Not all Social Networks are created equal.
Two months ago, I embraced a very interesting project in CEMEX that required the use of a Social Network platform. The first thing I was requested for was to answer the question: Why we just don't use FaceBook or LinkedIN to support our internal social network?
You know, is very funny to receive that question, because for example, from a user perspective everyone knows that Gmail, Hotmail and Yahoo mail are very strong offers and in some cases offers more capabilities that your corporate mail (storage and everywhere access just to mention two) but almost everyone knows that they are for PUBLIC use, that means: you create your account, with your name, you own your password and you are open to do whatever you want with them…. So why is so hard to understand that something similar should occur with social networks?
Don't get me wrong, I truly believe in the power of public social networks for business purposes (Luis Benitez, one of the brightest minds I have met in the social networks domain has powerful arguments around that) the potential opportunities are infinitum… But when you want to create a "corporate" network where the company needs some kind of control (for example feel comfortable of discussing topics that could became competitive advantage, as well as identify and promote key talent) you should not rely on a public service. This is like sending your sales information by Gmail. (I know some people do this, but they do this even for ignorance or malicious purposes; not because organizations doesn't care about it)
But sometimes is just hard to let people understand this kind of points (mostly when something is hot and fancy)… so how did I answer that question? With consulting terms: with a functional evaluation.
I proposed a set of "functional requirements" expected in a Social Network and divide them in the following "evaluation domains": Profile (to get people information), Network (how to let people connect with others), Communities / Groups (how let people create and join interest groups) , Blogs, Bookmarks, the capability of sharing (files, wikis) the capability of collaborate on specific thinks (social to-dos) and the capability to create a social analysis of the interactions. If you are familiar with IBM Lotus Connections you could say: "Ah this guy just make a copy paste of the Lotus Connections functionality" but believe me: I did not do so. Actually I asked IBM for some "evaluation criteria" and was very interesting to find that they didn't have something to share (at least the people I asked for).
Well in my evaluation matrix put several kind of "social networks" options: the corporate suite (IBM, since from my perspective SharePoint 2007 from Microsoft is far …far away of being a real social network platform) the best niche player (SocialText, amazing product around wiki collaboration), the best leisure network (Facebook), the best professional network (LinkedIN), and the best Open Source solution portal & collaboration (LifeRay)… interesting combination don't you think?
I will not discuss details here, just share a picture of the functional gap with a minor disclaimer: this is my perspective of how these tools could perform vs. a list of functional requirements I found useful for corporations. This picture doesn't say that something is better than other, it just present a forecasted performance vs. what we are expecting from these kind of tools.
Two months ago, I embraced a very interesting project in CEMEX that required the use of a Social Network platform. The first thing I was requested for was to answer the question: Why we just don't use FaceBook or LinkedIN to support our internal social network?
You know, is very funny to receive that question, because for example, from a user perspective everyone knows that Gmail, Hotmail and Yahoo mail are very strong offers and in some cases offers more capabilities that your corporate mail (storage and everywhere access just to mention two) but almost everyone knows that they are for PUBLIC use, that means: you create your account, with your name, you own your password and you are open to do whatever you want with them…. So why is so hard to understand that something similar should occur with social networks?
Don't get me wrong, I truly believe in the power of public social networks for business purposes (Luis Benitez, one of the brightest minds I have met in the social networks domain has powerful arguments around that) the potential opportunities are infinitum… But when you want to create a "corporate" network where the company needs some kind of control (for example feel comfortable of discussing topics that could became competitive advantage, as well as identify and promote key talent) you should not rely on a public service. This is like sending your sales information by Gmail. (I know some people do this, but they do this even for ignorance or malicious purposes; not because organizations doesn't care about it)
But sometimes is just hard to let people understand this kind of points (mostly when something is hot and fancy)… so how did I answer that question? With consulting terms: with a functional evaluation.
I proposed a set of "functional requirements" expected in a Social Network and divide them in the following "evaluation domains": Profile (to get people information), Network (how to let people connect with others), Communities / Groups (how let people create and join interest groups) , Blogs, Bookmarks, the capability of sharing (files, wikis) the capability of collaborate on specific thinks (social to-dos) and the capability to create a social analysis of the interactions. If you are familiar with IBM Lotus Connections you could say: "Ah this guy just make a copy paste of the Lotus Connections functionality" but believe me: I did not do so. Actually I asked IBM for some "evaluation criteria" and was very interesting to find that they didn't have something to share (at least the people I asked for).
Well in my evaluation matrix put several kind of "social networks" options: the corporate suite (IBM, since from my perspective SharePoint 2007 from Microsoft is far …far away of being a real social network platform) the best niche player (SocialText, amazing product around wiki collaboration), the best leisure network (Facebook), the best professional network (LinkedIN), and the best Open Source solution portal & collaboration (LifeRay)… interesting combination don't you think?
I will not discuss details here, just share a picture of the functional gap with a minor disclaimer: this is my perspective of how these tools could perform vs. a list of functional requirements I found useful for corporations. This picture doesn't say that something is better than other, it just present a forecasted performance vs. what we are expecting from these kind of tools.
posted by Josh at
8:10 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home