Microsoft Windows 8 - Introducing Chaos In The Workplace?

A couple of days ago, I sat down with fellow Microsoft partners for a Boot Camp of sorts for the new Microsoft products roll-out.  More than a few of us left scratching our heads with the same thought in our heads - "What were these guys thinking?"  Oh don't get me wrong, much of what the gang at Microsoft has rolled out is pretty cool technologically.  What they seem to have forgotten AGAIN is that sometimes average users aren't alwasy ready for "cool".  Their first priority is to get their job done and introducing major changes intimidate them.  I think businesses that migrate to Windows 8 are biting off on a big chunk of confusion and the need for big-time staff re-training.

Let me give you a couple of examples.  Microsoft is currently marketing the daylights out of Windows 8 and their new Microsoft Surface tablet simultaneously.  At first glance, they look the same BUT THEY"RE NOT!  Surface runs Windows RT while PC's will run Windows 8.  They're not compatible!  Windows RT will not run Windows based programs although they did build in a variation of a couple of office programs.  Don't expect to run Windows-based programs on RT!  The Surface won't join a network domain either which is the backbone of any company network.  It's a consumer product but they've blurred the marketing of the two products so that the average business decision maker may not understand the differences.  Those of you thinking about having your staff using Surface in your office, you'd better think twice.

Windows 8 was supposedly designed to blur the distinction between portable devices and the desktop to create a more "unified approach" to computing.  When Beta testers yelled "Hey, where's the Start menu and Task Bar?" in Windows 8, the "rumor" was circulated that there would be an ability to convert the new desktop back to the more traditional desktop used in businesses that favors keyboard use.  Now that it's out, there's no ability to go back to the tradtional desktop view.  Microsoft seems to have taken the stance "It is what it is, deal with it!".  Anybody getting any Vista vibes?  The Windows 8 desktop is designed with a touch screen in mind not  a keyboard.  Someone at Microsoft seems to have forgotten that in the business world the computer is more production device than consumption device.  Employees in the real world are expected to enter data for the business not just read it. 

I think we're going to find a slow acceptance curve in the business world.  I hope that I'm wrong but from what I'm reading on other Blogs, that belief seems pretty prevalent.  The tech that demonstrated the login/ authentication process in Windows 8 seemed pretty impressed when he showed us that signing into the new system consisted of swipes and circles and such and no keyboard use.  For more years that I'm willing to admit to, I've been coaching computerphobic business users on how to navigate their computers that has been pretty static for a long time and now Microsoft have re-arranged the entire environment!

We're looking at a LOT OF RE-TRAINING to do when we start rolling out Windows 8 platforms in the office.  Microsoft seems intent on catering to the BYOD philosophy for portable devices.  All I keep thinking about is that poor office clerk who has to enter invoices and type e-mails working on an operating system and desktop that has pretty much ignored the use of the keyboard.

To be fair, the demonstrator did point out that several third parties have already jumped in with add-ons that you can buy to "adjust" Windows 8 to put back the Start Menu and Task Bar but should that really be necessary?

For you Windows XP hold-outs that have been downgrading your new PC acquisitions back to XP to keep a standardized look and feel on your comporate desktops, the game is over.  Microsoft was quick to point out that their downgrade feature only applies to 2 previous generations and XP is no longer in that category.  You can't legally downgrade your computers to XP because with the introduction of Windows 8, Windows Vista is as far back as you can downgrade and they won't allow you to re-use previously registered Windows XP licenses on new PC's.  Sorry!

Tune in later and I'll tell you how they screwed up the Windows Server 2012 product roll-out by making it incompatible with legacy companion applications.