Value from Social Media
Through a discussion with Ken Allan on a post about Objections to Corporate Social Media Ken pointed out that much of the objections focus on new complexities associated with social learning. Ken then points to the 90-9-1 rule and says that because of the complexity - people simply will not adopt new methods and tools in significant ways - therefore:
It just won’t happen.
This becomes the crux of the issue for me personally and a big part of the reason to start Work Literacy in the first place. It needs to happen and here’s why …
Let’s consider a simple scenario - I’m trying to decide if a particular solution makes sense for my company / organization. I do some searching on Google and find some overviews of the solution and some other good information. But, what it’s still not quite enough to make me feel comfortable with my recommendations. I would like more in the areas of:
- Experience - What have been the experiences of other organizations (not the canned case studies) when they’ve used this solution.
- Boundaries / Existence - I’ve got a particular issue and I’m not sure if answers to that issue exist out there, I’ve not found it in my searching.
- Confirmation - I’m beginning to have an answer, but I’d like to get confirmation of the answer based on my particular situation based on experience.
- Importance - Some of the issues I see, I’m not sure how important they are in practice, should I be concerned.
All of these kinds of questions are hard to answer with Google. But there are really good ways to help you find answers via social media (blogs, social networks, etc.). In fact, getting the answer through social media solutions to these questions will be significantly faster and better than through search. Yes, it was more complex to be in position to be able to leverage social media to get these answers. And, yes, most knowledge workers are not conscious about performing in this way. But, I would claim that the social solution here is greatly superior.
Do you agree that it is better here and you believe that this is not an uncommon situation?
If so, then I would claim that there are a lot of knowledge workers who need to learn how to do this.
Who’s going to produce better at the end of the day: A person who knows how to use Google only or a person who can use Google and also can reach out via social media to help find and answer?
I believe the answer is obvious and individuals and organizations need to wake up to this!
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July 11th, 2008 at 11:17 am
I think that most people would agree that the social solution is better. It’s just that many people don’t understand how they can use technology to get those social solutions. They totally understand that they usually get the best info from asking people who are knowledgeable in the area where they want information. What they don’t recognize is that tech can enhance and enable this process.
I saw something the other day that social media will spread because it enables people to do things they do naturally. We’ve always gone to other people for answers to our questions. Now technology expands our abilities to do that. We need to 1) help people realize this and 2) help them get better at it.
My opinion, of course.
July 11th, 2008 at 2:44 pm
I think the person who can do both!
http://beth.typepad.com/beths_blog/2008/05/can-i-get-the-a.html
July 11th, 2008 at 7:20 pm
I remember when “they” said the same thing about e-mail. I think there is a natural evolution in software in which early adopters see a need that is met by the new media, but then they begin to modify the media to meet their particular needs. These modifications usually make the media more user friendly, so more people begin to adapt it. Soon it becomes “too” easy or standard so the earlier adopters look for new tools to meet what they see as a gap in the current technology and the ideal technology.
I see social networks such as Ning and LinkedIn making social networks more “mainstream” and acceptable to use in a business environment. These are familiar to facebook and myspace, but changes have been made to make it meet the needs of mainstream users.
The new technology will be mobile technology and the software that meets the needs of using handheld technology. I see these needs as a form of IM for the cell or handheld pda, access in areas with limited access (more power?), greater capacity to download and store interactive programs (i.e. video conferencing, creating mobile networks, collaborating using mobile technology).
July 11th, 2008 at 11:45 pm
Kia ora Tony
Thanks for the mention here.
I agree that Work Literacy needs to happen. I also believe that it will happen. It’s the way that it’s encouraged to be done that I wonder about. I put a comment on Kerry McGuire’s post to that effect.
@Virginia - I concur with what you say here. I see connectivity as a real factor in all of this. That’ll come, but not without a lot of huffing. I’m also not sosure about mobile technology being the way to go. M-learning? Hmmm.
Ka kite
from Middle-earth
July 12th, 2008 at 10:20 am
Virginia - not sure I agree on the specific technologies - but I agree with your adoption pattern.
Great line Ken - “It’s the way that it’s encouraged to be done that I wonder about.”
Somewhat encapsulates the issue doesn’t it.
July 12th, 2008 at 10:40 am
Tony - what if the product you work with makes it a liability to use social media to find someone to help you find the answer? For example, if you are in R&D at a company, couldn’t trying find the answer in this social way (sometimes even within your company) have an adverse effect on your company’s IP?
I’d say there are skills to be learned in knowing *how* to find answers using social networks, but I would also say that a more important skill may be knowing *when* to use which networks.
July 12th, 2008 at 10:58 am
Gina - the short answer is that if you are in R&D there’s an interesting gray area around what information you want and don’t want to find / be exposed to. So, yes, there’s a risk -as there is of doing a search.
And I agree that there’s a need to know how AND when. I actually think the bigger issue is that often people don’t know about the technique and don’t know when it applies.
I wouldn’t want to confuse it with the risks in the R&D scenario though. They have to assess that risk around any information exposure. Yes, if they use social, then there’s a new element of how much they can expose to the other person in order to get feedback. Often that’s not as much an issue as you might think. This is something I personally do quite often when I’m working on a new start-up.
July 12th, 2008 at 2:22 pm
Ken and Tony: this is not my trend (I don’t use any of these mobile technologies) but rather what my students and businesses I work with are actually using now. We are beginning to get students asking if they can access online courses via mobile technology. In an international project I worked on, an Italian student noted that he accessed the internet via his mobile phone because the internet hook up in Italy was too slow. My students when given the choice between technologies will use their cell phones or blackberries. Look at the number of people that use Ipods for other things than just down loading the “top 10″.
As most tech companies have very good marketing departments that keep track of these trends, I have no doubt we will begin to see a shift towards new add-ons for mobile technology. All the majors are shifting in the direction currently. You may find a mobile version of the Wii in the future!
July 13th, 2008 at 8:48 am
Virginia, I’ve seen the same info on mobile technologies and have wondered if, to some extent, it will be driven by the type of knowledge work you do. I can see people who need to be on the road, such as salespeople, architects who may need to be onsite, etc., moving more quickly to using mobile technologies, while people like me who do a lot of writing and thinking will need those less.
July 15th, 2008 at 9:56 am
[...] questo semplice scenario, liberamente tratto dal post “Value from Social Media” (http://www.workliteracy.com/value-social-media) [...]
July 15th, 2008 at 10:52 am
Guiliana, I like your comments on the complexity of social media and the role of dialog that aids in creating knowledge which social media can provide, but sites such as google cannot (if I understand your posting correctly–my Italian is really very poor).