Getting your organization ready for Social Media with a Policy
Posted on 03. Jun, 2010 by Gautam in How To Guides, Trends
My colleague Dave Evans has written a great article on Clickz about how critical it is for businesses to set up social computing policies.
I quote:
Current social computing and social media policies range from an outright prohibition of employee participation on the social Web, including at home (yes, some firms do this), to the more open – and very much informed – use of social media by Zappos, Dell, and IBM. Zappos encourages employees to participate. Dell builds disclosure into the social media handles of employees: “@StefanieAtDell” runs @DellOutlet. IBM’s policies clarify that employees using social media should refrain from using “we” and instead use “I” when publishing posts or comments that might relate to the workplace. At SAS Institute, employees using Twitter include a statement to the effect “these views are (mine) and not those of SAS” in their profile.
These are all solid examples of how to smartly approach social media and its use by employees. It’s essential that your employees understand the rules, ahead of time. Situations involving employees and social media will arise. If you don’t have social computing policies in place now, consider making this a priority.
Social Media News Stories 22nd March-2nd April
Posted on 06. Apr, 2010 by Hardeep Kaur Rai in Media, Reviews, Trends
News stories from 22nd March-2nd April:
1) The Times of India featured a story ‘India’s first You-Tube star’ by Javed Anwar on 22nd March that chronicled the rise of Wilbur Sargunaraj after his video ‘Love Marriage’ garnered indisputable fame. The 32 year old from Madurai has joined the ‘fame club’, with even the Digg community featuring him amongst its top stories and the article quoting celebrated movie critic Roger Ebert daring his followers on Twitter ‘not to like this Indian music video with its smiling bride’. However it seems this is not Wilbur’s first attempt with his first song ‘Blog Song’ uploading on You-Tube in July 2007 and numerous others after that.
Comment- YouTube is a rage in India and the above article is an instance supporting it. Whilst, it would be difficult to ascertain the exact geography of its audience, the fact that You-Tube is now a must medium for individuals and brands to communicate and explore is reason enough to watch it keenly.
2) An article ‘Facebookers more loyal to media than Google’ appeared in DNA on 22nd March that elaborated on the growing prowess of Facebook to pull in visitors to news and media websites than those brought in by Google News.
The Emerging Role of the Community Manager
Posted on 05. Apr, 2010 by Gautam in How To Guides, Trends
In my previous post, I stated that soon Recruiters and Hiring Manager would evolve from users of search engines and headhunters – to also adding their skill sets by becoming Talent Community Managers.
A valid question is – what does an Online Community Manager do? What are the skill sets, and what is the nature of this new emerging role? Do they really tweet and facebook all day long? A dream job for social networking addicts, perhaps?
Here’s an interesting post on the Responsibilities of Community Managers by Itamar Kestenbaum (@tweetamar) on the Techipedia blog.
Here’s what the key roles are according to him:
- Make friends in the Industry
- Look at boring stats and make them interesting
- Have a little knowledge of SEO (Search Engine Optimization)
- Develop Relationships with Clients
- Get Co-Workers Involved Online
- Organize Logistics of Social Media generated Operations
- Connect Good-Will for brand
- Work with web developers to update your site to web2.0
- Strategize with your webmaster to create a better conversion
- Create and Execute Email Blasts
As more and more organizations move into managing online communities of customers, partners and employees – be prepared to see more and more roles being added to this list.
Cultural Change in Organizations and Social Technologies
Posted on 24. Mar, 2010 by Gautam in Ideas, Trends
As an Organizational Behavior person, I believe that Culture trumps strategy. And of course, can derail tactics and events that go against the grain of the culture within no time.
Today, I was talking to a CEO of a professional services firm who was sharing how he had tried to champion a micro-blogging tool within his firm to share information across locations and silos and how the fact they were a hierarchical organization probably killed the tool’s effectiveness.
Yes, technology, even when championed by the CEO can fail if it runs into culture.
Think of culture like the running river, and any initiative like a rock. The rock seems strong. With executive sponsorship, resources, and sometimes external consulting. Eventually the river wins. Not by strength but by persistence.
Social Media Stories 6-12th March
Posted on 17. Mar, 2010 by Hardeep Kaur Rai in Announcements, Media, Reviews, Trends
So another week passes us by and we bring to you a round up of news stories and happenings from the Indian social media sphere.
1) The Economic Times featured an article on the latest takers of social networking sites ‘Social Networking Bug bites’ by Sarah Jacob and Harsimran Julka on 6th March. The article states, ‘More than ever before seniors are finding themselves drawn online for the same reasons as young adults; to stay in touch with family and friends, meet new people from the comfort of home, bridge the generation gaps and even find jobs’.
Comment- It was only a matter of time before this would happen. Considering the popularity of social networking sites as well as the speed at which technology is becoming simpler and efficient, it makes sense for seniors to join in on the fun and build on interests while maintaining relationships and other parts of life.
Using Social Tools and Staffing/Recruiting
Posted on 16. Mar, 2010 by Gautam in Case Studies, How To Guides, Ideas, Trends
A friend asked me some questions on doing Recruiting through Social Media. Here’s what I answered:
1. What is the web2.0 (pl explain in the simplest terms!) and which of these can be used by the Staffing team of the company?
Web2.0 is the collective name for a lot of technologies by which people can interact with other people (and organizations) on the web, publicly and in a transparent manner. It can include forums, blogs, twitter, linkedin, facebook, orkut etc.
We believe that Social technologies help people connect around some Core Dynamics – Content Generation, Conversations, Collaborating together, Community Formation and Collective Intelligence. Different functionalities enable users to connect differently
2. How widespread is the use of the web2.0 for finding top talent ? (can you give examples of companies who are doing this?) For instance, are there companies who are using Twitter to keep in touch with the campus crowd?)
The first question the recruiter needs to answer is – who is my top talent and what is he/she interested in? Primarily there are interested in the content and knowledge component of the job. Followed by organizational culture and the mechanics of the job. The recruiting firm needs to reach out to the community where top talent is likely to be present and present the above – by way of blog posts, youtube videos, pictures and discussion forums.
Luis Suarez on Why Employee and Talent Communities are Important
Posted on 16. Mar, 2010 by Gautam in Ideas, Trends
Luis (@elsua) recently left a comment on my blog post Use Cases for Talent and Employee Communities – and I think it deserves to be given prominence as a blog post on its own 
I will surely be blogging plenty more about it on my blog, when things quiet down a bit after this week’s business trip, but just wanted to venture a couple of thoughts on the relevance of this blog post:
- Communities are the major drivers of social software adoption, both inside and outside of the firewall, so every single social computing strategy should always be accompanied by a community building program to get the most out of it all.
- Communities have been there in existence for millions of years, and in the business world for several decades and if there is anything they have help companies with all along is talent retention and reduction of attrition rates. It’s that sense of belonging, of ownership, of connecting with fellow peers that helps communities become so important and crucial in today’s world and as such
- Social software tools are tremendously relevant in this context, because they help those relationships to flourish and nurture themselves much easier, faster and more meaningful than with traditional tools like email. If there is anything out there that social software is good for is social capital, and that’s at the heart of what makes communities healthy and mature at the same time: that people have an opportunity to help build and sustain personal business relationships through those communities.
Social Media News Stories-Last Week of Feb
Posted on 03. Mar, 2010 by Hardeep Kaur Rai in Media, Reviews, Trends
To begin with, a belated Happy Holi to all of you.Quite an interesting mix of noise in the social media sphere in the last week ofFebruary.
1) Business Standard featured an article ‘Turning a Digital Page’ by Neha Bhatt elaborating on the rising trend of digital books and the consequent increasing sales of e-readers. The article quotes Gaurav Mishra, CEO, 2020Social and a Kindle user, ‘I bought the Kindle last year. I was willing to leave behind my collection of 2000 books, since the e-reader could hold over 300 books. What I really like about my e-reader is the audio feature. The fact that the device is so light and easy to carry is another motivation’. The article elaborates that the device works for those who care about portability or those who want to appear chic to strangers or associates. However comparing to US and UK, the article considers e-readers a relatively new concept in India due to lack of e-books, pricing issues and loss of wider entertainment options like blogging, gaming and e-magazines.
Comment- For sure, e-readers have a brighter future and can take the book market by storm if made available within the budget of the common man. And with increased entertainment options, the youth will take to it like fish to water.
Social Media Stories Last Week
Posted on 24. Feb, 2010 by Hardeep Kaur Rai in Media, Reviews, Trends
Social Media News Stories This Past Week
So another week passes by and we bring to you a wrap-up of all the interesting tit-bits fron the Indian social media space.
1) Business Line featued an article by Anjali Prayag and Swetha Kannan on how corporates understand that ‘Social Networking is a serious business’ on 14th Feb. The article states how companies such as IBM and EMC are ‘using employees urge to keep in touch with people to their advantage by also creating their own networking tools, which they believe are useful to businesses’. The article further mentions IBM’s LotusConnections and EMC’s EMC One as social collaboration tools which carry features similar to social networking sites such as blogs, groups, user profiles, wikis, file sharing, photos and forum capabilities that enhance project collaboration for employees.
Comment- While the above trend is increasingly being incorporated amongst corporates, it is still in an exploratory mode in India. Quite a number of Indian firms are still apprehensive and struggling with the concept of social media and perceive social networking as a ‘waste activity’ that slows down the productivity factor of employees. What they fail to understand is that social networking can actually transcend into a tool for honest communication between employees and the firm as well as the employees themselves. Iit is precisely this open communication which sets the foundation for a globally forward firm that will ultimately realize its vision.
More on the Hyper-linked Organization
Posted on 07. Jan, 2010 by Gautam in Ideas, Trends
JP at Confused of Calcutta is musing about what the Facebookisation of the Enterprise means for IT departments. Here are some of the posts we have done at 2020 Social on the same issue: How to Build a social organization and Making of the Social Organization
As he says:
Was I talking about Facebook? Or was I talking about the IT department
Which brings me to my final point. Facebook does not invest in the edge apps, build them, host them, amend them. They don’t support them, maintain them, back them up. I think IT departments would do well to learn from this. Let the people at the edge build what they want, within a 21st century enabling framework. They know what they want better than any IT department can. What the IT department should do is their utmost to guarantee safety and security of access, privacy and confidentiality, search and subscription tools, scheduling tools, data migration tools, visualisation and mashing tools, prioritisation and ranking tools.
Here’s what I think:
2020 Social builds and nurtures online communities for Indian and international clients, connects their customers, partners and employees, and helps them achieve their business objectives.
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