I Hate(d) Lotus Notes
Eric Mack got me thinking in his recent post “I have a new outlook when I hear ‘I hate Lotus Notes’ or ‘Lotus Notes sucks’ “ about his experiences at the GTD Summit. By the way Eric, did you sneak the word “outlook” in there intentionally.
You see, having had to use Lotus Notes in a past life and now again with The Salvation Army, I have heard myself saying these very words. Time and time again I would hear Lotus Notes experts tell me that Notes was superior to the Microsoft alternatives because it had the foundation to do so much more, to be customised to suit the needs of an organisation so much better.
This was all very well, but they never actually pointed me to this flexibility in action. In fact, things were always organised, or at least seemed to be organised to cause the poor old end user as much heart-ache as possible. So if this flexibility actually existed, where was it in the wild?
I can now confirm I have seen, tried and actually bought a template for Lotus Notes that makes me say, “I love Lotus Notes.” That template is eProductivity. Even forgetting the productivity gains I have made by using Lotus Notes with eProductivity (and I can’t forget them so I’ll blog further about them in the future), it really has opened my eyes to the potential of Notes.
Still the question needs to be asked, “Why has a program with the potential of Lotus Notes not done better in the market?” Maybe the answer is that IBM seems happy to neither promote it nor train end users. So all the unlucky ones (ie. most) get is frustration…
If you want to join with me in my journey with Lotus Notes and eProductivity, I’ll be blogging regularly about my experience right here. Follow me by rss feed, by email or through Twitter
Please note that these posts are all my own thoughts and experiences. I will also be taking advantage of Eric’s kind public offer.
Tags: eProductivity, Eric Mack, Lotus Notes, Productivity
March 14th, 2009 at 7:27 am
I hate(d) Lotus Notes http://tinyurl.com/cmskkc New blog post #fb
March 14th, 2009 at 7:28 am
I hate(d) Lotus Notes http://tinyurl.com/cmskkc New blog post #eProductivity
March 14th, 2009 at 7:31 am
RT @shroedernz: I hate(d) Lotus Notes http://tinyurl.com/cmskkc [great post]
March 14th, 2009 at 9:28 am
RT @shroedernz I hate(d) Lotus Notes http://tinyurl.com/cmskkc New blog post #eProductivity
March 14th, 2009 at 10:30 am
I used Notes for over a year in 2000/1 and it drove me mad. Nothing was intuitive nor followed accepted user interface conventions.
I could tell it was a powerful system, but there seemed to be no way to easily unlock that power. The organisation I worked for just dumped it on me and my 100,000+ colleagues and all it became was a clunky poor email system.
I am watching your Notes/eProductivity journey with close interest and am increasingly tempted to switch! Of course it is easier to do so now that I control my own technology choices.
Why have IBM done such a poor system of marketing this tool? It seems a template like eProductivity is ‘all’ it takes so why don’t IBM do it out of the box?
Gavin Knights last blog post..Should Cullen be Charged?
March 14th, 2009 at 11:10 am
@Gavin Knight
My point precisely. But if you read Eric Mack’s posts, you’ll find that it can even be difficult for people to purchase Notes once they’ve seen the beauty of eProductivity!
Go figure…
March 15th, 2009 at 9:52 am
RT @shroedernz: I hate(d) Lotus Notes http://tinyurl.com/cmskkc New blog post #eProductivity >>> very nice post
March 15th, 2009 at 9:52 am
RT @shroedernz: I hate(d) Lotus Notes http://tinyurl.com/cmskkc New blog post #eProductivity >>> very nice post
March 15th, 2009 at 5:46 pm
Is this guy nuts or what? he says he LOVES LOTUS NOTES! See his blog: http://tinyurl.com/cmskkc
March 18th, 2009 at 9:33 pm
@Gavin
Everybody in the Lotus community ask exactly the same question, why IBM does not make a bigger marketing effort ?
Regarding the templates, there are some that come from 90′s. Their interface obsolete and everything but attractive. In any case, you can find commercial ones as good as GTD is, and additionally, at http://www.openntf.org there are plenty of free templates. Some of them as good as commercial ones.
Lotus has made and is making a great development effort in the las release. And I, as a Lotus consultant, hope that there will be a rise in Lotus deployments if IBM can change the perception of the product old version users have.
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