Plone for managers: how to achieve good ROI for your organisation and really use and value the strengths of Plone

During my 15+ experience as a Plone consultant, developer, trainer and project manager, the online software ecosystem has exploded into a complex but essential part of most organisations and their core processes. I have consulted quite a few organisations in the last few years where Plone has fallen out of grace of management and the responsible manager is looking for a replacement CMS.

Almost always (and there's not a milder way to put this) the reason is one of mis-management because of wrong expectations and assumptions about what is required nowadays and which organisational resources are required to operate a large CMS backed website besides the software itself. By the time I get involved it's almost always too late: it's easier to save your face as a manager by switching to another CMS and blame the software than admit you are responsible by not understanding and underfunding the context in which the software really can and will shine.

Actually: the responsible manager is often not to blame as well because it's the developers and integrators like me and the Plone community itself that does a poor job of giving context and guidance on a management level.

This talk is not only for said managers, but even more for integrators, developers and the Plone community at large providing Plone to clients.