We did some market research using Linkedin. The question: Most of what is described as Web 2.0 is happening in the public part of the Internet, e.g., FaceBook, MySpace, blogs and wikis. The capabilities are visible on the horizon and starting to move into the enterprise and then to expand to the extended enterprise. Is the culture ready to embrace wider collaboration?
We got a lot of good answers but two deserve wider distribution [Our notes in brackets]:
… As an auditor, I like the natural documentation that occurs within these systems. But I can see where legal would struggle with them. In either case, I'd always opt to house them internally so controls can be implemented and personal privacy can be maintained. [That would probably work for material the auditors are interested in.] Allan
My experience with "external" groupware solutions is somewhat mixed. Since most of my management has been of technical staff, bear in mind that my viewpoints are based upon this. To start answering your question, I believe it's important to subdivide "The Culture" into two groups: The Proletariat Culture and The Management Culture.
The Proletariat
At times, it seems that any time an organization imposes a collaborative tool upon the proletariat, the aforementioned tool is judged harshly by the proletariat and untrusted. Perhaps the feeling that big brother is watching them and recording their every interaction makes people less likely to engage in some of the witty banter which makes the social aspects of group activities more appealing. I doubt every meeting ever held has been 100% work-related. I can certainly recall a few from my distant past which were quite productive, but not entirely focused on work topics. These stress releases are an important part of the bonding experience that makes groupware the synergistic tool that it is.
Perhaps the feeling that the decision for the groupware tool was based upon pricing, invasiveness, politics, executive boondoggles, or "some new management fad" keeps the people from truly embracing it. Or, more insidiously, perhaps those people who intentionally hide their knowledge or actions, want to keep their knowledge or actions "off the record".
If your workforce is likely to experience any of these reactions to the selection of a collaborative tool, you absolutely need to address those issues before you could bother considering such an approach to improve collaboration. Software only automates what you already have and makes it happen faster. If your organization's social networks are diseased, social software will expedite its demise.
ManagementIf your goal is simply to give people a tool in which they could collaborate, have them just start considering, themselves, what they should use. This will most certainly foster its rapid adoption and widespread use. If remote, time-displaced, or part-time workers can get up to speed on current topics and offer their participation where they otherwise might not, it may catch on.
However, if management's goal is a universal "fix" for poor collaboration, to impose collaboration where there is none already, or to impose a given communication tool as THE tool for Knowledge Management (KM) knowledge bases and subsequent data mining, they are setting themselves up for a rude awakening.
Processes only work with the compliance of the people. And people MAY not feel that working in a collaborative tool is the best way for them to collaborate. Some may prefer the immediate, yet remote, interactions of Instant Messaging. Others, with the luxury of physical proximity to one another, may get up from their e-mails or IM window and actually go to someone's space and speak with them, at length, about the topic at hand. Still others will need to see things physically, and want to whiteboard their thoughts and ideas while they're still forming -- without the fear that their incomplete and perhaps partially flawed ideas will be committed, for all eternity, to an electronic storage facility.
So, the difficulty is most certainly NOT in the implementation of the technology -- that's simple. The difficulty is in getting what you want out of it. If you want very little out of it, why even bother? If you want a lot out of it, then it's worth it to spend some time understanding what the target is, before using a piece of software to accomplish it. Perhaps the answer is already in place, waiting to be used/hired/fired/promoted. David
We agree with David that Enterprise 2.0 is an enabler, it will allow and encourage people to collaborate and communicate, it will not drive them to it.
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