One aspect to this journey is to look around at different corporate functions and try and figure out what the ideal role might be for them to play in this journey forward.
And, for me, this breaks down into two discussions:
- how can your function benefit from these tools and behaviors?
- how can you help the rest of the company to become proficient?
Not surprisingly, looked at that way, HR (human resources) has a huge role to potentially play in the latter.
How is HR At Your Company?
I'd say I wouldn't be unfair if I said that the reputation of most HR groups at most companies isn't top-tier. The glory goes to product guys, or sales guys, or (maybe) marketing guys.
Well, the marketing thing isn't the case at EMC, but I can only hope! ;-)
At EMC, I'd say we're not unusual in that when we think of a Big Corporate Initiative, the HR leadership team isn't the first group that comes to mind.
But in this case, it's going to have to be different.
They have a huge -- if not essential -- role to play in all of this.
Sure, You Can Be A Proficient User
Our HR guys are all over this social media thing. As I mentioned before, they went out and tried Second Life for recruiting. They're interested in social networks as a way to keep people connected. And I'm sure there's much more.
And it makes sense to me. HR is in the business of people. And you'd think that tools that connect people better into communities (e.g. social media in all its flavors) has got to be right up their alley.
So the case for our HR guys to be proficient users at these techniques is pretty obvious.
I'm going to go as far as to say they probably need to appoint an overall lead to drive the intelligent use of social media tools and techniques within HR, and do so in a thoughtful and organized fashion. And I think I can get them to that point.
But that's not all I want from them ...
HR Can Be Responsible For New Skills and New Behaviors
If you look back at HR's contribution here at EMC, you'll notice that they've had a subtle but pervasive hand in many areas that we've had to get better at: cross-functional behavior, working in the matrix, taking responsibility for our own career development, diversity -- it's quite a list.
And when we put up their past accomplishments with the new needs of the organization, there's an extended mandate here that's richer, deeper and more sustained that is first apparent.
And I'm not just talking about some "Learning How To Blog" class.
Considering Enterprise 2.0
I love these big, amorphous buzzwords that gets everyone excited but no one's quite clear about what it actually means, or what to do.
As a professional marketeer, I consider these buzzword bubbles useful tools to grab, shape and mold to the task at hand. Hence my interest in Enterprise 2.0.
I'm going to describe Enterprise 2.0 as an ideal end-state, but to picture it as a set of layered, inside-out behaviors.
Build from the bottom, address several layers, and -- voila! -- you've got Enterprise 2.0, or at least a reasonable facsimile.
Here's the pitch:
Individual 2.0
Individuals in an "enterprise 2.0" model need different behaviors and skills to be successful.
They need to be able to express themselves cleary, articulately, professionally and frequently using social media. This means they're comfortable with blogging, participating with message boards, contributing to wikis, and so on.
They need to be able to navigate and monitor dozens (or hundreds) of discussions happening inside and outside of EMC, to find the ones of high interest to them (or to EMC).
They need to learn the social skills required to join an existing discussion while still representing EMC in a professional manner. They need to learn when not to participate, or when to escalate for additional help if they've spotted an online activity that isn't in EMC's best interests.
They'll need to learn to control their emotions and their initial reaction to lash back when they feel threatened or maligned.
Many of these skills and behaviors have clear analogues in the physical world. We just need to reinforce the proper physical-world behavior, and show how it translates to the virtual world.
They need to know that it's expected that they become proficient users of social media techniques, and that they'll be expected to be robust participants of many communities. And that such behavior is good and will be recognized as such.
I'm sure there's more, but you get the general drift ...
Program / Project / Team Lead 2.0
Today, when there's a cross-functional project in the offing, and someone's responsible, there's a pre-defined set of actions: call a meeting, send out emails, maybe set up an eRoom or perhaps a regular conference call.
In the social media model, we call these people community developers and community managers.
Again, the basic motivations / skills / behaviors are the right ones, they just need to learn how to do this with the new tools, rather than the old ones.
Anyone who's pulled a team together knows the social dynamics of doing it the way we do it today. We just need to make sure that this translates well to the social media model, as there are a few unique nuances here.
E.g. rather than spamming everyone with the most recent minutes from the meeting, encourage people to add the community aggregation feed to their RSS reader. Or, rather than send around a Word document with rev control, everyone into the wiki pool!
Or, rather than sending emails to everyone, why don't you just jump on the forum and leave a note?
Lots of examples. Getting work done collaboratively is at the essence of social media techniques, and people will need some help getting their arms around this if we're going to scale.
Manager 2.0
If you've ever looked at employee feedback exercises over several years, you'll always see "need to communicate more" directed at levels of senior management.
Having been one of those managers who frequently get this comment, the problem is time. Setting up weekly one-on-ones does not scale well. Quarterly all-hands meetings are unsatisfying, as is the periodic newsletter. I'm a bright guy, and I haven't found a satisfying solution yet.
I think that social media techniques will be able to dramatically shift the frequency and the quality of communication between a manager and their team members.
I ran across a few examples of teams that were routinely blogging about what they were working on. The manager would simple get an RSS feed of everyone's blog (and comments and other interactions in the space), so -- no status reports required!
If the manager wanted to provide feedback / advice, this could be provided quickly, easily and in the specific context -- and, in near-realtime. SImply leave a comment, or send a quick message.
Doesn't eliminate the need for face-to-face, but -- boy! -- it would be a heckuva lot better than what we have today.
In a few examples, the boss / manager would be blogging as well about what he /she is working on, thinks is important, etc. Employees are welcome to RSS aggregate that as well, and offer questions and commentary.
I'm not getting all pollyanna here -- if managers and their employees get comfortable with social media tools and behaviors, I bet we wouldn't see that perennial beef on the employee satisfaction survey anymore.
And that would be huge!
Director / VP 2.0
At this level, it's all about understanding the broader business, and transcending beyond the day-to-day to start grappling with the big issues. You know, the whole "leadership" thing.
The way we try and attack the first one today (know more about the business) is a combination of special education sessions, networking and the occasional career rotation.
Imagine a world with hundreds of behind-the-firewall communities: people sharing, working together, talking about what's important for them in their world.
And that anyone could navigate to that community, spend some time getting a flavor for what's going on, and even (gasp!) join in if they felt so motivated.
Not only would much more of the business be transparent to far more people, but the responsibility of getting to know EMC's broader business would shift from corporate functions to an individual function.
Hint: one of the ground rules I've decided for this project is "no private spaces". More on that later.
Going a bit farther, there are interest groups that informally spring up at the senior management level when we're grappling with a particular problem or issue.
Now, some of this stuff is sensitive, and not open for general discussion -- but imagine using social media techniques to enfranchise large numbers of EMC people around things like Six Sigma, or Total Customer Experience, or other large-scale initiatives that EMC periodically drives.
It'd be a different world, no?
I think there's a third distinct opportunity here as well, and that's using social media to transform your individual function. Imagine Marketing 2.0. Or HR 2.0. Or Customer Service 2.0. The list is endless, except maybe for finance and legal;-)
Back To The Role of HR
I believe that there will be two powerful forces that drive social media behaviors across EMC.
One is "modelling". People naturally look around and check out what other people are doing, especially the successful ones. A few high-visibility projects with associated glory and recognition, and we'll have more people that we can handle wanting to climb on board.
The other is "enablement". People want to know that they're being supported in their journeys to learn new skills and new behaviors. This is OK, we'll show you how, we'll provide feedback, yes we'll make mistakes, but that's OK (usually). And so on.
I can figure out how to get the modelling thing going.
But to get real scale on enablement, I'll need HR's help.
I'll let you know how it goes.
Comments