If you listen to anyone talk about how to drive adoption for new Enterprise 2.0 platform, they'll likely say that integration into existing business processes is extremely important. Michael Idinopulos from SocialText, for example, talked about this just 2 weeks ago.
If you've been following me for a while you know that I've been a big advocate of integration and have talked about how easy it is to integrate Lotus Connections into existing apps.
With the new release of Lotus Notes 8.5.2 several weeks ago, there's even more out-of-the-box integration bringing the power of social networks behind the firewall to a familiar interface, your email/collaboration client.
One of my favorite new features, which I accidentally stumbled upon, is the ability to invite someone to my network directly from my email client:
In case you are like me and haven't spotted all the new integration points, Mary Beth Raven summarizes all the new integration points in this blog post. Of course, IBM is all about openness so if you use Microsoft Outlook, don't feel left behind. Simply download this free plugin from the Lotus Connections App Catalog and bring the power of Lotus Connections to your Outlook client.