Indifferent, or Clueless?
What’s amusing me this morning is the fact that a mid tier consulting firm which charges money for its really, totally objective reports about content management cannot implement its own content management system.
I think I have made this point: Writing and marketing are one thing. Implementing and delivering are another, particularly when experts write about content yet are unable to deliver it for their paying customers.
Perhaps Forrester will blame Amazon? Perhaps Forrester will blame Hyland? Perhaps Forrester will blame one of the vendors profiled in its super reliable, high value report?
What’s missing from this list of blame targets?
Forrester itself. A technical milestone for content delivery. It does not work. Ah, mid tier consulting firms. Amazing!
Stephen E Arnold, April 14, 2017
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