This week in links - week 43, 2009

"Ten ways how leadership can influence and promote interpersonal trust in knowledge management behavior and processes", weknowmore.org

1. Act with discretion
2. Be consistent between word and deed
3. Ensure frequent and rich communication
4. Engage in collaborative communication
5. Ensure that decisions are fair and transparent
6. Establish and ensure shared vision and language
7. Hold people accountable for trust
8. Create personal connections
9. Give away something of value
10. Disclose your expertise and limitations

"The Business Case for Social Computing #SPC09" by Brett Young:

Session notes from SharePoint Conference 2009:

• Knowledge Management Issues within the enterprise are still looking for a solution, and social computing might be part of it: Rapid response to problems, capturing knowledge to ensure business continuity, and reducing transition costs. Although social computing may be part of the solution, it is not THE solution to knowledge management.
• If we manage by commitment, and employees meet their commitments, do we really care when, where, and how they do it?
• When all of your economics come from the industrial age, everything is measured like a factory.
• Social computing increases the frequency of "knowledge accidents" within a company – which is a good thing.
• If you don't build it they will go somewhere else.
• Social computing is really just a shift in communication channels. It is not something to justify, but something to navigate through, embrace, and leverage as a new capability and manage as a new risk.
• "The anti-social organization is ultimately non-productive." – Chris Howard, Burton Group.

"Grassroots Social Media is a Risky Necessity" by Anthony Bradley:

Enterprise IT organizations must determine when a grassroots movement has a high chance of success or when a more top-down approach is required. This involves building a decision model as part of the social media governance program that enables the enterprise (all levels) to understand the nature of the social media purpose in terms of its ability to succeed as a grassroots driven effort or where top-down involvement is required. Done correctly this can empower grassroots social media movements without undue risk.

Understanding and capitalizing on the grassroots is critical for both bottom-up- and top-down-driven social media efforts. Generally, the enterprise leadership forms a team to lead a top-down social media effort, while members of a potential social-media-based community drive a bottom-up approach.

"The Problem of the Intranet" by Gordon Ross:

We’ve seen several frames or lenses through which to view the “problem” of the intranet:

• intranet as technical problem (issues of performance, content management technology, search engine technology);
• intranet as information design problem (content structure, navigation, IA, usability);
• intranet as productivity problem (measurement of gains made through self-service applications and access to information, ROI, enhanced efficiencies); and
• intranet as social capital problem (employee engagement, culture, job satisfaction).

Our hypothesis is that while intranets are traditionally seen and framed as a visual design and material object design problem, they in fact have more in common with complex systems than printed brochures, especially when it comes to social intranets and Enterprise 2.0.

Challenging the assumption of “intranet as object” and reframing it as “intranet as complex system” is the first of a few key assumptions that need to be recognized and understood to ensure social intranet success. Framing the intranet as an object leads to trying to design an object and expecting it to behave like one, subject to standard cause and effect type statements. Framing the intranet as a complex system changes our perception of it: no longer is it a static thing, but a dynamic environment, one which responds to different attempts to control and shape it.