Friday, November 27, 2009

Social Search in the context of Social Learning

(Written as an explanation of introNetworks' Smart Search for @marciamarcia)

Do we know what are people looking for?

Thinking of how someone would potentially search the enterprise network before the network is built is a critical piece of the puzzle for those contemplating putting in a social network (or more appropriately, a knowledge network).

This thinking comes in the form of a series of Users Stories that articulate how a variety of people will take advantage of the knowledge network in explicit detail. What types of problems will they expect to solve, what type of knowledge can they easily extract, how effectively can they sort through thousands of individual profiles to find a finite set of skills in seconds? Every organization is different and one size will not fit all situations, making these User Stories as targeted as possible.

Is there a better way to capture profile information?

Extracting information that will be the basis of the knowledge network and searchable as described in the User Stories becomes the next challenge for the network designer. It is important to be able to customize the user profiles so that experiences, skills, challenges, values, expertise, personal and professional interests are user-submitted in an environment that is trusted and doesn't leave users feeling vulnerable. In this type of environment they are open, honest and forthcoming. It is vital that the profile be rich in content and completed in the context as described by the various user stories that have been compiled. When users give weight to each attribute in their profile by attaching importance, the overall quality of the network is increased tremendously.

Searching smarter.

With thousands of these nearly encyclopedic profiles that have been designed to capture the essence of what’s important to the specific needs of the organization, the potential to drill down with finite search criteria becomes a matter of a few clicks of the mouse. Imagine being able to isolate the population of 12,000 employees down to the 145 people with expertise in task management, and further tighten the criteria to those that also have a background in the energy industry and have taken a course in Delegation – which nets a much smaller list of 12 people. This is a much more actionable list and also allows the searcher to learn even more about these 12 people before reaching out to them, as the profile contains much more information than was searched for – this allows the user to use reasoning and experience to find the one or two perfect people for a project, or to pose a question to, in minutes, not hours or days.

Planning for actionable business intelligence

We believe that thinking ahead, knowing what your users will be searching for, and how you will use that information to further the goals of the organization are critical to the success of the design, implementation and sustainability of an enterprise knowledge network.

Thursday, November 19, 2009

Getting out from behind the desk

I have just arrived back in Santa Barbara from a whirlwind three day trip to NYC to visit clients and prospects. Having time to meet people face to face has become very rare in this time compressed age we live in. We are a networking company, and focus on helping people improve their relationships with their clients, employees, partners and prospects - yet we rely on GoToMeeting, GoToWebinar, email, Twitter, and our own client Community to stay in touch.

How refreshing, exhilarating and more effective it is to talk face to face. Yet, it is not scalable, especially when there are so many people to interact with. We were able to accomplish two substantial interactions each day, and had ample time to dig deep on issues related to Community that an hour online session doesn't allow for.

When we do online meetings, either presenting or attending, there is a 100% chance for distraction. Other windows, email, Blackberries, IM, people walking into the office, etc - all compete for mindshare. When you are in a live meeting you have a better than 99% chance of having 100% attention - though there is more and more the new aspect of distraction of Blackberries vibrating all over the table during the meetings - but social / business etiquette aside, you can look into people's eyes so much better.

It is estimated that 50-70% of communication is non-verbal. Being able to watch body language, facial expressions, all combine to give greater context to the conversation. I know that the meetings this week and the gains made in the individual relationships are more than 50-70% better as a result of us being there in person.

So, what did I learn? Get out more often. Make it a priority, no matter how much I hate dealing with the TSA, taking off my shoes and refilling my Metro Card at the Subway - being directly connected to the people that are helping us grow our business, that add life to what we do everyday is the most important thing to remember.

Tuesday, November 10, 2009

Great End to the Learning 2009 Conference

Well this has been a great week - many blog posts to come - but most important, the final party featured the top Beatle tribute band in the country, Fab Faux - wow. 1,300 attendees rocked the house with 90 solid minutes of excellently performed Beatles tunes.

I was able to record almost the entire set - hey, I had to dance a little bit, and it was hard to record and tap my toes at the same time. These were all shot with a MinoHD camera - the blog doesnt' show the whole width of the HD (must fix that someday...), so double click and it will take you to YouTube and you can watch it in it's full glory. Audio came out great!

Here you go - 12 songs, in their entirety, starting with Back in the USSR.





































And the Encore