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Information technology surrounds consumers in the digital age. But many who use Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and other social media tools to connect with friends outside the office find themselves stuck with little more than corporate e-mail at work.
Intel Corporation social media strategist Laurie Buczek said that needs to change. “No longer do you have to come into a company to leverage the latest and greatest technology,” she said Dec. 1, 2010, at Thunderbird School of Global Management. “It is now the reverse. The employee will access things like iPhones, Internet and Facebook outside of work and then try to eke them in and demand that they get used inside of work.”
Buczek, who spoke in the digital marketing class of Thunderbird Professor John Zerio, Ph.D., has been helping Intel turn the power of social media inward to create a more connected global workplace. The California-based chip manufacturer has 100,000 employees worldwide, and most work in virtual teams with colleagues in two or three geographies.
“Many people would not even recognize their teammates if they passed them on the street,” Buczek said.
Finding effective communication and collaboration platforms becomes a challenge in such a diverse environment. Buczek said one study suggests workers spend eight to 12 hours each week searching for people or information necessary to do their jobs.
She said social media technology can alleviate many of these challenges in ways never before possible. But companies must commit to change.
“How can a company get beyond corporate e-mail and start to leverage some of the Facebook-like and Twitter-like technologies? It is a challenge,” she said. “E-mail is 100 percent used as a collaborative tool in most corporations, so to introduce one more tool into the fray, you have a reduced probability of people leveraging that.”
She said companies increase their odds of success when they identify their key challenges and choose technology that fits the situation.
“Make sure it is fully integrated into where people work and how people work today,” she said. “If it is disconnected — if they are not tripping over it in the way they get work done — you have a lower probability they will incorporate it into their workflow.”
| Social Media in the Workplace: Social media strategist Laurie Buczek of Intel Corporation talks Dec. 1, 2010, in the digital marketing class of Professor John Zerio at Thunderbird School of Global Management in Glendale, Arizona. View the video on YouTube or on China’s www.tudou.com (2:59). |
December 8th, 2010 at 10:40 am
I think that integrating Facebook with a companies intranet is a good solutions to this. Perhaps that way usage might be monitored as well. There is also ways of creating your own private social networking site using wordpress, it’s called Buddypress.
December 14th, 2010 at 6:05 pm
This piece was shared with the Social Media in Organizations (SMinOrgs) Community by Bruce Kneuer. I’ve articulated many of the same ideas through the Social Media Primer I’m developing (http://tiny.cc/SMinOrgsPrimer). It’s great to read/hear validation of those ideas, especially from a practitioner in a large, leading-edge firm like Intel.
Implicit in Laurie’s comments are some challenges that are important for leaders to address. First among these is that they need to make leveraging new digital tools and technologies a strategic priority, and provide the necessary support to enable people to be successful using them. Though groundswells can work elsewhere, they can’t necessarily be relied on inside organizations. For example, although email may be a “collaborative tool,” it’s a clunky one at best. People can accomplish tasks more efficiently and effectively using 2.0 technologies, but they may be resistant to work outside of their comfort zones without prompting, direction, and support from the powers that be. With respect to forces for change, they need to come from the top as well as the bottom.
Courtney Hunt
Founder, SMinOrgs Community