johnmdemarco posted on May 27, 2010 19:28
Today I attended a workshop entitled “HR—Caught In the Web of Social Media,” sponsored by the Nashville Chamber of Commerce and featuring Donna Yurdin and Thao Nelson of Nashville-based Credo Management Consulting. Yurdin and Nelson shared several innovative examples of how companies are supporting and developing their talent pool through social media, in ways that are “social, mobile, collaborative, engaging and fun.” These efforts occur amid the challenge of a workforce culture shifting from the dynamics of face-to-face interactions to virtual collaboration and sharing of information.
A few of the coolest examples included Wachovia Bank’s use of cell phones to equip its sales representative with all the information they could ever need in the field, replacing the traditional (and dreaded) three-ring binder; IBM’s “Blue Social,” an internal Facebook-like social network that deepens communication and collaboration among its 300,000 worldwide employees; and Sun Microsystem’s use of high-tech games for its new employees that tell the Sun story and introduce the company’s products, replacing the boring new hire orientation classes found in most larger companies. Other companies are onboarding employees through Facebook pages, LinkedIn groups and YouTube videos.
The speakers emphasized how the quest for any organization—HR division or not—is how to have both a strategic plan and the necessary resources for social media tools to be effective in building talent and driving performance. Lacking a strategy, companies will jump on the hottest trend—and they are ALL hot trends—and never gain traction in a manner that truly supports the business goals. Without the resources—time, money, people—to support the use of social media, it will grow stale, irrelevant and, at times, even comical. I’ve seen plenty of Web sites that haven’t been updated in months, as well as lots of Facebook or Twitter accounts without a status update in ages.
My favorite moment of the workshop occurred when Ms. Nelson spoke of the “fun” aspect of social media as it relates to the training and development world (most of my vocational sphere). “Edutainment” is the buzz word, and it is brought to life by asking key questions such as, “I have a message to train around—what are all the possibilities for me to do this?”
I like to think about possibilities. The person who is free to focus on possibilities is knowledgeable about and secure with the necessary boundaries and policies that keep an organization from undercutting its success. The creative spark fans into flame within the structure of an intentional entity. A fun learning atmosphere done well, with strategy and passion and plenty of tools, drives business goals while feeding the hearts and minds of employees who want to grow with the organization and continue to invent new possibilities.
Social media has created more of these possibilities than could have been imagined just a few years ago. The Internet, as Ms. Yurdin emphasized today, is “so passé.’” It was merely the foundation, and we are adding layer upon layer. A rich parallel is the person who has mastered the fundamentals of a field, and then joyfully delves into more and more complexity. This person stands apart from the crowd because he or she is not intimidated by ambiguity or obsessed with what might go wrong; they are willing to be “caught in the web,” for the possibilities of human creativity are only limited by those who play it safe to the point of endangering the business itself.