Social Glass

I’m being a bit redundant with this post, but I cannot over-emphasize how important Enterprise Search is to Enterprise 2.0. As Dion Hinchliffe, Chief Technology Officer for the Web 2.0 Advisory and consulting firm Hinchliffe & Company, puts it,

“Discoverability isn’t an after thought , it’s the core”

Enterprise 2.0 systems must be centered around Search - the ability to discover content and people.  It’s the first component in McAfee’s SLATES methodology, and “Google-like” search it is a fundamental feature that most enterprises lack.  Recent experiences have shown me that companies are eager to implement this thing called Web 2.0, but on their roadmap their first priority is making their existing content discoverable.

In my humble opinion search-centric Enterprise 2.0 systems, like Suite Two, will drive the greatest amount of user acceptance.   80% of internet experiences begin with search and there’s no reason to assume this should be any different inside the firewall, even with an Enterprise 2.0 ecosystem in place.

Update: It seems like Cogenz does a lot of what is discussed below (see the comment from Niall Cook).

We spend a lot of time talking about wikis, blogs, etc. when it comes to Enterprise 2.0. The problem I have is nobody ever seems to expand on “etc.”. I thought I might take a stab on expanding something besides wikis and blogs that is important for internal collaboration, social bookmarking.

What if Digg came out with Enterprise Digg? This would accomplish two goals.

The first is allowing workers inside the firewall to share content they find interesting with others through the “social bookmarking” effect obtained with Digg. Users would be able to bookmark content from the internet and intranet in an effort to harvest and share relevant information with others. This also makes it easy for knowledge workers with similar interests to find each other (if worker A and B both save the same URL it’s safe to conclude they’re both interested in the content).
The second goal is the creation of a platform through which workers can gauge the effectiveness of information. The Digg voting mechanism would allow knowledge workers to vote on shared links they find useful within an enterprise context with the most useful documents rising to the top of the index. In this way the most important enterprise knowledge assets are the easiest to locate.

I see significant value in Enterprise 2.0 ecosystems having a Digg-like platform.

History shows us that competing societies catalyze innovation, and that’s certainly one of the principal points made in the book Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond. He points out that the rapid advancement in naval warfare technologies in Europe, for example, was a result of wars between England and France in the 1700s and 1800s. If France built a bigger cannon England must do so also or risk defeat. Competition forces societies to recognize and embrace innovation. According to wikipedia, in the 15th century, for example, the Ottoman Empire was the first to effectively adopt gunpowder and managed to conquer the Middle East, North Africa and the Balkans due to its technologically superior weaponry. Coincidentally the empire was eventually overthrown due to its inability to embrace new military innovations as those in power were threatened by change and thus chose not to change at all.

Jared Diamond eventually won the Pulitzer Price for his book and his advice has been sought by corporations on how they might foster innovation. On this topic (according to strategy-business.com), Jared’s position is:

“There are obvious differences in innovation and productivity among companies (compare Microsoft with IBM), industrial belts (Silicon Valley in California versus Route 128 outside Boston), countries (Japan versus Russia), and sectors within the same country (Japan’s electronics industry versus its food industry).” The distinctions in innovation and productivity, he says, relate to “differences in the flow of ideas, centralized control, and operation of competition — just as in the contrasting histories of China and Europe.”

Microsoft brought Jared in to help them foster helpful competition. Microsoft is now organized into small, competing groups in an attempt to harness the innovation that is expected as output.

In order for innovation to fuel competition inside an organization innovation must be apparent. During the Cold War nuclear missile tests were used to showcase technological advancement on both sides. But (assuming we’re not talking about Lockhead Martin), how to organizations manifest innovation internally?

Enterprise 2.0.

When intellectual property is discoverable across the enterprise a state of comprehensive competition arises. This means knowledge workers must be able to easily document and publish their knowledge, and other knowledge workers must be able to find it.

To enhance a previous position I’ve held on Discovery and Collaboration, then, Discovery leads to Competition which leads to Innovation.  Enterprise 2.0 is key to enabling organizations to realize the benefits internal competition brings to the table.