The Water Cooler

There has been some buzz about how to leverage different social networking tools to increase communication ties between people in a work environment.  This is especially a good idea when a department is large or spread out geographically and thus finds it difficult for people to meet at their conveniently centralized water cooler, conference room, or break room.  It can be very useful to know what a colleague is working on so you don’t duplicate her work, don’t interfere inadvertently with the goal of her work, and can share ideas and tips to make the outcome of her work better.  Public social networks such as facebook, myspace, and others could be utilized to share information between colleagues, however, they are more social and can be perceived as a procrastination time sink than a productivity tool. 

To make proper use of a social network for work, the tool needs to be separate from these well known web applications.  Many folks may be apprehensive to share their social network pages with employers or professional colleagues.  While I’m a firm believer that you should never post anything on the web that you wouldn’t want your mother-in-law to see, sometimes even benign information about your social life can be distracting toward the professional world you work in.  This coupled with the fact that a social network dedicated to work might be an easier sell to managers and directors who might see myspace and facebook as a procrastination tool rather than a productivity tool. 

I think we have to be careful, however, not to take ’social’ away from social networking.  Some fun information about colleagues should be shared so that we get to know each other.  It is always easier to work on a team when you know the teammates well.  Even something as simple as knowing their likes or dislikes is useful.  This information can give team members information that can be used to relate to each other and help build a more cohesive team.  There seems to be an invisible line between what’s appropriate for a work social network and what’s appropriate for other more general networks.  At first it might seem difficult to distinguish between the two types of networks, however, I believe the mores of a work environment, whether spelled out in policy, or assumed implicitly will govern the work network to keep a certain professionalism that may not be present in the general social networks.

Useful network tools within the social network could include many of the Web 2.0 applications we use every day.  An editable profile that list job duties and report structures is useful so that colleagues in a large department know who to contact for what.  A social network is often better than just a directory as the duties that define what our job is often changes dynamically depending on the tasks that need to be accomplished.  A micro-blogging system such as twitter is also a handy feature.  Using this tool, members could state what they are working on and how they are doing.  This feature is central to the network as it lets everyone know who is doing what at any particular time and if they have questions or need help.  This is much better than email because often times you don’t know who to email when you have a question.  Team workspace such as a wiki or discussion board also could be used to allow folks to keep meeting minutes, setup agendas, or discuss matters outside of the conference room.

Social bookmarking and public web aggregators could also be employed to share what people are reading.  Articles from these tools could spark discussions and direct members toward an important topic that might have been overlooked if it was not shared via the network.  Because we cannot always keep up on what’s up and coming all of the time, a sharable repository such as the bookmarks and subscribed rss feeds will allow for the whole team to keep up with what’s new in their fields.  

A work oriented social network should not replace face to face meetings, but augment them.  Small amounts of time taken to update wikis or discussion boards could have large benefits to the overall productivity of face to face meetings as many of the logistics could be worked out online.  If managed carefully, a meeting leader could create the agenda, ask for updates, and start a pre-discussion online so that when the face to face meeting begins, no time is wasted bringing members up to speed and the meeting can jump directly to the real issues that need to be worked out.

So this all sounds wonderful, what’s holding us back?  The biggest drawback toward a system like this is buy in. If members are not using the tools, don’t know how to use them, or don’t believe it will work, then it will not be successful.  A proper design and roll out and support structure needs to be in place before jumping in with both feet.  Also, like any network, it is only going to be as valuable as the number of people using it.  Therefore, a small department or organization will not be able to benefit as much.    

This entry was posted on Thursday, October 23rd, 2008 at 2:30 pm and is filed under Technology Trends, Utilization ideas. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.