Enterprise workers don’t have the bandwidth for social media

Jun 16, 2008 | blog

'Ben Considered Working from his new Balloon Cube' by ShadowStorm In past posts on the topic, I’ve often wondered when the average worker would “get” blogging. I have to admit that I finally “got it” recently, but from a different perspective. While working with larger firms, I’ve again had the chance to observe the average office worker. In doing so, “it” occurred to me while explaining how social media adds value to an organization that many folks just don’t have the bandwidth to participate.

It’s not that they wouldn’t want to, rather, it’s that the modern organization is so optimized on searching for productivity gains that there is little room to add back the socialization tools to the mix. To do so without finding the reasons for using more employees’ time doesn’t add value to the organization. Many existing efforts to engage the employee meet with mediocre results because people don’t have interest in helping their employer know more about them.

Another aspect of social media in the enterprise is buy-in. There simply is a certain demographic that will be averse to participating. The reasons for this can be nearly anything, but usually comes back to the fact that many people can’t grasp the value of participating. They may exhibit this perspective in many other aspects of their life as well by not joining community groups or friends in other activities.

So, for those organizations that are trying to leverage the knowledge of their employees, the challenge is to find the channel that they will respond to. It’s more than that however, because just like working to connect with consumers, the business needs to connect with their staff. They need to eliminate the gap between business and employee by being themselves. Executives & veeps need to show their personalities, not their “game face” that they use for business. The employees know about that all too well, they need to see that the business is made up of real people.

Social Media in general has this issue – that people aren’t willing to invest the time, or don’t see any value in participating. It’s not unique to this new way of engaging people. Similar challenges faced radio and television at one time as well, newfangled things that they were. These new community building tools & techniques are still in their infancy and will be a large part of the infrastructure of the new economy that is developing as we speak – the trends in the market prove that out every day.

Photo credit: ShadowStorm

Change your vista

Apr 4, 2008 | blog

De cara com a vista... by lulacerdarj at Flickr It’s all perception, or how you view things. I’m often trying to change my view of the world by working in different places when I have the chance. Whether that be coffee shop, a cafe, or a park – the change of scenery does wonders for one’s productivity.

Inspiration

That thought was driven home when I looked out the window last evening and watched the beginnings of a beautiful sunset. Just being able to see that sunset after a darn hard day of coding helped change my perspective on the day. It elevated the spirits and allowed me to get more done around the house than I had planned for the evening.

Look for Patterns

So often I see people doing the same thing day in and day out. It’s an easy routine to fall into. After all most tasks are repetitive and we naturally evolve processes to fit them and simply follow the process over and over. Often we don’t even think about the repetition, instead letting the frustration of it cloud our view of things in general.

Trying Things

It’s amazing how changing even the simplest of things can change one’s point of view and bring on a fresh perspective.

  • Soundtrack for your life – listen to some tunes while you work
  • Rearrange your desk – it’s amazing how moving things around shakes things up
  • New wallpaper for you desktop – get some new vistas to look at
  • Work remotely – go find that “Coffee-Fi” as my friend Thomas calls it, exactly who says you can’t be productive outside the office

Watching for it

More than anything, simply watching for real opportunities to change how you do things, view things, or even work will help bring a new perspective. You’ve probably been doing this type of thing for your employer, “think outside the box”, but may not have done it as often for yourself.

Stand up for a minute and take a good, slow look around your office, and office mates. Turn all the way around. How many others are looking up or around? I bet you’ll see most of your cube mates “heads down” doing those repetitive tasks we talked about.

What About You

So, what are you going to do? Do you have something that we can learn from? What other things have you found to change your vista?

Photo credit: lulacerdarj

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Perspectives: Clarity

Jan 9, 2008 | blog

Single point perspective - photo by Mark Reeves Every couple of months I “wake up” and realize that I’m in control.  It always bothers me when I loose that perspective, and it happens much too easily.  Having that moment of clarity, that realization, understanding what that means, is a powerful experience.  It allows you to look past the moment and take a different long view of your inner goals than you normally would.

Keeping that perspective for more than a few minutes or hours, though, is quite hard.  Life intervenes, whether at work or home, and we have to deal with the responsibilities at hand.  But that is how it should be.  Being able to leverage those powerful moments when everything is very clear, however, is the key.

Sometimes you can prepare for those moments by taking notes or jotting ideas down – keep a journal maybe.  When those moments arrive, take advantage of the clarity and motivation.  Pull out that notebook, journal, or the ideas swirling in the back of your mind.  Think on them a bit, write down your conclusions and ideas if it helps, doing so can help to empower you later.

Perspectives are how we view the world, ourselves, and our place in the world.  It also affects how we view opportunities.  Without the right perspective, some opportunities might be right in front of us, and we’d never know it.  Learning what enables those moments of clarity will help you leverage those times for you and your family.  Watch for those moments, learn how to bring them about and turn them into your normal frame of mind.

Photo credit: Mark Reeves

Is Windows still relevant? A CNET News.com Perspective

Oct 6, 2006 | blog

Charles Cooper, a Executive editor at CNET News.com, discusses an interesting point.  One that I’ve seen as well: is Windows still relevant in today’s “web 2.0” centric world?

The answer, of course, is yes.  Charles goes on to discuss a quick history of Windows’ “bundling”/anti-trust disputes.Microsoft Logo  What I find interesting, or more correctly – frustrating, is the attitude with which many companies are taking.  Charles talks about Symantec and Adobe trying to whip up sympathy in the European Union about Microsoft competing with them in their market.

The part that bothers me the most is that these companies, and others, fail to see that the product that was a lucrative niche market 10 years ago, is today’s commodity toaster.  Since AV engines, and portable document formats are a commodity, the are to be expected in the base OS – a base service available at any moment to any requesting application.

These companies simply need to be more proactive, find that new niche.  Look forward and discover those new business opportunities, and develop a business plan to exploit them.  Simply relying on the old tried & true product song & dance.

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CNET News.com – Perspective: Is Windows still relevant?

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