Community Manager or the Art of Ambiguity: an introduction
This article was originally published on the Boostzone Institute’s blog on March 23rd 2010.
What is discussed here is the Enterprise 2.0 Community Managers view, focusing primarily (although not exclusively) on the internal side of it, rather than the social media marketing individuals.
Last fall, Dion Hinchcliffe wrote about the online community manager as the “jack of all trades” in his blog, and his view generated some discussion among Boostzone members and fellows. Hinchcliffe’s diagram is rich and exhaustive, with responsibilities spanning 11 different areas, as diverse as can be, ranging from Platform Management to Brand Management and Staff Development. Among the reactions to the graph, Dominique Turcq liked the approach but thought it made it an unsustainable job and therefore community management should not be just a job definition. I worried about putting all these responsibilities on one head (or even one community management team) and argued that rather the entire organization should take the E2.0 train, and share the load. Philippe Masson, commented that in his past responsibilities as Capgemini’s global leader of the strategy consultants community, with a team to support the assignment, his focus was more fundamental: provide a shared aspiration for the community members, entertain a climate of trust amongst them, and promote the value and fight for the values of the community with group executives.
Then last week, I was asked again about the optimal E2.0 Community Managers’ role description, and how to recruit some. Corporations express some real concerns behind questions about this role:
- Is this role really needed – isn’t planning for E2.0 mainly deciding about the tools and the content?
- About the boundaries, in the new paradigm where managers are asked to become team animators – who does what?
- The Enterprise 2.0 is not a community, nor even a community of communities, it is much more fluid than this, and so is there any use for community management?
- As a resource, wouldn’t such jobs be an overhead and just go at the next bump in the economy? Any resulting risks?
- Is there already a market for skilled Community Managers and are they becoming rising stars that companies will hunt and fight over?
- What authority and power should they have? Could they be trainees? Should they be seniors or executives?
- Should they be dedicated to this role or can they do something else?
A list of questions addressing different areas, from different contexts, which leads us to presume that there are no standard job description, nor generic rules to get it organized.
Organizations which are still very hierarchical, with information flowing through strict paths, will stumble even more on the Community Management concept. Anyway, the question can be seen from two perspectives: how should the organization address the issue, and what are the main tasks and skills for a community manager (or a community management team).
Organization perspective: beyond community management, a need for governance
Organizations that have already started their transformation are taking mixed routes, but they all have a predominant and critical idea in mind when it comes to community management: foster adoption, i.e. get participants onboard and make them contribute and find usefulness. In short, make it all alive.
For organizations in the early stages of adoption and deployment, often a steering committee shares the duties: it gathers the heads of transformer functions such as IT, Communication and HR, heads of client functions such as R&D, Marketing or Sales, project management, and community management. The Enterprise 2.0 project managers lead areas distinct from community management: technical interlock, coordination between vendors and internal IT development team, deployment planning, just to mention a few. The Steering Committee works even better when a champion and top executive leads it, and when it incorporates a few prime evangelists. The higher the steering committee members are in the organization chart, the better. They do not need to meet often, as once they are identified it gives the two key players, the community manager and the project manager, the necessary support to make decisions and impact the organization (be it to obtain resources, engage sustaining programs or elaborate further organizational transformation).
This type of structure becomes less formal in more mature organizations, though basically the roles continue.
Community manager skills and task
The community manager, as pictured in such an arrangement, is both the adoption leader and the voice of users – toward the other members of the steering committee, and beyond when necessary. Animation must be subtle, since a community is not an audience and a community manager must step aside from users. Her/his daily tasks are online introductions, offline encouragements, as little moderation as possible, spread the news of the value of Enterprise 2.0 in everyday’s business life, and of the successful initiatives that are rooted there. Adoption is the number one concern, mainly in early stages: it is good to organize some relays such as ambassadors (can also be called advocates, or many other titles) and early adopters. Ambassadors may become more important as the organization appropriates the Enterprise 2.0 model, and have roughly the same duties as Community Managers, although they probably will be more visible as they are closer to the users, and community management will not be their primary role.
Community management may be a thankless role when there are complaints or when executives put pressure to ensure success, and as such holders need a very resilient character. The art of stimulating participation is difficult to master: help each and everyone to step forward in their collaborative identity, without being in the front line, always add value, avoid moderating as much as possible though do make the ethics known.
Some clues … to adapt to the context
- Yes, community management is needed in Enterprise 2.0, although it may not be linked to specific forums or groups but addresses the wider community engagement.
- Community management is less about simple animation, more about backstage work to ensure the ecosystem is healthy, alive and useful to its inhabitants. As such it leads to generating value for and from the community. It may be relayed by ambassadors, themselves being super-users and mentors to others, and doing it on top of their regular job.
- Whether it means a dedicated roles depends on each case; but they must have direct access to the organization’s decision makers, and get listened to when they follow-up on the wider community’s life.
- Community managers probably can be hired externally, yet they must catch up with the culture and the history – at least recent – of the organization.
- Over the time, community management might become less formal and fade, however ambassadors will carry on.
One of the community managers I know defines her role as making it useless: she tries to drive enough momentum into the organization, so that she may eventually hand over the very small compulsory portion of her work to anyone atop of the organization, without jeopardizing the result. The ultimate ambiguity.
Is Enterprise 2.0 the neuro-organization?
This article was originally published on the Boostzone Institute’s blog in August 2010; a version in French is available here: Entreprise 2.0 et cerveau, quels parallèles ? .
Using metaphors enriches understanding and provides insights that are not only theoretical, but also incredibly practical. Gareth Morgan, in his book “Images of Organization”, mentions the Brain as one of them, among many others. It didn’t strike me as an interesting analogy until recently, when one of my neuro-psy teachers drew neurons connections on a chart. Dependant on the brain territory, you either get neuron highways, i.e. structured and persistent connections, or a fully meshed design where connections can be established on demand, in virtually an infinite number of ways.
The prefrontal cortex (PFC) connections schema caught my eyes: isn’t it similar to what one can draw when picturing the most recent form of an organization, whether you call that Enterprise 2.0, the Collaborative Organization or the Connected Corporation?
Are our brains more evolved than our enterprises?
According to the Triune Brain theory revisited[i], the very first brain development was the Reptilian territory, dedicated to survival: act when everything is calm, escape, fight or play dead when there is a death threat. Second layer was the paleo-limbic, when mammals started to live in herds: it manages relationships in the group. The third brain territory that developed was the neo-limbic cortex, where our character and temperament sit, and where among other things our values are formed and referred to – this territory is present today in a limited number of mammals brains. The PFC is the last evolution stage of the brain and only exists in human brains, and a few apes: it helps us face complexity and new situations. It also manages pure creativity, when one is able to think beyond what-he-thinks-he-knows – see double loop learning from Chris Argyris, for example. That is how it creates new routes of neurons on demand, and how many more connections are kept alive than in other territories.
A small joke among neuro-psy practitioners is that politics are at the paleo-limbic stage, our education system is at the neo-limbic one, and the enterprise is trying to overhaul that same neo-limbic stage. A vision of hope.
Are we making the most of our brains? Forget the old rumor saying we only use 10% of it – this was in the 80’s when we didn’t know what the 90 other per cent was doing. They work at 100% . However, the whole brain does not hold the reins all the time. Where the neo-limbic territory governs automatic responses and actions based on a data bank of known situations (or supposedly known) related to given behaviors, the PFC benefits from a virtually infinite database of very diverse tokens and recollections in which it can search, evaluate and compare. The thing is, most of the time the neo-limbic governs, while the PFC is backstage – even sometimes when it should conduct. It is just like if the PFC has yet to accomplish its full development.
Parallels with todays corporation? The neo-limbic looks like the corporate culture and the processes, whether they are explicit or implicit. The PFC looks like the collaborative and collective potential – when there’s a whole world of talents and knowledge to mine and the power of connections to leverage. The former runs our organizations, the latter may have hints for innovating and solving pervasive issues – though not fully sure how to use it, not sure where it will lead.
| Decision-making constituents, action impetus |
Brain |
Enterprise |
| Who usually drives? | Limbic territories: Relationship in the group, character/ temperament/ values, automatisms | Corporate culture, processes, hierarchy, policies, norms & rules, etc. |
| Who can help adapt, progress, change? | PFC: complex and new situations are its field, with fully meshed neurons networks and a versatile memory, able to process on-demand – no automatisms there, it is mainly adaptation, creativity and innovation (that are lost in case of lobotomy) | ? Could it be the power of connected people, collaboration and collective intelligence? |
Adapt or die – where the power of networking could fuel agility
One easily sees benefits of being able to put the PFC to work: adapt to any situation without chains or barriers, benefit from our total intelligence in any circumstance. Human beings who can do this are very few – as mentioned above, our brains have not yet reached this development level. One can train and improve though, this is some of what we learn to facilitate in neuro-psychology.
One paradox of using the PFC is that one has to let go the effectiveness and efficiency duty in order to become more effective and efficient. A clue is that serene people are in much better shape to address edgy situations. Easy to write, hard to grasp, harder to do!
Back to our comparison, a conjecture would be that the enterprise has to get ready to welcome what may come from collaboration initiatives, and get the most of it. That is, without planning ahead what the result should be, or how it should work. Just wait and see. And, it has to feed it with real and serious problems.
In both cases, brain and corporation, it does not mean the other layer (the neo-limbic / the corporate culture and processes) is off work; it just implies that both layers need to work together and rely on each other.
How can the enterprise get there? Probably one very important ingredient is a culture of change. Because whatever situation you address, there will always be a new and more complex one coming. The power of connected people needs to be tapped, but not tamed: new forms of collaboration, new forms of collective intelligence have to be fed with new issues.
The corporation does not age, but it can eventually die. It may become rigid, make errors in terms of adaptation, and then collapse – most corporations expire before they reach 40 years old[ii]. And in these times where everything accelerates, it is more than urgent to cultivate adaptability, even if it means welcoming uncertainty as a resource.
[i] Among other, by the Institut de NeuroCognitivisme in its neurocognitive and behavioral approach
[ii] a Royal Dutch/Shell survey of 1983, the Fifth Discipline, Peter M. Senge
Are modern organizations more zen and more change-ready?
Two organizations with the same activity in a common transforming market: the former has been acquired several times, had its strategy adapted to enhance competitiveness and align with the headquarters, offers high wages and employee retention programs ; the latter offers reasonable wages, has a stable strategy (even a strategy of stability). One could think the first one will better motivate its employees, nevertheless instinctively we understand it is not that simple: the actual issue is about the work atmosphere, which is not only influenced by the wider business environment or financial results. Several factors are in play, and in this instance, the second organization is more zen, less stressful for its employees and executives, and has better medium and long-term durability prospects.
Occupational health versus neurosciences: making the enterprise Biocompatible
In France, the concept of psychosocial risk factors is spreading : it is on the agenda of Human Resources as well as of Corporate Social Responsibility, and has full attention from enterprises and government organizations, as we saw in this recent round table of HEC au Féminin (French).Other countries have a similar focus: see for example updates from the World Health Organization.
Last year, the Institute of Environmental Medicine (IEM) ran a national survey in France whose conclusions are even more interesting as they are analyzing the foundations of welfare and ill-being, not only the symptoms, risks and individual factors. To summarize:
- Job roles must adapt to people who hold them and vice versa, to allow deep and durable motivation – I’d say, to formulate it differently, that talent analysis should be extended to include personality analysis
- Information needs to move freely, transparently and appropriately: upstream to allow work to be done, and downstream to improve both individual and organizational synergy. We can see commonalities with Lean management, however here all type of jobs are included as well as an active and continuous constructive feedback about the job, through transparency. Beyond reporting, it touches the very functioning of teams and the corporate culture.
- Responsibilities and power need to be balanced, for each job and at each organizational level, to avert frustrations and drifts which can surface as power struggles, always hard to live with and usually counterproductive, or a discrepancy between one’s daily tasks and the “heart of function”.
The IEM puts all this unders the concept of biocompatibility at work, and it is obvious that more than the individual and his job, the entire organization as a system has to operate in a healthy way.
Beyond the enterprise’s health: change readiness
The survey report and the tool behind it engaged me more from a corporate adaptability view point than in relation to the psychosocial risks factors. Indeed, when one works on organizational change, a prerequisite is to delineate if the organization can welcome a transformation. And when analyzing the corporate culture, neurosciences and tools such as the IEM one are of value: a healthy enterprise will be more open and will better adapt than a stressed one, whatever is the change to implement. Not only must what makes the strength of the organization be respected, but one needs to detect and compensate its weaknesses to avoid putting it at risk with a growing distress, if not an identity injury or loss.
Are collaborative organizations less stressing, more agile ?
In addition, the « healthy information circulation » dimension leads one to think of the collaborative organization: have enterprises who undertook this change eliminated some of the stress factors, are they as a consequence more agile?
A while ago I reflected on parallels between the different layers of the human brain and the evolution stages of the enterprise (Is Enterprise 2.0 the neuro-organization?): it led to a picture of some potential similarities between the prefrontal cortex, the last in the brain’s evolution, and collaborative organizations due to their ability to connect people and groups, circulate information independently from the organization chart, and allow collective intelligence. The prefrontal cortex is also the area of the brain called upon to address complex or new situations, those which may otherwise generate stress. One can infer that collaborative organizations might well be less stressful and more agile than traditional organizations.
Now when looking at the other two dimensions depicted in the IEM report, responsibility-power balance and jobs suited to people’s deep motivations, there is no a priori evidence that modern organizations might be better there than traditional organizations. Nevertheless, we know that a well deployed collaboration increases people’s autonomy and initiative ability; it seems that collaboration then allows balancing each person’s responsibilities and powers, eventually. There remains the adequacy of jobs to people (to their personalities, beyond their talents): if the enterprise allow its employees to move jobs and maintains a list of openings (which should be the case when the organization communicates correctly), we’re on the right path.
Collaborative organizations and neurosciences which connections, which contributions?
To conclude, one can speculate that a corporate transformation for more cooperation, collaboration and collective intelligence will be easier if the enterprise is in good health ; and that this transformation will make it more agile and stress impervious. If the transformation is well led, and well digested, from the bottom to the top and for all organizational constituents.
Collaborative organizations and neurosciences which connections, which contributions? : this will be the theme of a Boostzone Institute workshop (in French) facilitated by Jean-Louis Prata, IEM’s R&D Director and one of my friends and mentors, on the 4th of March. If you are interested in the reflection and debate, don’t hesitate to join us: more information here .
As this post by @ceciledemailly was originally published on the Booostzone Institute’s blog in French, some linked resources remain in French; google translate or altavista babelfish may help the reader to understand more of these resources.
Note: ce post a été publié à l’origine sur le blog de l’Institut Boostzone ici.
Deux entreprises ayant une même activité sur un même marché en pleine transformation : l’une a fait l’objet d’acquisitions en série, d’adaptation de sa stratégie pour améliorer la compétitivité et la rendre cohérente avec celle de la maison mère, offre des salaires élevés, a un programme de fidélisation des employés ; l’autre offre des emplois moins valorisés, a des salaires très raisonnables, a une stratégie stable (on pourrait même dire une stratégie de stabilité). On pourrait croire que la première sera celle qui motivera le plus ses employés- mais instinctivement on sent que ce n’est pas si simple : la question qui se pose immédiatement est celle de l’ambiance dans l’entreprise, et celle-ci n’est pas uniquement tributaire de la conjoncture extérieure ou des résultats financiers. De nombreux facteurs sont en jeu, et en l’occurrence dans cet exemple et avec des résultats financiers comparables, la seconde entreprise est plus zen, moins stressante pour ses employés et ses dirigeants, et a des perspectives de pérennité à moyen terme plus positives.
Risques psychosociaux vs. neurosciences : rendre l’entreprise biocompatible
En France, le concept de risques psychosociaux prend de l’ampleur : il est à l’ordre du jour tant du point de vue des ressources humaines que de la responsabilité sociétale, et fait l’objet de nombreuses attentions de la part des entreprises et des pouvoirs publics, comme l’atteste cette récente table ronde d’HEC au Féminin.
L’année dernière, l’IME[1] a réalisé une enquête nationale d’autant plus intéressante qu’elle utilise les neurosciences et la systémique pour proposer un baromètre très pragmatique : il analyse les fondements du bien ou mal-être, et pas seulement les symptômes, les risques, ou les facteurs individuels. En synthèse :
- Les postes doivent être adaptés aux personnes qui les occupent et vice versa, de manière à permettre une motivation profonde et durable – je dirais, pour reformuler, que l’analyse des talents devrait être prolongée d’une analyse des personnalités
- L’information doit circuler de manière fluide, transparente et appropriée : en amont pour pouvoir faire le travail, et en aval pour améliorer la synergie individuelle et organisationnelle. On retrouve des points communs avec le Lean management, mais ici il s’agit de tous type de postes, et d’une recherche active et permanente de feedback constructif sur le job en lui-même, par le biais de la transparence. Bien au-delà du reporting, cela touche au fonctionnement des équipes et à la culture d’entreprise.
- Les responsabilités et les pouvoirs doivent être équilibrés, pour chaque poste et à chaque niveau organisationnel – pour éviter les frustrations et les dérives, que ce soit les rapports de force, toujours mal vécus et contre-productifs, ou le décalage des tâches journalières par rapport au « cœur de fonction » de chacun.
L’IME rassemble tout ceci sous le concept de « Biocompatibilité », et l’on voit bien qu’au-delà de l’individu et de son poste, il s’agit que l’organisation entière, en tant que système, fonctionne correctement.
Au-delà de la santé de l’entreprise : l’aptitude au changement
L’enquête et l’outil qui est derrière m’ont plus intéressés sur le plan de l’adaptabilité des entreprises que par rapport aux risques psychosociaux. En effet, lorsque l’on travaille sur un changement organisationnel, un préalable est de déterminer si l’organisation est apte à accueillir la transformation. Et lorsqu’on analyse la culture d’entreprise, les neurosciences et un outil tel celui de l’IME appliqué à l’organisation sujette au changement sont précieux : une entreprise en bonne santé sera plus ouverte, s’adaptera mieux et plus vite qu’une entreprise stressée, quel que soit le changement envisagé. Non seulement il faut respecter ce qui fait la force de l’entreprise, mais il faut détecter et suppléer à ses faiblesses pour ne pas l’exposer à un malaise grandissant, voire à une perte d’identité.
Les entreprises collaboratives : moins stressantes, plus agiles ?
Par ailleurs, la dimension « circulation saine de l’information » mène tout droit à penser à l’organisation collaborative : les entreprises qui ont opéré ce changement ont-elles éliminé certains facteurs de stress et sont elles en conséquence plus agiles ?
Il y a quelques temps j’avais réfléchi sur le parallèle entre les différents niveaux d’évolution du cerveau humain et les différents niveaux d’évolution de l’entreprise (Entreprise 2.0 et cerveau, quels parallèles, aussi en anglais sur le site de Boostzone) : il ressortait de cette réflexion que l’entreprise collaborative présente des similitudes avec le cerveau préfrontal, tout récent dans l’évolution, du fait de sa capacité à connecter les personnes et les groupes et à faire circuler l’information indépendamment de l’organigramme, et à rendre possible l’intelligence collective. Or le préfrontal est aussi la partie du cerveau mise à contribution dans des situations complexes et nouvelles, génératrices de stress. On pourrait donc en déduire qu’une organisation collaborative et capable d’intelligence collective devrait être moins stressante et plus agile qu’une organisation traditionnelle.
Si l’on examine deux autres des dimensions proposées par l’étude de l’IME, l’équilibre responsabilités-pouvoirs et l’adaptation des postes aux motivations profondes de chacun, pas d’évidence a priori que les organisations modernes soient meilleures que les organisations traditionnelles. Néanmoins on sait que la collaboration bien déployée amène, de fait, une plus grande autonomie des individus, et une meilleure capacité d’initiative ; il semble donc que la collaboration permette aux responsabilités et aux pouvoirs de chacun d’être plus en phase. Reste l’adéquation des postes aux personnes (aux personnalités, au-delà des talents) : si l’entreprise permet à ses employés de changer de poste, et maintient à jour la liste des postes disponibles (et l’on peut s’y attendre dans une entreprise qui communique bien), une partie du chemin est faite.
Entreprise collaborative et neurosciences : rapports et apports ?
En conclusion, on peut supposer qu’une transformation de l’entreprise pour plus de coopération, de collaboration et d’intelligence collective se fera plus facilement si l’entreprise est en bonne santé ; et que cette transformation la rendra plus agile encore et plus imperméable au stress. Si la transformation est bien menée. Et bien digérée. De la base à la tête et dans toutes les composantes de l’entreprise.
Entreprise collaborative et Neurosciences : rapports et apports ? : c’est sur ce thème que Jean-Louis Prata, Directeur R&D de l’IME et l’un de mes amis et mentors, interviendra lors d’un workshop de l’Institut Boostzone, le 4 Mars. Si cela vous intéresse de poursuivre la réflexion et participer au débat, n’hésitez pas à vous joindre à nous : plus d’informations ici.
N.B. : cet article sera traduit en anglais dès que possible, un lien sera posté ici.
[1] Institut de Médecine Environnementale – www.ime.fr
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Presence, the next life changer
This article was originally published on the Boostzone Intitute’s blog in October 2009.
When the Internet started in the 80’s, globalization was unheard of and those working in international organizations were not “connected” across frontiers and seas. Open questions – fewer at that time – were solved by asking nearby in the same office, floor, building or restaurant. Twenty years later, technology has made everything faster and everyone closer; to keep a business among the leaders, collaboration is a must, real time, across distance and frontiers.
Instant messaging (IM) arrived in the early 90’s as an engineer’s gadget, and was rapidly adopted as a business tool. Simple, practical, ergonomic, cheap, it allows us to see who is ‘on’ and pass short messages that don’t need the formality of an email nor the interruption of a phone call. You may use AIM, Google Talk, ICQ, Jabber, MSN Messenger, Office Live Messenger, Reuters Messaging, Sametime, Skype, Yahoo Messenger or many others including in-house versions, or a mix of those through aggregators such as Pidgin or Trillian. You will need to install the client and to ask your contacts to connect (except in some companies, where the directory is pre-declared in the IM server). It is easy to use, and carries very few constraints: no need to click/open/read/answer/proofread/send/archive, no need to search for a phone number in a directory, no need to stop everything else and concentrate, you have your contacts at your fingertips.
Here are some common pros and cons (randomly organized):
| Pros | Cons |
| Very practical, easy to use A great tool in geographically dispersed teams For informal quick Q&A, frees you from email and/or phone Allows multitasking Allows you to check info on a call/in a meeting (virtual-whispering) Boosts efficiency, cuts costs A great collaboration tool, and allows you to network in an easier way than phone or mail, or even voicemail |
Perceived by some as a waste of time, or a time consuming distraction Management concerns on the need to monitor and archive conversations (with the corollary of privacy concerns) Legal concerns in regulated markets (trading etc.) Fancy pop-up opening during exec presentation is generally ill thought of Not for long complex messages You rarely end-up with o single tool – more often with 2 or 3 |
Presence everywhere
In 2005/2006, as IM reached maturity, security questions came to the foreground; they are now mostly under control thanks to awareness training (security risks mostly come with connecting to strangers), acceptable use policies (AUPs), and in-house IM servers with security features (encryption, authentication, DLP[i], etc…) where necessary.
More recently, most social networks (including in the in-company versions we categorize under the label Enterprise 2.0) have added an IM feature. You can also try Mobile IM (MIM) by installing the client on your Smartphone – a step beyond SMS and MMS which it is expected to replace in 2011[ii] – it is still a bit impractical and monopolistic, but expected to improve quickly.
In fact, the advent of social networking seems to have slowed the growth of IM as a standalone service for individual users. Not yet the case in corporations, though a trend to expect as Enterprise 2.0 platforms spread.
Changing group dynamics
Just like many other technology tools, IM makes collaboration practical and transversal to the organization (and as such, is somehow unsuitable for command & control organizations). It also carries more spontaneity than most other tech-tools, hence is seen as less mechanical, more ‘human’, strengthening ties. It usually denotes autonomous employees: an example I like is self-organizing support teams, who use IM to check who is on shift and hand over problems quickly to the right expert[iii]. It also allows questioning of a variety of sources at the same time, and is seen as a true power in troubleshooting problems.
Because it is easy, and because it can be kept short and simple, some users forget about meeting face to face IRL (in real life), even when sitting just a door away. And, just like for email, each has her/his own pace, and addicts run the risk of harassing more tentative users. Yet, advantages seem still more important than burdens – one of the testimonies I received was even more enthusiastic: “I can work without mail, I can’t live without IM”.
Tops collaboration tools
Forrester recently ran a survey for information workers in the US[iv]: surprisingly, only 26% of ‘information workers’ use Instant Messaging – one would have expected more, as this kind of service is now mature.
Instant Messaging tops collaboration tools
The other interesting finding is that Instant Messaging comes first of all collaborative tools, followed by web conferencing (used by 24%), Team document-sharing site (19%), Social network sites (12%) and Videoconferencing (8%). It is definitely a main tool to facilitate the rise of corporate collaboration.
If your corporation is not yet there, should it go now? Probably yes, unless you are all in the same place, all time, with a super coffee machine, and don’t need any informal external stakeholder contact.
Since the application seems pretty mature, what’s next?
How will business IM morph?
- Presence everywhere, with Mobile IM. Mentioned above, this is seen as the replacement for SMS/MMS in the next few years, more or less connected with online platforms.
- Adding features. As a standalone tool, Skype seems today to be ahead with chatroom on demand, voice, video, video-conferencing, and any kind of mix you want. Plus clients for Smarphones. Neither yet screen or application sharing nor enterprise management support, but one can hope for it.
- Replacing phone. Skype has a phone-like set, and VoIP service and hardware providers (i.e. the whole telephone market) are all paying attention to this area … though not yet clear if it will lead to something
- Integrating in collaborative platforms. Already started, most social networking platforms, and especially in-company ones, now propose the same type of services, interconnected with many other collaborative tools.
- Geolocalization. Earlier this year I had the opportunity to see a demo of AkaAki[v], a mobile social networking service from Berlin. It adds geo-localization and diverse profile and history features, allowing people to meet when they roam nearby each other, whether they know themselves (it alerts you) or not (it compares profiles, common friends etc. to propose people you should meet, or you can search for someone you see around – and if she/he is registered, her/his profile will give you chat subjects…). It uses GPS, Bluetooth and antenna recognition to map Smartphones and proposes to their owners a view of the neighborhoods. Beyond the privacy debate it generated, and assuming necessary ethic and safeguards will be developed, the idea of geolocalization is quite appealing: imagine entering in a crowded meeting room and immediately having the exact list of participants, imagine in a conference checking who you can or should meet around you, imagine while travelling your Smartphone lets you know that several of your workmates or partners are around…
- Bridging/federation. No lead there, but a need : those users working with several tools still need an efficient , agnostic and user-friendly aggregator …
- Interactivity. Out of the Cloud comes … GoogleWave, beta launched a few weeks ago, aiming further at real time live collaboration, mixing presence, social networking, email, … and many other things. Google is playing an ambitious endeavor – betting users will understand the purpose of this crossbreed tool, and will like the practical use. In any case, we can be sure that this innovation will influence corporate collaboration behaviors and tools – continuing on web 2.0 startups fate since almost a decade now.
How would you like these tools to work, in the future?
[i] DLP : Data Loss Prevention software
[ii] Mobile messaging futures 2007-2012 – www.portioresearch.com
[iii] Question thread asked in LinkedIn (see http://www.linkedin.com/answers?viewQuestion=&questionID=566821&askerID=1198599)
[iv] See Forrester report http://www.forrester.com/Research/Document/0,7211,55268,00.html
[v] AkaAki was demonstrated at the 2009 NetExplorateur http://www.netexplorateur.org/
Entreprise 2.0 et Cerveau, quels parallèles ?
Les métaphores enrichissent la compréhension et font naître des idées qui ne sont pas seulement abstraites ou théoriques, mais peuvent aussi être incroyablement pratiques. Dans son livre « Images of Organization »[i], Gareth Morgan propose celle du cerveau, parmi beaucoup d’autres. De mon point de vue l’analogie entreprise-cerveau n’était pas frappante, jusqu’à récemment, lorsque l’un de mes formateurs en neuropsychologie s’est mis à dessiner des neurones interconnectés au tableau. Selon l’aire cérébrale à laquelle on se réfère, on trouve soit des ‘autoroutes’ de neurones, c.à.d. des connexions structurées et persistantes, soit un réseau totalement maillé où les connexions peuvent être établies à la demande, dans une infinité d’arrangements.
Le schéma du cortex préfrontal est frappant : une similitude saute aux yeux, celle du diagramme que l’on pourrait faire d’une forme plus avancée d’organisation, qu’on l’appelle Entreprise 2.0 ou organisation en réseau.
Nos entreprises sont-elles aussi évoluées que nos cerveaux ?
D’après la théorie du cerveau triunique revisitée[ii], le tout premier ‘étage’ à se développer a été le cerveau reptilien : dédié à la survie, c’est lui qui gère l’action primaire dans le calme, et la fuite, le combat ou l’inhibition en cas de danger de mort. Le deuxième étage fut le cerveau paléo-limbique, lorsque les mammifères se sont réunis en troupeau : il gère les relations dans le groupe. Le troisième fut le néo-limbique, siège de notre caractère et de notre tempérament, ou se forment nos valeurs pour faire plus tard référence – ce territoire est présent chez un nombre limité de mammifères. Vient enfin le préfrontal, dernier stade de l’évolution qui n’existe que chez les humains et les grands singes : il nous aide à faire face aux situations nouvelles et/ou complexes. Il gère aussi la créativité pure, lorsque nous devons penser différemment, en dehors des sentiers battus – on pense à l’apprentissage en double boucle de Chris Argyris. C’est pour cela qu’il connecte les neurones à la demande et de manière différente en fonction de chaque situation ; c’est aussi pour cela qu’il garde ‘actives’ ou potentielles beaucoup plus de connexions que les autres territoires.
Il y a une demi blague qui circule parmi ceux qui pratiquent la neuropsychologie : la politique serait au stade paléo-limbique, l’éducation au stade néo-limbique, et l’entreprise serait en phase d’apprentissage préfrontale. Une vision d’espoir pour cette dernière.
Tirons-nous le meilleur de notre cerveau ? Oublions la légende qui dit que nous n’en utilisons que 10% – elle date du temps ou on ne savait pas à quoi servait les 90 autres pourcent : on a trouvé depuis, les 100% sont utiles. Ceci dit, tous les territoires ne sont pas aux commandes. Là où le néo-limbique gouverne les automatismes et s’appuie sur une banque de situations de référence (qu’il suppose connaître ou reconnaître) auxquelles sont associées des comportements prédéterminés, le préfrontal bénéficie d’une mémoire plus ‘totale’ et parcellaire qu’il utilise comme une base de recherche, d’évaluation et de comparaison pour déterminer le comportement ad hoc. Malgré tout, la plupart du temps c’est le néo-limbique qui est au front tandis que le préfrontal reste en arrière, parfois même lorsqu’il devrait prendre l’initiative. Comme si ce dernier n’avait pas complètement fini son développement ni trouvé sa place.
Quel parallèle avec l’entreprise moderne ? Le néo-limbique ressemble à la culture d’entreprise et à ses processus, qu’ils soient implicites ou explicites. Le préfrontal ressemble au potentiel collaboratif et collectif – une mine de talents et de connaissances à exploiter et à maximiser par les possibilités des connexions entre personnes. Le premier système pilote nos organisations, le second peut nous mettre sur la piste de l’innovation et de la résolution de problèmes persistants – mais nous ne sommes pas encore certains de la façon de l’utiliser, ni d’où cela va nous conduire.
| Décision et action | Cerveau | Entreprise |
| Qui conduit, habituellement ? | Territoires limbiques: Relations dans le groupe, caractère, tempérament, valeurs, automatismes. | Culture d’entreprise ou organisationnelle, processus, hiérarchie, chartes, normes et règles, etc.. |
| Qui peut aider à l’adaptation, au progrès, au changement ? | Préfrontal: dédié aux situations nouvelles et/ou complexes, avec un réseau de neurones totalement maillé à sa disposition ainsi qu’une mémoire polyvalente, qui travaille de manière personnalisée – pas d’automatismes ici (en cas de lobotomie de ce territoire, l’être humain perd créativité, innovation et adaptabilité) | ?Est-ce que cela pourrait être la puissance des personnes en réseau, la collaboration et l’intelligence collective ? |
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S’adapter – grâce au pouvoir des connexions? – ou mourir
On voit très facilement les avantages qu’il y a à mettre le préfrontal au travail : s’adapter à toute situation, sans idées préconçues, pouvoir utiliser la totalité de notre intelligence en toute circonstance. Ceux qui peuvent le faire à volonté se comptent sur les doigts de quelques mains – cf. ma remarque précédente, nos cerveaux n’ont pas encore atteint ce niveau de développement. Cependant on peut s’entrainer et améliorer son propre accès au préfrontal, c’est l’un des domaines d’application de la neuropsychologie.
L’un des paradoxes de l’utilisation du préfrontal est que l’on doit ‘lâcher prise’ en matière d’obligation d’efficacité et d’efficience pour pouvoir justement devenir plus efficace et efficient. On le voit lorsque l’on se rend compte que les personnes sereines et qui prennent le temps de cogiter sont aussi celles qui sont plus à même de s’atteler aux situations tendues. Facile à écrire, moins à digérer et à mettre en action !
Si l’on revient à notre comparaison, on peu conjecturer que l’entreprise doit se préparer à accueillir différentes formes d’initiatives collaboratives et en tirer le meilleur parti. Et ce, sans planifier ce que le résultat devrait être, ni comment on devrait y arriver. Enfin et surtout, c’est sur de vrais problèmes, sur les priorités que doit être utilisé ce potentiel.
Dans les deux cas, cerveau ou entreprise, cela ne veut pas dire que l’autre système (le néo-limbique / la culture d’entreprise et ses processus) ne sert plus à rien; cela veut seulement dire que les deux systèmes doivent apprendre à travailler ensemble et à se faire confiance.
Comment avancer dans cette direction, pour l’entreprise ? L’un des ingrédients clé est probablement une culture du changement. Parce que quelque soit la difficulté à laquelle on s’attelle aujourd’hui, une nouvelle difficulté plus complexe se profile à l’horizon. La puissance de l’Entreprise 2.0 doit être exploitée mais non maîtrisée : de nouvelles formes de collaboration, de nouvelles formes d’intelligence collective doivent pouvoir voir le jour et être alimentées avec de nouveaux défis.
L’entreprise ne vieilli pas, mais elle peut mourir. Elle peut devenir rigide, faire des erreurs et ne plus s’adapter, s’effondrer – la plupart des entreprises disparaissent avant d’avoir atteint la quarantaine[iii]. Et de nos jours, alors que tout s’accélère, c’est drôlement urgent de cultiver l’adaptabilité même si cela veut dire que l’incertitude devient une ressource.
Ce post a été publié pour la première fois sur le blog de l’Institut Boostzone, en anglais.
[i] Voir : http://www.uk.sagepub.com/booksProdDesc.nav?contribId=515429&prodId=Book229704
[ii] Voir les travaux et publications de Jacques Fradin et l’Institut de Neurocognitivisme, par exemple.
[iii] Selon une étude de Royal Dutch/Shell de 1983, rapportée par Peter Senge dans son livre the Fifth Discipline
Cecile Demailly's blog: ponderings on disruptive change 
