Enterprise social sharing structure
We know how social bookmarking can lead to discovery of shared interests, which then may lead into other ventures such as group formation, CoP’s, etc…
We also know how people tagging can do a similar thing, we can discover people by topic/keyword…kind of like a tag based “people yellowpages” for the enterprise (this can complement the “people whitepages”…staff directory).
For further on this see my posts:
fringe contacts: people tagging
Internal communication blogs and km2.0
Well check out URLgreyhot, who has some nifty diagrams putting all this together in an enterprise social network structure…see more.
km2.0 allows social interests and connections to thrive (people are connected via the system design)…people will gather and consolidate information, having a space to collect, comment and discuss information with “like” people…this may be a close solution to teasing out tacit knowledge…but not only that, to also drive innnovation.
Blogs are a great idea to publish personal knowledge, but then again there is the take up problem.
If blogs are just one of the social tools, and all these social tools are weaved together, and everyone has a profile, then it will be the norm to share knowledge…if it works on MySpace and TagWorld why not the enterprise. People like connecting and exchanging information and if they have their own publishing space even better…they can be excited about publishing without having to be an expert or go through traditional channels…also it is a way to be heard and contribute whereas this may not have happened via email, forums, or face to face.
This creates a different management lead approach…instead of top management pushing possible areas of innovation, and pushing the old school km tools for this to happen, now socially designed enterprise communication tools (not just email and IM) are going to manifest innovation in a more organic way by allowing people to share and discover and grow.
Really, instead of top management pushing people to connect, in the km2.0 environment it will be the opposite, they won’t be able to stop people connecting.
So the role of top management may be moreso in filtering the cream of the social discussions and leading that way, I think the creative thinking and great ideas will surface in the social networks and not in the board rooms…just give them the tools.
The best interests of the enterprise can be driven by the people.
[ADDED 21/06/06: Bringing Knowledge, Relationships, and Experts Together in the Enterprise]
[ADDED 16/08/06: How Can You Communicate the Corporate Benefits of Enterprise 2.0 Network Effects?]
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There is a very interesting discussion of just these issues here:
http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/jun2006/tc20060605_424102.htm?chan=technology_ceo+guide+to+technology_ceo+guide+to+technology
Comment by Hope Leman — June 12, 2006 @ 6:19 am
I agree that applying social networking techniques is an issue in more traditional hierarchically structured organizations, which I documented in my “Web 2.0 Management Survey” (http://www.ddmcd.com/findings/). But some of the benfits seem too great, such as in the area of expertise manegement, which I have just started to research (http://www.ddmcd.com/expertise_management_index.html). I’m glad I found your blog and I shall be coming back! - Dennis McDonald
Comment by Dennis D. McDonald — June 21, 2006 @ 3:40 pm