Is Gamification a Cure for Entitlement?

October 19, 2011

What value is all this talk about gamification? It’s one thing to deploy game-design tactics to turn your for-profit services (like Foursquare or Hashable) into games. By playing games, folks actually will train themselves to use these products. More troubling to me is the idea of using gamification to redesign work tasks. Gamification and Work [...]

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Take Our Daughters to Tech Events

October 11, 2011

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 [...]

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The “New” Crisis of Meaning?

October 4, 2011

What’s up with the word “new” in the phrase “meaning is the new motivator”? From all corners of the interwebz conversation about ‘business’, I see mention of this idea that meaning at work is something new, something that we have just begun to desire. Seriously. It seems to come as a surprise, or as a [...]

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Pay Attention to How Social Media Communities Create ‘the Organization’

September 20, 2011

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 [...]

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My Nose, Other People’s Business

September 1, 2011

[(As I prepare for teaching the first class of the Business Technology Consulting Practicum, I've been reflecting on how to encourage the students to identify the unique gifts that they have and to consider how they'll bring these gifts to the teams and the projects they choose this year.  It's only fair, I think, for me to pony up [...]

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Help Me Find Consulting Projects for my Business & Technology Students!

August 15, 2011

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 [...]

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4 Reasons Why Socializing Your Intranet Makes Organizational Change Easier

August 3, 2011

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 [...]

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Social Organizations from the Inside Out: Start with Your Intranet

July 27, 2011

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 [...]

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How Social Media Can Help Us Generate Productive Momentum

July 18, 2011

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 [...]

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Purpose is the Killer App: Why Organizations Need Social Business Tools

July 12, 2011

What will it really take to get organizations to adopt social media tools inside the enterprise? Mere numbers won’t compel us, so don’t count on ROI. The shiny object syndrome won’t hold our attention, so back off with the bells and whistles. And, please, don’t work on us with peer pressure. We’re above trying to [...]

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