Review: The 8 Step Guide to a Social Workplace by @adigaskell

8steps-featuredSome time ago I had the good fortune of being asked to publish my content to DZone: Social Business. I was quite honored to be considered, after all, I was merely a fledgling SocBiz blogger.

Adi Gaskell
Adi Gaskell

The dude that asked me is Adi Gaskell (@adigaskell). We’ve been “following” each other ever since. Next to that, he’s a major commenter on this site, which is always good.

So, when Adi mentioned he was working on a SocBiz whitepaper, I was positively thrilled.., and I couldn’t wait to get my hands on it.

Now, at last, it is done, and I got a chance to read it.

The 8 Step Guide to a Social Workplace

The 8 Step Guide to Building a Social Workplace
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The first half of the book delves into the ‘Why’ of Social Business. It is a very logical place to start, because for a lot, it is still a big mystery. Even for those who are active practitioners, the ‘Why’ can sometimes be cloaked by the ‘How’.

The details of implementing, and the daily challenges can become distracting, even overwhelming. As mentioned in the book, the adaptation, or transformation, to a Social Business takes time, a lot of it. Sometimes it’s good, even necessary, to take a step back and remember the ‘Why.

For those coming to grips with Social Business, the first chapter is really useful. Here Adi deals with a few myths and misconceptions that do need to be cleared up before diving into the good stuff. Also, the list with (potential) benefits is extensive and inspiring.

I dare anybody to read that list and then dismiss the potential of a Social Workplace (read the first chapter at the end of this post).

Return On Investment

roiROI; a business term I was not familiar with before Social entered the realm of business.., and the one term that keeps popping up in almost every conversation, book or blogpost.

This is because asking; “What is the ROI on Social” is a very legitimate question. When you consider the time, effort and money that is involved, even in running a Facebook Page, is significant. Having a Facebook Page (or Twitter account) is, of course, a far cry from being a Social Business, and the investment that is required is equal to that. Depending on the size of the company, it can be gargantuan. Determining the ROI is therefore a very necessary step to take.

Often the problem with social business isn’t making a difference, it’s in that positive impact actually being measured

The main school of thought is leaning more and more towards having a clear purpose when it comes to Social Business. Whether the purpose of the adaptation is social or commercial, once this purpose is set, you can begin measuring it.

There still is an air of “let’s just begin” to it, but then ROI is indeed difficult to measure, if not impossible.

Basically, companies already measure a lot within a company. When you aim to change a certain process with the help of social tools, it’s relative easy to keep measuring, and, in the long run, see the difference.

For All To See

Through various use cases, from thought leaders in the industry, Adi explains in a clear and concise manner how the game is played.., and won. It is written in a no-nonsense down-to-Earth manner.., and this is important.

With job titles like Social Media Evangelist, Social Activationist, Community Data Guerilla and all the Ninja’s and Rockstars out there, it is difficult to take social serious. And it’d be even harder when you want to sell your Social Business ideas to The Board.

Hence the importance of this book, the content, and the way it is written. It cannot be denied that Social Business is a very, very serious business. The potential benefits can be listed, but are still hard to grasp, and many will only present themselves after many years.

This book gives you the advantage and answers you need, and it will convince you to take that step; to call in for reinforcements to get the job done.

80%

It is imperative to realise that 80%(!) of all Social Business exploits die a silent death. Taking with them the hope and enthusiasm of those involved.Momentum is a crucial element of change. Having to re-invest time and effort (let alone money) is a hard thing to do.

The Social Business Adaptation is such an intense, long and highly customised process that a good first step is crucial.

This book will help you take that step, it will help you realise what Social Business is, how you can benefit from it, and which questions to ask when you invite someone like Adi Gaskell to your office.

Post*Shift and the Long Term Change

Last February, in Paris, I was fortunate enough to catch Lee Bryant’s talk about how to approach the adaptation of Social Business within a company. I caught up with him a few days after #e20s to discuss this vision, and Post*Shift, a bit more in-depth.

sky-limitThroughout the conference, several talks covered several approaches on when, or where to start the Big Change. With all the different people, each with their own discipline and field of expertise, came a lot of different thoughts on how to approach this.., issue.

We had Change Agents, Community Managers, Business Strategists, Platform Specialists, and all-round Social Business Evangelists (and more). All were present and provided a piece of the puzzle.

Everyone

Now, I know, we need everyone to transform a company. There is no way a single individual, or a single discipline can achieve this. Only when we work together will the sky be the limit.

However, the element of focus in Lee’s talk was the adaptation of the hierarchical structure of a company.

Wow, wait a minute. So, we don’t start with aligning the business goals? Or creating a community? Or with a (small) pilot project to establish a proof of concept?

We go straight for the spline of a company?

No Rogier, we do not. Pay attention.

In my defence, if you watch the video below, at the 1 minute mark, you see a tall, well suited man walking towards the front row. That would be I, said the fool.
I missed Lee’s introduction, because, you know, I needed to open my laptop and check the #e20s tweets.

Moving Beyond

The key phrase of that intro was;

We need to look very seriously at the organisational design structures, IF we are to go any further with social technology.

This became apparent when I asked Lee if he would start with changing the organisational structure within a company. No, he would not.

At some point the (often old school) organisational structure will limit the progress of change. This is why you have to consider a way to adapt that hierarchy to suit the flow of information and the natural tendencies of humans to talk with whomever they want, and find resources and help where they are available.

Hierarchy does tend to bring with it an element of politics.

Solving problems laterally, instead of hierarchically saves time and a frustration. A more real-life interpretation of a hierarchy doesn’t follow the down-and-up-and-down flow of the org chart anyway.

In the end, we’re all in it together. And dealing with issues in a harmonious and transparent way will, at some point, turn into higher productivity (and many more benefits).
Sure, those who thrive on playing the office politics game won’t like this. But then again, they don’t add anything positive to begin with, and can only change for the better.

The slide below visualises the difference between an org chart found on the corporate Intranet, and the way people communicate in the real world.

Post*Shift

I also wanted to ask Lee about his new venture. This has been on the radar for a while, but now that Post*Shift is a go, it’s time to address it.

post-shiftThe thing I noticed when browsing the Post*Shift website was this;

We have developed our own (proprietary) Framework for assessing a company’s progress against a number of key attributes relating to structure, culture and practice, establishing a solid base on which to undertake modernisation initiatives.

I like that. One of the biggest issues which pop-up is where to start. With this tool you can assess the base-line of a company. For instance, if you’d want to know how agile your company is, you can ask very specific questions to determine just that.

And, on a larger time scale, you can measure it (ponder the importance of that for a minute).

Of course, it is a combined experience of many years (of the six people that make up the company) that results in the capability of creating such a tool. Then, being able to interpret it correctly, providing an enterprise with a (very) long-term roadmap, and supporting that enterprise in all the steps that need to be taken is, in a word, impressive.

Time and Customisation

Few businesses have such long term impact on a business as Social Business does.
And few businesses require such high customisation as Social Business does.

The ability to be flexible enough in your approach to cater to any business, and have the ability to see into the future can never be underestimated.

I wish Lee and the rest of the Post*Shift team the best of success, I’m sure they’re of to a good start.

I leave you with another quote from Post*Shift’s website.

After 10+ years of pushing the notion of social technology as a business operating system, the idea is now mainstream – the headshift we tried to create has happened – but we have only begun to touch on its long-term impact on how business is done.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3gookq0SviQ?rel=0]

Elevator Pitch: I help a business maintain its fluidity.

First of all, apologies for the two selfies, I needed a picture of (or in) an elevator, I found two. Second, this is one of the longest posts ever on this blog, so the title is cleverly misleading. The actual pitch is all the way at the bottom, so you can scroll down, if you so desire.elevator-2In this day and age, where on-line relationships are more rampant then ever.., we sometimes tend to forget that the real world relationships are much more.., precious. It’s fine to meet somebody on-line, have a conversation or a discussion, even build something valuable. But, at the very least, have a good long Skype talk, with video, to get to know somebody beyond the 140 characters.

At the last #e20s, I met John Wenger, and, if you know him.., well, he’s one of those guys you have to meet for real. But.., the on-line conversation I had afterwards, was as interesting as the one off-line.

He asked me… What is your elevator pitch? Damn, and here I thought we’d just chat for a bit, forgo on the tough questions. But.., no…

However, I do have a pitch, or several, after asking myself ‘Why‘, I came up with;

Social Media Integration. Don’t Panic.., you too can get it under control.

For now, that’s still on my Twitter profile. On my website it’s a bit deeper, but not much;

Transform your Business into a Social Business. Unleash your Human Capital.

I stand by both of them, but do they convey what needs to be conveyed? In a literal sense, yes, they do. Question is, do you want to be literal, or does a good metaphor work better?

According to John, it does. And I have to agree. I used both pitches a few times and received a lot of blank expressions. Sure, after explaining the statement, I sometimes have a change to explain the underlying ideas about Social Business. And, of course, at a Social Business conference you get a lot of head nodding and affirmation with these statements.., but they understand the game.

elevator-1Rethinking

So what do I stand for? What do I deliver? How can I help a company? And.., why? In order to answer those questions, I think it’s best to go back a decade or so, and look at the flow of my IT career. Let me tell you why.

Back in 1998 IT was booming and companies grew so fast that they were reorganised twice a year. In my opinion, many (little) companies were build with one purpose, to be sold as quickly as possible. Consequently, I kept the same job for 12 years, but was employed by 5 different companies.

You get to learn to be flexible, to adapt. New branding, new e-mail, new pay-checks, new managers, new colleagues, new CV’s.., etcetera.

Tech vs. Humans

I started out in tech, networks. Learning about LDAP, IP packets, network configurations and so on and so forth. Tedious. Learning a lot and ending up on a helpdesk (or customer service desks, as they are now called). I took too much time helping people, never really quite made the quota. But, my customers were happy. I tried to help people, instead of closing a ticket as fast as possible.., thought it more important.

This started to be a trend for me. Solving communication problems between IT and Business. Speaking out at meetings, because none of the IT guys would. And finding myself more and more interested in the front end, rather than the back end.

I shifted my focus towards the Internet, and was placed on webserver maintenance. Errr… Nope, that’s not what I wanted.

Content Management

My first real experience with what we at the moment call Social Business, came with content management assignments. This was far more interesting, because I got to deal with people, instead of machines. It was still a one way connection, as far as the Internet went, but I was on to something.

With the advancement of technology, the platforms became slightly more interactive. Privately I already had a blog, build websites and tried to engage.

Social

Ever since I started in IT there had been one constant. The need to connect, to share, to retrieve information quickly and efficiently. However, this could not be done. Several attempts were made, with each takeover another brilliant idea failed miserably.

My last throes in IT circled around a Board of Subject Matter Experts. Our task was to come up with a platform which could unite employees and their on-line efforts. I never got to enjoy the end result, because by then, I needed to leave the nest. My IT days were over.., time to move on.

Back To Now

What interests me most about Social Business is the way it has the potential to change the way we live. On a fundamental level.

Think about it, if we change the way we work, the way we live our lives during office hours. This, invariably, will have an impact on our daily, and personal lives. It already does. Current office environments can be extremely nasty places to spend your precious time. Gossip, office politics, harassment, intimidation, bullying.., these things happen, all the time. And we take it home, get depressed, or even have burn-outs.

Can you imagine if you could turn that around? Turn that negative experience into a positive one. Can you imagine what that would do to a company, to the individual employee? Try…

Communication

The major issue that I come across is the blockage of information through lack of communication.

I know that with Social Business a primary objective is improving business goals through the use of social tools. And that’s all good and well. But the average employee has absolutely no interest in that during their day-to-day work. I never cared about the business goals of the company I worked for. I didn’t even know them. I wasn’t even told about them. Well, maybe in a very general manner. And it was always the same message; “Thanks for the hard work the past year. We did well, but not well enough. We need you to work hard for the next year”.., rinse and repeat.

But, communicating these goals, involve employees, ask for feedback, sharing the information, or even being informed on the decision making process, might just result in a rise of employee engagement which is so important for a successful enterprise.

Fluidity

At last.., now we’re getting somewhere.

Once you start with a metaphor, in this case the flow of water, you can come up with tons of examples, or at least quite a few.

Bruce Lee pointed out the adaptability of water. It always takes the shape of it’s container. It can crash and it can flow.

For a business this translates pretty well. When you let information flow where it needs to go, in an organic and natural way, those who need the information, receive the information.
And when it’s time to crash, maybe with a quick-to-market product, you have a much better change of doing so by directing the flow where it needs to go.

Or take a dam. A marvel in engineering, but, when the pressure is too high, it can burst. If you keep your employees mute, and in the dark, you run the risk of building up a pressure which you cannot control. Easing the pressure with a steady flow prevents unnecessary problems, or risks.

On a much smaller scale, a plumber can be, at times, the most important person in your life. When there is a blockage in your piping, you’d be very happy when somebody can find that blockage and remove it.

As you can imagine, there are plenty of examples.

So, when you ask me what I do, I don’t say; “I’m in Social Business”, but, I say:

I help a business rediscover its fluidity.

And if they ask what that means, I say;

I help you to make sure the flow of information runs like a well maintained river. Because you do not want to obstruct or divert it too much, when you do, it becomes unpredictable, and maybe even dangerous. Water (information) needs to flow, and be redirected when applicable. Irrigation needs to be set-up, so you can be sure it gets where it is needed, in the quantities you desire.

Be like water my friend.