This was fun. It took me a while to figure it out, though. The presentation hinges on two pairs of pairs: the first set is new media = social media and new generation = net generation, and the second set is the 2×2 matrix. I only came across that while ironing handkerchiefs and playing with my speech topic out loud. Once that pattern floated up, everything else fell into place.

Part of the fun of making presentations is figuring out a natural pattern for the topic… =)

Technorati Tags: enterprise2.0, presentation, sketches, slideshare, speech, talk, web2.0

I'm interested in this because as a technology evangelist, I've talked to a lot of people about social tools like blogging and wikis. Over the next few blog entries, I want to share some of the objections that I've come across. I also want to share some of the methods I've tried and observed.

But first, let's talk about what technology evangelism is. You might be wondering why I use the term "evangelism", considering its religious roots and sometimes negative connotations.

For me, evangelism has that hint of being more than just a dry list of facts. You want to inspire people to action, and you want to do this in a way that sticks even when you're not around.

The technology you want to promote is not going to be a perfect fit for everyone or every time. Technology evangelism is not about convincing people that your way is the right way. It's about showing people what their options are, helping them find something that fits them, and helping them learn how to make it part of their work or their lives. (I forget this sometimes, too.)

So if a technology isn't going to be a perfect fit for everyone immediately, how can you encourage grassroots adoption?

One way is to scatter the seeds as widely as possible. If you reach out, you might find a lot of people who can benefit from the technology you want to promote. Help them, and their success stories and influence will help you reach out to even more people.

You might not have that option. You might have been asked to help a team get up to speed on a tool. You might want to explore a collaborative tool, but before you can take advantage of that tool, you'll need to get other people on board too. (After all, you can't collaborate on your own.)

This is where it can get frustrating.

Next post on Monday (or earlier =) ): Sowing seeds: Five common objections

Todas as faces da colaboração?

O poder do indivíduo já era. Experiências com colaboração e ferramentas sociais em grandes companhias, como a IBM, dão conta de mostrar o valor do trabalho desenvolvido em rede e global

Que tal conseguir o emprego dos sonhos compartilhando suas idéias em um blog? Foi assim que Sacha Chua, atual evangelizadora de Empresa 2.0 da IBM, conquistou o posto que ocupa hoje dentro da companhia, em Toronto, Canadá. Aos 23 anos, tão logo a jovem estudante passou a circular pela empresa por conta do projeto de conclusão de sua tese de mestrado em computacão social, em 2006, não hesitou em disparar posts sobre a própria pesquisa pela ferramenta interna de blogs que a IBM disponibilizava aos funcionários.

"Percebi que se não fizesse isso, no final de mestrado poucas pessoas leriam minha tese. Escrever sobre a pesquisa enquanto ela era feita permitiu que eu compartilhasse meu conhecimento com outras pessoas e aprendesse com as sugestôes e conselhos que me davam", conta.

Foi como se a partir daquele momento tivesse calçado os sapatinhos de cristal de uma Cinderela moderna que ascendia para o universo corporativo. Do dia para a noite, o blog da então ilustre desconhecida caiu no gosto dos funcionários e se tournou o mais popular da empresa não só no Canadá–com média de 300 a 600 acessos diários–tudo sem sair da esfera interna da IBM. "Queria fazer mais do que escrever software, queria ajudar as pessoas a se conectarem por blogs, wikis e outras ferramentas web 2.0 e a IBM era a empresa perfeita para aplicar tudo que aprendi a respeito no mundo real. Quando chegou a hora de pedir o emprego, o processo foi fácil porque os futuros colegas de equipe já me conheciam e sabiam o suficiente para convencer a gerência a criar um cargo só para mim", lembra.

A história de Sacha poderia ser uma exceção, mas não é. Essa é apenas uma das faces das oportunidades que as ferramentas sociais e de colaboração apresentam dentro de companhias. Por isso, a IBM vem apostando na criação de ambientes férteis para a inovação.

Except for my age, most of it's right. Nifty! There's more, but it would take me a while to type it all in from the scan. I wonder if I can get a copy of the magazine for my mom… =)

Pereira, Paula. June 2008. "Todas as faces da colaboração?", B2B Magazine

Here's what I love about Pass It Along, and I think you'll love it too:

• You can find out who's learning a topic and see what else they're interested in. Sharing what I know becomes a lot more fun when I can see who's learning, because it gives me feedback that what I'm sharing is useful. Lists of people are much better than anonymous hit counts because I can view their profiles to see what else they're interested in.
• You can learn from other people's contributions. People can add links, related presentations, discussion topics, and other updates. For example, the "How to Make the Most of Your Commute" topic I started within IBM drew lots of interesting suggestions.
• You can create a place for discussions. I give a lot of presentations, and Pass It Along topics are a terrific place to hold follow-up discussions and reach out to more people. I post my presentation material using the Presentation Wizard and include the URL of the Pass It Along topic on my slides. It's a great way for learners to connect with each other, too.

I also really like how a newbie like me can create value for other people by sharing what I'm learning. =) Whee! I'm copying some of my public content over, and you can find my topics on Pass It Along.

IBM Pass It Along on Alphaworks is a public site open to everyone. Access controls will follow soon, so you can limit topic access to just your organization if needed. IBM Pass It Along is even better inside your organization, where you can link it up with your employee directory or do all sorts of other cool stuff.

Check it out - it might be a great fit for your organization!

IBM Pass It Along

Technorati Tags: enterprise2.0, ibm, km, learning, passitalong, social, web2.0

• Meet Charlie: What is Enterprise 2.0?
• A new way to define a productive worker: Enterprise 2.0
• Meet Charlotte

Someday I'm going to make slides like that.

Thanks to The Shed 2.0 for pointing me to this group of Slideshare presentations.

On Technorati: enterprise2.0

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The most common objection I hear after my presentations on Enterprise 2.0 is, "I don't have the time to blog." The underlying questions are, "What's in it for me? What can I expect to get out of blogging? What's the return on investment on my time?" It's hard to give a dollar amount ("You will earn XXX more") or a firm idea of time savings ("You'll save YYY minutes every week"). I'm still trying to figure out how to explain the intangible benefits of better connection and collaboration to people who already think they're maxed out. Maybe learning more about how to establish the business case for informal learning and related concepts will allow me to be more effective at evangelizing Enterprise 2.0.

• Luis Suarez: elsua: Making the Business Case for Social Computing
• Jay Cross: Internet Time Blog: Making the Business Case for Informal Learning

On Technorati: enterprise2.0

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Bryce Johnson pointed out a difference between barcamp.org wiki and usabilitycamp.org wiki - barcamp wiki was where organization happened, whereas usabilitycamp wiki happened after the organization. Tom shared something from Office 2.0: "A blank wiki is a room without chairs." (Esther Dyson)

Comments: Seeding a wiki can affect how it goes. Any best practices? Tom suggested deliberately making small mistakes, which encourages people to look for how to edit it. Another person points out that this also lowers the psychological barrier to entry - things don't have to be perfect. There are social issues, though, such as implied permissions. Bob Logan pointed out that you can't design emergence. Alex Petrov noted that you can't predict innovation if you're going bottoms-up. Tom acknowledged the loss of control, but talked about unorganizations that emerge as well.

Another person explicitly distinguished between innovation and collaboration. Innovation is never really been successful without some sort of direction, he continues. A wiki is like a blank piece of paper, which is difficult to work with. Tom replied that collaboration is a good stepping stone toward innovation or the dispersion of innovation. The first person continued that R&D expenditure has no correlation to the performance of the company. Innovation is a very different function than collaboration. Another person talked about skunkworks and the possible value of having a skunkworks wiki, which could be a very powerful tool. Greg Van Alstyne supported Tom's point that innovation requires diffusion and adoption, and differentiated innovation from invention. You have to see it happening in a network. The person beside him talked about emergence and levels of complexity.

Another person talked about the nature of a corporation as a tree structure, push instead of pull. You have to fuse them together. Tom wondered if wikis need critical mass, and if the software isn't as good as they thought.

Deb brought the conversation back to the empty wiki. Anything successful has at the core of it a real problem, so that people have a motivation to do whatever. Carsten pointed out that it needs to be appropriate. Bryce brought up the idea of voice. Tom agreed that different kinds of media fit different tasks. Brent Ashley pointed out that there's a certain constituency of the population who are going to be involved. So we need to draw out the people in the organization who would be good adopters of these tools, so that the tools will be built by people who care about it. Tom agreed absolutely. Firestoker saying: "Learn to stop worrying and love your 1%." Rohan said that the key is to make sure that something there is important. People don't want to be left behind. As long as what's on the wiki is a hobby thing, then they're not going to go there. Jevon of Firestoker: A moment of crisis. Work gets done and operational efficiencies come into play. In that moment of crisis, it's a chance for leadership to let go and give up some of their silos. It's after that point that we see innovation and collaboration really come into play, because that's when people trust the space. Carsten: I think what makes collaboration unattractive is the lack of integration. The browser is the great equalizer. [But it's not integrated into the applications that I live in, like Outlook]. Maybe the wiki is not all that appropriate or practical.

Jevon: Story about Big 5 banks. They had computers in managers' offices, but no one was reading e-mail because computers were handled by their secretaries. Then the CEO sent the final paper memo, and then everyone used e-mail.

Person: If you build technology that does not conform to the way people behave, no one will use it. Noted problem with signup wiki. UX experience is the story. The experience of using a device should complement what you want to use it for.

On Technorati: enterprise2.0camp, enterprise2.0, barcamptoronto, barcamp

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• Optional
• Free of up-front workflow
• Egalitarian, or indifferent to formal organizational identities
• Accepting of many types of data

  Check out the rest of the post for more insights into Enterprise 2.0.

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On Technorati: enterprise2.0toronto, enterprise2.0

Random Japanese sentence: その少年たちはかわいい猫と一緒に２人きりで暮らしていた。 The two boys lived alone with a lovely cat.