Social Media Musings

Engage. Evangelize. Empower. The 2.0 Adoption Council is waiting for you!

 You might have heard about the 2.0 Adoption Council from any one of our nearly 100 members who’ve joined thus far, or you might have noticed the logo right here on the left rail of my blog. I’ve had the pleasure of being among the very first group of internal 2.0 evangelists to come together and help one another by sharing ideas, tips, tricks and best practices for what it is we do every single day – evangelize the benefits of Enterprise 2.0 and enterprise collaboration and networking technologies (think communities, wikis, blogs, discussion forums, microblogging, etc.) and share with our enterprise organizations the benefits of exploring these tools and technologies to connect employees, change and improve business processes, and open up information that’s critical to the organization’s long-term success.

 What are the benefits of membership?

All of our members are all involved directly in developing and executing strategy for their organizations.  This means that we get to directly converse and collaborate with people doing exactly what we’re doing. I cannot stress enough the power of being able to discuss, share and ask questions of people focused on the same things that I am working on day in and day out.

As Andrew McAfee said at Enterprise 2.0 in San Francisco back in November, being an evangelist can be a lonely job because you’re often the only person or one of only a few who are in the role of an evangelist and you’re often in a situation where you’re sharing ideas, best practices, and benefits with folks who are not quite there yet in terms of seeing Enterprise 2.0 as a critical component of the future success of the organization. Having a network of peers to talk with and bounce ideas off of is just immensely helpful and refreshing.

We are a well-recognized group of thought leaders. Even in our short time since creation by Enterprise 2.0 expert Susan Scrupski (aka ITSinsider), we have received quite a bit of positive industry recognition by folks such as Andrew McAfee, Dion Hinchcliffe, Gil Yehuda, Dan Keldsen and Carl Frappaolo of Information Architected, and many others. We were also a research partner for the Enterprise 2.0 Conference in San Francisco and members have been interviewed by publications such as BusinessWeek, CIOZone, IDC, and The Economist.

We have access to and demonstrations from a wide variety of vendors and experts in the Enterprise 2.0 space. We’re often the first to know, or among the first to know about new products and services being offered, and are often offered access to the products to test them out and see what we think. We also schedule regular calls and discussions with industry experts in the Enterprise 2.0 space to ask them our toughest questions and learn from them first-hand. I can’t say that I’ve ever had the opportunity to chat with so many experts and learn from so many folks that have gone before me, before now.

We publish ground-breaking industry research. We are committed to collaborating on and publishing research from the Council members’ knowledge and experiences. You can check out our latest report on our site, and order a copy of it if interested. I highly recommend it!

So, are you interested yet?

 If all of this hasn’t been enough to encourage you to join us, check out our member testimonials:

I’m proud to be a member of The 2.0 Adoption Council because it provides me with an opportunity to connect with and have meaningful conversation with peers from all over the world facing the same challenges that I am on a daily basis. I’m able to tap into the Council at a moment’s notice, and ask for opinions, experience and assistance with a wide variety of topics and receive practical advice from my peers. I’m also able to share my own experiences in the hopes that they’ll help others along their own journey. I’m honored to be a part of the Council and the experience it provides.

Jamie Pappas, Manager, Social Media Strategy, EMC Corporation

 

Membership in The 2.0 Adoption Council is a must for any professional responsible for internal social computing. The ability to connect with smart people across the industry has been invaluable to me.

Laurie Buczek, Social Computing Program Manager, Intel Corporation

 

In just a few short weeks my network of colleagues and experts who share the same passion and focus that I do in the Enterprise 2.0 space has expanded exponentially. For the first time I no longer feel isolated behind our firewall wondering how others are dealing with the challenges I might have. In just a few weeks, I have already been able to benchmark best practices and case studies with a few members, an activity which has directly benefited me in the next stage in our internal deployment. I find the members all wanting to help and engage, making it a great source for real exchange and support.

Claire Flanagan, Sr. Manager, KM and Enterprise Social Software Strategy, CSC Corporation

 

Being a member of The 2.0 Adoption Council immediately paid off by expanding my network of knowledgeable and experienced internal community/social media professionals. Now I have that many more people to collaborate with regarding decisions and questions we’re faced with daily.

Matthew Ladin, Corporate Social Networking Chief Evangelist/Technical Lead, Texas Instruments

 

It’s only been 3 weeks but if first impressions are any indication, this is going to be a very valuable group for me. I think the opportunity for regular, informal contact through social cast and then the yammer platform is a great way to bring us together. I’ve enjoyed the discussion throughout the day and the opportunities available to learn from each other as we navigate these new waters. I look forward to expanding my participation and expanding the relationships that are budding….Thanks!

Jim Worth, Director MRL II, Merck Research Labs

 

I go to conferences, I Twitter, I Yammer, I’ve got friends and colleagues in Facebook, Ning and LinkedIn, but I didn’t have a virtual community of like-minded, focused and creative people looking to drive the 2.0 mantra throughout their organization, be it through culture, education, collaboration, technology or leadership. The 2.0 Adoption Council has become that place for me and the intellectual competence and idea exchange is second to none.

Dan Pontefract, Senior Director, Learning & Collaboration, TELUS

 

I am proud to be part of The 2.0 Adoption Council because of the network of knowledgeable peers in this space. We are all engaged with helping to make E20 successful in our organizations which bonds us. Our work in enhancing adoption is new territory and it’s exciting to be in the midst of this thinking, learning, strategizing and sharing of experiences.

Mary Maida, Information Solutions Manager, Medtronic, Inc.

The 2.0 Adoption Council has been a godsend for me. When I first opted in I was giddy at the idea of having others commiserate with and bounce ideas off of. It quickly became very clear that we had more answers than I’ve ever heard from a stage or an online event. It taps right into the strength of conference events; we get to have the hallway discussion every day if we like. We can drill down and talk about the realities of challenges, change, tools, and how to navigate these uncharted waters.

Megan Murray, Community Manager, Project Coordinator, Booz Allen Hamilton

 

Being a member of The 2.0 Adoption Council has given me a peer organization to share my challenges and my successes. I always find someone who is willing to help me out when I hit an issue that I have not dealt with before. The advice and expertise I receive is an invaluable resource for implementing collaborative solutions within my company. The team spirit and camaraderie of the council is well represented in everything we do from Demo Thursdays, to Guru Q&A, to exploring and evaluating new tools. I can’t thank my fellow members enough for the value that I take away each and every day.

Greg Lowe, Social Media Architect/Program Manager, Alcatel-Lucent

So, what are you waiting for? Join us! 

Is your social networking hurting your personal brand?

As we all explore the world of social media and social networking, we cannot forget that we all have a lot of learning to do along the way. Just as different tools resonate with different people, the ways in which the tools are used are all over the board, as well. This is likely no surprise to any of us who participate in social networks regularly. And yet, as users, we often forget how our social networking and social media activities can be perceived by those that do not use them as we do. To assume that the way in which we are using these tools should not be questioned by anyone is naïve at best, and foolish and even detrimental to your career, at worst. I'd offer this piece of advice to remember: Participating in any online social network or public forum is always going to be subject to review and interpretation by others, whether family, friends, current or potential employers. Why? Because it's just that - public. You should not have any notion of privacy if you're participating in public social networking sites. It's wise to always keep this in mind.

As a recent example, a co-worker was looking to hire someone to expand their team, but after checking out a prospective candidate online, became turned-off when they went to the person’s Twitter account and saw over 40 postings in the past 24 hours, most of which were not work-related. Admittedly, even to me - an individual quite comfortable with just about all social media tools available - I thought that was a bit much, especially given that many were during work hours. Personally, I have even un-followed people on Twitter who took up my entire tweetstream and seemingly used Twitter as their public IM tool. To me, quality over quantity showcases your talent when using social networking sites, whereas random and frequent brain dumps are not the kind of “conversation” I care to follow.

Is there such a thing as too much tweeting? Yes, I think there is – if you’re tweeting (or blogging or surfing Facebook or another social networking tool) with flaming finger velocity and it’s on work time and you’re not even remotely discussing work-related topics or somehow showcasing your talent as an employee of the company, then I think you’re approaching the area of risking folks thinking that you’ve got too much time on your hands. 

One might argue that if you’re getting your work done, producing high quality work, and not bothering anyone, that it’s no one’s business. I’d disagree. There are many days at work where having someone help me for even an hour would be a huge help. If you’ve got time to send that many tweets, messages, post that many blogs, etc. during work hours, and especially about non-work-related topics, then you’ve got time to help out a fellow co-worker and be a part of the team and showcase your talent to the company in that way.

Like it or not, what you do online when associating yourself with the company reflects not only on your personal brand, but also on the brand of your employer. Here are some tips I’d offer up to folks trying to find the balance between the personal and professional realms of social networking:

• The #1 question you should ask yourself - Would you care if someone else was telling you this?
• Share interesting information, resources, photos, videos, and link to blogs and articles
• Share success stories, ideas or comment on something of interest
• Do not use public social networking sites as your instant messenger tool
• Know your reply ratio – try to have a conversation with people instead of just broadcasting yourself
• It is OK to share some personal interests when online at work, be mindful of how it can be perceived – a good rule of thumb during work hours is 80% business, 20% other interests
• Learn that every tweet/blog post/status update/photo/etc counts – every post can help or hurt your personal brand as well as your company’s
• Learn from others, listen to advice and experiences they share
• Remember that this is a public forum in most cases
• What you say lives forever, even if you delete it, chances are good it's already been indexed or someone has already seen it
• Ask yourself: Would you say this to your manager or a customer?

---- 

 Jamie 

 Blog: http://www.jamiepappas.com

 Twitter: http://twitter.com/jamiepappas

 

 

Enterprise 2.0 is still alive and well, thank you very much

I am just back from a week in San Francisco attending the Enterprise 2.0 Conference in San Fran as a featured speaker along with a whole host of other industry experts. Those of us that were on the keynote stage got “backstage passes” and felt a bit like rock stars walking around. Thanks to everyone who made it possible for me to attend a great conference!

For my part, I participated in a panel with five other members from the 2.0 Adoption Council entitled “Is Enterprise 2.0 a Crock?”  I’ll share more on the panel and the whole idea of E 2.0 “crock-i-ness” in general in another post, as I’d like to get my overall conference thoughts down here first as well as share some advice based on ongoing discussions I had with folks at the conference that I hope to be helpful to them, as well as anyone else trying to do this. 

Photo courtesy of @adunne's Flickr Photostream. Panel left to right: Greg Lowe, Megan Murray, Bryce Williams, me, Bruce Galinksy, and Claire Flanagan. (I took a few photos, too, at the conference, though not nearly as good as Alex's.)

I have to say that I enjoyed the conference and the city of San Francisco. The weather was exceptionally nice and the city is amazing, even though I only saw a very small portion of its loveliness due to being inside most of the time.  But nothing compared to the opportunity to meet not only my friends from the 2.0 Adoption Council - Susan Scrupski our Founder, Andy McAfee, Greg Lowe, Megan Murray, Bryce Williams, Bruce Galinksy, Claire Flanagan, Timo Elliott, Hamilton Pridgen, Bert Sandie, and Donna Lucas - in person, but also so many other folks so passionate about the topic of Enterprise 2.0. I am proud to be a member of the 2.0 Adoption Council, and a part of the Enterprise 2.0 conference, as both have done great things for me on many levels.

One thing that’s still very clear to me from the conference, and the folks that I talked to there, is that Enterprise 2.0 is alive and well in terms of both interest in “cracking the code” of rollout and implementation as well as interest in and a hunger for examples of companies that are doing it and doing it well. It’s refreshing to work for a company (EMC) that’s considered to be ahead of the curve in terms of strategy, deployment, and adoption of Enterprise 2.0 tools and behaviors behind the firewall. I know that we still have a lot of learning and work ahead of us, but it’s neat to hear what folks think of what we’ve done so far, and of course to know that I’ve been in the thick of it.

So, how does one go about thinking about and preparing to launch an Enterprise 2.0 initiative? Here’s my advice on questions you need to ask yourself and be able to answer before moving forward. I’ll be elaborating on these questions in future posts:

How do you pitch the idea and to whom?

Understanding the key stakeholders and influences that need to be involved in the initiative and decision-making will go a long way towards a successful rollout. My recommendation is to define your goals and try to include key stakeholders from as many cross-functional teams as makes sense for your organization. This will hopefully reduce the number of times you may have to go back and re-pitch and refine the plan.

How do you determine what tools to use?

Understanding your goals will lead you towards tools. My recommendation would be to start smaller and more concise to meet specific goals you’ve identified and add new functionality as your users request it - providing too many bells and whistles up front will likely turn users off.

How do you secure executive sponsorship and program funding?

Getting an executive sponsor for your initiative who “gets it” and can articulate the value of the tools you’re proposing, as well as actually use them, is going to be key to your initiative.  You’ll also want to be honest with your budgetary needs – nothing is free, not even if the software’s free – it’s still going to take someone’s time (and time is money, after all), to roll out the initiative. My recommendation is to start with a pilot or beta program to get folks interested in the offering and then scale up as needed as new users join.

How do you educate on the tools?

Educating on the tool(s) that you choose is going to be key for a successful initiative. Too often, we make assumptions about people’s level of knowledge on any particular tool or subject. My advice is that you’re going to need to prepare beginner, intermediate, and advanced training materials in multiple formats to have a truly successful educational program.

How do you roll it out to the company?

When it’s time for go-live, you’re going to need to determine how you’re going to roll it out and to whom – will it be the whole company or a sample group of folks? You’ll also want to consider any marketing and communications channels you’ll be able to take advantage of to increase awareness. My recommendation is to also have a plan in place with consistent messaging for your advocates and evangelists to take advantage of when they share the tools with others. This will help to keep the messaging consistent and avoid confusion as to what the tools are for.

How do you handle the naysayers, those that don't see the value or support the idea?

See my previous blog post on this one.

How do you measure the impact and success?

You will inevitably want to consider the measurements you will take into account to consider your initiative a success. There are lots of different measures that can be captured, and each organization is different. My recommendation is to gain insights from your key stakeholders as to what they might consider a measure of success and then propose a phase 1 list to folks for consideration. As the tools and their use evolves, so too can your measures of success.

In summary, the key ingredients for any Enterprise 2.0 initiative are:

• Executive sponsorship
• Funding
• Defined goals/purpose
• Defined “rules of engagement”
• Partnerships are key (IT, HR, Legal, PR, Business Units, etc.)
• Group of passionate folks
• Patience
• Perhaps a leap of faith

---- 

 Jamie 

 Blog: http://www.jamiepappas.com

 Twitter: http://twitter.com/jamiepappas

Dealing with the Enterprise 2.0 and social media critics and naysayers

This past August, I had the pleasure of facilitating a discussion at PodCamp Boston 4 – “How do you get your company to see the value of social media?” This session could have very well been entitled “How do you get your company to see the value of Enterprise 2.0?” and my advice would have been the same.

Recently, a similar discussion came up among members of the 2.0 Adoption Council, and I shared my response with folks in the discussion, and decided to blog on it finally, as I’ve been meaning to for a really long time! 

When we started our community endeavor over two years ago, our success measure was never to have 100% adoption, but rather to build a community of value for employees passionate about collaboration. Once we had several hundred passionate folks engaged and getting value, we continued to work and evolve the community so that it not only continued to provide value to the existing community members, but the hope was also that as the value grows, it would also persuade others to check out the community, join, and contribute. We also actively seek to gather and share success stories, use cases, etc. and post those within the community, as well as include them in our presentations and informational sessions on the community. 

In my opinion, the most important thing that we've really tried to do, which has made a world of difference, is that we've tailored our message to each individual group in terms of use cases and how they can get value from the community. We go into every single meeting with the WIFA (What's in it for the audience?) question at the forefront of our presentation for the stakeholders of that meeting. We learned very quickly that if you tailor the message to their very specific needs, and pinpoint their worst pain points and address how the community can help with some of those issues, it goes a long way towards persuading them to at least give it a try. 

The second most important thing we've done is be honest about the level of commitment required to get a community up and running, as well as sustain it long-term. It's not easy. It doesn't happen overnight. And just because you build it, doesn't mean they'll come! Being honest with each group about the level of commitment required to build and sustain a community and emphasizing the fact that it's a long-term effort to build a successful community has worked wonders for setting expectations. 

Some additional advice I shared at my PodCamp session has helped me a lot in meetings and conversations with folks who are skeptical about the value of an Enterprise 2.0 initiative: 

• Anticipate possible objections: It helps to try to anticipate some possible objections ahead of time and think of how you'll respond to them. If you can prepare for the objections and think of a response, it will help keep the conversation on point and help you to illustrate/reinforce the benefits for that group. 
• Acknowledge concerns: You always want to acknowledge concerns - never tell people they're being stupid or unreasonable (even if you think they are!) Concerns are legitimate to the people raising them. You will not convince anyone to join the initiative by ignoring or dismissing their concerns. You also need to acknowledge that not everyone sees Enterprise 2.0 or social media as you do - some folks will need more time to see the value.
• Engage in friendly dialogue: Engage in friendly and inviting dialogue with the person(s) who are objecting or arguing against the value of the Enterprise 2.0 initiative. Whatever you do, don't get into a heated debate with someone who does not see the value of the initiative. It doesn't do anyone any good and it puts a bad vibe in the way of future conversations. 
• Respect critical feedback: Everyone's entitled to their own opinions. You don't have to agree with them, but don't dismiss them either. See if the feedback presents opportunities for improvements, further exploration, or even education on misinformation or lack of knowledge or understanding. 
• Educate where ever possible: Sometimes the critics feel the way they do simply because they don't have the full picture of the features/functions, use cases, etc. Sometimes they just don't know where to start and so they are critical for that reason. Use the conversation or information from the critic as an opportunity for education and see if you can illustrate your value proposition with meaningful examples and case studies. 
• Accept that social media is not for everyone: Enterprise 2.0 and/or social media is not for everyone and that's ok. If you go into it thinking that success = 100% adoption, you're going to be sorely disappointed. Your job is to provide value, illustrate use cases, benefits, etc. and accept that not everyone will want to use the tool or community. And you know what - that's perfectly fine.

Barriers to embracing the “social” in social media

For me, the term social media automatically makes me thing of being social with other folks, by way of a various tools, technologies, and even in person – talking openly, but politely, about what’s on your mind – what you like, what you’re not so fond of, and just generally sharing information, tips, tricks, best practices and helpful tools with friends and all those wonderful folks you’ve built into the great network you now have across all those tools…it means joining in the conversation!

Social media, for me, has been an amazing way for me to connect with people I wouldn’t have otherwise necessarily had an opportunity to meet. I’ve met amazing Distinguished Engineers, like Steve Todd, insightful TC’s like Dave Graham, Windows guru (and Rush fan!) Brian Henderson, and one of the many folks at EMC who are passionate about SM, Stu Miniman. I even met wonderful people across the pond – Storagezilla makes us proud! Not to mention, another web junkie like myself, Len Devanna.

And in case you were thinking this is just an EMC love fest, well, it’s not. I’ve also had the pleasure of meeting Chris Brogan (you’ve been under a rock if you haven’t heard of Chris!) and Sean O’Driscoll, chatting with Jeremiah Owyang virtually, and rubbing elbows with the likes of Dave Alston, Peter Kim (please check out the panel Peter’s hosting at E2.0 in Boston and say hi!) and Robert Collins.

It’s been a wonderful, amazing and truly interesting experience! And, it all comes together in the realm of social media. Yes, social media. Without social media and the power that all these tools possess, I wouldn’t have met all these wonderful folks, let alone had the opportunity to stay connected with them in real-time fashion.

One of the things you may have experienced in your adventures is that while this open, transparent, and sometimes seemingly TMI flow of social interaction that occurs on any one of the many tools out there is natural for some of us, for many folks out there, it’s not.

We’ve always debated the topic of open vs. closed communities on EMC|ONE, and many of us have talked about our approach – where ever it’s possible, we try to keep communities open, as we truly believe that it facilitates greater collaboration – think of the old adage “Two heads are better than one.”  Or, to be less geeky – how about – great things happen when folks come together and share ideas. After all, that’s what community’s all about, right?

We’ve always been open to the idea that if there’s truly a business need for private collaboration, then let’s talk about it…let’s make sure that 1 – you’re in the right place, using the right tool, and 2 – we can help each other learn what types of scenarios call for private collaboration.

The reality is that in the great majority of cases, there has not been a pressing need for a private collaboration community on EMC|ONE. Rather, we’re seeing the same tendencies re-emerge in cycles as new users join the community. So what are some of the reasons folks are opting in to "private" collaboration?

1. Fear of making a mistake publicly – What if I say something stupid?
2. My (insert role or title here) does not think social media is “work” – If I participate, I’ll be viewed as “playing” so I won’t participate.
3. Not realizing the full business capabilities of social media tools - How do I collaborate in a business fashion?
4. Not understanding all the tools available - I don’t know how to use this stuff!
5. Being overwhelmed by all the conversation and collaboration on the site – There’s way too much going on – where do I even begin?

The good news is that since there are patterns emerging, there is a way for us to identify and address these barriers by encouraging, educating and evangelizing the value of social media and enterprise community/collaboration. And now, the work begins!

What have you experienced as barriers to adoption of open collaboration in your communities? How have you addressed those barriers? 

The Social Media Club

We’re trying something new here to get folks more interested in social media and all that it has to offer – we’ve started a “Social Media Club” here at EMC. To give credit where it’s due, this (hopefully) monthly event was the brainchild of Stuart Miniman a.k.a @stu here at EMC. Stu had the vision and I help with the logistics and execution of this fantastic idea!

It’s pretty straightforward – it’s a public “club” with a group on EMC|ONE for anyone interested in learning more about and/or currently using various social media tools to connect, share experiences, ask questions, make recommendations, and just generally be social!

We approached the first session not really sure of the level of interest this might be, but we were pleasantly surprised at the turnout! We had well over 100 folks worldwide dialed into the event, watching via webcam and sitting in the room with us.

As it turns out, there are lots and lots of folks here at EMC who are interested in social media, not sure where to start, and find it helpful to converse with folks who are already “in the game” so-to-speak.

The focus of the first get together was how interest in social media started at EMC, with Chuck giving a chat on where it all began many moons ago. Folks were very interested to learn more about how this all came about, the challenges that we’ve faced thus far and how well it’s working now, understanding that we still have room to grow.

The feedback was positive on the session and we have lots of great ideas for future sessions, the next of which we’ll be having in a month with a focus on “other” social media tools available to use besides blogs, namely twitter and facebook in this session.

One thing that's clear to us is that people have an interest in learning what’s out there, but are often times not comfortable or interested in starting their own blog right out of the gate - they prefer to ease into things a bit, know their options, and how to use each, and make the decision on what's right for them - a stellar approach if you ask me. So, one of our primary goals is to educate folks on what else is available to them to participate in and take advantage of - who else is using it, how they're using it, what they can expect, etc. All good stuff.

I am definitely looking forward to these chats, and will share more as we have future sessions.

In the meantime, however, I’d love to know - are you doing something like this at your company? Any lessons learned and best practices to share?

Getting Word Out About Your Community

One of the challenges that our community managers often face is figuring out how to increase awareness of their community once they’ve created it and started some good discussions or collaborative projects. It's what I call the "now what" syndrome. Ok, I built it, now what...?

This is a list of things I share with them as ideas to get the word out. I always suggest that they'll need to try multiple avenues to reach a wider audience. Do you have a similar list? Have you tried other things that have worked? Please share!

• Respond to emailed questions (where appropriate) by posting the question and answer to your community on EMC|ONE, then respond with a link to the thread you created
• Showcase your community via an article or announcement about the community (be sure to include links!) in relevant EMC newsletters you participate in
•  Include the link to the community in your email signature, when appropriate
• Promote the community and provide links in any meetings you attend when the audience is relevant
• Email SME's on specific threads you know they have an opinion on or a stake in and personally ask them to jump in and provide their expertise on the subject
• Email an announcement to your key audience (sales or pre-sales, for example) when you have the community populated with some content and discussions that are valuable to the group
• Post a link on your Powerlink page, if you have one, or other relevant Powerlink landing pages (Powerlink is our extranet where all sales supporting collateral is shared with the field)
• Share it with a co-worker in the lunch line or at the water cooler

One of the challenges we always have to remember is that people are busy -- they only have so much time in the day to do everything that needs to get done. If you manage your community with the idea that they're always going to be thinking in the back of their head "what's in it for me?" and then meet those needs and demonstrate value, the people will come, and they'll stay.

Lessons from the Upgrade Trenches

First things first

First of all, I owe all of you an apology. I have been operating in stealth mode these past several weeks. Ok, who am I kidding; it’s been well over a month. And for those that were looking for more from me, I apologize. My only defense is that there's a really good reason, I swear. And it's got everything (yes, really, everythign!) to do wtih the mega-upgrade we just completed for EMC|ONE. After a few speed bumps, we are up and running succesfully and I'm happy with where we are - now.

 

As you may recall, we’re running Jive Software’s Clearspace platform for both our internal community (EMC|ONE) and our external EMC Community Network (ECN).

 

The good, and it is very good

Overall, I’m quite pleased with the upgrade coming out of it with a few “wish list” items (see more in The bad below) and a really, really big “what the heck were you thinking!?” item (see more in The downright ugly below).

 

We got a lot of what we were hoping for in this upgrade, and for that, it was worth it. What did we get, exactly?

 

Well, we got the ability to easily customize our home page of EMC|ONE, whereas before it was just the out-of-the-box fire hose of content and communities. Think all 130+ communities scrolling for pages on the left, and ALL of their most recent posts mixed together on the right two-thirds of the page. Not exactly optimal, especially for new users first coming to the site. Now we can change the page whenever we want with widgets and customized layouts. Total thumbs up on adding this functionality!

 

We also got a customizable home page for each end user to design as they like using widgets. They can also set it as their default. This was a major ask from just about everyone in our community. So, total thumbs up on this one, as well!

 

We got way more people functions – more robust profiles, friends, status updates (think Twitter), and social groups.  All very good, and highly desired by our community.

 

Finally, we got a much improved and much easier to use text editor, which presents our users with a more intuitive interface and allows them to use keyboard shortcuts they already know for formatting. Very nice, guys!

 

The bad, otherwise known as my wish list

Along with the good, we lost a couple of things that I wish we hadn’t. Not sure why the decisions were made to remove them, but I’m not alone in missing them.

 

We lost the ability to easily track the number of views and number of comments on any given post within a community. This used to be a key tenet of one of the widgets available for community design, but has disappeared and is causing some major bumps in the road for some of our community managers who liked to gather these kinds of stats to see what was working and what wasn’t in their venues.

 

My personal philosophy is that it’s more important to take into account who is saying what about your content and conversations than how many people viewed it, but not everyone using EMC|ONE as their information portal for all things EMC agrees.

 

We lost the ability to aggregate more than one blog into a given community or space. As we all know, it’s nearly mandatory to follow more than one blog, and you will find more than one valuable blogger on any given topic that you’d like to enable your readers to have access to by simply aggregating a feed into the community you manage. Sorry folks – not anymore. It’s a strict one-to-one ratio now, no exceptions.

 

I miss it. I loved this functionality. Unfortunately, there’s no good workaround for it right now, either. Apparently, I’m not the only one that misses it - I did hear there might be a possible widget under wraps that may address this wish list item in the future. That would be a swell Christmas present.

 

The downright ugly, which I have recently been referring to as "what were you thinking!?"

 

Blogs were not a smooth transition. Personal blogs remained largely untouched, but boy did we get killed with the community blogs that we had on EMC|ONE.

 

The title of this section says it all – it was ugly, downright ugly, and that has not changed much. Admittedly, it was ugly enough that I lobbed off a few “what were you thinking” emails to our lovely vendor last week and this week.

 

Why was it ugly? Not only did we have to re-assign every blog to the community it was appearing in, but the process renamed the blogs, re-assigned a new URL to the blogs, and wiped out the author list. Wouldn’t have been great had I know this before the re-assignment, but at least I could have prepared for it. We launched with people not being able to find their blogs, not being able to write to their blogs, and having to scramble to fix things only to find that there’s no “undo” if we make a mistake (I’m only human) thanks to those darned software bugs we all love so much.

 

So where does the “what were you thinking” come in? Communication, my dear friends - had I known these things before re-assigning the blogs to their homes, I would have definitely thought twice about doing so. Not knowing it ahead of time has caused me to down more chocolate and coffee than one woman should ever have in a 24 hour setting. I’ve also uttered the cliché “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” more times than I care to admit.

 

And then there’s the question that I might never know the answer to – why oh why did you break what didn’t need fixin’? I loved, the community loved the old blog functionality. What were you thinking breaking it? Sigh.

 

What sayest the community?

For the most part, the feedback around the upgrade has been positive. There has been some frustration at first with the “new” functionality. But, once folks calm down, they realize all the basics are the same, and they can choose (or not) to take advantage of all the extras at their own pace.

 

Why so successful? Well, we put out a call to our community for volunteers for testing. There were some annoyances found, some personal nits, but no deal breakers. I think it’s a success because we involved our community. We asked them point blank for their honest feedback, and they gave it to us. And it helped to make this great big endeavor work. And now we all get to reap the benefits.

 

The final verdict

 

So, if given the opportunity, would I do the upgrade again? Yes. But I’d make a few changes to how I approached things. I guess that’s what it’s all about, isn’t it? Learning from our mistakes and improving upon our weaknesses.

Thoughts on Executive Blogs

One of the cool things I get to do at EMC is talk with people about the tools that are available to them, both via EMC ONE or in the “outside world” and how they might use these tools to accomplish their goals. In recent weeks, I have spent a great deal of time talking with some very passionate and interested EMC executives who would like to blog on ONE to share their own experiences, goals and perspectives with the vast EMC employee population.

As I have met with these folks, some recurring themes continue to emerge in the conversations. I have captured the top 3 below (more to come soon) along with my advice to them.

Please jump in with your own advice, experiences and lessons learned, too.

Time and energy or How much time are we talking here?

 

As we know, executives are busy, busy, busy. Not only are they the face of the company in all that they do, but they are in high demand for just about everything because of this. Every activity or meeting they choose to participate in comes at a cost of not doing something else, or turning someone else’s request away. Blogging is no different.

The typical first reaction when an executive is thinking of blogging is to compare themselves to any of the well-known and more prolific bloggers at EMC or another company and think that they have to live up to those same standards for their blog with the same frequency of posts, level of responsiveness, interactions, dialogue and debates. This is simply not true, and anyone diving into something as new as blogging is to some of these folks would instantly feel overwhelmed with that kind of expectation right out of the gate.  

My advice –

Set realist expectations for yourself. How often do you hope to post? Is that reasonable given your schedule? Start by setting a realistic goal for frequency of posts, and if you’re available more often, then that’s great. Don’t be afraid to change your goal if it’s not working for you. This is your blog, and it only needs to be as often as it is comfortable for you to do it – consider once a week, once every two weeks, or once a month as a starting point.

Commitment or How long am I going to be doing this?

 

Nobody likes to fail. Plain and simple. Starting a blog for some people implies that it must go on forever, with no end in sight. The thought of not being able to sustain it sometimes brings about thoughts of failure.

This is really sad for me when I hear this because blogging, in my mind, is supposed to be fun. It’s supposed to be something you enjoy. It’s supposed to help you de-stress, not make you feel trapped into doing something forever or risk being viewed as a failure.

My advice –

Go into this blogging adventure with an open mind. Do it as often and as long as it is enjoyable and works for you. Do not let it become a source of stress. Instead, let it become another, very valuable means of communicating to people you are trying to reach in a different way. Never, never, never go into it thinking “If I can’t sustain this, I’ve failed.” Some people are natural bloggers and writers, while others are not. That’s ok. We all have different strengths and weaknesses. We’re only human, after all.

Authenticity or Can’t someone else write my posts for me?

 

Back to the time constraints and considerations…Given that time is an invaluable asset in the lives of executives, one of the questions that comes up often is the idea of having a ghost writer for blog posts. “I can have someone else, who knows me and what I do well, write my posts and I’ll just post them. That’s how I’ll get around the time issue.” That’s what they do for their other communications, so the feeling is that it’ll work well for blogging, too. 

No-No-No. No-No.

Not only is this against the authenticity that is at the very heart of blogging, it complicates things incredibly. Elaborate plans and schemes have to be concocted in order to sustain this, and many people have to do the right things at the right time in order for it to work. Not only that, responses to comments and questions become crazy to handle – who’s responding to what? What if they say something other than what you would have said? Then what? Do you correct them? Do you add your own comments? And what happens then? And on, and on, and on…

My advice –

Keep it real, and keep it you. Do not start a blog just because it’s cool. Do it because you want to, for whatever amount of time it works, and do it because you’re committed to doing it authentically. Think of the reasons why you want to start a blog, one of which I’m pretty sure is because you want to connect with and communicate with people, right? Well, this is your chance to let them hear from you. Share what you want them to hear from you.

More themes to come soon…

Whose Job Is Social Media Engagement?

One of the things that I see organizations continue to struggle with in the realm of social media engagement is who is (or should be) responsible for it? Who should set up a community on behalf of the company? Who should manage it? Who should monitor it? Who should drive its strategic direction? Who should blog? And who should organize the bloggers, and who should monitor it and…You get my point.

People trust people

The traditional approach to media and communications from most organizations has largely been to have communications, regardless of their nature, come from PR “on behalf of the company.” Now, I have nothing against PR and in fact work with a number of fantastic PR folks who understand the value of social media and are fantastic proponents of the tools and technologies out there. And I know I’m not alone in this. My point in bringing this up is that in order for social media and community engagement to be successful for enterprises, one cannot depend solely on PR to drive the efforts. You must have people talking to people for it to work.

There are all sorts of research findings that point to this, as well. People trust people first, not companies first. They want to hear from people like them, facing the same decisions, the same challenges, the same options. The chart below from the Edelman Trust Barometer is a great pictorial of this dynamic. You’ll see that folks have consistently put their trust into “a person like me” vs. trust for employees of a company, CEO or otherwise.

 

Source: 2008 Edelman Trust Barometer, shared by Steve Rubel

This is a further testament to why it’s important for organizations to have all the right people involved and invested in making social media a success – different people have different perspectives, and will connect differently with readers, customers, partners, prospects. You must have well-rounded representation in order for social media at an enterprise organization to be genuine.

The champions

There are always people who will naturally become champions of the social media initiatives at the organization. It is important to welcome these people, nurture their knowledge, and make it easy for them to share their knowledge, experiences, and expertise with others. These people are your greatest asset when launching and maintaining active engagement for social media tools. And the beautiful part is they come from all parts of the organization, so they have the diversity of experience to share what works and what doesn’t in different parts of the company, as well as with customers, partners and prospects.

For EMC|ONE, we have a voluntary mentor program in which we encourage folks who have emerged as the champions of social media to add their names to a list of mentors that anyone can contact for technical assistance, advice on how to do just about anything, brainstorming on ways to encourage participation and make their communities more welcoming and discussion oriented. Why? It’s the same principle – people trust people who have the same experiences, questions, and challenges that they are facing.

For our growing list of external bloggers, we do the exact same thing – we have volunteers who are more than happy to share their experiences, advice, best practices, and of course, we have a community on EMC|ONE dedicated to their efforts, as well. We encourage anyone at EMC, blogger or not, to ask questions, seek advice, and share their experiences with the rest of the crew.

The educators

The open and real-time nature of social media tools makes it essential to ingrain education into the roadmap of launching an enterprise social media initiative. If organizations want people to use social media responsibility, and on behalf of the organization, they must set forth what they consider to be the “rules of engagement” and best practices, even use cases for participants of the tools. An example of this is the disclaimer on my blog – Sure, I work for EMC, and I share my experiences, opinions and stories of working here, but I do not speak on behalf of the organization. I speak on behalf of myself.

I often find that people get so excited about the initiatives that they are working on that it can be easy to forget what is appropriate to disclose in a public forum, such as a blog or discussion groups. Reminders of this, for the sake of both the individual and the company, are helpful and necessary components of the endeavor.

Some folks just need a helping hand by means of basic introduction as to when to use a wiki, blog, or discussion forum and what each means and implies regarding participation. To meet this need, we have created a fairly robust set of FAQs and Tutorials for our users on these very topics. They serve as the starting point for folks and lay the framework for them to feel a bit more comfortable engaging in the tools we offer.

The final verdict - Teamwork

There is no magic formula for how many people, or what departments, or what levels must be involved in a successful initiative. You must be open to exploring the right mix for your organization. And you must be open to changing that mix frequently until the team is right for your organization’s needs.

All of this makes the case that there is a point person or persons that needs to coordinate the company’s social media efforts beyond the tools provided for use. But, it also makes the case that social media success requires a team of diverse and committed individuals to make it a success and to serve the interests of not only the individuals that use it, but the organization as a whole.