Organizations that are outperforming others have been able to seize and cultivate a more collaborative environment. They use tools to help people build and maintain relationships no matter where they are in the organization. Those that have embraced Social Business are collaborating across their organizations and finding answers and experts quicker than ever, working on projects with colleagues in California while they sit in their offices in NYC in Real-Time, and also comparing best practice guides to make sure they aren’t repeating mistakes other colleagues have already made.

Every department within your organization can benefit from Social Business:

-           HR Department: can increase overall employee productivity and job satisfaction through improved knowledge capture, expertise location, and collaboration. Travel, training and teleconferencing expenses also can be reduced by implementing wikis and activity templates. Hiring in-house employees will also become easier by being able to search for specific qualifications in employee’s profiles, reducing time and money spent on brand new hires. Employee morale will increase with the easy ability to connect to one another to gain insight on projects and answer pending questions, in real-time.

-          Research and Development: quicken internal idea sharing and discovery, as well as transform how they generate ideas, share strategies and gather feedback from key customers and partners.

-          Customer Service: With more immediate access to content and expertise, customer service representatives can work more efficiently and provide higher-quality service. They will be able to access “Best Practices” for situations while on the call with the customer and be able to provide them with a solution that another teammate has already found.

-          Marketing and sales teams can have more time to spend with customers and to dedicate to customer-focused initiatives. They will be more knowledgeable with wikis, blogs and best practices published by fellow sales people on product forums. They will have access to information throughout the organization and on an array of products as well as communication tools in real time, and team rooms to hold team meetings. Access to product experts will also become easier than ever with employee profiles stating their skills,experience and expertise.

Cut Expenses

-           The expense of travel to face-to-face meetings can be reduced through online expertise location; project-based commenting, messaging and status updates.

-          Employee training costs can be reduced ,faster ramp-up of new hires.

-          Employee turnover rate can be reduced by creating a more engaged and satisfied workforce.

-           Teleconferencing expenses can be reduced with real-time communication

-          Reduced need for email storage

-          Reduce cost of hardcopy, printing and distribution

Cut Time

-          Reduce time spent answering repetitive questions.

-          Discover work that has already been done before your department embarks on the same project another department has already accomplished

-          Create a feedback forum after a conference call instead of multiple individual calls and emails sent to the call’s host

-          Shorten development cycle and foster innovation by being able to collaborate with the right experts, the first time.

-          Create relationships across the organization to be able to find experts when needed through knowledge management tools like wikis, blogs, discussion forums and shared bookmarks

IBM has put together IBM Connections,  a suite of Social Business software with messaging and unified communications all on a single home page. It is open to new capabilities as they are developed, and already has hundreds of plug-ins to allow your business the ability to customize it to fit your needs and products already used. Its platform is able to bring global visibility to every employee and his or her contributions, all on an easy to use user interface that most employees are already familiar with.

The homepage is similar to that of Facebook, with a running feed of recent activity, status updates and profiles of coworkers. There is a search tab to find specific colleagues and also access to create and join communities. In these communities people can tackle challenges common across all locations and skill sets so those working at different locations will be able to reference past projects and results. Users can create and view Wikis and blogs that share the knowledge and expertise of other users, as well as provide feedback and comments for the writers. Forums are available to encourage discussion of pressing business issues, again creating an interactive area where feedback can be received on important issues. Status posts, profiles and listings of activities help employees previously stuck in silos to learn what like-minded colleagues are working on and share successes and challenges. Support for tags, community bookmarks and shar­ing of files make it easy to locate knowledge and best practices.

Social Business is not only in the future of the Business world, it’s happening NOW. With remote workers, organizations with multiple locations and team activities, having a more collaborative environment is essential for success in Today’s business world.

Here is a quick download on the ROI of Social Business, read it through, and let me know if you can afford to NOT move forward with implementing a more social environment.

Contact us today at kmartir@metrotsg.com to schedule your Business Value Assessment to see how implementing a Social Business Solution can help your current organization collaborate more efficiently to ensure the success of your future.

His talk was insighful, very pragmatic and full of hope, as ususal. It was also different from last year speech, with new inspiring stories from US and Albania, among others.

As USI President Martinoli said in the opening speech, Prof. Yunus is a great example of how academia can bring a remarkable positive change in the society!

Just as you set or comply with stringent guidelines for a corporate brand; you should do the same for your personal digital one. Why? Because:

1. Reflecting on the aspects of your personality you want to share and those you prefer to keep private helps create a loyal following of advocates who engage regularly
2. Consistency in your image and messaging improves recognition and recollection. Seeing the same profile photo on Facebook, twitter, linked-in and other channels helps followers remember you.

Here are a few tips on how you can do that:

• Principles & Policy -  reflect on your standards for following, befriending, liking and criticizing others.  Think of how you’ll engage fans, friends and followers on topics you find interesting.  Be consistent.

•  Your avatar photo – defines your personality.. make it reflect who you are.. keep it consistent across networks.
• Covers & Backgrounds – are important digital real-estate. Use it to give insights into your passions. Share your causes, creations and concerns on your covers and backgrounds.
• The language you use – dictates your followers.. how you speak, the tone, the language, the topics all determine who follows you. create a dialogue (not a monologue) around topics you like and can maintain an interest in. Don’t be a trend follower, be a trend starter.
• Hashtags – You can use to subject trends that spark your interest by hash-tagging. It keeps your content current. Anyone who searches for a hashtag finds you. Take the time to develop your hashtags and use them consistently. My favorites #SOCENT  (Social Entrepreneur) and my personal ones #elevate and #live2give
• Keep it in character – while being different is good, being you is great!  I often come across content that’s trending and unique, but it doesn’t reflect my character. I move on!  You can get fans and followers by riding a trend wave, but do you really want just anyone riding your coattail?

Or on the topic from the expert:

7 Tips to Finding “Your” Writing Voice | Jeffbullas’s Blog.

If you have any more insights on creating a personal brand online, please share them in the comment section. Looking forward to hearing from you!

Related articles

• Who do you influence?
• Branding the Internet
• Top 5 Ways to Build Your Small Business Brand Online

If there is one thing that has changed the way organizations identify, target, and communicate with their audiences in the past five years, it is social media. Today, everyone from large corporations to small local businesses have an even playing field to attract new audiences and to gather feedback from existing ones. With social media evolving and changing how we do business, it’s critical to establish a long-term vision and begin investing in today to deliver on strategic activities in the future. But first, you need to figure out whether your company is ready to strategically carry out, assess, know how to define social success, and maintain social media campaigns and communities.

Here are eight key categories of 42 best practices that serve as a great checklist when determining whether or not your company can fully embark on using social media.

Senior Management

• Senior Management is interested in leveraging social media as a new marketing channel.
• Senior Management understands that social media is a long-term priority.
• Senior Management is prepared to contribute to social media content development (blog postings, press interviews, etc.).
• Senior Management is interested in taking customer feedback and other data to make changes in the organization.
• Senior Management is willing to provide the resources necessary in order to get the social media program off the ground (budget, staff, etc.).

Social Media Knowledge Level of the Organization

• We understand which social media channels are available and which are the best fit for our organization.
• We have a solid understanding of how our employees and executives are using social media.
• We have read industry based reports and benchmarking studies on social media.
• We have attended conferences and networked with colleagues to gain a better understanding of how they plan on implementing social media.
• We have joined social media peer groups to learn more about how we can leverage social media.
• We subscribe to social media educational sites (Mashable, etc.).

Audience Engagement Level

• Dedicated online community groups (Facebook, Twitter, Google+, etc.) already exist for our industry or product types.
• We have a company profile on social media networking sites such as LinkedIn, Facebook, etc.
• Our subscriber list is growing among the various forms of social media being used (Twitter, Online Newsletter, etc.) and we know how large our reach is online.
• We regularly contribute to online discussions (forums, blogs, etc.).
• We know if our audiences’ tone is positive, neutral or negative on third-party sites.
• Our audiences (customers, congregations, etc.) regularly make comments on our postings.

Competitive Insight Analysis

• We have audited our top competitors’ and/or partners’ online strategy, evaluated their maturity and have a basic idea of what they are doing with social media.
• We regularly track our competitors and/or partners (number of blog postings, comments, twitter followers, Facebook group members, etc.).
• We monitor competitive social media changes and updates daily.
• We provide competitive positioning information to our product or services management group.
• We have joined our competitors’ and/or partners’ online community and networking groups.

Staff and Resource Allocation

• We have defined roles and responsibilities for people in our organization who are involved with social media.
• We have a dedicated internal point person to manage our social media program.
• We have consulted with social media experts to make sure our programs’ success.
• We have an industry thought leader who contributes to our blog postings.
• We have consulted with our IT department to get their advice on technology selections.
• We have developed and provided a training program to staff and partners.

Plan and Channel Selection

• We have created and presented a social media channel map which highlights how we will use social media.
• We have a defined strategy with clear goals, targets, initiatives, and measures.
• We have analyzed and prioritized our social media channel options and have consensus on which opportunities to pursue first.
• We have evaluated and selected technology solutions for implementing our social media program.
• We have developed a project plan with timelines, deliverables, and milestones.
• We have communicated our social media plan to our staff.

Process Documentation

• We have incorporated and integrated social media into our normal marketing mix (product launches, marketing plans, customer service, etc.).
• We have developed a calendar for selecting topics and organizing social media communications.
• We have defined the frequency for updating our social media channels (blog, Twitter, Facebook, etc.).
• We have a regularly scheduled meeting to discuss our social media program (topics, results, competitive insights, new opportunities, etc.).

Governance Measurement

• We have a policy to govern the use of social media with our staff, vendors, prospects, clients, and members.
• We use a dashboard to report on our top social media metrics.
• We communicate the results of our social media program to Senior Management and Board on a regular basis.
• We have documented the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy for the social media applications that we provide.

Even today, no company is fully ready for social media as this space continues to evolve at a rapid pace, not to mention, the diverse applications available for different services and industries. This readiness assessment (social media checklist) can be used as an internal measurement for companies who seek to establish and maintain a leading edge in reaching customers.

Article Source: Andrew Chow

Related articles

• 10 Crucial Things Organizations Need to Consider before Embracing Social Media (communicationisking.com)
• MarketResearch.com Report – Wealth Management Companies Have Adopted Social Media as a Preferred Advertisement Channel (prweb.com)
• Real-Time Social Media Marketing Process Doesn’t Need To Be A Paradox (business2community.com)
• How to Integrate Your Content Marketing and Social Media Strategies (sproutsocial.com)
• Social Media isn’t about control (mgfantato.wordpress.com)

I assume that you do have an idea on how to open the box, don’t you?
But have you asked also why? Why you should open it?

According to many publications and articles it seems that innovation and being creative aims mainly to find solutions. We need to find solutions for social needs, for growing demographic problems, for environmental issues, for health problems and many more … That’s why we are focusing that much on finding … solutions. The thinking on how to solve problems is growing everywhere. Just have a look at technical solutions: The incredible high number of apps, the uncountable mass of new services and website ideas are really impressive. Or search for business ideas in Google. You will find hundreds of thousands…

But somehow it feels wrong. Often solutions are not really solving our basic problems. They are just like a drop of water on fire, just solve the very obvious, superficial problem, the problem we recognize at a glance.

Reading through the ‘Design for public good report’ this morning I came across this statement:

A designer addresses development by “looking for a problem – not a solution”There is only one problem, but there are many solutions. Because of the amount of competition and the pressure on finances and resources, we don’t have time for mistakes. It is both efficient and risk reducing to identify the problem before developing the solutions.”
– David Fellah, CEO main markets, Designit

So, it might be worth to go more in depth and analyzing what is the real problem we need to solve before we are becoming innovative and find solutions, isn’t it?

Asking why and why again leads to the original problem
I mean an apparent problem might be already the consequence of another problem which by itself can be the consequence of a still deeper one. If we solve just the first, we will not automatically have solved the original problem.
If we think there is too much traffic in the cities and we build new streets then this is a short term solution. If we ask why there is so much traffic, we will find out that there is huge need to go from A to Z. If we ask why people need to move so often we will find a lot of reasons behind.

We need to make problems tangible through direct observation, visualisation and start to build prototypes. It is about rendering these things, which can seem so intangible and therefore so difficult to approach and only then start to be creative and innovative. Making it concrete, clear and easily intelligible to a wide variety of stakeholders.

So, imagine we would just solve one of the original problems instead of finding solutions for the apparent one… Then, probably, we would be much more successful.

What do you think?

Related material

Design for Public Good, a new report for the European Commission
April 2013

Courtesy of Stacey Acevero Twitter @sacevero

Tom Webster of Edison Research spoke first; a bit daunting since the WiFi was down.  His presentation was on data storytelling and the 2012 political elections.  “We don’t need data analysts; we need data storytellers.  There’s too much data repukery.”  (Nice word Tom:) “We are becoming less skilled at being social with people we don’t agree with.“  God’s honest truth and Tom’s clarity was a gut check.  Katie Richman tweeted Tom is where “psychology meets statistics.”

Spike Jones of WCG World presented Word of Mouth.  “It is not – nor will it ever be – about your product.”  Some brands forget it’s about their *community* as they blather on about their products or themselves.  “Influence can be created; passion can not.” “Everybody wants to be a part of something bigger than themselves.”  Check out slide 44:)

The WiFi came to life during Morgan Johnston‘s Jet Blue presentation.  “Inspire Humanity.” Here’s how JetBlue does social:  Monitor -> Engage -> Inform -> Humanize.  So simple.  He spoke about how they handled Hurricane Sandy, no small feat.  The audience really engaged; not sure if it was because the WiFi came back to life or because a lot of people fly Jet Blue!

Ian Schafer from Deep Focus spoke on Mobile First. “60% of active users access Twitter via mobile …”  And then we had our Beyonce Super Bowl moment, when we zapped the power – apparently crashing the entire block.  350 people with phones, laptops and iPads all charging just might trip a hotel’s circuit breaker!  Amazingly, it was back on in about 5 minutes.  Ian’s main message:  “The best mobile ad is a brand’s most engaging content.”

Chris Tuff of 22Squared tackled how to achieve ROI via content, analytics and paid:  “Art & Science:  Right content & right people & right time = success.”  Hyper target sub tribes. Value of Impressions: Twitter – 15 mins, Facebook – 1 hr, Instagram – 2 days. Tumblr sticky for 9 days. ROI = Return on Impressions as well as Return on Investments.

Last speaker on Day 1 was Christopher Penn, from Shift Communications, who addressed Earned Media.  “Earned media is anywhere people talk about how awesome you are (or aren’t)!” Love Chris’ Marketing Circle of Life (slide 8).  The difference between Owned, Paid and Earned is clearly defined on slide 12:)  The goal: Do social business well, achieve earned media.

Jim Tobin from Ignite Social Media kicked off Day 2 by talking about the Power of Organic on Facebook.  “Earn it.  Don’t buy it.”  “Tobin’s Law:  The size of a brand’s network is always smaller than the size of its network’s network.”  Say what?  Simply:  You want the people who are friends with your network to engage with you.  The T-shirt photo below left visually depicts Jim’s concept.  Real success is when you have more shares/interaction from your network’s network than your network itself.

Adam Kmiec from Campbell’s presented an Insights Driven Organization.  “We’re data rich and insight poor.”  “Strategy, Community Management, Content, and Insights are all required to do social business well.”  Slide 40 is his prescription for success.  Many of the SMB attendees drooled over the idea of having the resources to employ some of the tools Adam uses!

Ted Rubin of Collective Bias talked about the Return on Relationships: “Social is just a facilitator of relationships.” “Listen.  Make it be about THEM.  Ask “How can I serve you?”  Aim for ongoing engagement.”  “Relationships are the new currency.”  Based on the number of tweets generated, the crowd really liked Ted.

Ryan Cohn from Sachs Media Group spoke about CEOs and social business. “16% of CEOs are on social — expected to rise to 57% within 5 years!” “LinkedIn is the only platform with more CEOs than general population.”

It was my first time hearing Chris Brogan of Human Business Works speak, so I was enjoying Friday afternoon at Social Fresh.  Chris’ basic prescription for success:  1.  How do I add value?  2.  How do I make my buyer the Hero?  3.  How do I equip my buyer for success?  4. How do I attract more audience?  And then build them into my Community?

Jay Baer from Convince & Convert presented Youtility, the subject of his new book. “If you help someone, you create a customer for life.” “Answer every question via your various forms of content and engagement media.” “Youtility is a process, not a project. The ‘We’re awesome, click here’ is short-term, not long-term.”

Katie Richman from ESPN talked about creating “reskinnable content.”  “Consumption is less about reflecting who we are … more about who we want to be.” – Paul Mullins.  Loved Katie’s description of Pinterest:  It’s magazine collages 30 years later!

Kevin Vine from Dunkin’ Donuts finished the conference on a high note when he spoke about Encouraging User-Generated Content.  “We don’t own our social media channels – our fans do.”  “Listen -> Learn -> Engage -> Celebrate”  “A brand is no longer what we tell consumers it is.  It’s what consumers tell each other it is.” – Scott Cook, Co-Founder of Intuit  “Make your fans and followers Stars.”

Why did I include “Back to Basics Baby” in my post title?  While I recapped 14 speakers in < 900 words (a miracle:), I could have done it in much fewer:  Tell Stories.  Make it About Them.  Humanize.  Mobile, Mobile, Mobile.  Return on Impressions.  Earn It.  It’s about your Network’s network.  Use insights to inform business decisions.  It’s still just all about the relationship.  Make your customer the Hero.  Help someone and create a customer for life.  Don’t reinvent the wheel every time.  Encourage participation; make them Stars.

Here’s how I know Social Media has grown-up into Social Business:  It’s no longer about how to use Facebook or Twitter for business, what the latest and greatest platform is, if you need a Pinterest or Google+ profile.  It’s back to being about your customers and how you can help them move forward.  It’s back to the heart of your business – those humans you call customers.

Speaking of Humanizing, Jason Keath, CEO of Social Fresh, celebrated his birthday around Social Fresh, so here’s a photo of his surprise cupcake.  Happy Birthday Jason and many, many more!

Another human touch?  The Tweets So Fresh mug I won for being one of two people who’ve attended four Social Fresh conferences.  I love my mug:)  It makes me feel like a Star!

All photos courtesy of Social Fresh and Spherical Communications

Many organizations today spend a lot of time, resources and financial investment trying to understand the social landscape and engaging externally their customers and prospects. They are on a quest to become a social brand.  They are investing in Facebook applications, branded communities and blogs; and many are using online monitoring solutions to listen and see what people are saying about the brand.  And, from this perspective, many companies today are doing a decent job.

In researching more on “social customers”, I came across a great book worth picking up, titled Social Business.  Author, Michael Bitro, dives into how organizations cannot ultimately achieve effective, external conversations with consumers, unless they can have effective internal conversations first.  While I certainly agree, I also realize many marketers are charged with establishing external conversations first, proving to business executives how social media is an effective channel and should be viewed as a business imperative.  For this reason, I felt it was important to share how Michael identifies the 6 types of social customers.  As with all marketing, before we can start adopting and effectively using social media, we need to first understand who the social customers are.  Once we understand the different types of  behaviors around each social customer, can we begin developing successful social strategies.

Highlighted below, are the 6 types of social customers Michael Bistro encourages us to be thinking about:

1. The Venting Customer
2. The Passive Customer
3. The “Used-to-Be” Customer
4. The Collaborative Customer
5. The Customer Advocate
6. The Future Customer

Learn more about the 6 types of social customers by visiting Michael Bistro’s blog, Social Business.

When planning your next social media activity, start by understanding your consumers’ natural behavior on social media, along with the technology , and how they work in the offline world to maximize the effectiveness of your efforts. Hands down, the most successful activity on social media taps into customers’ natural behavior.

Related articles

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• Your Social Media Marketing Strategy: You Have One, Right? (21stcenturysmm.com)
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I’m on vacation in sunny California so I thought I would pull a few of my favorites from the archives. Check these folks out. 

________________________

You never know who you’re going to connect with on the Twitters.

Back a few months I had tweeted a post in regard to me preparing for my SHRM Work/Flex presentation and happened to mention my Powerpoint. I received a follow from @SlideKlowd and checked into who they were – as I often do before simply clicking the ole “follow” button.

Upon my investigation I found out more about their amazing mobile and desktop app that allows greater engagement between presenters and their audiences whether it’s at conferences or events, online hangouts or training. I was so excited about the possibility of doing away with “the way we’ve always done it” and having to fill out those paper surveys after a conference session or keynote, for one. Secondly, I see how this can tremendously affect the way we communicate and present future events and / or training for HR and beyond.

Just think about the possibilities of having real-time engagement with your audience and being able to walk away with REAL data. I guess it could be terrifying to presenters who are boring and those who can’t engage an audience and the like.

My next step was to follow them back online and hear more about their product and services so I did just that. I was hoping to use SlideKlowd at my presentation in October but it was cutting it short.

I sat in with my new-found connection > Justin Foster, one of the founders of SlideKlowd, in a private one-on-one Webinar to share more about what they offered and I fell head over hills with this product. I like it so much, in fact, that I told several of my HR buds about it and scheduled a Google+ hangout for Justin to present the demo to them.

Here is the hangout >

Thanks Justin, for a superb job and for the fantastic job you guys are doing at creating a greater way to drive engagement.

Oh, you’ll want to check them out at SlideKlowd.com and connect with them on Facebook and Twitter. I can’t recommend them enough.

Here is their latest video introduction.

We at Good for Business are delighted to share with you some ‘fresh’ creative work. We were selected by the recently created Fund for Lake Michigan to develop a communications blueprint, logo, tagline, identity package and website. The Fund for Lake Michigan is focused on making a profound impact on the health of Lake Michigan and its communities. They are here to help ensure the Lake continues to be both an economic powerhouse and an environmental treasure to the citizens of Wisconsin and the Midwest. They do this by investing in projects that benefit local communities and the environment; by embracing a high standard of openness about what they support and the criteria that drives our decision-making; and by rigorously evaluating results. They aim to leverage the investments of other key Lake Michigan donors, pursue partnerships and use the Fund’s power as a convener to promote collaboration. Their grants focus on projects that achieve tangible near-term and long-term results such as protecting critical natural habitats and making water resources more swimmable, fishable and drinkable. Their Oversight Committee of Trustees manages the Fund, establishes grant making priorities and guidelines, and makes funding decisions. Trustees include representatives from Madison Gas & Electric, Wisconsin Electric Power Company, Wisconsin Public Power, Inc., Clean Wisconsin, the Sierra Club, and the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources. We invite you to learn more about the Fund for Lake Michigan is clearly making a deep impact by visiting the newly launched web site: http://www.fundforlakemichigan.org/

Understand. Engage. Deliver: Earning Customers for Life – that’s the theme of this year’s summit.  We’re really excited to be participating this year as a platinum sponsor. It will be two-and-a-half intensive days chock-full of analyst presentations, workshops and peer interaction, giving business and IT leaders a complete view of the customer across the organization and across every touchpoint in every medium. Understanding what customers want, need and expect — and having the right people, processes, cultures and technologies in place to respond in real time — will be critical to every organization’s success, according to Gartner.

We agree completely. Our mantra is Every Customer. Every User. Every Time.

That’s the message we’re spreading, as a sponsor of this year’s Customer 360 Summit.  SugarCRM focuses its SFA messaging on empowering every sales user to be more effective every time they engage 1-to-1 with every customer. Sugar focuses on the point of interaction between a customer and sales professional. We enable sales professionals to have the knowledge and tools necessary to understand their accounts and prospects as individuals, identify what really matters and when it matters, and drive value and a superior experience every time they engage with their accounts.

We’ve planned multiple meetings with Gartner analysts, customers, partners and prospects over the next few days. Today, we hit the ground running attending the afternoon pre-event CRM Boot Camp.

Stay tuned as we’ll be sharing insights, perspectives and things we learned at this year’s exciting Gartner Customer 360 Summit.

Best,

Jay Mejia

Director of Communications

Je suis convaincu que les raisons évoquées dans cet article reflètent bien les interviews qui ont eu lieu avec des gens proches de l’auteur. Mais je ne suis pas sûr que les Jeff Jarvis, Seth Godin avec leurs livres réguliers et courts soient des thought leaders.

Ils sont vifs et rapide sur la balle pour évangéliser le meilleur usage du web en étant convaincu que le web est naturel et qu’il faudra s’aligner. je pense qu’un auteur comme Evgeny Morozov en témoigne dans ses livres dont le dernier que je vous recommande, To save everything, click here.

Mon hypothèse est autre et je la développerai dans un autre poste mais culturellement, les USA vivent dans un paradigme d’exclusion, l’individu y est roi et doit être autonome en comptant exclusivement sur lui même. L’européen (à l’exception des Allemands) quant à lui, vit dans un paradigme d’inclusion, de réseau. En survolant les Usa on découvre des villes quadrillées, chacun son bloc, les blacks là, les latinos ici. En survolant l’Europe on découvre des villes concentriques, c’est rond, tout se touche et se mêle. Mon hypothèse est que la technologie qui favorise les réseaux corespond à un plus grand besoin non assouvi aux USA qu’en Europe. Un besoin qu’ils peuvent assouvir avec les nouvelles technologies et les réseaux tout en gardant le contrôle absolu, ce à quoi un homme autonome et exclusif ne peut se résoudre à renoncer.

Qu’en pensez-vous ?

Patrick

KLM a découvert les médias sociaux et leur utilité lors de la crise du nuage islandais qui a affecté toutes les compagnies aériennes en Europe. KLM a très vite compris que les médias sociaux pouvaient utilement suppléer voire se substituer aux call centers qui étaient débordés. Le reste a suivi, toutes l’entreprise s’est convertie à l’usage de ces outils et est devenue un social business. voici un article sur la présentation faite par KLM au congrès de Londres, ‘engage 2013′.

Social Minutes of the conference…
…can be found on Twitter under the #intrel13 hashtag. It’s definitely worth browsing through the almost 1.000 tweets that we’ve produced in the two days.

My personal key take away from INTRANET.Reloaded, Berlin (2013)

1. When Communications & IT join big things can happen
2. People centricity is not just reflected through “social software” anymore (Or: The social radio and the hidden dream team)
3. Cultural change – it’s less of hen and egg than before
4. Key asset of the new workplace: relevant content
5. The requirements document is not a wish list

1. When Communications & IT join forces big things can happen

The status-quo still seems to be more of a two class society. In some organisations the business and technology folks haves moved closer together. In others there’s still a lot of platform, bells & whistles and “just get it out of the door” thinking. That leaves business professionals frustrated and demotivated when they are either bullied or slowed down by there sous-terrain peers (maybe it’s some kind of reaction on the lack of daylight…). Whenever business and IT decided to work hand in hand on the endeavour towards real business IT results where exciting. In particular the presentation of StoraEnso on the current status of their journey towards a digital workplace was impressive. What I particularly loved (yes…emotion!) was their mantra to

“…make sure that employees simply have clarity on where to go for what piece of information.”

This is one of the “common sense” things. However, to take this as a motivation to merge collaboration and communication initiatives and replace the “old” world with a completely new digital service concept for employees is heart warming. It’s consequent. It’s smart. Here’s what StoraEnso shared as their general advice to the participants of the conference.

The same applies to the Sonae’s presentation (Portugal; check the #sonae hashtag combined w/ #intrel13). I strongly recommend to “steel with pride” from their quadrant on driving the digital workplace initiative (http://t.co/mtZq2dpyzf).

2. People centricity is not just reflected through “social software” anymore

Or: The social radio and the hidden dream team

Almost all speakers emphasised the importance of “seeking to understand before seeking to be understood”. Running conceptual pre-studies and making sure that the results of the project will meet actual business needs has been an essential part of the impressive and promising case presentations. I cannot emphasise enough the importance of how need/requirements are evaluated. Talk to anyone who has applied the Xmas approach of how useful wishful thinking of frustrated users eventually is. More to this a little bit later in this article.

In particular Novozymes (Danmark, @frankhatzack) made two very strong points. Their analogy of the new abilities to drive communication and collaboration through social media inspired services with a social radio is just beautiful!

“Following the flow of activities in a company is like listening to a social radio. You have to make sure that you’ve tuned into the right channels and silence the noise.”

This goes hand in hand with the so often used quote of “There is no information overload, just a filter failure” by Clay Shirkey. Using the social radio requires the users to be aware of the general principles and the way one can use the dials to fine tune personal relevance.

Secondly “the hidden dream” concept is something that should be on the agenda of all drivers of innovation/best practice/idea management initiatives. Novozymes figured out that the most powerful ideas came from the “long tail” of users submitting ideas. It’s not the ones with the loudest voice, it’s the ones that rather post less quantity but strive for higher results – and bear in mind that innovation usually involves more than one point of view. To unveil the hidden dream teams is an amazing opportunity that lies within a company’s organisation. New ways of surfacing experts, expertise and experience that derive from socialised business IT definitely helps with this task.

3. Cultural change – it’s less of hen and egg than before

For years change management has been trending in the context of enterprise 2.0 and the future of information work. @frankhatzack from Novozymes made clear: digital doesn’t go well with pure hierarchy. There a general agreement that top management (aka the C-suite) is happy to request and lead change. The employee base is happy to tap into the new opportunities – adoption rate and speed depending on the demographical structure. Middle management however has a proper challenge with their change of role. The more connected the nodes of an organisation are and the more automated informations logistics become the less “controllable” it will be. #FOLC was established as an acronym at the conference this year: Fear Of Loosing Control. All endeavours have to address that fear as much as they have to pick up on potential #FOMO amongst employees: Fear Of Missing Out. Adding new channels and new opportunities requires to make sure that each single employee is able to work in full certainty and clarity that the relevant stuff will find her/him. For StoraEnso that was a key driver to treat intranet and digital workspace as ONE.

What has settled in is the fact that change in work culture and the digital workplace have to come hand in hand. It’s a give and take. Making cultural change the foundation for changes in the digital workplace is like swallowing the elephant in one go. Slicing it up in reasonable steps, prioritising based on value contribution and managing expectations towards the scope of the single steps is the way to go.

4. Key asset of the new workplace: relevant content

Ensuring relevance for the actual user is key in the majority of initiatives. The way to tackle relevance today ranges from very basic pro-active selection of “what I want to see” to the automated delivery of the right piece of information to the user’s door step at the right time.

One key take away of the conference is definitely the issue of managing/creating information assets in a multi-channel world. Skanska (Sweden) for example manages its content for all digital services through one backend. Treating external and internal presence as just a different channel is definitely a smart way to make sure that content is used most effectively.

Pfizer (USA) decided to “harness the ego factor” (@NoraGhitescu) and give people that produce content for their digital channels. They turned their communicators into correspondents and gave them the chance to stand out with by-line and picture. As a result Pfizer was able to create content that attracted so many people that media agencies would be probably more than happy to sell advertising on that inventory.

5. The requirements document is not a wish list

Making sure that the new endeavour will deliver value to individuals as well as the organisation is key. Evaluating requirements and managing expectations in that context is definitely key. At this point I’d like to refer to one of my older posts on motivation. Requirements don’t have to be things people want (or wish). It can as well be something that should be resolved, removed or improved. That angle – it terms of motivation & measurability – is much stronger than just striving towards a vision.

What I definitely have to share is Sonae’s (Portugal) slide on requirements engineering. It actually doesn’t need much explanation…

World Café on “Managing expectations along the workplace evolution”

I had the opportunity to host a world café session on “managing expectations”. As a framing for all participants (5 rounds in total) I used the following approach:

Seek to understand before seeking to be understood

(Stephen R. Covey)

Use this paradigm as the motivation to understand where you are today in order to understand how to phase out the roadmap to the vision of the future workspace (the reloaded intranet).

Find your current position on either or or both following models for distinguishing the status/evolutionary phase of a workspace:

#1 Workspace Maturity Model

#2 People Relationship Model (w/t the thought leadership stage)

After the framing followed the discussion based on how the participants of the world café table positioned themselves in the model and shared their insights on how expectations were managed on the way to the current status and with regards to the future steps.

Key take away of the discussion around “how to manage expectations along the evolution of a digital workplace”

• It’s about people. Evangelist or Ambassador programs are essential but both have to be connected to the real steps that are taken. Just preaching the vision won’t be enough to make people really adapt. Sometimes some “nudging” towards the new opportunities might be required.
• Management has to be committed to the change and support it by being a prime example.
• To get commitment it’s necessary to have role based value proportion for “what’s in for me” for e.g. roles like CEO, CIO, HR, program managers, production managers, etc…
• Top Management might require a value proposition that resonates with their abstraction of the business in Excel and ERP. Middle Management needs a value proposition that avoids #FOLC. The employee base has to be ensured that #FOMO is unnecessary and that access to the relevant content will actually improve.
• Taking into account blue collar work is essential for companies that produce more than just paper. However, it should not stop initiatives because (broadly) involving blue collar roles will be a challenge for almost all companies.
• Do NOT ask people what the want. Ask them “What’s preventing you from being excellent?”.
• Argue the endeavour and its scope based on challenges that will be solved and QuickWins that derive from new opportunities. Do NOT argue along bells & whistles of digital services.
• Easy things first: create tangible results quickly!

INTRANET.Reloaded: Inspired not just by the content

At this stage I want to share a way the organisers of the conference decided to create “minutes” of the conference. It was a live sketching done by an incredible illustration artist. I can strongly recommend this to anyone who’s intending to produce a documentation alongside a larger event…

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Disclaimer:
The rights to all content shown in pictures of slides of the conferences lie with the original/presenting author(s) and the represented company.