The Social Media Garden

The rapid growth of social media is creating new and complex challenges for organisations. As classic examples of disruptive innovation, social media tools such as Facebook and Twitter are forcing individuals and organisations to re-examine their methods of working and communication.

And they're not about to disappear overnight. So what are some of the challenges that social media presents for organisations? An informative piece of research - called the Social Media Garden - provides a valuable contribution to this debate. Here is a Slideshare of the final report:

The Social Media Garden Report from The Denovati Group

The research puts forward some interesting concepts such as 'Leadership 2.0', the qualities of which include "embracing change, being open to experimenting, demonstrating transparency, fostering a culture of innovation, open to the voice of the people, stimulating sharing, acknowledgment of expertise, working collaboratively and creating dialogue". And the researchers go on to suggest that "use of Web 2.0 will only be successful in an organisation if Leadership 2.0 is in place". I'm inclined to agree.

I particularly like the method of data collection. As the researcher states at the start of the report, it makes sense to conduct a study on social media using a more 'social' methodology than the traditional survey. This short video explains how the Social Media Garden, developed by Hybrid Wisdom Labs, works:

And all of the above is testament to the power of the open community - thank you to Tracy Gravesande and Robin Heyden for sharing the above resources!

Collaboration by Difference - avoiding 'groupthink'

I just came across an interesting post on collaboration by Duke professor Cathy Davidson:

Collaboration by Difference - Video - Harvard Business Review

In this short video, Prof. Davidson suggests that in a collaborative group it is very often the non-expert or the person who is not in charge who has the most interesting thing to say. It is therefore important to structure ways to hear that person to avoid them being drowned out by the more vocal members of the group. She calls this 'collaboration by difference', a way of hearing the disrputive or dissident voice.

Prof. Davidson presents three useful strategies for avoiding what she terms 'groupthink' when working in groups:

1. Air out differences democratically. When working with two international groups, this can be done by giving each member of each group two cards. On the first they are asked to write a perceived opportunity and challenge of working with the other group. On the second they write a perceived opportunity and challenge about what they themselves can offer. All cards are collected, shuffled and then read out by a facilitator without identifying who wrote which card. This often helps reveal that all participants are worried and excited about the same things. Rather than focusing on the differences, this helps participants focus on the opportunities nd challenges of working together.
2. Let non-experts talk first. For example, staff and students are participating in a two-hour workshop on Learning in the Digital Age. By asking staff to sit and listen to the students for the first hour, this helps them to understand and appreciate that the students know much more than staff might think. By flipping the relationship between the expert and the novice it enables everyone to hear suggestions and ideas that might otherwise have been suppressed.
3. Ask what you're missing. One person will have the responsibility of identifying what has been missed in the discussion, but no-one knows who that person will be. The person running the meeting will choose a participant at random - this makes everyone pay attention because they don't know if they will be chosen. Doing this helps indicate that participants might not be as clear on something as they thought they were. This often derails the conversation, but it also often turns out that participants were heading in the wrong direction and it was therefore beneficial for the conversation to be derailed.

Making collaborative work work - Harold Jarche

Harold Jarche sets out three principles that underpin successful collaboration in the workplace:

http://www.jarche.com/2012/03/making-collaborative-work-work/