Can you help me out with a messy research-related question?

What are the best ways to set boundaries around subsets of an “extended organization”, and then give these subsets names so that they are easy to talk about?

The problem seems on the surface looks like a question of semantics (i.e., what to call it). But it’s more than that, since the terms of expression need to be founded on some kind of principle of composition. I need help with both the semantics and the principle(s).

When we’re talking about a network of coordinated, interdependent economic actors, how do we decide which of these actors should be considered part of the organization and which of these actors should be considered outside the organization?

And, how do we name the groups within different levels of boundaries, in a way that’s easy to comprehend and makes sense conceptually?

And the biggest issue:

How do we refer to “the organization” without automatically dismissing the sense of connection that any particular actor might feel, and without diminishing his/hers/its valid status as “part of” the organization?

(Note, I can’t call it The Organization because (ultimately, though not now) I want speak of it as its real self, by name, and not just talk about it as a theoretical organization.)

Here’s the situation:

“The Organization” in question is the core entity and the largest entity in a community of commerce / commercial network of businesses. All of the businesses are interdependent economic partners.  The core organization cannot exist without the co-commercial organizations. And, although some of these entities have revenue streams and commitments to entities outside the extended organization, most of them depend on the incorporated organization for key elements of their value chain.

The incorporated organization is big-ish (400 employees), and the co-commercial entities are small (1 to 10 employees) concerns. Some are incorporated or LLCs.

What I’m talking about this extended organization, I need to name three things:

• The incorporated organizational entity, which is incorporated and has a CEO, and directly employs individuals (that all get W-2 income from their work in the organization).

• The extension of the organization that includes not just the W-2 employees of the incorporated organization but also includes all of the co-commercial partners whose participation is critical to the incorporated entity.

Because the incorporated organization relies so heavily on these co-commercial partners, it’s hard to think of them as not being part of “the organization”. In fact, lots of these partners describe themselves as being part of “the organization”, and are often seen that way by customers and outsiders. If you asked a customer or a random person on the street who The Organization was, they’d likely include the co-commercial partners and maybe not even know that they were not completely part of the incorporated organization.

• The community of commerce, which includes not only the incorporated organization and its co-commercial partners but also includes the customers that interact with partners.

Do economic or financial dimensions work as complete decision rules?

In my description above, of the different layers/levels/subsets of “the organization”, I’ve defaulted to using legal & financial categories to set the boundaries. For example, the incorporated organization vs the intended one. Another similar strategy is distinguish between entities financially, by using who issues the W-2 to whom as a way to separate the pieces.

The easiest way for me to distinguish the boundary is to consider the legal entities–whether they are incorporated or not, and then to consider who is attached to each Inc. entity, based on their W-2 income.

But these dimensions and boundaries are defined by purely financial criteria – which isn’t enough to really define “the organization” if organizations are more than just economic machines. Categories like sources of revenue, origin of income for individuals, and legal status don’t reflect any particular sense of social agreement, such as the beliefs of participants about who the organization is or isn’t.

I’m willing to use the financial criteria to establish qualitatively different boundaries that include more or less of the network’s participants, but once I do that I still have the problem of …

What do I call the different entities?

I have to start with the core organization’s real name, so that outsiders can sort of know what I’m talking about. My daughter suggested “Pluto” as the nom de recherche for this organization, so Pluto has to be part of it. (Or not, you can convince me otherwise).

I could call the three key groupings Pluto Incorporated, Pluto Extended, and Pluto Community.

The method for distinguishing groupings can’t put any particular group down. In other words, there can’t be a master category (e.g., President) and a few marked categories (e.g., Female President), because adding the modifier to only some of the categories makes them subordinate. SO, I can’t do Pluto, Pluto Extended, and Pluto Community.

And, I need a method to refer to them that feels reasonably seamless, and is not clunky or cumbersome. This is made me think about using subscripts, to call it Pluto -I, Pluto-X, Pluto-C. (note, I can’t format a subscript in wordpress — techfail on my part)

But does this look dumb or distracting in print?

Self-Determination and Psychological Connection

Finally, a perfect solution would be to have a naming system that was related to how the different people (and the entities they are part of) think of themselves in relation to “the organization”. How could the names reflect the group that think of themselves and each other at “the organization” when this includes the core organization and some but not all of its co-commercial partners?

Even though the I, X, and C designations map onto financial distinctions, they don’t tell the reader anything about the sentiments or relationships among the actual people I’m referring to. For example, to talk about Pluto-I when I’m talking about things other than revenue/finances, such as the effort of “the people who think of themselves as ‘the organization’ and who are all working together”.

Theoretically, I could make a fourth group that includes all the people who think of themselves as being part of Pluto.

Maybe Pluto-| could stand for Psychologically Pluto?

Making distinctions of who’s in or out based on members’ psychological self-assessments, by asking them whether or not they consider themselves “in” the organization, makes sense when we’re trying to capture or talk about their psychological (that is, non-economic) motivations. But, since I’m an outside researcher who can’t survey the sense of membership of all the entities in the network, I’d always be referring to this group as a theoretical one with a boundary that hasn’t been firmly established.uld always be a blurry group.

Any thoughts on how to parse these distinctions in a way that’s conceptually clear, emotionally inclusive, and textually simple?

I’d love your suggestions ..

Image: B’okay on Flickr ??? Some rights reserved by HarshPatel;Photographer

Networks of people and organizations are usually either “markets” or “communities”.

It bothers us that networks fit one or the other model of working together, because we envision something more –something both market and community –  in one network.

We are often disappointed when markets don’t exhibit a commitment to any values other than maximizing profits. And, while we treasure communities where we create collective meaning and build relationships, we often shy away from using these relationships to help each other make a living. We ask too much of the market format, and expect too little from the community format.

It’s become easier to see how these two different models, the market focused on economic transactions and the community focused on meaning & social interchange, diverge in both form and feeling.

Ebusiness and social technologies have made it easier for us to buy and sell based on prices alone. At the same time, they’ve made it easier for us to build strong and rich networks of interpersonal and collective relationships that sustain us socially.

In online markets, the ease of finding a lower price or quicker delivery has led us to dis-intermediate the buyer-seller social relationships we relied on before. We’ve learned to sacrifice the comfort, the security, the qualitative connection, and any interpersonal meaning we found in these commercial exchanges in favor of reduced search costs, lower prices, and increased economic efficiency.

Online communities, facilitated by social technologies, have created more meaning for us, as we’ve been able to find and interact with people who are like us (or unlike us in desirable ways), who have similar interests, values, and goals, who can recognize and affirm who we are, and with whom we can pursue a shared social purpose.

Although we often draw on online communities for social support, learning, and collaboration, we have sometimes shied away from using them to sell or buy or earn money. We worry about burdening our relationships with something as crass as pricing or payments, since we fear that these will change the nature of our interactions and deprive the community of its innocence – or its nobility.

These concerns and these hesitations are appropriate, since markets aren’t supposed to be about creating meaning, and communities aren’t supposed to be about extracting excess rents. Markets and Communities are different models for working together.

But what about our vision of markets where relationships matter and communities where we can make a living while we explicitly pursue values beyond profits?

Enter the Community of Commerce.

As I’ve been researching online eMarketplaces like eBay and Etsy, I’ve identified that while the dominant model is a marketplace that’s all about efficiency and economic exchange, an emerging model is a marketplace that combines the exchange of goods and services with the exchange of social meaning. This combination of economic and social exchange is intentional, motivational, and wickedly effective.

Instead of seeing this model as some sort of ‘not-free’, values- constrained market, let’s give it its own category. Let’s call this model a Community of Commerce.

Defining a Community of Commerce

A community of commerce is a network of organizations and individuals that buy, sell, and exchange goods and services within a collectively-defined community culture, a culture that is based on articulated, shared, more-than-economic values.

Back in 2000, Stacy Bressler & Charles Grantham published a book “Communities of Commerce: Building Internet business communities to accelerate growth, minimize risk, and increase customer loyalty.” Their thesis was that businesses should learn how to transcend geography so that they could identify and connect with strategically relevant business partners. Bressler & Grantham’s motivating contrast was between off-line and online business relationships; they used the terms “communities of commerce” and “online business communities” interchangeably.

I want to expand the definition of “communities of commerce” to focus on how the tensions, tradeoffs and opportunities of a commercial network that puts community first will differ in economically and socially important ways. Trying to stack a network for exchanging meaning on top of a network of economic exchange won’t work – it’s not like we can simply add “meaningplace” to “marketplace” and call it a coherent business model.

In the next few weeks, I’ll post my efforts to define what’s distinctive about a community of commerce, to explain how it’s related to other progressive business models, and to begin to unfold the tensions and opportunities that arise when buying & selling are inseparable from and integral to the mutual exchange of meaning.

I’d love your thoughts about the concept and especially your suggestions for defining it.

See also:

Don’t Tell Esty That Authenticity Is Getting “Old” — The Social Dynamic Between Crafters and Buyers is Timeless
Purpose is the Killer App: Why Organizations Need Social Business Tools
7 Ways That Social Business Advice is Wrong for Your Organization
Insights about Authenticity from the Open Community Book Tour

Image: Indian Garden Flowers Some rights reserved by EssjayNZ

In my first contribution to Social Business News, I’m reminding organizations that want to align their social media messages to focus their efforts on leadership.

I find it pretty frustrating that so many social media advocates recommend “governance” or “policy” or “control” when an organization finds there are too many voices, not enough voices, or the “wrong” voices aiming to represent the organization online.

My post on Social Business News, “Too Many Wrong Messages On Social Media? Try Leadership, Not Control” outlines my argument and recommendations in full. Here’s the takeaway:

If employees are making “mistakes” on social media, that’s not the fault of the organization’s governance, but the fault of the organization’s leadership.

If your employees use social media to talk too much or not enough or not about the right things, that’s a leadership opportunity for you. Don’t concentrate on policing the perimeter with control tools and governance initiatives. Instead, lead from the core of your organization and help members learn to express the organization’s brand and demonstrate the organization’s values as they represent the organization.

 

________

Social Business News is a website dedicated to covering enterprise social media, collaboration, governance, technology, and change management. It’s updated every day with original content from a broad range of social media, social business and social organization experts.

Be sure to bookmark or get the RSS feed for Social Business News.

Follow us on Twitter @SocBizNews_.

Is there a “best way” for organizations to ‘go social’?

More specifically, is there a best way to ‘grow social’, so that the organization incorporates social tools and processes so that change is generative and authentic?

Because I’ve been critical of arguments for Social Business and felt unengaged by arguments from the world of technology, I’ve been wondering what the alternatives are for advocating that organizations become more social. I’ve identified four arguments for moving towards social organizations.. Each of these paths tells us to adopt enterprise social media to become more social. But, each of these paths serves a different set of purposes and a different world view.

4 Paths to Social Organization

We can get to social organization on 4 basic paths:

            1. Technology
            2. Social Business
            3. Collective Values
            4. “Product” Resonance

Two of these paths get a lot of attention, and two of them are under-appreciated. Can you guess which two will lead to the most positive transformation?

1. Technology

The Technology path is the classic model, where the availability of technology leads to the desirability of that technology which leads to implementing that technology. Social media tools exists, we like them, we are able to add them to our enterprise 2.0 systems and so we do. Besides, they’ll make work more efficient, reduce waste, increase speed, etc.

Technology-driven ‘social’ seems most prominent in the Enterprise 2.0 / Knowledge Management / Collaborations systems conversation. And, the Technology path is usually promoted by IT experts.

2. Social Business

The path with the largest cheering section is the “social business” path. Originating in Customer Relations Management (CRM) and Marketing disciples, the social business path starts with parts of the organization deploying social media as a way to link the customer community and the organization’s outward facing / front line employees.

When marketers realized that it would take more than social listening and a few brandividuals to serve customers’ needs, they advocated that the organization transform into a ‘social business’ to support these externally-oriented programs with internal changes. These internal changes seem to be concentrated in areas where other organization functions (outside of marketing) can serve back information or solutions for customers. (Lateral social connections within the organization are still largely an afterthought, if included at all.) The Social Business path is usually promoted by marketing experts.

3. Collective Values

The Collective Values path is often derided as the ‘kumbaya’ approach. This path is pursued, where organizational leaders realize that enterprise social media can support the values of the organization by facilitating new kinds of coordination, communication and collaboration behavior. Values like “community”, openness, full participation, engagement, and the like can be brought alive through the behaviors that enterprise social media supports.

The Collective Values path is promoted by a diverse assortment of business unit leaders, HR professionals, organizational change agents, management scholars, and organizationally-committed employees.

4. “Product” Resonance

The Product Resonance path is so rare that it doesn’t even have a good name. I’ve thought about it as the “Progressive” path and the “Movement” path, but neither of those names captures the intent that drives organizations down this path. So let me try to explain in a few extra words.

Organizations follow the Product Resonance path when they realize that the product, service or issue that they produce suggests a certain set of values, and they also realize that these product values demand to be demonstrated through more ‘social’ organizational practices.

For example, an organization that sells recycling services might see that the community participation their product advocates and depends on can also be expressed through specifically social work & organizational practices, like community forums to discuss the organization’s next quarter targets.

For another example, a community health collective adopts enterprise social media because the very premise of community, health, and collective demand transparency, openness, and inclusiveness — all values that cam be demonstrated in enterprise social media. The employees of these organizations use social media with each other to practice what they preach.

Motives Matter

The path that any organization takes to go social matters, because each path carries with it the potential downsides of the perspective it comes from — the Tech path can seem un-human, the Social Business path too profit-driven, the Collective Values path too woo-woo, and the Resonance path too uptight about appearances.

Only two paths towards social organization
engage the core of who the organization is and what it stands for.

Only Collective Values and Product Resonance paths
engage the organization’s identity as an engine for growth.

Even though the Resonance path and the Collective Values path both are driven by values, there’s a subtle difference between the two. The Collective Values path is driven by self-reflection, a push for authenticity, or other self-expressive motivations. It gets its momentum from the inside.

In contrast, the Resonance path is driven by the organization reflecting on what its external presentations say, and then using any discrepancies or opportunities to drive organizational change. For this path, the trigger for change is external. The Resonance path would be pursued when an organization make connections between external projections — its sustainability goals, its CSR goals, its products, services, political commitments — and the way it organizes itself.

What is Growing Social really about?

Technology is about being more efficient, Social Business is about being more profitable, but Collective Values and Resonance are about creating and aligning meaning. And, both Collective Values and Resonance are all about changing the organization to benefit people first, with concomitant benefits for products, processes and profits. Finally, both paths will lead to deploying social media to create systems of engagement.

This is what I’ve come up with so far — I’d love to hear what you think about these 4 paths, the distinctions between them, and how they might matter.

See also:

Social Media for Social Change — Inside the Organization?
CSR that Improves the World But Leaves Your Damaging Business Model Intact: Authentic or not?
Is your organization flourishing or withering?

Image:
Resonate Some rights reserved by theloushe, Resonate Some rights reserved by Attrill

What is the best, purest way to get more girls interested in tech (and more women employed in tech)?

Get them deeply interested in what tech can do and what problems tech can help us solve.

When girls (and boys) become genuinely interested and genuinely curious, they will pursue careers in tech not because ‘that’s where the jobs are” or because “that’s what smart people do”, but because that’s what they *want* to do.

How can we get girls curious about tech?   

Take them to events where polished, enthusiastic, hip tech evangelists share their world-changing ideas.

Take Our Daughters to Tech Events

My DH and I tried just yesterday evening to do just that: We took our daughters (13 and 11) to a tech event– IgniteNYC.

The set-up of an Ignite event seemed right for introducing the girls to an array of tech-y topics and an assortment of speakers. There were 16 people on the agenda — both female and male, white and people of color. The presentations are short– only 5 minutes — so if any one talk was boring, a new one was on the horizon.

Plus, I knew that some of the speakers would be especially interesting… like my OpEdProject pal and tech entrepreneur Tereza Nemessanyi, who would be talking about her start-up, HonestlyNow.

Finally, the price was right– instead of $800 for a day pass to Web 2.0 conference, I could take them to a live event for $11 dollars each. That plus a trip to Shake Shake. No problem.

Until we showed up at the venue.

It turns out,

No one under 21 was allowed into the tech event.

Ostensibly, this was because there was a cash bar at the cocktail hour before the event.

This was not a worry for me. My girls have been to plenty of wedding and fundraisers with cash bars, and they have never tried to spend their allowances on gin & tonics.

But, even though my tweens looked obviously too young to sneak up to the bar, even though they were accompanied by not one parent but two, and even though they’d brought their kindles to sit in the auditorium and read with me until the presentations started, we could not get around the event coordinator/caterer’s policy.

Turns out, the IgniteNYC organizers were surprised too. (see note, below)    They were unaware of the age restriction, which was part of the larger contract organized by Web2.0. They have had teens speak at previous events, and they are committed to reaching out to the younger tech-curious community.

(What was also distressing was that the catering contract prohibited people under 18 — even though the legal drinking age in NY is 21. What’s up with that? Some inconsistency there, if the point is to prevent ‘underage’ exposure to liquor. But I digress. See correction below.)

Consider that it wasn’t just precocious 13 yr olds who were barred… College students and start-up interns under 21 18 were also not permitted to attend.

Do you have to be over 21 18 to be interested in Tech? One would hope not, because by then it’s too late.

The Ignite Coordinator was genuinely distressed at having to turn away the girls.  She quickly refunded our tickets and apologized for the constraint, and my kids went off to hang out with their cousins while I stayed for the (fun) event.  I understood later that the cocktail hour of mingling was a big part of how the event was framed  — more like a party than a TEDx.  But still, it made me think:

If these tech events exist to get people excited about and involved in tech, why not make room for people under 21?

Inspiring Tech Curiosity While Girls Are Young

We have to Take Our Daughters to Tech Events, because we have to catch their interest while they are young.

We have to catch them young, before they’ve set their sights on becoming the next Taylor Swift.

We have to catch them young, so that they can see tech stars and rising stars — people like Caterina Fake, Joanne Wilson, Carlota Perez, Sekai Ferai, Kanika Gupta, Tara Hunt, Birame Sock, Annie Chang, Selma Zafar, and Adria Richards — and imagine themselves becoming like these dynamic tech-y change agents.

These kids need to see more than a fancy software site in beta when they look over their parents’ shoulders at the computer. They need to “see it to be it”, as @SCJoson reminds me.  These kids need to be inspired, by seeing a bit of the real thing – the real people — powering our tech revolution.

We need to expose our kids to tech events and rising tech stars so that we can catch them while they are young.

So, I’d like to propose that we do two things –

• Take Our Daughters to Tech Events.
  Let it be(come) normal, and not a surprise, to see teenage girls in the tech event audience, all hepped up to see the latest change-the-world digital product. And,

• Make it easier for teens to attend tech events, by creating room for them.

For example,
– Create a seating space with no access to alcohol (e.g., a small side section of the seating area, with an entryway that doesn’t take them past the bar).
– Clarify policies, so that teens can attend with adult chaperones.
– Identify age limits. Make it clear whether or not people under 21 are welcome.
– Rethink catering contracts– if it’s underage drinking that’s the fear, address this in other ways.
– Check your contracts w/ venues, caterers and event planners. Ask them to find ways to include teens lawfully, sensibly, and with a genuine welcome.

Not too young though. I’m not recommending that we set aside places for toddlers in strollers, or put out coloring books for kindergartners who are up past their bedtimes. And, I’m not recommending that there be childcare at these events, although that is an appropriate step too.

Nobody really wants to bring her or his child to professional event where the kid would disrupt the scene. BUT some of us want opportunities to bring well-behaved, interested kids to events where they can see tech as a solution, tech as an opportunity, tech as an option for them.

Let’s make it easier to inspire our kids. Let’s make it possible, and normal, to

Take Our Daughters to Tech Events

[** I forwarded this post to one of the IgniteNTC's coordinators, to make sure I had the facts right, and IgniteNYC's Director, Tikva Moriwati reached out to me to clarify a few bits. This led to a few edits, above. Tikva shared that they too were concerned and disappointed that IngiteNYC couldn't be a family event-- at least not this particular night. The no-kid policy was established by the contract of the larger event (Web 2.0), and wasn't discovered by IgniteNYC until that evening. The exclusion of teens was not something igniteNYC wanted, and they will be more deliberate when they plan and publicize future events. I appreciate that  Tikva and her team of volunteers are committed to reaching out to the whole community, not just grown-ups. My girls and I are looking forward to their Spring event -- but planning to skip the Dec.1st cocktail party.  --  Oct 13]

Why do so many social business advocates overlook the organizational value of online communities?

Too many people dismiss online communities for not being central to the organizations they serve.  These critics dismiss communities for being merely social, just another way to chat or swap tips. Even when they acknowledge how communities can be critical for getting certain kinds of work done, they claim that communities are not sufficiently “business-like”. Worse, they dismiss community advocates and experts as “enterprise social business bleeding hearts” and “kumbayaros”.

What these under-valuers miss is the way that these communities serve a key ‘business’ purpose for their diverse and wide-ranging participants.

While the online community is not the organization, for many participants, the community is their central experience of the organization.

It’s in their role as participants’ central experience of the organization that communities are under-appreciated, and I think it’s time we look at the unique contribution that communities make to the ‘social organization’.

Communities serve two organizational needs that are fairly well understood.

1. Communities serve participants as a way to find, share and develop understanding of things related to work.

2. Communities serve organizations as ways to focus, coordinate, and engage members in shared activity that contributes to the organization’s main goals.

Communities also serve a third, under-the-radar need of organizations –

3. Online communities serve members’ individual and collective needs for a coherent sense of “the Organization”, by creating the experience of being part of something larger, consistent, and meaningful.

The double-barreled concept of “central experience” is key here.

Online communities are central because:

• They draw members from across the organization together into a group

• They draw this assortment of different participants to a common set of topics

• The participants’ conversation is anchored in a (relatively) stable and findable place

• The shared place is created and hosted by the organization itself.

The online community aggregates, focuses, and anchors a subset of organization members in a place that belongs to the organization

Online communities create an experience for members because:

• The community isn’t composed of abstract thoughts ‘about’ the organization, but of actual other people who act and respond.

• The community is composed of tangible actions, reactions, expressions and feelings that participants contribute. Instead of thinking about organizational issues in ways that are isolated inside their heads, participants put stuff out into the shared space.

• The community has an emotional tenor. Sensing, experiencing and contributing to the emotions in the community reinforces participants’ experience of the community as real, since their emotional reactions are decidedly real.

• The community is “present” as well as past, or potential, because the community and members’ relationship to the community exists over real time.

Tangible, Material “Organization”

For the participant, the community creates a tangible subset of ‘the organization’ that’s perceived as something different from the both the collection of other organization members that surround the individual while ‘at work’, and the collection of specific individual participants in the online community.

Not a mixture but a compound, not an aggregate but a sum.  The community becomes a ‘thing’ — “the Organization”.

Centrality + Experience => Entitativity => “The ‘Organization’”

Together, the the centrality and the experience of an online community help to create for members a sense of “entitativity”. (Entitativity is the scientific word for “thing-ness”.) Unconsciously and sometimes consciously, participants experience and thus treat the community as though it were “the Organization” .

Creating a sense of “the Organization” is a critical business process. The community does not “become” the organization, but it represents the organization in the experience of the members.

What “the ‘Organization’” means for the Community Manager

When we recognize that the community is experienced as “the Organization”, the stakes are raised for the community manager. The community manager not only has to facilitate and support the community as a community (of people interacting, in helpful ways, across an array of topics), but also s/he has to manage the elements of the community that influence what people conclude about the actual organization based on how they experience the community.

Community managers have to manage “the Organization” by:

1. Intentionally crafting the tangible space.

Community managers must attend to large and small decisions that physically construct the space (e.g., names, colors, user interface, visual appearance, defaults and fields, mode of display, data in the display, etc).

They need to think of themselves as the ‘property managers’ of the organization’s online building, since the community site provides the architecture, the aesthetics and the functionality that creates the experience of “the Organization”.

2. Intentionally curating the space.

Community managers must make firm, consistent, deliberate decisions about what is discussed, what resources and participants are brought in, etc. so that the community acts and behaves in was that resonate with the larger identity and vision of the organization.

3. Facilitating the community in the organization’s style.

Community managers must demonstrate, reinforce and cultivate a spirit and a collective personality that resonates with the identity of the organization, since ultimately participants’ experience of that spirit will influence how they define their organization.

It’s not only that the community managers must help the communities serve the organization’s larger goals; they also need to make sure that the experience of ‘the organization’ supports the larger understanding of who that organization is, what it does, and why it does what it does.

Participants will extrapolate from their central experience of the online community their sense of who “the Organization” is, and apply this to make sense of who the (whole) organization is and also to make sense of how they themselves should act.

Community Managers as Leaders

Because the online community helps to construct the organization an entity, rather than ‘just’ a conversation, Community Managers have to be recognized as more than “facilitators” or “moderators’. Because Community Managers are responsible for participants’ experience of the community, these managers have a critical — and undervalued– role as leaders in their organizations.

As leaders, community managers need to have a clear vision for the ‘central experience’ that their communities provide (a vision that is connected, I hope, to the reality of who the organizaiton is and wants to be) so that they deliberately serve that purpose of shaping what becomes “the Organization” for so many.

Image: a close-up to nature from eeicenbice
Circle of Life – For Mao Mao from Loves_TaiShan

Note: Whether communities remain ‘standalone’ conversations or morph into coherent online collectivities that span several tools on a social intranet, it’s clear that communities will become more and more critical to “social” in organizations. Eventually, these communities will organize all other forms of online organizational interactivity.

I am so excited about the class I’m teaching this fall that I’m breaking down the Chinese wall between serious topical blog posts and the practical fun of my work life, to post this Call for Projects for my students.

I’m hoping that some of you readers in the New York/ New Jersey/Hoboken area may know someone, or some organization, that would be interested in sponsoring a team of student consultants who are ready to help you with a business & technology challenge.  Read on for the details, share widely, and let me know if you’re interested.

Also, if you’d like to be a guest speaker for the class (Thursdays 4 to 6), let me know. I’ll put up a separate post for that.  Many many thanks in advance for your help.

Call For Projects:
Consulting Practicum in Business & Technology 411/412

The Faculty of the Howe School of Technology Management in Stevens Institute of Technology is seeking projects that combine business and technology challenges for student teams in our 4^th Year Consulting Practicum, over the Fall 2011 and Spring 2012 sessions.

We are looking for projects where multi-disciplinary teams of 5 students can consult with your organization in a way that contributes towards your business while challenging the students with important, real world business and technology issues.

We are hoping to identify several potential projects by the first week of September 2011.

 How the Practicum Projects Work

 Project Sponsors identify a business problem or opportunity, often with a technology component, where they’d like fresh eyes, thoughtful analysis, a strategic plan, and support for executing that plan.  Sponsors provide student teams with general direction, access to information and key stakeholders, and occasional advice. Student teams meet with the Sponsor to agree on project deliverables, to get a midpoint update, and to receive the team’s analysis and recommendations (in Fall 2011). Teams will work with sponsors to execute plans (in Spring 2012).

Students’ work on your project is supervised by Stevens faculty. The student team’s work on your project will be supported by weekly class sessions, where students will develop their consulting, project management, and business planning skills. And, each week the students will ‘workshop’ their project with other student teams so that they can draw on the insights of their peers. Students may also be advised by faculty members with relevant business and technology expertise.

Benefits of Sponsoring a Practicum Project

Organizations that sponsor a Practicum Project gain:

• Focused, dedicated work on projects that address a specific issue important to you
• Leading edge thinking and practice from student teams, supported by the intellectual and professional resources of the Howe School of Business and Stevens community
• Data, analyses and recommendations, as well as support with project execution

Your organization will benefit from the efforts of a diversely talented student team who will bring new insight, great enthusiasm, technical expertise, and a can-do attitude to your business challenge.  The students will draw on their coursework and their practical experience, as well as the resources of the Stevens community, to address your business challenge.

Sponsors will enjoy the chance to contribute to the students’ learning and help to develop a new generation of business & technology leaders. And, you’ll contribute to the Stevens community as a business liaison.

Types of Consulting Projects We Seek

Practicum projects can run the gamut from conceptual questions (e.g., is there a market for this tool?) to execution plans (e.g., how can we get this technology adopted by reluctant users?).  While we especially encourage projects that have some technology component, the role of technology depends on the specific business challenge. Projects may have:

-       Technology as a component of the recommendation (e.g., how can we use social media to raise community awareness?)

-       Technology as the expected product, where the team’s challenge is to design something to meet a market or community need

-       Technology as the presenting problem, where the team’s challenge is to find better ways to use tools, systems or data, or

-       Technology as the business opportunity itself, (e.g., a product to be commercialized) where the team helps turn the technology into a business.

 For projects that may have no specific “technology” component at the outset, the student team will identify whether and where technology might make a difference.

(For ideas, please see the list of brief descriptions of previous projects, below.)

 Practicum projects may involve any functional areas of your organization — including HR/OD, strategy, marketing, engineering, finance, R&D, or operations.  The Sponsor and Student Team, with the help and approval of the Practicum faculty, will craft a project that furthers both the objectives of your organization and the learning goals of the Business & Technology Program.

Do you have an interesting business challenge that you’d like help with?

If you have a business challenge – especially one with a technology component – that might be appropriate for a Practicum and you would like to sponsor a student team, we would love to talk with you.

Please email the Practicum faculty member, Dr. CV Harquail, at cvharquail@gmail.com.  Please tell us:

• Your name, title, preferred email address and phone number
• Business/organization name
• A 2-3 sentence description of the organizational issue that you think a student team might address for you
• Any questions you might have about the practicum process

We’ll work with you to scope the project to fit your needs.

Previous Projects Have Included:

-       Developing a marketing & adoption plan for a public service smartphone app

-       Creating a sales & marketing plan for a 3-D imaging machine, including market analysis, customer identification (lead generation), and developing print & video marketing materials

-       Developing a Customer Relationship Management System (a digital application) for a local retailer, in part by extracting data from a point of sale system, and in part by understanding local customers and consumption trends.

-       Conducting a feasibility analysis for a technology derived from a faculty member’s patent, and then developing a full start-up business plan

-       Creating a ‘green business plan’ for an organization competing for grant money

-      Developing a community emergency preparedness plan, with a focus on delivering emergency supplies, including site recommendations and supply inventory levels

-       Developing a social media strategy for a community services organization, with a corresponding plan for supporting this strategy with revised staff roles and training

You can make the process of becoming a Social Organization a little easier if you start by socializing your intranet. Why? Because the shared, cohering nature of your intranet makes ‘social’ change efforts more comprehensive, more democratic, less scary, and more reinforcing of collective identity.

In my previous post, I argue that we should develop Social Organizations from the Inside Out, starting first with the organization’s intranet. 

Your organization’s intranet is the network of digital systems that reinforce the organization’s structure, processes and culture. Changing these systems to become more social (aka Socializing the Intranet) will help to make the organization’s structure, processes and culture more social.

Socializing your intranet is a great way to introduce significant organizational change, because intranets are broad-based, protected, visible and core to who your organization is.

Plus, these features of your intranet actually make organizational change easier.

Why Socializing Your Intranet Makes Organizational Change Easier

1. Socializing your Intranet demonstrates a company-wide commitment to new social behaviors and systems, making it easier for members to choose to change.

Going social on your intranet demonstrates the organization’s commitment to the global concept of changing how everybody interacts with everybody else.

When an organization integrates social media tools into its existing intranet or when it adopts new social intranet technology, the organization invests both financial and attentional resources.  Rather than focusing this investment on one department or function, the organization invests across the board. It’s not some ‘skunk works’ or ‘demonstration project’, but a full on collective commitment.

 This perceived commitment helps members trust that changing — becoming more social– actually matters to the organization. Thus, organization members will be more likely to put in the effort and take the risks to learn more social systems & behaviors.

2. Socializing your Intranet creates an opportunity for every member to get involved at the same time, making it easier for everyone to learn, share and support each other’s changes.

Intranet-based social innovations create an opportunity for more democratic, more broadly-shared participation in becoming a social organization.

No one department, level or function gets the new tools ‘first’. There is no implicit hierarchy of “who is and who isn’t important to social business”. Instead, social tools are introduced on the common platform, and everyone learns together, from the ground up.

When everyone is involved in the change effort, what any member learns about using the tools is broadly relevant to other members.  Members can support each other as they experiment, and build change momentum across the entire organization.

3. Socializing your Intranet creates a protected space for learning how to be social with each other, making it easier to learn without punishment.

On a social intranet, members can experiment, experience, practice, explore and learn how to be more social as individual contributors and as members of the organization, in a relatively safe environment.

An intranet is a comparatively protected space for interaction — the firewall that keeps the intranet internal makes it nearly impossible for a member’s participation to damage the organization’s relationships with external stakeholders or to damage the organization’s reputation. Members can learn to be social without putting the organization at risk.

And, since much of the activity on a social intranet is organization-related, and not work-task related, members’ participation on intranet social tools won’t be evaluated as part of their work performance. For example, participating in a conversation about possible changes to the cafeteria menu, or HR procedures, or the organization’s new logo won’t be evaluated as part of that member’s “work”.

Conversation on the social intranet can make an organization feel smaller and more cosy, and in that way more welcoming to members’ participation. A social intranet can provide a secure base for individuals and departments who really need to take risks and extend themselves to become more social.

4. Socializing your Intranet creates a rich display and constant reinforcement of “who” your organization is, making it easier to create ‘new’ social behaviors that are authenticity.

A salient, visible, constant sense of your organization’s identity makes it easier for members to figure out how to use social tools in ways that are appropriate and authentic to that particular organization.

Your organization’s collective identity is created, expressed and reinforced through interaction among members. [This interaction can be direct (IRL), psychological (e.g., in the mind) and tech-social (on social media).]

Members’ online interaction with social tools works to translate and express the organization’s identity into the digital form & space of the intranet. In other words, members figure out how to express their organization’s norms, values and character in their digital communication. Doing this on a shared intranet helps members create their organization’s signature ways of expressing values and purpose, “socially”.

Not only is a clear identity important for sustaining authentic interactions internally, it is also a prerequisite for authentic interactions across the organization’s boundary.

Organization members need to be (relatively) secure with “who the organization is” so that they can behave as a reliable and trustworthy social partner to other stakeholders. When the organization is confident and secure in who it is, it doesn’t give up too much of itself in an effort to accommodate and please external stakeholders. And, it behaves consistently and reliably, generating the confidence and trust of stakeholders.

Inside-Out Change Isn’t Easy

I’m not suggesting that going social from the inside out is easy. It is not.

For most organizations, becoming more social will require challenging deeply-held beliefs about the socio-political arrangements of workers, managers and the organization. This means that becoming more social will require a profound cultural shift by your organization and its members.

But, this organizational change towards a more social organization can be made a little easier.

— When the organization demonstrates a commitment to change,
– When all members take small steps together,
– When members learn to change in a relatively safe environment, and
– When the change activity recreates and reinforces the organization’s sense of self,

the whole organization can move forward from its core.

Take advantage of the ways that your central, collective, prosaic intranet can support your members’ move towards more social online interaction.

Become a more social organization by working from the inside-out.

See also:
Making social networking work inside the firewall by @eileenb
The True Nature of a Social Intranet by Oscar Berg on CMSWire
Building a Social Intranet by Toby Ward (@tobyward)
Why your intranet is not strategic by Gerry McGovern

Social Intranet Design and Organizational Identity: Design for functionality and character
Social Media for Social Change — Inside the Organization?
Re-creating Reputation Through Authentic Interaction: Using Social Media to Connect with Individual Stakeholders

Image Lantern  Some rights reserved by HeyNixt

What’s the best strategy for making your organization more social?

Where do you start to transform your systems, so that you can transform your organization?

Many social media experts suggest that you work from the outside-in.

They encourage organizations to start with one function and one stakeholder group, and ‘get social’ by linking CRM (customer relationship management) systems to the organizational groups involved in customer support.

The smarter way to change is for the organization to get social from the inside-out.

Why? Because comprehensive change requires addressing the core of the organization itself.

The core of your organization’s digital systems is your organization’s intranet.

That’s why we should focus on intranets as we strive to make our organizations more social.

The Intranet as Your Organization’s Digital Core

As traditionally designed, intranets are a combination of portals and repositories, functioning in the background of your day to day activity. Your intranet is where all kinds of ‘managed content’ are located. It’s the place you go for reference materials, bulletins, request forms, employee directories and maybe a white label email system.

If your organization has an intranet you probably use it every day, several times a day, without paying much attention to it. Intranets are “stealth applications”, used regularly but pervasively in the background of your work.

If you work in a smaller organization, you might not have an official intranet. Instead you use an intranet proxy to access the resources of your organization. This proxy might be an external email system (like Outlook or Gmail), a file-sharing & collaboration system (like early Sharepoint) or your organization’s website.

A Common Center that Represents “The Organization”

Whether it’s a formal intranet or an intranet proxy, this place where you start your digital work day provides a common organization-focused center for all members. Thus, intranets should be the starting point for any system of organizational engagement.

Even more important, as the digital starting point of your work, the intranet actually represents your organization to you, and to every other member using it.

Intranets are the digital communications systems that cohere and construct organizations.

I know, intranets are old news. Many intranets are boring, underfunded, decoupled from business strategy, and lacking in tech-sex appeal.

Worse, we take intranets for granted, as the “always there”, “always on”, and nearly invisible.

But, because they are the shared backbone of your organization’s digital communication,

Intranets are the digital social scaffolding of the organization’s structure, processes and culture.

If you want to change your customer relationships and your brands to make them social, by all means start with boundary-crossing systems like CRM and work you way inside to support these changes.

But, if you want a more social organization, one that can support engagement among external and internal stakeholders, then you need to address the structure, processes and culture at your organization’s core.

Go social from the inside-out, and start by socializing your intranet.

See also: Social Intranet Design and Organizational Identity: Design for functionality and character

Images: Tiny Apple and Tiny Apple Core, on Flickr Some rights reserved by me and the sysop

Social Media systems inside organizations should not be designed just to support tasks.  Social business systems should also be designed to support the emotional elements of interpersonal relationships, since these build momentum by helping us feel more meaningful and valuable as we work together.

Often, people assume that digital social systems inside organizations should help us move specific, particular tasks forward. “If these systems help us edit documents, send updates, check information, and find resources,” we think, “they’ll help us get work done better and faster. But if these systems make the social, emotional, personal/collective experience of doing those tasks more pleasant, that’s a side benefit. It’s not critical.”

That view couldn’t be more wrong.

Our social business systems should help us capture and share positive socio-emotional feelings related to doing work tasks, since these emotions are critical for generating productive momentum.

Generating Productive Momentum

I just cracked open a new book, The Progress Principle: Using small wins to ignite joy, engagement, and creativity at work, by Teresa Amabile and Steven Kramer. The Progress Principle gives us a different way to identify what generates productive momentum and to make sure we’re designing systems that support all the elements that matter to productivity.

According to The Progress Principle, there are two forces that make productive momentum possible: “catalysts” and “nourishers”.

(I wish their labels sounded more like actions or tools and less like personality types, but I’ll stick with their labels for now.)

“Catalysts” are actions that directly support the work on the project. Catalysts include firm goals, operational autonomy, action steps, access to resources, and clear progress indicators. These features are usually built right into knowledge management, enterprise, and collaboration software. They’re what many people imagine when they think of digital work systems.

“Nourishers” are interpersonal communications that share feelings and reflect the qualities of our work relationships. Nourishers lift our spirits, encourage us, and support us socially & emotionally as we work. Amabile and Kramer highlight nourishers like demonstrating respect, offering encouragement, offering emotional support, and developing a sense of affiliation. Actions that affirm identity, link activity to purpose, and offer chances to contribute from one’s unique knowledge set also nourish momentum.

Social Media systems of engagement can support both catalysts and nourishers.

Catalysts: Social media systems help us generate productive momentum simply by making work easier to do. In addition to helping us do the actual work, social media helps us see the progress of our work, by surfacing, recording, tracking and aggregating the actions that move the tasks along.

Nourishers: Social media systems can also help us generate productive momentum by supporting the social & emotional experiences that keep us engaged in our work. Features that support our day-to-day relational work, and features that allow us to share our moods, remind us to send thanks, prompt us to broadcast accolades, and maintain an ambient feeling of being ‘with’ others working digitally alongside us, can support and sustain positive relationship experiences.

Tools that help us surface, recognize, savor and celebrate positive interactions generate momentum by making work personally and collectively meaningful.

Catalysts are productivity generators that software designers, IT managers, and project managers are most likely to pay attention to. But nourishers are productivity generators that leaders pay attention to.

Leaders who want to generate momentum:

• When you think about the systems you are building for your organizations, are you supporting not only catalyzing actions but also nourishing actions?

• Are you paying attention to how your tools could provide socio-emotional support that builds individual and group momentum?

• Are you helping to learn and to teach others how to use the tools you have to convey both task information and positive social information?

For individuals and collectives actually to be productive, both the tasks and the positive social experience of doing these tasks must be supported. Social media systems should be designed so that we have tools to capture, record, and convey when we experience ourselves, our colleagues, and our work activities in positive ways.

Thanks to Terri Griffith for the head’s up about The Progress Principle.

See also:
How Social Media Reveals Invisible Work
Rearranging Chairs as an Act of Leadership