Metrics: What is the impact of social media on organizations?

April 2, 2008

Getting social media or web2.0 into an organization is still not an easy task. The skepticism is often as high as the enthusiasm. If you can prove the benefit of social media in an organization, then you have better cards to go forward. I have been experimenting for a while with blogs and wikis in an organizational context, therefore I thought of possible metrics.

Thanks to Rachel Happe, I have now a little, albeit comprehensive, list of metrics to measure the impact of social media. The following list is an excellent start for the evaluation of the impact or return of investment of social media:

Activity Metrics

  • Page-views
  • Unique visitors
  • Members
  • Posts (ideas/threads)
  • Number of groups (networks/forums)
  • Comments & Track-backs
  • Tags/Ratings/Rankings
  • Time spent on site
  • Contributors
  • Active contributors
  • Word count
  • Referrals
  • Completed profiles
  • Connections (between members)
  • Ratios: Member to contributor; Posts to comments; Completed profiles to posts
  • Periods: By day, week, month, year
  • Frequency: of visits, posts, comments

Survey Metrics

  • Satisfaction
  • Affinity
  • Quality and speed of issue resolution
  • Referral likelihood
  • Relevance of content, connections

I imagine that with all or some of this statistics, it is (1) much clearer to see whether users engage thoroughly in social media, (2) get a picture of the specific culture of communication and sharing, (3) whether this interaction has a benefit and is an alternative to conventional communication, and (4) it brings something new in the sense of synergies and innovation. Thus a next step would be to compare old ways of communication with the gains of new ones.

If you analyze this activities within the organizational contexts, you can easily extend them to the rest of the web. Pete Shelton makes some helpful suggestions of how to Measure the impact on the web or here is one for blogging.

  • Page views/visitors
  • Downloads
  • Citations
  • Mentions in the media/blogs
  • RSS feeds
  • Search engine rankings

NGO2.0 — the end of the organization? (1)

March 19, 2008

Michael Gilbert wrote an article called “The End of the Organization?” in which he wonders how civil society organizations, such as NGOs, can continue working the way they do?

Whether the organization as we know it survives or not, it is by studying the changing patterns of communication that we will discover the new shape of civil society. Our methods of analysis - and possibly our methods of regulation, funding, and participation - will shift from those that reflect managerial thinking to those that reflect ecosystem thinking.

Here are five important innovations that we need to make this transition successfully: (1) We need ways of making network structures tangible to those who want to support civil society. (2) We need to develop and propagate the language of networks, with adjustments suitable to our many communities of practice. (3) We need models of collaboration and communication that help organizations make the most out of their new permeability. (4) We need financial structures that facilitate network centric funding and (5) legal structures that facilitate network centric employment.

This kicked off a debate among these bloggers: Joitske Hulsebosch, Andy Roberts, David Wilcox and Josien Kapma. Their interesting posts discuss whether the statement is valid and emphasize the role that communication plays within it, and to which extend a transformation of civil society and its organizations has already happened.

I think that organizations eventually have to change because of: (a) complexity, which can only be managed in open networks; and (b) pressure from members, stakeholders or competitors, who move on to other organizations, coalitions or simply form there own campaign. But, in my opinion, the organization will change slowly. Still, NGOs have been participating in networks or coalitions for decades although there internal structure has been often preserved conventional. Here lies the dilemma that most organizations are still pretty much self-contained and naturally driven by self-interest for funding, reputation, etc. — and this is a key obstacle for cooperation. However, civil society was one of the first ones to start working on the potential of the web and in networks if you look at campaigns against the Multilateral Agreement on Investments (MAI) or the Zapatistas in Mexico in the Nineties. A key challenge, for traditional NGOs in the next years, will be to compete with extra organizational activism or open networks for social change.

Allison Fine coined the phrase extra organizational activism in her book “Momentum igniting social change in the Connected Age.” She argues about how we should reconsider cooperation and external communication in an organizational context. I wrote about her book in this blog post: open source approach for organizations. One step in the same direction is The Membership project, where David Wilcox is also part of and which “explores changes that the social web and other factors may bring to groups and organisations … and to our ideas of belonging in an increasingly networked society.”

Replying to Michael Gilbert’s five value points, I think they tend to be very formalistic and I can see the web is changing faster and forming more loose networks with their own rules. So the question is whether traditional NGOs can match these loose and open networks with their sometimes quite conventional organization. And I wonder whether it is possible and even conducive to search and create”models of collaboration” or “legal structures” to harness the potential of these new networks.

Organizations can be democratic, flat and passionate

March 9, 2008

The web is full of thoughts and discussion around open, democratic and flat organizations. Most of this discussions and concepts are connected to web2.0, but that is not necessarily new, as Ricardo Semler proofs it in his book: The seven-day weekend. For more than twenty years, he has been experimenting with open knowledge models. I was surprised how good it fits to the contemporary approach, such as the new Wikinomics Playbook formulates.

Democratic

Seven Day WeekendWhile on holidays, I had the chance to read Semler’s book. The cover looks a bit curious, but the substance is quite inspiring. Thanks to Ignatia for recommending me this book. The main message of the book is that it is possible to have an open democratic non-hierarchical and successful company. In his book, already a few years old, Ricardo Semler tells his story about how he has transformed a company for the past thirty years until today, together with his colleagues through an open management model. He proved, to my surprise, that an ongoing cycle of questioning things makes progress and change possible. The book has a lot of fascinating insights next to some repetitions. Here is the excerpt, and here are two great quotes:

And the increasingly popular concept of work/life balance is not all that we seek. Balance also ensues when people are given room to explore so they can find out where their talents and interests lie and merge their personal aspirations with the goals of the company. Once employees feel challenged, invigorated, and productive, their efforts will naturally translate into profit and growth for the organization.

Giving up control also means relinquishing exclusive rights to information. Privileged information is a dangerous source of power in any organization. Information that one person has that others lack can be terribly important, and can give them the upper hand. To annihilate information hoarding and illegitimate power, information must be shared. The argument that competitors might latch onto sensitive information if it is widely known is not convincing enough to stop the free flow of information.

Flat
The wikinomics playbook — collaboratively written by the readers of the wikinomics book — will be printed soon. The online version, freely available, offers many different topics. I, particularly, liked very much chapter 2: “The Wikified Organization.” In the centre there is of course a wiki, which is less a technology than a chance for all to contribute and create something new. “At its heart, the wikified organisation is about communications—wide-open, no-holds-barred, inclusive communications.”

Wikis are not about bottom-up management, they are about round table solving of solutions where titles are null and void, where intellects win and where ideas are valued, not ruthlessly critiqued…Wikis change the paradigm… the goal is a refined idea…. not an idea beaten into consensus!”

With a wikified approach, a team can transform a “good idea” into a “cause,” and a cause has a life of its own. Often a cause is unstoppable—if the idea that spawned it is “good” enough. Later, a cause, if it has enough energy, capital and direction (read as steerage and guidance), can become a movement. And a movement can change the world.

Passionate
The authors of Playbook argue that this wikified approach leads to an ongoing open space of ideas and exchange between passionate driven contributors. Maybe that is why the company 37signals has recently announced a change to a four-day week and that they are funding there employees passions.

Three-day weekends mean people come back extra refreshed on Monday. Three-day weekends mean people come back happier on Monday. Three-day weekends mean people actually work harder and more efficiently during the four-day work week.

It could turn out to be just like the story from Semler. In one part, he describes when the company was introducing hammocks for lunch-break-naps and how this led to a creativity boost.


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