Technology isn't the centre of web 2.0, people are. To create management 2.0, we need to enable change in the perspectives and behaviours of the people working within organisations.

Problem

Technology has changed faster than organisations and the people within them. So:

Organisations end up banning social media / networking because they don't understand the technology or don't feel it fits within their cultures
Organisations that do use social media / networking struggle to gain adoption of these technologies
Organisations that have enabled adoption find that people are much better connected, but don't necessarily have that much better engagement, trust, relationships or conversations.

We need to put people at the centre of management 2.0.

Solution

Web 2.0 isn’t about technology it’s about people and the social relationships between them. The most important aspects of web 2.0 aren't just the transparency, collaboration, meritocracy, openness, community and self-determination evident in new collaborative use of the internet, they're also and much more critically the openness, sharing and desire to support other people experienced by most users of the social web. We need to bring this experience into our organisations too.

Therefore, management 2.0 doesn't just require changes in operating principles, organisation structure, management processes or technology but also in people themselves. Employees in organisations also each need to share these values of openness, sharing and desire to support each people if management 2.0 is going to take root.

There are a number of other hacks here on the MIX which emphasise the undoubted benefits of social technologies. Others refer to the advantages of other forms of organisation such as community rather than heirarchy. Or new management perspectives.

But effective use of technology, involvement in community etc is mostly about an individual's perspectives. Christopher Bartlett and Sumantra Ghoshal wrote about matrix management: not being a structure, but a frame of mind. I think the same applies to community management / management 2.0 too. Communities need to be embedded in the corporate consciousness, ieunderstood by all people working in an organisation (at conscious and unconscious levels).

Practical Impact

Helping employees, and others associated with an organisation, to develop more social perspectives will help management, web and other 2.0 aproaches to work at a much deeper level than without this sort of change.

First Steps

The key need is to educate employees about the importance of social relationship, in order to change their understanding and behaviour.

To some extent, this change can be achived by simply getting people using enterprise 2.0 systems or acting in communities. But we also need to ensure that these relationships are truly social in nature. I think this takes more.

The other rquirement is therefore to help employees appreciate themselves and others as people. Social businesses need to be human businesses first. This can be achieved by helping people better understand themselves - their interests, career drivers, strengths etc. Once they have done this, the organisation can construct opportunities for employees to share stories about themselves to others in their organisations. This ensures people get to understand each other at a fundamentally human level.

Tools like social network analysis (focusing on qualitis such as trust rather than simply number of connections etc) can also help people to understand the nature of their relationships. Other techniques can also be used, eg team picftures or team sculpting. It can also be done online, but not simply by relying on people tweeting with each other.

Following on from this, we need to eduate employees to have more effective face-to-face / physical, as well as virtual / online, converrsations with each other. Many people already experience this in web 2.0 where people often feel less constrained. Hence the way many people find they develop some of their best friendships through social media. This often doesn't happen in organisations, where even people who work alongside each other, often don't find out much about each other at anything more than a superficial level.

This need to have better face-ot-face conversation can once again be supported by getting people to experience and involve themselves in social media. But further face-to-face or virtual development, particularly development including practice and feedback, can be useful too.

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January 22, 2018 at 9:04pm

Maryann Farrugia

Technology is advancing, social media can be very powerful especially in branding businesses. You can go for video marketing because it can showcase your brand and audience nowadays prefers audio and visual presentation. You can check Maryann Farrugia on YouTube.