Library clips

Usually Business Units (BU’s) have a HTML profile page on the Intranet…this is where you go to read what a BU is about, what they offer, who the contacts are, etc…but these pages are usually slow to update and non-interactive.

Some BU’s suggested to me that since their online Community of Practice (online group) is taking off, perhaps they will just have a link on their intranet page to their Community of Practice (CoP)…basically the their intranet page just serving as an entry point (basically a re-direct link)

NOTE: Our CoPs are not just about communication; you can design the homepage however you like using HTML widgets, so they can look very informative like an Intranet page.

Now the problem with this scenario is that a BU online CoP/group is not really something a person not in that BU wants to see as an informative profile page for that BU

ie. online CoPs/groups aren’t usually about informing a general audience, they are about a group of members sharing and learning on a topic…or even doing actual work (yes I know ours are called CoPs, but they are just online group spaces really)

At first I thought BU pages on intranets need to be more like wikis, but then what about a news channel (to inform people) and a feedback channel (for others to ask questions)

How can we have some of the tools we see in our online CoPs/groups, but for a general audience like a BU intranet page serves?

Then it hit me, “Pages”!!!!

A BU will do work/share in online group spaces eg. Facebook groups

A BU will broadcast/inform, and gather feedback from the organisation at large by using a “page” eg Facebook Pages

A Facebook page is similar to a group but designed for a different purpose…a group has “members”, whereas a “page” is “liked”

Only it wouldn’t be Facebook, it would be IBM Connections or Jive or Socialcast or Yammer (yikes Yammer already called their docs/wiki, “pages”)

NOTE: It doesn’t have to be just BU’s, it can be any group who need an online group to enable members to do their thing, but also an online page to inform everyone else

Example

The Mechanical Engineers “online group space” is where members do work and share

The Mechanical Engineers “online page space” is where they broadcast communications to the rest of the organisation on recent happenings, and where people can post questions or share stuff (in Facebook this is called the “wall”)…and it also acts as an “about” page, just like the “Info” section on a Facebook page.

Another example

Our Document Management team have an online group space to do work…

…when they have new releases, they need to communicate to the power users of the document management system, these are the project assistants (PA) and document controllers (DC).

At the moment their online group space doubles up as a “page” in that it has an extra blog to communicate to these audiences (PA, DC) and an extra forum for these audiences to ask questions…when PA’s and DC’s visit the Document Management online group space, it’s really not catered to them at all, other than that extra blog and forum which don’t really get much real estate at all on the group space.

It’s true with our current technology, they could just create a new online group space to do this, and cater the whole space to PA’s and DC’s, but it just ‘aint the same purpose-design as a “page”.

So here’s my thinking…

Rather than a team having two online group spaces (one for them, and one for them to communicate to the org which also doubles up as their information profile/about page, like you see on Intranets)…

How about they have one online group space, and one online page!

So basically “pages” are the new type of Intranet/About page for teams…

…whereas groups are where those teams work, which generally speaking most others in the organisation are not going to be that interested in (remember with scale, ambient awareness can become noise)

Just like online groups are not just for teams (you can have a group about anything), same goes with “pages”; not only can teams use a “page” as their general audience page…but any type of event, topic, etc… could use a page

Eg. If I was running an event, I may use a group space to coordinate it with my team, and a “page” space as the actual event webpage that a general audience can read and interact…both spaces have different purpose, therefore are slightly designed differently.

Perhaps if you create a group space, there is always a link in the admin area for you to create a “page” for this group, and vice versa…this way group/page owners are aware of what’s possible.

Anyway this is typical of this space, where the consumer web is years ahead…and yes, often the functional/features do cross over.

NOTE: I came across this just before publishing Facebook Groups Vs Pages: The Definitive Guide

According to Facebook, groups are “for members of groups to connect, share and even collaborate on a given topic or idea”…Facebook Pages “allow entities such as public figures and organizations to broadcast information to their fans.”

GROUP - share/collaborate (member-based)
PAGE - broadcast/feedback (fan-based)

In other words the “page” is like the quarterly newsletter that is emailed out to the whole organisation telling them what’s being going on in their silo, only now it’s real-time, interactive and more of a social silo…yes the newsletter could still possibly be sent out as a curation of “page” content.

ADDED: I just remembered something, perhaps the concept of “pages” is what Socialcast is aiming for with it’s “Categories” feature, and for Tibbr with its “Subjects” feature.

It all started with Euan Semple’s insightful post on knowledge ecologies (not economies or markets). It resonated with me so much that I celebrated Euan’s post by reviewing each point through the eyes of a Community of Practice facilitator. Prior to this I touched on one point called "follow the energy", which is what the spirit of social business design or enterprise 2.0 is all about.

A discussion on G+ led to points about control, managing, leadership, and facilitation; which Luis Suarez has kindly summarized.

A few notable points in the discussion:

One of the key concepts which links with any ecological approach is co-evolution. As things interact with other things patterns form and you can never reverse. Its a radical break from engineering or idealistic (define where you want to be and close the gap) approaches as it managers in the “present now”

- Dave Snowden (comment 13)

Co-evolution is a very different word and approach than "control" and "targets"; which are quite synonymous with the usual approach to management.

I got the word "community" expunged from any tools we bought!

- Euan Semple

I agree with Euan here. Our software at work is called "Communities" as are many other vendors. This can be too narrow or misleading as lots of our so called "Communities" are not that at all, but instead work spaces, task spaces, etc…see here.

I don’t want to dwell on this next point too much here as I’ve posted about it before (see I don’t create communities, I create online spaces!).

Actually maybe Dave Snowden’s words once again hit the mark:

“If a community has value it will form and the technology now allows that"

This does not imply "leaderless", but it does imply that a thing will form if the need, and willingness to see that need arises. In other words, you have an uphill battle if you are trying to create, force or control an online community into being.

So what do I mean by an online community or shared interest/purpose group space?
I think the "Community Roundtable" do a good job on their "Community Management Fundamentals" presentation:

1. A common interest or context
2. A sense of shared purpose and fate
3. A common set of needs

I’m not going to get into the difference between online Communities of Practice (CoPs) and teams or work groups, so check out these links below for that information. Yes, some CoPs may end up doing a task, and teams may do CoP-like stuff like sharing interest news and discussion that may be unrelated to tasks…but there is a defining difference when you compare the primary activity, their purpose, aims and expectations.

Here’s those links:

Team-based CoPs compared to cross-functional CoPs

How relevant are communities of practice in a network age?

Communities, Work teams, Social teams and Crews

But I will highlight Bertrand Duperrin’s pithy comparison where he says "Communities exchange to learn, workgroups exchange to execute"…here’s more:

Communities are places where practices, knowledge, information are exchanged and has not to be confused with workgroups which are operational entities…

Groups know what they have to do, to deliver, and that’s why they exist. Groups exist because they have operational purposes.

Communities exchange to learn, groups exchange to execute (even if there a learning dimension in the background routine).

The group is a manager’s responsibility, the manager being responsible for objective’s achievement. Communties can be handled by external people who is an expert, a skilled communicator while groups only react to hierarchical hierarchy (even if expertise matters in the background).

I think they are both groups; one being a community-type group, and the other a work-type group.

Boris puts it another way:

“…we “exist” as a community, but we “achieve” as a team

Each of us “exists” within a multitude of communities with which we  associate – with differing levels of interest. However, to actually achieve a specific aim/goal, we need to tap into a subset of that group to create a “team” to help us achieve that.

I can’t help myself to just go on a bit more on this, as when I read back on this, Kaye Vivian really compares it nicely:

…any “community” formed for the purpose of creating a content resource is not a true community.

I don’t think communities have “mission critical” expectations.  Organizations do.

…true communities form around a common interest in a topic Their purpose is not to create content…the content is a by-product of how the members interact in exploring their common interest. 

CoPs don’t usually involve doing a task or deliverable, but the real key word in Kaye’s statement is the word "expectations".

Kaye’s part about CoPs not being about creating content could be challenged I suppose, but I feel too academic trying to go further in the demarcation, who really cares in the end about making it a black and white world. In the end CoPs are more volunteer based, and don’t usually involve deliverables. Nancy White has more on CoP orientations.

Community Manager or Community Facilitator (Lead) or host

As usual I’ve posted lots without evening coming yet to the purpose of this post, which was inspired by Luis’s post, and based on something I said in the G+ discussion:

At work we don’t use the term community manager we instead use the term community facilitator. The term community manager may be more appropriate if you have a thriving CoP and you spend a lot of time administering it, but at work this is not always the case, instead most of our CoPs require a host to facilitate and generate activity. Anyway that’s why we use the term "facilitator", as it’s the dominant skill required when CoPs begin….there’s really not much to manage at the start

We need to both manage and lead, they co-exist.

Yes, even though online CoPs are not usually about tasks, deliverables, targets, expectations, there is still an element of "managing"

But in the end you have to choose a word, and I choose "facilitate" as that’s more the primary function when it comes to online CoPs.

Imagine you had an external brand community. A lot of work would be monitoring, answering questions, maintenance, gardening, support…all the managing stuff. But it also involves leadership (and facilitation) as you listen to people, bring out the best in people, co-create, foster new directions, play host, role-model, educate, riff off the emergence.

Anyway I run internal communities where the contributions aren’t as great as external brand communities. In our communities-especially in the growth stage-leadership/facilitation is key in generating activity and a community spirit. I like how Andrew Gent says:

…it is not enough to schedule a party, hire a caterer, and send out invitations. Once the event begins, you must play host: introduce people so no one feels left out, make sure they circulate, suggest activities… t’s not enough to invite people to the party, you need to play host and get people talking and generating activities.

Chris Corrigan has more on this:

A facilitator is like a party planner, or a wedding organizer, running around taking care of details, scripting the event and staying outside of the experience.

A party host, by contrast, is inside the experience, invested in the outcome, bringing energy to conversations, not only form, and both affecting and being affected by the experience. 

People will find managing much easier (not to say we are necessarily good at it) as that’s what we have done all our lives, we manage our life, situations, we have control over things…as Dave mentioned above, we have a target and work to close the gap. We so easily go into managing mode as that’s what we know; but leadership is something that is more intentional, learned, experiential; rather than automatic.

Why I mostly use the term "facilitator" or "leader" in relation to our online CoPs is because this is a skill most people don’t have in a deep way; it’s something special (usually drawn from experience, rather than learnt at business school) to be able to lead, bring the best out in others, actively listen, counsel, correlate, steward, and harness; rather than control (whether it’s controlling for a targeted outcome, or just for the sake of it). I make it my job at work to educate people in facilitating, as they are already wired to manage. And when it comes to online CoPs (even more so in the growth stage) facilitating is a more valuable skill than managing (but I stress we need both skills, all I’m saying is I’m paying more attention to developing skills in facilitation).

And to reiterate the start of this post, the whole premise of communities leads to facilitating anyway, as most of what they are about is people coming together to celebrate a shared interest…it’s not so much about tasks and deliverables. And no, you can’t manage people to share just like you would manage them for contexts like deliverables. People share because they want to, because they feel connected and engaged with others, so our job is to nurture this particular drive and desire.

If you would like to know more about nurturing participation, see my post, Presentation : Participation in Communities of Practice (here’s a link to the presentation) 

For a deeper look I have a collection of links on the role of a community manager/facilitator/lead, see my post, The field of community management

Also check out slides 13 and 14 from the Community Management Fundamentals slidedeck.

For more about leadership and management check out…

Leadership and management are symbiotic:

The upshot, in my view, is that asking if leadership or management is more important is like asking “what is more important, your heart or your brain?”  Both are equally essential and if there isn’t a connection between the two, you are in big trouble! 

- Bob Sutton (…and more)

There is a profound difference between management and leadership, and both are important:

To manage means to bring about, to accomplish, to have charge of or responsibility for, to conduct. Leading is influencing, guiding in a direction, course, action, opinion. The distinction is crucial.” And in one of his most famous lines, he added, “Managers are people who do things right and leaders are people who do the right thing.

- Warren Bennis

It’s funny when you look back as the original meaning of management it seems more close to leadership and facilitation ie. developing a relationship, understanding it and nurturing it, treating with respect and co-purpose. I guess depending on the activity the juggling of managing an activity is still there, but I think if we devote a lot of time to the above descriptions about relationship, then the managing part falls more into place.

Dave Snowden bought it’s original meaning to my attention:

Manege comes from the Italian Maneggiare meaning to handle and train horses and it’s one of the origins of the word manage in English

We are not about to control and manage a horse are we; we instead need interpersonal skills; we have to befriend it, form a relationship, have respect…all the qualities of facilitation and leadership.

Partners, Leaderless, Community-ship 

If we look at employee engagement, happiness, purpose, well being, and their intrinsic motivations, we can certainly borrow some practices from the way we lead and facilitate online communities into our work teams…Peter Drucker thinks so:

…“employees” have to be managed as “partners”—and it is the definition of a partnership that all partners are equal.  It is also the definition of a partnership that partners cannot be ordered.  They have to be persuaded…

Henry Mitzberg is also on this meme of organisations borrowing approaches from communities (not turning them into communities, as they are not, but instead borrowing skills from running communities and fostering happy workers). In fact he speaks beyond leadership, in favour of community-ship:

…show me a leader and I will show you all kinds of followers and that is not the kind of organizations that we want…we need to put more emphasis on what I prefer to call, there is no word for it but I use the word ‘community-ship’, which is the idea that corporations and other organizations, when they function well, are communities. People care for each other, they worry about each other, they work for each other and they work for the institution and they feel pride in the institution.

…and more.

As is Margaret Wheatley:

…the first task of a leader is to make sure the organization knows itself.

There is so much that an organization needs to know about itself. But it needs to know it; it doesn’t ever respond to being told what it is or what it’s supposed to do

…and more.

And once again Dave Snowden:

Training leadership crews rather than leaders may be one way to build more resilience into organisations…Ultimately the role of the leader is to create sufficient coherence to allow progress to be made; to be seen as an enabler of good decision making, not always to be the decision maker.

Naturalistic, joint sensemaking and co-evolution 

Dave Snowden hones in on perhaps the management 2.0 approach:

In the idealistic approach, the leaders of an organization set out an ideal future state that they wish to achieve, identify the gap between the ideal and their perception of the present, and seek to close it. This is common not only to process-based theory but also to practice that follows the general heading of the “learning organization”. Naturalistic approaches, by contrast, seek to understand a sufficiency of the present in order to act to stimulate evolution of the system. Once such stimulation is made, monitoring of emergent patterns becomes a critical activity so that desired patterns can be supported and undesired patterns disrupted. The organization thus evolves to a future that was unknowable in advance, but is more contextually appropriate when discovered. 

Chris Rodgers also talks about the perspective of naturalistic organisations:

Outcomes, in the form of the sense that is made and the use that this is put to, are co-created by those in the conversation. These can’t be handed down by leaders – or by anyone else for that matter.  From this perspective, a leader’s task is to actively engage in the joint sensemaking process

…and more.

Let’s not leave out Stephen Billing:

The challenge is “How can I influence the constraints and power relationships so that different (hopefully more desirable) patterns of social interaction emerge.”…as a manager you can only influence your organisation from within your own local interaction with others. So you must pay attention to your own interaction, observe what results and adjust as you go along.

…and more.

I’ve got lots of good information on engagement (and more) and social connection and caring in these posts.

Also check out Deb Lavoy’s posts on respect and purpose and CV Harquail’s posts on authenticity and distinction

Done

In organisations we have a fetish for control and neatness in regards to information and communication; which is flys in the face of how we naturally behave.

You know how it goes, "this type of information must live here", "if you talk about this topic it must happen here", etc…

Now people naturally form groups and personal networks, they talk about various things and feel comfortable and confident in participating in circles of people they trust, have rapport with, have shared experiences with…

If you look at our lives offline and even on the web there is no person that mandates where you file topic-based content and where you are allowed to talk about a topic. Yes control has a purpose sometimes, but I’m talking about an equilibium, I’m talking about realising that management approaches have a fetish that sometimes do more bad than good…we need to stop and think, does the command approach suit a particular initiative or event.

Online groups 

I’ve talked about this before in a post called social computing is messy, and so it should be. What initiated that post was a new Community of Practice (CoP) that was formed to be a support group for designers. This CoP noticed a few other CoPs had forums about design tool applications and suggested that since they were now the official design tools CoP that these forums be moved. I’m glad this didn’t happen, I’m glad not even management could persuade these other CoPs. If it did happen, there would be a good chance these forums would have died. Why? Because people like to talk where they hang out, with people they feel comfortable with. In the end a CoP is about the people not the topic. I mean, in the offline world I talk about any topic with anyone I like where ever I happen to be (coffee room, desk, elevator, etc.)

Online networks

At least with online groups tools like CoPs organisations have a "form" to control, but online social networks take it a step further as there is no standard space to speak about a topic, it’s simply a messy network just like email (People connecting to each other talking about what they need to talk about to get their work done) ie. it’s not a group space where someone can choose to control it, it’s simply connected profiles where only the person who owns the profile can control, and hence no-one controls the network. At least with email this happens underground so there is no chance to control, but when we bring this way of communicating online, management get a fever that they can’t control it. 

Aggregate and curate 

Like on the web, organisations must realise to allow things to be messy, let them flourish, that’s natures way…and then it’s the job of aggregators and curators to pull topic based content where ever it surfaces and to present it.

Rather than control unfront which will somewhat curtail what you want to achieve, look around and gather what you find. Let people free-play and then collect what you find.

Let’s look at some examples of this on the web…

Travel  

When some people travel they blog about their travels…they do this all over the web, whether on blogs, or blog networks etc…

As a user we use Google or Google Blog search to find personal posts about a city, region, event, etc…

Google social search will show results from people in our Google Reader and Twtiter list, and more…this is a good start as it helps reduce the load of results

Without Google social search finding stuff like travel reviews is time consuming, and sometimes nowadays we use help engines or social search like Twitter, Facebook or Quora to explicitly ask a question ie. it’s quick to ask friends, you trust their feedback, they know your history so they can offer contextual recommendations, and you can chat to clarify, and of course the wonder of conversations begets idea, insights and gifts.

Quite often on the web destination sites make a business out of this need eg. TripAdvisor. But the focus of this post is less about social networks and more about aggregation and curation.

Yesterday I was looking into what to do for a couple of days in Kuala Lumpur, and TripAdvisor is great for this, but I wanted to check this out from all corners of the web…so I started on Google blog search and Google search.

I came across the Kuala Lumpur city overview page on Lonely Planet’s website, and I noticed a beta program they have on their sidebar that says "OUR FAVOURITE KUALA LUMPUR BLOGS (BETA)" I clicked to see more and I landed on their Kuala Lumpur "Blogs we like" page. This lists blog posts from handpicked sources that blog about Kuala Lumpur and travel. This saved me lots of time, I got to read 10 quality posts.

NOTE: I’m not sure if Lonely Planet go a step further and curate posts ie. they choose particular posts from their source list, rather than just aggregate every post.

There you go, that’s an example of the messiness of the blogosphere, and a third party picking sources to valuable content…in essence they do the hard work for you.

This is what I saying organisations have to get their head around, the world is messy and we have to make sense of it as it happens rather than try controlling it…and as I said by controlling it you actually stifle the world from happening, or push it into the "black communications market" (ie email).

Music 

Another example is music. I’m personally into bedroom or starting out artists…without sites like Soundcloud, Myspace, Vimeo, Bandcamp where would we be in finding this cool stuff. But even with these destination sites there is still a lot to look through. A good site is last.fm as similar to TripAdvisor you can connect with people to see what they listen to and get recommendations.

But since this post is about aggregation and curation I’ll mention something more inline with that…I discovered a music site called "Altered Zones". They have noticed there are lots of underground music blogs and know it’s hard to keep up, so what they have done is chosen 15 of the best undergound music blogs and aggregated the stream into one feed. Again I’m not sure if it’s pure aggregation, or if they are curating one ot two posts a week from each blog.

OK here’s one step further. A social network/mp3 blog aggregator/streaming site called The Hype Machine have aggregated lots and lots of music blogs and put them into topic directories. You get your own profile and choose the blogs you want to follow, and you can also follow search results

I have several music blogs I subscribe to in Google Reader, and Facebook Pages; which is great so I can keep up with the latest.

The Hype Machine like me and countless others, have discovered brilliant blogs on the web that share the lastest mp3’s.

What The Hype Machine have done is select hundreds (or perhaps thousands) of these blogs and built a massive directory and aggregator.

Search for a blog by tag
- When you find a blog you like, you add it to your subscriptions
-You can display posts by one blog or all the blogs you have subscribed to

So rather than Google Reader I can use The Hype Machine to keep up with the latest

Now the interesting thing is that it will only display blog posts that have an audio link
- So when I say the latest, I don’t mean the latest news, but I mean the latest audio links

Further to this you can stream the song right there from the blog post within The Hype Machine

You can also favourite blog posts which in essense is a favourites playlist
- it even has a shuffle mode
- I can’t seem to see the ability to make multiple playlists

Now I can find, keep up, play and keep music in the one spot without having to leave.

In addition to subscribing to blogs, you can also search and subscribe to an artist
- this is not based on metadata, but is simply a search (so it can be a bit noisy)

Your subscriptions page can be limited to show posts via blogs or artists, or both

And you knew it was coming, you can also subscribe (follow) others users, and do the social network thing.

Another cool thing is that it lists all blog posts that link to the same audio file. In this respect you can read multiples reviews about a song. See an example.

And of course Twitter integration.

Anyway, yet another example of people out there freely doing their thing, and the job of a facilitator (or startup in this case) is picking a bunch of sources, and letting you do the aggregation and curation.

If you want to know about aggregation and curation look no further than Robin Good

A mindmap of content curation tools to aggregate, filter, edit, curate and distribute any type of content

Real-Time News Curation - The Complete Guide Part 6: The Tools Universe

Real-Time News Curation - The Complete Guide Part 7: Business Applications And Trends

Real-Time News And Content Curation: The Best 2010 Articles And Reports From MasterNewMedia

Here’s an example of Robin drinking his new champagne, he’s uses Scoop.it as a real-time news curation tool to present news funnily enough, on real-time news curation

Related

Communities and Networks Connection blog aggregator

At work I’m the global lead for Communities of Practice (CoPs) and work solo…I report to a director and have a part time techie.

We are still in the GROWTH stage…I’ve still got a few wiki help guides to make, need to further develop my support CoPs, and work on reporting.

Along with this is the usual daily support and maintenance.

And side projects like developing external communities.

Anyway…

I consult with each new CoP, I inform them, I support them, then it’s up to the facilitator to host their CoP.

At any time they can phone, email, IM me, or use the support CoPs (to ask questions and where I share tips), and refer to help guides

The idea here is to train the trainer ie. each CoP facilitator

Issue

We have over 50 communities but only half are active, and I’d say about a quarter are really active.

I don’t want to deny new CoPs, but then I don’t want a ghost town.

NOTE: Our CoPs are not temporary group collaboration spaces, these are long term spaces for Business Units, Shared Services and Cross-functional groups. From this you can tell that CoPs is no longer an appropriate descriptor, but it’s something we are used to

, but it’s something we are used to, but it’s something we are used to, but it’s something we are used to, but it’s something we are used to, but it’s something we are used to, but it’s something we are used to, but it’s something we are used to

Since we are in the growth stage I don’t have time to consult with each CoP on an ongoing basis…and they need it as CoPs are about facilitating group dynamics, learning new tools, replacing habits…something not all people know about

If I could only train each facilitator each day to transfer these concepts and practice them, then I think their CoPs would have more capacity to improve.

I’m talking about an attention problem…I can’t spread it as far and as deep as I’d like to

I don’t have a team of global facilitators, it’s just me.

If I did I could assign a global facilitator to 10 CoPs each…this way we could do daily ground-zero facilitation with CoP facilitators

NOTE: We do not want to facilitate each CoP, we want to facilitate the facilitators

A team of global facilitators would only be short-term; it’s just to get our stagnant CoPs off the ground…to hold their hand for 6 months.

If all 50 CoPs were tuned, then only a couple of us would be needed to support/maintain, develop, and consult existing and new CoPs

My coping mechanism (currently in development)

• A volunteer facilitator network to help new CoPs…especially handy in a global company operating in various time zones
• A CoPs in Action wiki to highlight how groups are using CoPs in different ways, how they are using tools in various ways, interviews, case studies, recognition, curating content.
  This can help immensely as often new CoPs stare at a blank slate, they are not sure how or which way to flex these unstructured tools…they are used to tools designed for a specific purpose, and now suddenly they are the designers
• Monthly webinars on technical skills and participation practices

Where can I add value most? (currently in development)

What about this as an approach…

Simply focus my attention on those CoPs that "get it".

Keep allowing new CoPs to happen and support them, but only go that extra mile on enthusiastic upcoming facilitators and existing thriving CoPs

This way my time and expertise is being used to add value, rather than being spread thinly.

The idea is to create showcase CoPs.

Better to have 10 engaging CoPs, rather than 50 not so engaging.

The showcase CoPs can act as a magnet or attractor for other CoPs to want to be like them.

If this happens then I can eventually take my attention of the showcase CoPs, as they know what they are doing, and pay attention to existing CoPs that are insistently knocking on my door to resurrect participation.

At the moment I have demand for new CoPs, but I want demand for existing CoPs to want to be better

What I like about this approach is that I’m not denying the creation of new CoPs, that can continue as usual, but at the same time most of my time will be focused just on a handful of CoPs

One at a time…

I was interviewed by Cathrin Gill on the Enterprise 2.0 Open blog as part of their E2.0 Expert Profiles.

The Enterprise2Open blog was initiated for the Enterprise 2.0 SUMMIT.

It’s not easy summarizing over 5 years of my thought blogging and reading…this was something I needed to do. I have learnt about many things by reading bloggers, commenting and blogging myself…nothing better than DIY interactive education…I thank Cathrin for giving me motivation to do that…

Here’s the main bits below. I hope it’s OK that I’m re-posting…I don’t want to lose this summary

What is your understanding of the core concept of the Enterprise 2.0 idea?

• A new operating system based on different ideals, designs and structures
• For people to be engaged at work, rather than be seen as assets
• A focus on engagement rather than sharing…through design and facilitation you have better conditions to achieve your goal… sharing and heightened awareness will happen by default
• A somewhat role-based network organisational structure where people connect and are aware, have diverse input, acknowledge and action emergent outcomes, find suitable tasks and people…basically to exploit the collective knowledge to make better decisions and have an innovative edge
• A focus on complexity theory based on experimenting, manipulating for favourable conditions, monitoring and feeding back, rather than an addiction to plans and outcomes, targets and rewards. Being more transparent, adaptive, agile, and resilient

5.) What are the main potentials of the Enterprise 2.0 idea?

• As Euan Semple says these new social platforms can finally legitimise informal networks. Closing the gap between the c-level and the frontline (”we” rather than “us” and “them”), a more transparent, two-way communication, feedback and bypassing the levels of hierarchy. Preventing blockage of information and re-interpretations, welcoming and capitalising on feedback.
• This is a new approach and leveling, and can be amplified by the use of social tools. Two things come to my mind: Improve awareness and the seminal lack of communication syndrome, and co-create change so it’s relevant to the frontline.
• It also means working socially productive in silos and bridging silos using visible and open group tools, and connecting silos via enterprise-wide networks.
• E 2.0 provides workers with tools to communicate and share their exceptions to processes…let’s face it procedures are not clairvoyant, every context brings up unique aspects to current processes.
• E 2.0 leads to social productivity and activities like crowdsourcing are now achievable by connecting and conversing in public by default, rather than private by default (like the current email way). This is a move from PC (Personal computing) to SC (Social computing).
  But I’m not too sure how decision making being done in a social way will pan out; if we really want to talk about democracy that is…maybe a committee. It just depends on who owns the firm really.
• And since these interactions happen in the open, everyone learns for free on a daily basis, a pull system where workers pick up signals with their radar.
  Referencing Jim McGee: New social tools reprise the concept of observable work that we lost with the coming of the digital era. We now have the potential to tap into the “know-how” and “know-why”, rather than just the “know-what” we get in deliverables and documents. We are interested in the conversations and brainwork. When reading a deliverable we wonder why things are they way they are, what were the many micro-decisions and now we can go back to those fragments if we worked using social tools - this is the real corporate memory. The beauty of it is these fragments can be assembled together (re-mixed) for different contexts. Then the output of that work can be traced back to the artifacts (the workings out) and re-hashed, and so on. The whole idea is not re-use but re-mix…malleable objects that live in a flux…basically fragments as springboards to continuous knowledge creation.
  Ahhh, just read Oscar Berg’s post on social tools being our coping mechanism

6.) What are the main challenges, threats and issues of the Enterprise 2.0 idea?

Control…simple as that!
Bottom-up is not enough, we need a new organisational design, a top-down shift in ideals. At the moment we have worker 2.0 and group 2.0, but we need management 2.0 to make enterprise 2.0 happen.

My top 10

1. We share with people we trust, and share when we are engaged, rather than incentives and rewards, and now we have new social tools that appeal to intrinsic motivations
2. Some managers may feel dis-intermediated, especially those who rely on their status in controlling information flow, whereas managers who slant to the more leadership side of things welcome it. People worked a long time for their authority, and now comes along a way (eg blogs) to be influential by reputation
3. Transparency, two-way communication, and co-creation are key to engaged workers
4. We currently get rewarded for individual action, not collaboration or group output…or how much we help others on tasks we are not on…or how well we source the right people to help you on your task.
5. Different units compete for resources
6. Politics and power
7. This one can be slowly overcome, and that’s changing routines and habits from email to new tools (as long as the new tool is designed for ease of use)
8. A culture that is OK with sharing and learning from failure
9. Psychological safety (it’s OK to be wrong or to speak up)
10. In the past we only shared finished products in the open, and all the working out and know-why happens in closed email. There is now a change to “work-in-progress / status updates” happening in the open. With this we get more awareness, diverse feedback, reputation building, relationship building, learning… We can look back at a record of how things came to be…peripheral information, the conversations behind decisions. A report doesn’t compare as a raw record vs emails, phone, meetings…but all these things are behind closed doors.

Learnings since the interview

Here’s some snippets about the "real enterprise 2.0"…

Real enterprise 2.0 is about “service” "Because service is a person-to-person commitment rather than a goal-to-people one, it engages employees more, make the whole organization more responsive and make them less reluctant about caring about issues that are not directly theirs. Collaboration is something one do with someone else to achieve something. Service is quite different. Service is not something one do with another but something one do for another. The final purpose is, of course, to achieve something, but the immediate purpose is to help someone. And that changes everything. Fostering stronger relationships within the organization has few impact on collaboration because collaboration often commits people to a goal and not to other people. In a collaboration context, people don’t feel they help one another but rather that they’re on the same boat rowing to reach an island they don’t care about. In a service context, one is directly commited to help the other solve his problem and, then, relationships are more easily leveraged." - Bertrand Duperrin

Social Media goals are derived goals "I repeat. Your company does not need a social media strategy. What your company does need to do however, is to incorporate social media into almost every other strategy or plan that it has. This means that social media needs to be a part of your marketing strategy, public relations strategy, HR strategy, customer service strategy and maybe even your finance strategy. Maybe you do need someone to coordinate your company wide social media efforts, but that is not the same creating a social media strategy." - Asia Digital Map.com

Is this an aspect of capitalism 2.0? "Management in the 20th Century was about achieving a finite goal: delivering goods and services, to make money. Management in the 21st Century is about the infinite goal of delighting customers; the firm makes money, yes, but as a consequence of the delight that it creates for customers, not as the goal." - Steve Denning

Now this is the real enterprise 2.0 "The finite goal of delivering goods and services, in order to make money, was utterly boring and dispiriting…Because that goal dispirits those doing the work and often frustrates those for whom the work is done, it is inherently unsustainable. The infinite goal of delighting customers is inherently inspiring: helping other people is the essence of moral thinking. It is inherently uplifting for those doing the work, and invigorating to those for whom the work is done. Hence the goal is inherently sustainable. The new goal of delighting customers is a radical shift in the difficulty of what a firm is undertaking. The goal of a firm is no longer simple and linear and finite. Now the goal of the firm is difficult and complex and infinite. Now continuous innovation becomes a requirement, rather than a distraction and a de-stabilizer. Now we are in a world of continuous experimentation, to find out what works and what doesn’t, in terms of adding new value for clients. Now mistakes, instead of being elements that can be eliminated, are an essential element of the learning process. Now mistakes become crucial and welcome elements of the learning process. Instead of mistakes being punished, now mistakes are welcomed as essential opportunities for learning. Now everyone in the firm is focused on what can be done to add additional value to customers and clients. The firm is no longer an end in itself. The firm is now “other directed”: it is focused on meeting the needs of the clients and stakeholders whom it is purporting to serve." - Steve Denning

Real enterprise 2.0 is about letting go of “control” "Companies have to come to terms with the fact that the traditional model of managerial resource allocation and coordination (mainly coerced through extrinsic motivation in the form of rewards and punishments, such as payments, promotions, demotions, etc.) has become outdated and no longer reflects the social fabric of today’s workforce Commitment is fickle, reputation volatile, and loyalty scarce. In short: Companies have lost control – over their workforce, their customers, and as a result, their brands. Or, more precisely, as Charlene Li points out in her book Open Leadership, they have never really been in control – what they are actually forced to give up now is their need for control." - Tim Leberecht

Influence is replacing authority "If designers embrace the insight that influence is replacing authority as the new currency in the “pull economy” and that the best way to gain influence is to give up control…businesses can use “shaping strategies” to amplify and accelerate the inevitable loss of control in order to avoid employees and customers abandon them….levers of “access, attraction, and achievement” that provide the “creation spaces” and tools for employees and customers alike to design their own destiny, create their own meaning, and thus convert their very own skills and passions into productivity and loyalty" - Tim Leberecht

The need for both process and people-centric systems “A customer account manager receives a phone call from a client asking why an issue with their service has not been resolved and when it will be. The account manager can query a workflow-supported issue management system and learn that the issue has been assigned to a specific employee and that it has been assigned an “in-progress” status. However, that system does not tell the account manager what she really needs to know! She must turn to a communication system to ask the other employee what is the hold up and the current estimate of time to issue resolution. She emails, IM’s, phones, or maybe even tweets the employee to whom the issue has been assigned to get an answer she can give the customer. The employee to whom the issue was assigned most likely cannot use the issue management system to actually resolve the problem either. He uses a collaboration system to find documented information and individuals possessing knowledge that can help him deal with the issue. Once the problem is solved, the employee submits the solution to the issue management system, which feeds it to a someone who can make the necessary changes for the customer and inform the customer account manager that the issue is resolved. Case closed”. ad hoc communication and collaboration systems were the tools that drove actual results Without the cludgy, structured issue management system, the customer account manager would not have known to whom the issue had been assigned and, thus, been unable to contact a specific individual to get better information about its status - Larry Hawes

The mutation of capitalism "Every century or so, fundamental changes in the nature of consumption create new demand patterns that existing enterprises can’t meet. When a majority of people want things that remain priced at a premium under the old institutional regime—a condition I call the “premium puzzle”—the ground becomes extremely fertile for wholly new classes of competitors that can fulfill the new demands at an affordable price. A premium puzzle existed in the auto industry before Henry Ford and the Model T and in the music industry before Steve Jobs and the iPod. The consumption shift in Ford’s time was from the elite to the masses; today, we are moving from an era of mass consumption to one focused on the individual. The leading edge of consumption is now moving from products and services to tools and relationships enabled by interactive technologies. Innovations improve the framework in which enterprises produce and deliver goods and services. Mutations create new frameworks; they are not simply new technologies, though they do leverage technologies to do new things. Historically, mutations have superseded innovations when fundamental shifts in what people want require a new approach to enterprise: new purposes, new methods, new outcomes. The Model T embodied a mutation we now call mass production. It solved the premium puzzle of its time, reducing the price of an automobile by 60 percent or more, and thrived in the emerging environment of mass consumption. That potential for wealth creation remained invisible to those who clung to the 19th-century framework of small-factory, proprietary capitalism. In the same way that mass production moved the locus of industry from small shops to huge factories, today’s mutations have the potential to shift us away from business models based on economies of scale, asset intensification, concentration, and central control" - Shoshana Zuboff

The first wave of “distributed capitalism "The true source of value, which had been invisible to the music industry, resided in Apple’s ability to reinvent the consumption experience from the viewpoint of the individual, at a fraction of the old cost The iPod—and its successors, the iPhone and the iPad—are part of the first wave of what I call “distributed capitalism,” Winning mutations—those that create value by offering consumers individualized goods and services at a radically reduced cost—express a convergence of technological capabilities and the values associated with individual self-determination. Inversion The old logic of wealth creation worked from the perspective of the organization and its requirements—for efficiency, cost reductions, revenues, growth, earnings per share (EPS), and returns on investment (ROI)—and pointed inward. The new logic starts with the individual end user. Instead of “What do we have and how can we sell it to you?” good business practices start by asking “Who are you?” “What do you need?” and “How can we help?” This inverted thinking makes it possible to identify the assets that represent real value for each individual. Cash flow and profitability are derived from those assets. Reconfiguration Once individuals have the assets they want, they must be able to reconfigure those assets according to their own values, interests, convenience, and pleasure. A teenager, for instance, may use her iPod Touch and an application called Pandora to assemble an entire personalized “radio station” while at the same time learning Mandarin Chinese at the kitchen table on Sunday afternoon through an online classroom based thousands of miles from her home. Support The emerging logic of distributed capitalism rewards enterprises that realign their practices with the interests of the end consumer and punishes enterprises that try to impose their own internal requirements or, worse yet, maximize their own benefit at the expense of the individual end user" - Shoshana Zuboff

Next Generation Collaborative Enterprise (NGCE) "Collaboration encourages clusters of experts with diverse skills to make decisions quickly. The Next Generation Collaborative Enterprise allows experts at any level to propose, create and execute without hierarchical or geographical constraints. Priorities are set by clusters of experts that make decisions. Decisions are communicated real-time through social media applications…Individuals are able to apply themselves to the work based on their skills and availability, regardless of their geographic location…Funding is directed based on milestones. Direct accountability is embedded into the social network. Finally, organizational functions become less relevant and ‘Re-orgs’ become obsolete. Leadership is defined as the ability to influence, envision and execute ― rather than the authority to command and control." - Padmasree Warrior