Real-Time TeamworkReal-Time Teamwork

Among the apps employees will find on Galileo are a host of IBM Lotus Software tools, including Notes for E-mail, Lotus Team Workplace for collaboration, and Lotus Instant Messaging. Nektar is a rare example of a company that has embedded presence in its E-mail and team workspaces and throughout its portal. Any time a Nektar employee's name appears in any of those places, floating the mouse over that name will provide a glimpse into that person's online availability, as well as a link to a directory listing that provides comprehensive contact information and, potentially, details about the person's role and expertise.

Over the next year, Nektar plans to extend presence to let employees connect to each other directly from within documents or search results, says Heidi Rebottaro, project manager of application development. Down the line, the portal may be extended to external partners, who would have access to reports and their authors.

The technological hurdles of making such an environment a reality pale in comparison to the cultural hurdles in promoting new ways of working, Rebottaro says. "The technology isn't that hard to deploy. It will be the behavioral change we'll need to work on."

Based on the progress vendors are making and the interest among companies, many in the workplace will have no choice but to ride with the changes. Real-time collaboration is on the way. Presence awareness in the enterprise is inevitable. Integration of data and voice over the Internet is being refined. And new standards, if all goes as anticipated, will hook together the various elements seamlessly via portals. Once it's all running, the workplace isn't likely to be the same.

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