Decision Makers Guide:

Best Practices for Converting from Lotus Notes/Domino to Google Apps

Contents
How Did We Get Here? The Evolution on End User Computing The Ten Steps How to Evaluate Google Apps Step 1: Determine if Cloud Computing with Google Apps is Right for My Organization Step 2: Quantify Bottom Line Benefits to the Business / Business Unit Step 3: Quantify Soft Benefits Step 4: Look for References and Customers Who Have Already Made the Switch Step 5: Get Experienced Step 6: Assess Your Training Needs Step 7: Determine Resource Needs Step 8: Determine Data to be Migrated Step 9: Present Your Case to Senior Management Step 10: Implement Google Apps / Follow Up with Users 2 2 2 3 3 4 5 6 7 8 8 9

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Question: What if there were a way to replicate the functionality that was provided by Lotus Notes/Domino, add the functions of Lotus personal productivity applications and deliver it for a fraction of the cost with secure, managed uptime? Answer: Google, the global leader in search, authors Google Apps, applications that give you and your team functionality commonly associated with the Lotus Notes family of products: email, document creation, spreadsheets, and presentation software. Organizations that use Google Apps enjoy real-time collaboration, 100 percent web accessibility, lower capital outlay and decreased operational expenses. Additionally, they benefit from guaranteed uptime, flexible scalability, and a globally consistent user interface. This interface is available in multiple languages, accessible by any Internet-connected device, and readily familiar to any user who

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already has an existing Gmail or webmail account. For organizations considering an upgrade to the latest version of Notes or for those that may desire a changethis document outlines a 10-step process for determining if Google Apps is a viable, cost-effective alternative.

How Did We Get Here? The Evolution of End User Computing

At its core, the computing infrastructure exists to support the needs of its end users. From the early days of centralized punch card driven mainframes, to interactive mainframes, to minicomputers, to disconnected PCs, to networked PCs, and now finally to Internet based cloud computing, end users have adopted the technology that would help them get their jobs done faster and cheaper while offering a competitive advantage. Each successive wave of dominant computing platforms has brought with it and been driven by: Lower acquisition and ownership costs per user; Greater end user functionality; Greater end user empowermentthat is the ability for end users to achieve higher levels of productivity with less IT involvement.

Although this new wave of computing is allowing more end user involvement, IT has not become less relevant. Rather, IT professionals have become more important because they are focusing on delivering functionality to a newly expanded pool of end users and on the higher value add of end user productivity. Little argument exists that Lotus Notes/Domino has played a leadership role in technology evolution. It has relieved location-based and network connectivity limitations and enabled organization-wide messaging and collaboration. Environmental factors, insufficient network bandwidth, and data movement were absolutely show-stopping technological concerns that were solved with the replication technology in Notes/Domino. However, those innovations occurred before the reliable, inexpensive Internet became readily available on a global scale. Just as Lotus Notes/Domino revolutionized and empowered corporate workers of all ranks, cloud computing with Google Apps represents the next increment in the natural evolution towards computing that is better for end users, cheaper for organizations and faster for those who adopt the new technology. The underlying infrastructure, the Internet and TCP/IP based networking, has become sufficiently dependable to enable cloud hosted, centralized mission critical applicationseven for distributed organizations. Google Apps allows organizations to exploit these new capabilities and reap the benefits at a minimum of cost.

The Ten Steps How to Evaluate Google Apps

Step 1: Determine if Cloud Computing with Google Apps is Right for Your Organization
Cloud computing, using resources outside of the organization to deliver end user computing, has clear cost advantages. If one or more of the following is true for your organization, then Google Apps is worthy of consideration. Desire to Reduce Capital Outlay for Technology Acquisition: Most cloud computing models are offered as a pay as you go servicewith organizations only incurring expenses for the resources they consume. Rather than purchasing capacity in advance of demand (software licenses, device endpoints, storage and storage management, servers, etc.), companies can scale costs with the value being received and expand capacity when needed. Desire to Reduce Operating Expenses for the Lifecycle of the Application: Google Apps handles patching, upgrading and other maintenance activities seamlessly behind the scenes, reducing IT overhead.

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Platform/ Location Freedom for Traveling and Remote Users: Applications and documents stored by Google Apps are available from any location and any device with Internet connectivity and the proper credentials. They can equally support Windows, Apple and Linux desktop/laptop users, as well as Blackberry, iPhone, Android and mobile users. Need to Focus on Core Business Considerations: As organizations streamline their business functions, non-core activities like providing email can and should be outsourced. Outsourcing will allow the businesses to focus on their core activities, selling goods and services at a sustainable profit. Desire to Stay Ahead of the Curve and the Competition: Keeping ahead of technology trendsor, at the very least, keeping pacepositions companies to learn how to leverage advantages to the benefit of their revenue gaining and cost containment goals.

Step 2: Quantify Bottom Line Benefits to the Business / Business Unit

Compelling technology offers measurable cost savings to an organization and allows calculation of soft costs and benefits that will increase the technologys value. Specifically, you should measure: Software Acquisition Costs: Lotus Domino plus Lotus SmartSuite costs $450 per user based on published pricing1. Google Apps costs $50 per user, per year, with no upfront capital outlay. Hardware Acquisition Costs: Lotus Domino requires the purchase and maintenance of the server hardware to support email. Google Apps greatly minimizes server investment by relying on the processing power of Googles data centers and an existing desktop, laptop, or netbook. Cost of Storage: Electronic mail and files created by end users consume 35 to 70 percent of an organizations storage. Storage consumption, largely driven by increased email traffic and retention, increases 30 to 35 percent per year, per user. Storage of email and files on corporate resources can add up to significant costs. Google Apps includes storage as part of the price. Hidden Costs: o Backup Backup is not free. According to a popular vendor website, the core backup product costs $995 to purchase, plus $595 for the special agent that is able to backup Lotus Domino servers. Performing backups of the mail system requires staff time to setup, execute and secure the process. o E-discovery In the event of litigation, email and documents are admissible and, in some cases, the primary evidence used to prove a legal accusation. Firms in regulated industries (healthcare, securities, government) have additional compliance requirements involving the proper storage, discoverability and retention of documents and email. Email archiving and e-discovery can be quite costly for firms that maintain their own internal document creation and email management systems. On-premise email archiving can add $50 in software acquisition costs per user and increase the storage consumed by seven times, depending on retention policies. Software maintenance and upgrades can add significantly to yearly operating costs. o Disaster Recovery Firms dependent on internal email and electronic documents are susceptible to severe business disruption in the following disaster scenarios: Natural Disasters hurricanes, earthquakes, fires, tornadoes, floods, blizzards, lightning strikes; Man Made Disasters terrorist acts, malicious/disgruntled insiders, virus attacks, denial of service attacks; Small Scale Service Interruptions power failure or server equipment failure, for example.

Step 3: Quantify Soft Benefits

Depending on organizational culture and beliefs, soft benefits can be used to increase substantiation of cost savings options. Ironically, these soft benefitssuch as increasing end user productivityare often discounted even though the provision of IT services for end users is generally 100 percent on increasing end user productivity.

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Areas of Increased Productivity IT Staff Productivity For firms with dedicated IT personnel, freeing up staff time allows them to work on more challenging and strategic projects. End User Productivity Being able to access documents and email anytime, anywhere, from many devices without having to log into the corporate VPN or remote access saves time, enhances internal security and allows your end users to get more done in less timewhile saving money. Self-Service Application Building Organizations that have already adopted Google Apps report that some departments use Google Sites to build team workspaces, portals and intranets easilywithout formal development training and without purchasing costly third-party applications. Enabling the IT / Business Partnership A highly visible, successful cutover to Google Apps demonstrates how IT aligns with the business and can set the stage for repeat, positive IT / business outcomes. Value Calculator Google offers a free value calculator that estimates messaging and productivity savings associated with switching to Google Apps. Organizations that are considering a switch to Google Apps can work with a product specialist on a savings assessment tailored to their situations.

Formula for quantifying IT Staff productivity gained at a hypothetical 500 seat organization**
For estimation purposes, one can assume that IT staffing for Notes/Domino is as follows for organizations of 500 seats: Number of end users = N FTE IT staff required = 1 + (N/150) Of course, this is a non-linear scale. Organizations with significantly higher or lower user populations will experience different savings. For estimation purposes, one can assume that IT staffing for Google Apps is as follows: Number of end users = N FTE IT staff required = N/500 So, a switch from Notes/Domino for an organization with 500 end users would free up 3+ IT FTE (full time equivalents) to address IT opportunities elsewhere in the organization.
** These numbers are for illustrative purposes only. Your results, costs, and savings may vary greatly from those represented in this model.

It also offers an additional free calculator to estimate the email savings when switching from Microsoft Exchange.

Step 4: Look for References and Customers Who Have Already Made the Switch
After determining that Google Apps will save money and increase productivity, you should talk with peers, colleagues and key industry experts to be certain that the expected benefits are the benefits received. Resources include: Google Businesses Share their stories reference deck This link includes industry specific videos of customers detailing their decision processes, implementation strategies and cost savings. The Google Apps Channel on youtube.com This video showcases customers discussing their use of Google Apps. The Google Enterprise Blog on blogspot.com The development and product management teams at Google frequently update this blog to explain developments and highlight new customers who have adopted Google Apps. Make the Move to Google Apps from Lotus Notes This is an official web resource center at Google.com. DitoWeb This is a popular Google Apps reseller / integrator website that includes client testimonials, technical information, and a newsletter. Google Marketplace A Google hosted website, this link lists resellers and add-on applications for your Google Apps deployment.

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Deployment Guide This guide outlines how to manage a successful Google Apps deployment. Migration Guide from Lotus Notes (PDF) This guide details the process of migrating from Lotus Notes 6.0 or higher to Google Apps.

Step 5: Get Experienced

Two ways exist to get experience using Google Apps, passive and active. For a passive experience, Google provides webinars free of charge. One good 6-minute video, Google Apps for Business Overview, shows the user experience and highlights features in Google Apps for corporate users. For active experience with Google Apps: 1. Sign up for Google Apps if you do not already have it. Google offers a 30-day free period when you sign up online. Check out Google Calendar, Google Docs, Google Spreadsheets, and Google Sites. 2. Check out the demos and stories on the Google Apps site. As you test drive Google Apps, you will note interface innovations like search, threading, labels, and integrated chat, and begin to understand end user benefits, and note areas that will require training. When you are ready, you should start a Google Apps pilot. A pilot lets you duplicate your production deployment on a small scale, so you can evaluate Google Apps without changing your existing infrastructure or disrupting your normal business operations. During the pilot, end users can experience Google Apps and provide feedback. Also, you can evaluate how well Google Apps improves users productivity and supports your business processes. All of these can be done with minimal risk to your existing environment. Since only a subset of your user population will pilot Google Apps, support requirements will be minimal. A pilot will also let you leverage any integration work completed during the production deployment. For example, if you decide to implement an automated user provisioning process using the Google Apps Provisioning API or provide integrated authentication through the Single Sign-on (SSO) service, you can continue to use your implementation when you scale up to a complete rollout of Google Apps. Select Which Applications to Migrate Google provides tools for organizations to migrate their Notes files to Google Apps. Google Apps includes the following: Gmail for Business This application features 25GB storage per user, less spam, a 99.9 percent uptime SLA, and enhanced email security. Calendaring, integrated video chat and email data leak protection are also included. There is no hardware or software to buy. Google Docs This application features spreadsheet, word processing, and presentation software to meet the basic needs of all but the most demanding productivity software users. Google Sites This application provides wiki functionality for end users to create their own team workspaces, websites and portals. You decide if they can share across domains as well to collaborate with customers and suppliers, for example. Run a Pilot Project The first step in piloting is to assemble your team of testers. Choose a pilot team of moderate to extremely savvy end users who have sufficient time for a two to four week pilot. Ideally, this will be a team of people who normally work together. If your organization has product managers or sales engineers, they usually make excellent test subjects because they are involved in lots of collaborative work, tend to be technology knowledgeable and can usually communicate effectively with both IT and business roles. Be sure to involve members of IT, including help desk, international users, and one or two up and coming non-senior executives. They will be able to provide executive level feedback, as well as serve as valuable endorsements on the next step.

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Many organizations that have run successful pilots find that the participation from a savvy userone who is known for pushing the limits of technologyis invaluable for uncovering both opportunities and remediation. During your trial, poll your test team for feedback. (This is a great way to test forms functionality in Google Docs!) Gather data at least one time per week. You want to understand: a. System usage; b. Tasks that testers have had difficulty accomplishing; c. New capabilities they have discovered that would be useful to share with the group. Identify objections to the Google Apps system that must be resolved before you propose the project for full rollout. The Google Apps discussion and help forums should help you find ways to overcome any objections. With more than two million businesses using Google Apps, you can tap into a community of answers and tips. Working with a Google Apps certified professional can also have a positive impact. At the conclusion of the pilot, do a gut check. Is this going to work? You should feel comfortable with the technology and be able to identify the hard and soft cost savings for your organization.

Step 6: Assess Your Training Needs

Some employees embrace new technology; others run from it. The best practice for IT is to build training into a major application rollout. Organizations should survey employees to determine how much training will be required. Smaller organizations with homogeneous worker populations may be able to switch with little or no end user training. Larger organizations may want to separate their users into two to four groups.

Training Needs by User Type

MEDIUM Focus on email training Brief training on other applications HIGH Guided instruction Written documentation Consider external training providers Pick key worker tasks for intense learning MEDIUM Train evenly on all aspects of suite Focus on feature awareness Seek volunteers to assist users in high training need group

Resistance to New Applications

LOW Focus on how to access and usage policies Brief training on other applications

% Office Suite Job Reliance

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Survey your employee base to assess training needs. Many employees probably have personal Gmail accounts. These users will find the transition seamless and will welcome being able to use key Gmail features as a part of their daily work routine. Efforts should be made to include power users in both the pilot project and potentially as trainers during the rollout. Power users typically have the savvy and desire to learn new applications. A wide variety of training vehicles, written, video and in person, are available online.

Sample questions that may help you determine training needs for users:
1. Do you use Gmail for your personal email? (Yes equals lowest training requirements.) 2. Do you use another web-based email service such as AOL, Hotmail, Yahoo, or email provided by your Internet provider? (Yes equals low training requirements.) 3. Do you use social networking such as Facebook, LinkedIn, or Twitter? (Yes equals low training requirements.) 4. Do you use an office suite of productivity tools like word processing and spreadsheets every day at work? (Yes equals higher training requirements.) 5. Do you consider yourself a fast learner? (Yes equals lower training requirements.)

Step 7: Determine Resource Needs

Migrating email and office suite users to Google Apps will involve some effort. Training, data migration, user setup, and potential workflow modification will need to be accomplished. Project planning software or a spreadsheet may be a useful way of estimating your resource requirements. Be honest with your assessments of person-hours required to achieve a task. When you have totaled up needed resource and time requirements, determine which, if any, of these tasks should be outsourced to an experienced Google Apps partner. While the Google Apps experience is designed for self-service, it is often worth it to bring in a professional who has completed several migrations. A rough measure of effort is 30 minutes of migration work per user and 15 minutes of individualized training per user. Training classes will be between 30 minutes and 2 hours per group, depending on the intensity and depth of training. Consider a 50 user migration**: 50 users x 30 minutes of migration work = 25 man hours 50 users x 15 minutes of individualized training = 12.5 man hours 4 training classes x 1.25 hours duration = 5 man hours Train the trainer, pre-rollout knowledge acquisition / study = 10 man hours Project Total = 52.5 man hours
** These numbers are for illustrative purposes only. Your results may vary significantly

Of course, there are economies of scale for larger projects, and smaller projects may involve significantly less training.

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Step 8: Determine Data to be Migrated

How do you decide if migrating data from Notes to Google Apps will impact your deployment timeline? Option 1: Big Bang Migration No legacy data is moved to the new system. This is the easiest migration approach and recommended for organizations that want to realize fast benefits. By divorcing data from application migration, end users start using Google Apps quickly. The old messaging system may stay available as a resource library, but send and receive capabilities are lost on the day of switchover. Option 2: Hybrid Migration A certain level of data, documents, and email are transitioned over to the new system, and data is migrated only for a set of users (e.g. executives). Data that is 90, 120, or 180 days old can be replicated so that users do not have to look outside of the Google Apps system for documents and messages they need. This approach can have a moderate impact on your deployment timeline. Option 3: Absolute Migration All data existing in the legacy email system and on shared drives is moved to Google Apps. This tends to be an intensive process and risks moving items that may be out of date, unused, and outside of compliance guidelines in certain industries. The advantage is that legacy applications can be decommissioned sooner. Absolute migrations disadvantage is that it is somewhat risky, time consuming, and inefficient. It potentially impacts the length and timing of your deployment. Under any scenario, remember that users store data both locally and on shared drives. Google provides a number of data migration tools to automate the transfers and data conversions. For more information about the migration tools provided by Google Apps, see deployment.googleapps.com.

Step 9: Present Your Case to Senior Management

Presenting your business case to senior management is the last step before beginning the company-wide rollout. It should include the following: Statement of Benefits: Hard benefits, including cost savings compared to an upgrade of your current platform, should be detailed. Break costs down between capital expenditures (servers, storage, and software licenses for the two systems) and operating expenses (staff expenses, consulting, software maintenance). Soft benefits include increased staff productivity, easier remote access to documents, efficient collaboration, reduction in time for managing mailboxes, and better document search and retrieval. If your organization is concerned about environmental impact, Google Apps can be presented as the greener choice because of Google Datacenter efficiency. Transition Plan: In the transition plan section, you will detail the project plan for the migration based upon your experiences with your pilot group. Be sure to detail the timeline for implementation. Factor in major corporate milestones and be sure that your migration plan does not interfere with year-end or quarter-end financial accounting deadlines or major new product introductions. Be willing to be flexible for exact timing of rollouts. Risk-averse senior management may have strong opinions about modifications to existing systems, especially if those systems and the savings you are expecting do not impact their departmental budgets. Your transition plan should also mention the training program and your plans for training before and during the rollout. Anecdotal Information from Your Pilot Team: Providing testimonials, quotes, and quips can be a colorful way to illustrate your belief that the program will be successful. This input will be especially useful if members of your decision team include marketing or sales executives who often rely on this sort of input for their decision making. Lastly, engage your audience by using the presentation as a time to demonstrate the capabilities of Google Apps. Making a business case using the tools you are recommending is a powerful testimonial to their real benefits.

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Step 10: Implement Google Apps / Follow Up with Users

Now that you have done all of your homework, demonstrated the business, financial, and productivity benefits of Google Apps and reached an agreement with the rest of the management team, it is time to send the applications out to production. Information about the actual rollout can be found on the Google website. Do not forget to schedule follow-up information gathering sessions. Make sure you are receiving the quantity and level of benefits expected. Uncover any unexpected outcomes that may have arisen during the rollout. Find and promote new uses of the Google Apps technology. Address users who may need additional or remedial training.

You may elect to conduct a formal post-implementation survey. Feedback from end users, IT, and the help desk will help you ensure that intended benefits are actually realized. It will also help you understand how to fully leverage most-used applications, and, in the case of staged rollouts, make continual improvements on that process.

IBM Lotus Notes Features and How Google Apps Compare

Notes/Domino organizations enjoy certain benefits over other messaging and application platforms. They include the following: IBM Lotus Notes/Domino
Notes/Domino offers arguably the industrys best data replication engine, allowing distributed Notes databases (.nsf files) to be automatically synchronized across geographically dispersed installations in the same network.

Google Apps
It centralizes data in the Google cloud, guaranteeing that all users access up-to-date work products from a range of Internet-ready devices. There is no need for replication because all users access a central database.

Database Replication

Collaboration

It is provided through Notes and, more recently, Quikr.

It is provided through Google Sites for ad hoc workgroup / project team / inter-domain or cross-firewall collaboration and through Google Mail and Google Docs for document level, permission-based collaboration. Google Apps does not include a workflow engine. You have two options: keep it on premise with your legacy Notes/Domino applications or upgrade to a cloud-based service. The Google Apps Marketplace offers options to add on third-party solutions to Google Apps, extending your cloud-based strategy with workflow, CRM, project management and accounting capabilities. Google AppEngine can be used to develop, run, and deliver custom applications using Java or Python. Google Sites provides Intranet capabilities, allowing non-technical end users to create and update web pages, embed rich media, and more. Design, presentation, data collection and reports are provided through the forms functionality in Google Docs spreadsheets.

Workflow

Notes/Domino offers a workflow environment and an engine.

Custom Applications

They can be used as a platform for custom applications.

Intranet

It is provided natively and through third-party applications.

Forms

Design, presentation, and data collection are provided natively.

Based on $137 per user for Lotus Domino. ChannelWeb. Take a Message: Its Lotus vs. Exchange. June 8, 2009, and Lotus SmartSuite pricing of $313 for a single user copy from the IBM website. Sept. 3, 2009.

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