Customized wikis and out-of-the-box software

Shiv Singh of Avenue A | Razorfish detailed some of their mediawiki customizations. While he starts off questioning whether enterprise wikis are more apt than customized open source based solutions (which can be debated and argued for both ways, see the comments there …), another point caught my eye:

Furthermore, enterprise 2.0 as coined by Andrew McFee is not about cost but about what the software does for its users and how they shape the software themselves.

Well, this is an aspect of McAfee’s SLATES concept that often goes underestimated: Freeform, adaptivity and emergence. We need to prepare for these up-front, we need to design for emergence, so that usage patterns can evolve over time and to allow for easy tweaking and adapting of solutions over time. Then, scalability of social software in the enterprise does not simply equal more users/pages/page impressions/organization units involved/etc., it also implies a high level of adaptivity for a variety of tasks/organizational settings/security requirements/etc.

And yes, this (more holistically interpreted) scalability is a hard requirement for (pre-)packaged solutions … too often the need to prepare for all possible kind of tasks has led to bloated (complex and costly) software, that’s all but lightweight.

Do only young people get Web 2.0?

One might think yes when reading this report in TechWeb (“Younger Workers Demanding Web 2.0 Tech On The Job”).

I am not sure what to think of this line of reasoning, because I’ve seen both enough “old” people who get Web 2.0 and vice versa. Physical age is a dumb metric, especially when it is applied to knowledge workers etc. So judging employee’s ability to get Enterprise 2.0 by their age, is just like, well, judging books by their cover …

Moreover I am not sure whether I like this article for the analysis and the actions it recommends. While I am all for respecting IT governance, social software in the enterprise must be approached differently (as it’s not so much a technological than a social shift). So asking for …

IT managers better start preparing to deal with Web 2.0 technologies, like wikis, blogs, mashups, and social networking sites, because sooner or later — and it’ll probably be sooner — they’re going to have to deal with it.

And that means adopting technologies, managing them, and securing the network from the people who use them.

… is leading the wrong way.

For one, it’s not sooner or later, it’s now.

And it’s not about technology.

And “securing the network from the people who use them” sounds weird, they’re your employees not your enemies.

Emergence in Enterprise 2.0 implementation

More on emergence as a principle behind enterprise 2.0 concepts (add this to my post here) in Miguel Cornejo Castro’s take on the McAfee/Davenport debate (Davenport’s pov):

Integrating this “emergence” paradigm into the management methods of modern business is darn hard. It will take time, it will take experiments and failures. It’s not just a technology awareness issue (as the previous implementations of e-business and other disruptive technologies), it’s a cultural issue. A business-practices issue.

Web 2.0 is just another enabler for a cultural change that was already under way with Web 1.0. Witness forums, online collaboration tools (not invented with tags et al), and the emergence of the idea of the knowledge worker. Witness the whole latest generation of Knowledge Management as a discipline.

Now I wouldn’t define emergence as a paradigm, but rather as a principle (building upon an underlying paradigm of “complex adaptive organizational systems” and in line with principles like connectivity and adaptivity). Hence, it becomes clear that we must not focus solely on culture – yes, organizational culture is playing an important part, but it is neither the only adoption and implementation lever nor the only thing to mind when bringing web 2.0 to the enterprise.

Assemble Enterprise 2.0 with Open-Source

John Eckman points to an Optaros whitepaper on Enterprise 2.0 technologies, specifically open-source tools.

I like their take and view of technologies for supporting knowledge management 2.0 and their criticism of “One True Architecture”-thinking. No wonder, as I too argue that adaptivity, connectivity and emergence are essential ingredients to knowledge management concepts …

Here’s the Executive Summary:

Enterprise 2.0 promises a new approach to creating, managing, and consuming knowledge within the enterprise, allowing patterns and value to emerge out of relatively freeform, experimental, unrestricted exchanges. Unlike knowledge management systems of the nineties, which locked users into strict taxonomies, enforced rigid workflows, and reflected hierarchical management relationships, emerging social computing systems rely on lightweight, adaptable frameworks designed to facilitate knowledge creation across traditional boundaries, enable rapid change, and foster contributions from throughout the management hierarchy.

This new knowledge management paradigm needs to be supported by new technologies and approaches. It isn’t, however, just a matter of selecting the right set of applications or the right platform; there is no “One True Architecture” which includes all the features and functions users could ever desire.

Werte statt Macht

Sören Stamer, CEO von Coremedia (hier das Video seines Next07-Vortrags), im Interview mit dem Fischmarkt-Team, u.a. zu zeitgemäßer Unternehmensorganisation aber auch den Implementierungserfahrungen bei Coremedia, u.a.:

Was bedeutet die Post-Web-2.0-Ära für klassische Unternehmen?

Der Hauptpunkt ist der, dass der Kampf gegen den Paradigmenwechsel nicht zu gewinnen sein wird. Jedes Unternehmen kann zwar versuchen, dagegen zu arbeiten, aber meiner Meinung nach wird man mit dieser Strategie nicht erfolgreich sein können. Traditionelle Modelle mit starren Hierarchien und starker Machtorientierung werden leiden und möglicherweise untergehen, weil die Welt um sie herum sich grundlegend ändert.
[…]
Mit dem Medium Internet hat sich eine kulturelle Revolution in Gang gesetzt: Selbstorganisation statt starre Hierarchien. Kompetenzen statt Kontrolle. Kooperation statt Kampf. Werte statt Macht. Technologie hat somit in erster Linie einen kulturellen Effekt.

Web 2.0 changing decision making processes within organizations

More on Chambers keynote by the people of Avenue A | Razorfish, pointing out his argument that decision making processes (at least at Cisco …) were changed and accelerated:

And when talking about web 2.0 [Chambers] specifically drew attention to social networking as changing decision making processes within organizations.
[…] Chambers emphasized that social networks are changing businesses making them less hierarchical and more network oriented.

Well, yes, strengthening (and leveraging) social networks via social software may facilitate this, decision making can be accelerated (and be more distributed, democratized, deconstructed, diversified, …).

In fact, the main change effect is not acceleration (but the change effects in brackets …).

Alas, be warned, your results may vary, social networking in the enterprise is not “easy”. One reason is that this is not a technology problem (with some kind of tech answer), but a people problem. Supplementing organizational hierarchies and “command and control” decision structures with free-form collaboration and teamwork approaches needs some serious thinking before “kicking-off these projects”, taking into account that this calls for broad implementation approaches, lead and energized by skillful managers, and more …

Then (and only when …) we employ freeform social software and enterprise 2.0 concepts we can ease implementation, like when we leverage bottom-up mechanisms that are already in place, and allow for the emergence of usage and networking patterns that reflect and support the actual informal networks that exist in the organization anyway.

Social software may enter the corporate world quite naturally in the end …