I ran into Len Devanna’s blog today and it had some interesting insight on introducing social media into corporate culture. He quotes Bob Lord, President of AARF, who cites four basics,

Experiment - Just try it. There’s no penalty if you don’t hit perfection on the first try. This is new ground. If you’re trying to break into the enterprise with social media - you’re a pioneer - period. There’s no play book, yet.

Simple - Don’t over complicate things out of the gate… There’s plenty of time for that later. Start small, build an initial offering, perhaps providing the raw basics, and let it evolve.

Be Global - Not in the geographic sense, but rather organizationally. Don’t work in a silo - reach out across groups, find partners to help participate and evangelize your effort.

Social - Be sure to tap into the social network itself… Shape the culture through the voice of the community. It’s what it’s all about.

Excellent concepts, but just as retail stores’ policies are designed to prevent shoplifting by a few, but when implemented negatively impact the majority of honest shoppers, so do HR and legal departments look on the sharing innate in social media with fear and loathing.

This is nothing new, one or the other or these groups are often at the bottom of information control attitudes (especially legal). They want the company to run on a strict need-to-know basis, yet still expect employees to be interested, motivated and vest their future with the company. But it doesn’t work that way. While we are seeing more enlightened HR, legal doesn’t seem to be changing at all.

As Len says, “The truth is, social media is not all that different from email. Recall the concern in the early 90’s as we took hours of training on the proper use of email. Fifteen years later and we’ve managed to survive.”

Your comments-priceless

Don’t miss a post! Subscribe via RSS or EMAIL

Sphere: Related Content

One of the most dangerous things that can happen to a CEO is losing touch with what’s really going on in his organization or business. CEOs who limit their contact to only C-level execs or even D-level are asking to lose touch with their company.

Others go to great lengths to stay in touch.

“Many CEOs talk about spending time on the front lines. But few take it as seriously as Arkadi Kuhlmann. In early September, the CEO of Internet bank ING Direct USA traded the quiet, spacious, warehouse-chic digs he shares with three other C-suite members for a noisy corner desk in the call center.

Kuhlmann’s new “office”–an oval table at one end of the vast open room, complete with file cabinets, two halogen floor lamps, and a cubicle for his assistant–has energized the Wilmington (Del.) call center staff, say the floor’s supervisors. And of course, it keeps him close to customer issue…. Trips back and forth to his desk–he passes at least a dozen customer service reps on the way–also give him the chance to make impromptu pep talk…. There are other, symbolic reasons for the move. Kuhlmann, who also sat in the marketing and lending departments, believes “nesting,” or decorating desk space, can encourage territorial, silo thinking. Uprooting himself is a way to remind employees that to stay innovative…”

Staying in touch is a major reason to practice management-by-walking-around, just remember that you’re there to listen, not just give pep talks or suggestions on how to do the work.

The more you really listen, without clarifying/excusing/refuting, the more you’ll be trusted and the more information people will share with you. However, if you retaliate in any way, i.e., kill the messenger, even once, then trust is broken and fixing it is very unlikely.

This doesn’t mean that you condone untruths or political manipulation, but it does mean that you deal with it in a careful, considered manner, not instantly reacting or with an off-the-cuff comment.

Everyone should think before talking or emailing, but as you climb higher in your career “should” changes to “needs to” and that changes to “must” when you’re at the top.

Your comments-priceless

Don’t miss a post! Subscribe via RSS or EMAIL

Sphere: Related Content

Do you watch NCIS (Tuesday on CBS)? It’s one of my favorite shows and last night one thing really cracked me up. Without going into too much detail, there was a crisis and the young FBI agent notified her boss about it by email. It was sensitive, urgent information affecting a critical investigation and she sent an email; needless to say, her boss wasn’t pleased—but it was played for a good laugh.

I’ve written several times, and linked to pertinent articles and research, about the problems inherent communicating by email and now there’s more. A recent NY Times article explains that, “This [email exacerbating misunderstandings] is becoming more apparent with the emergence of social neuroscience, the study of what happens in the brains of people as they interact. New findings have uncovered a design flaw at the interface where the brain encounters a computer screen: there are no online channels for the multiple signals the brain uses to calibrate emotions. Face-to-face interaction, by contrast, is information-rich. We interpret what people say to us not only from their tone and facial expressions, but also from their body language and pacing, as well as their synchronization with what we do and say. Most crucially, the brain’s social circuitry mimics in our neurons what’s happening in the other person’s brain, keeping us on the same wavelength emotionally….In an article to be published next year in the Academy of Management Review, Kristin Byron, an assistant professor of management at Syracuse University’s Whitman School of Management, finds that e-mail generally increases the likelihood of conflict and miscommunication.”

Email can be useful for sharing information, arranging meetings and other one dimensional actions, but beyond that, you’re looking for trouble.

“Consider, too, the “e-mail the guy down the hall” effect: as the use of e-mail increases in an organization, the overall volume of other kinds of communication drops - particularly routine friendly greetings. But lacking these seemingly innocuous interactions, people feel more disconnected from co-workers. This was noted in an article in Organizational Science almost a decade ago, just as e-mail was starting to surge. Saying “Hi,” it turns out, really does matter; it’s social glue. “

What about the rest of the social media world, stuff such as LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, etc.? Professor Clay Shirky, adjunct professor in New York University’s interactive telecommunications program, whose expertise is social computing - software programs through which multiple users interact, ranging from Facebook to Listservs and chat rooms to e-mail says, “social software” like e-mail “is not better than face-to-face contact; it’s only better than nothing.”

Got that? Better than nothing. That’s not saying much for the medium that’s being treated as the solution to your business (and even personal) ills, when, in fact, it might enhance, but it doesn’t replace either in-person visits or phones.

Think about it.

Your comments-priceless

Don’t miss a post! Subscribe via RSS or EMAIL

Sphere: Related Content

I know a development manager who uses the old chestnut “don’t have time to do it right, but have time to do it over” as the basis for gaming his boss.

Why would any manager in his right mind do this? Why would he intentionally set up his people to fail when, in fact, he has the time to do it right the first time?

To make himself look good.

Here’s a simplified version how it works.

Boss: We need the new version by [valid time frame], can you do it?

Mgr: It’ll be tight, but if everything clicks together we can deliver it.

Mgr to development team: We’ve been asked to have the new version by [time frame minus 30%] I know the schedule is tight, so do it quick and dirty and we’ll fix it later.

[Schedule is met, but product doesn't work as required]

Mgr: There’s no way we can release the product in this condition, so I went to go to my boss and groveled to get us some more time [the 30% he had deleted] to do the fixes.

Development team goes into crisis mode to clean up all features on which they had cut corners to meet the original schedule.

Boss: Great job, you’re exactly on schedule. I’m surprised because I’d heard you were having problems.

Mgr: Thanks. It was touch and go, but I was able to rally the team and we got it done.

To a boss who isn’t paying attention the manager looks like a hero; to the team he’s a jerk (no “looks like” about it).

Two morals:

• Bosses need to pay attention and walk managers to the door if they can’t be turned around. Employees need to avoid rationalization and vote with their feet when their manager continually plays manipulation games.

Manipulation is part of MAP (mindset, attitude, philosophy)â„¢ and MAP can only be encouraged to change externally—actual change is only generated internally.

Your comments-priceless

Don’t miss a post! Subscribe via RSS or EMAIL

Sphere: Related Content

“When you’re up to your tail in alligators, it’s hard to remember that your purpose is to drain the swamp!”

That’s why a consciously developed, flexible, scalable culture is so important, it helps keep the swamp drained when you’re busy with the alligators.

You’re never going to get rid of the alligators, nor do you want to; alligators are normal swamp dwellers and do lots of good things for the ecosystem.

So swamp = company and alligators = everything touching the company, including employees; vendors; customers; facilities; technology; parking; commuting, staffing; the list is endless.

Beyond being the drain, culture is the ecosystem that binds all the disparate swamp inhabitants together.

That being the case, we need an additional adjective to describe it, sustainable; a consciously developed, flexible, scalable, sustainable culture.

Even if you’re not the one who created the culture, you’re in a position to help sustain it and do the things, whether large or small, necessary to mitigate whatever pollution or damage there is.

Just remember, always start with your own bit before trying to clean up someone else’s.

Your comments-priceless

Don’t miss a post! Subscribe via RSS or EMAIL

Sphere: Related Content