Knowledge Heroes

The best place for your employees to learn professional social media is inside the company. Thomas Vanderwal was right when he told me that social media adoption is all about comfort. Most employees are intimidated by the openness and transparency of social media.

By launching these tools internally–within teams, departments, divisions, business units, etc.–you acculturate your employees in controlled, comfortable environments. You can train them, educate them, watch them, and even (horrors!) let them make a few mistakes. Once your employees get used to using social software inside the company, it’s easy and natural for them to expand their interactions to include customers, channel partners, and even the general public.

Read the full article at michaeli.typepad.com

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Messaging with the boss much? Maybe you ought to be. Workers who have strong communication ties with their managers tend to bring in more money than those who steer clear of the boss, according to a new analysis of social networks in the workplace by IBM (IBM) and Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Read the full article at www.businessweek.com

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One theme persistantly comes up whenever I talk social media, either inside my workplace or outside. This is “culture change.” When talking about catalyzing adoption of social media within the enterprise, at some point, someone will predictably say something like, “the most important thing is to get the culture to change.” Framing social media adoption in these terms is basically a show-stopper, because it means you’ve trotted out a reassuring phrase that allows you to view yourself as a visionary, others as obdurate idiots, and gives you something abstract to blame when (not if) your initiative fails.

Read the full article at enterprise2blog.com

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I’ve been back reading through blogs, presentations, articles, tweets and well just about every thing I can manage over the last week to resolve questions in my head as to why so many Social Media “Experts” or “Gurus” seem to think of social media as breaking down walled gardens (silos) and destroying hierarchies inherent in much of culture, business and online systems – and that this is a good thing or indeed what is actually happening?

Read the full article at www.exponere.com

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Burton Group, a research and consulting firm focused on in-depth analysis of enterprise information technologies, has conducted a detailed field study analyzing social networking within the enterprise.

Almost universally, organizations participating in the study felt they were behind their competitors — or the market in general — when it came to internal social networking initiatives. Based on the results of this study, Burton Group concludes that such perceptions are unfounded. Many organizations are yet to make an enterprise-wide decision on social networking tools. Even in those organizations that have set a direction, many of those projects are in proof-of-concept or early stages of deployment.

Read the full article at ccsblog.burtongroup.com

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I get calls from all types of organizations seeking guidance on their path to Enterprise 2.0 success. Sometimes I’m just in awe of the great ideas and clever tactics they ask about. And sometimes I have to hide my emotion as they explain the challenge they face. I’ll share one such tidbit — of course with fake names.

Read the full article at www.gilyehuda.com

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The last couple of years I have had many conversations with a broad selection of mid-sized to large organizations. Some of these are customers of mine or potential customers while others are conversations I have had, but all having the similar discussion about social tools in the enterprise. What follows is a collection of snippets from those conversations regarding Microsoft SharePoint 2007, most are not publicly attributed as they were not intended to be “on the record”.

Read the full article at www.personalinfocloud.com

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To help corporations create knowledge more consciously, the author of Managing Flow draws on Western and Eastern philosophic traditions.

Read the full article at www.strategy-business.com

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