I spent the first two days of the week at NewComm Forum 2009, and listened to a group of very talented thought leaders, strategists, researchers and practitioners. Since we now live firmly post-paradigm - in a new paradigm where content creation, sharing and its use happens newly first outside the enterprise - we also live with this basic root question: “what does this mean for the enterprise?” Or: “how can the enterprise learn from and use this?”
This – in this case – is the burgeoning world of new social media tools. So … do enterprises choose to ignore … or … or do they choose to adopt?
There were too many interesting insights and lines of thought (and view) to even partially list. But, the remark that played with me throughout, and is still with me, is one made by Pam Strayer. Pam, President of Strayer & Co., was a panelist at one of the first panels of the three-day event – “Integrating and Measuring Web 2.0 across the Enterprise”. And, in the dying minutes of the panel she said “people have to get IT (departments) off that SharePoint train!”
Why? Let me tell you (or contact Pam). SharePoint will likely keep you in the past – stuck in time, in a time warp that is forever 2004 (or thereabouts). Before Facebook, LinkedIn, Plaxo and that group. Before YouTube. Before Twitter … And, just as important, before lots of web tools began to make it SO EASY to integrate a mesh of new media tools to create the basis for building front ends that display the sliver of the ontological world that the user wants (demands) to be in.
2004 was a so-so year for knowledge management. Most of the problems faced by enterprises still not very solved. And along comes this whole slew of innovation called new social media, which solves at a fingersnap the whole pervasive issue of how to make tacit knowledge actual and concrete and shareable and “permanent” (for its useful life).
The future always reveals itself. But, those who analyze it coming (NOT the lucky guessers) bequeath great benefits to those who hire them or their advice. Want some proof that the SharePoint train may keep you in 2004, or thereabouts, regarding the kind of knowledge management that you need? Pam opened her intro of the panel by showing the video of what Best Buy is doing with new media from The Conversation Group home page. It’s very well produced. But don’t let that get in the way of seeing what’s going on.
As for SharePoint – trouble ahead … trouble behind … likely too. And as for train wrecks … Americana (culture and music particularly) is littered with tragic tales and good advice around train wrecks -
