Concept

The first user groups began to form in the 1980s for the new applications such as CAD and FEA.  In those days there was a genuine difference of experience between the vendors (who had been working hard to create the applications) and the users, who were applying them for the first time.  For the users, group meetings not only side-stepped any commercial pressure from the vendor, but gave access to other people with experience that the vendor just did not have.

Development

Successful user groups began to elect officers (such as a chairman and secretary), settle on a preferred frequency of meetings, and develop rolling agendas that allowed some of the more complex issues to be taken forward.

In parallel with this, the vendors' involvement and support of their users allowed them to build their own body of experience; and their willingness to encourage their users meant that the user group formats were diffused over time so that vendors and users would both take part.

Production

For as long as active individuals are prepared to volunteer their time, and there are issues to be discussed and resolved, user groups can carry on meeting.  Relationships with the vendor tend to stabilise to a kind of "dynamic equilibrium", in which an agreed proportion of the meeting time is allocated to vendor issues in return for some level of administrative support.

Evolution

With no formal control mechanism, this kind of dynamic equilibrium tends to destabilise in one direction or the other.  The main factor tends to be the 'lifecycle' of user group volunteers - after a year or so, a chairman will want to stand down, and a year later so will his replacement.  Within a group of limited size, a few cycles of this will exhaust the number of candidates.

Another force that drives in the same direction is increasing vendor input.  As products become more complex, and more applications are added to the suite, there are ever more subjects to cover.

This has resulted in user groups splitting into two types.  A few of the "classic" style user-led groups are still running, but they tend to be low key and to meet fairly infrequently.  By far the dominant species is now the "user event", at which the vendor organises a 3-5 day showcase gathering at a major resort or conference centre.

An excellent example of this was the UGS PLM Europe Conference 2006, staged in Frankfurt, Germany.  A reported 700+ users from 31 countries took part in a three-day programme with keynote speakers, evening entertainment, and 15-20 parallel strands of technical presentations.  The event was buzzing throughout, and the main problem for delegates was to decide which of the many presentations to see.

The future of "user extravaganzas" seems secure for the time being, and they are an excellent place to meet people to exchange general PLM ideas and experiences. However, they do lack something needed by those seeking advice on specific problems, and that is structured face-to-face discussion time.

"Classic" style user groups can provide this, but they need effort to organise and to develop the agendas.  For smaller groups there is also the restriction that they may be dealing with issues that user groups of other vendors (or in other countries) may have resolved.

A PLMIG survey in October 2008 of nearly 100 PLM-related user groups revealed that 39% had become defunct and fewer than 10% of the remainder had any activities planned for 2008 or 2009.  This suggests that only around 6% of potential user cooperation is actually taking place.  Reasons for this included the workload placed on unpaid officers such as the secretary and treasurer; a lack of interest or relevance in the agenda; and the difficulty of addressing PLM issues inside a four-hour or half-day window.

PLMIG Role

It is the aim of the PLMIG to bring PLM practitioners together so that they can create new knowledge.  We can therefore work with existing user groups, and with users who have no local user group, to host events at which users from different user groups can meet and work together.

The meetings will have their agenda and deliverables set by the user groups themselves. The PLMIG has a global reach, so the only limitation is how far it is practical for people to travel.

If you would like your user group to be involved, or if you just want to keep informed about this, then please let us know via user_groups@plmig.com.