Social Objects for Business Conversation

Recently, I have been intrigued by this idea of “social objects” - as the basis for driving the success of E2.o applications. I first heard of the term just a few months back on Hugh Macleod’s blog. I have since looked around for more information and really enjoyed watching Jyri Engestrom’s lecture on social objects as used within social computing platforms. The conference video is out on YouTube. It seems that Jyri, the founder of Jaiku, has been instrumental in bringing the idea to life.

MacLeod defines Social Objects as “The Social Object, in a nutshell, is the reason two people are talking to each other, as opposed to talking to somebody else. Human beings are social animals. We like to socialize. But if think about it, there needs to be a reason for it to happen in the first place. That reason, that "node" in the social network, is what we call the Social Object.”

Honestly, I don’t know if I had ever thought about the idea before seeing these posts – but it seems to make a lot of sense. It’s certainly true for me. There exists some social object in the mix most every time I talk to my friends or colleagues. It might be a movie. It could be a baseball game. It could be a friend’s job situation. It could be a finance report. The bottom line is that “social objects” are the basis for most all of my conversations. It’s a fascinating concept if you think about it.

The idea got me thinking. What are the typical social objects within business conversation? What social objects attract the most attention and could become the basis for a robust conversation? It would seem to me that these objects could be the obvious building blocks of a productive corporate social network or social computing application. Here’s my informal list from a 5 minute brainstorm. I have put an “x” next to the Top 10 form my perspective!

Variable compensation plans
Performance objectives
Market factors
Executive Leaders (x)
Management (x)
Strategy
Mission statement
Values
Culture (x)
Norms (x)
Office environment (x)
Corporate Communications (x)
Brand
Public Advertising
Performance Review Process (x)
Benefits Package
Finance function
IT function (x)
Budgeting Process (x)
Key initiatives (x)
Budget variance explanations
Forecasting assumptions
Customer needs
Customer experience
Parking
Lunch destination

MacLeod goes on to say, “The thing to remember is, Human beings do not socialize in a completely random way. There’s a tangible reason for us being together, that ties us together. Again, that reason is called the Social Object. Social Networks form around Social Objects, not the other way around.”

I wonder. I just wonder what it takes to influence and/or transform the core social objects within our business conversations? At first glance, I would suspect that we would be better off if the top few objects in our business dialog were the following:

Customer needs
Customer experience
Strategy
Performance objectives

As an aside, in thinking back to my many years of consulting, I must say that there is only one client where I remember hearing this last set of “social objects” integrated into almost every conversation. It was WalMart! I wonder what that is saying?

Can you think of other social objects that I have missed? What are your thoughts on the topic? Please drop me your comments.

Relationships Trump Rank

I finally got to reading through Karen Stephenson’s article dated February 28th on The Community Network Solution. The subtitle reads: “In reweaving the social fabric of a city or town, relationships trump rank.” That last phrase caught my attention! And it teased me into leaving it on the top of my ‘reading pile’ for the last two weeks! (I know – I need to retire my reading pile and try an Amazon Kindle or a Sony Reader.) Anyway, the whole article is excellent.

The article begins by bemoaning the selection of quote-unquote ‘power brokers’ to make things happen within a community. Here are some highlights:

When a community sets out to address complex problems such as … the effort usually ends up going nowhere.

The quiet failure of such initiatives is often attributed to human nature, or to some flaw in the process that shaped the effort. But in fact, the problem usually starts when the project organizers compose their first list of proposed participants. The organizers ask themselves: Who are the power brokers around town? Who are the key players? …

Thereafter, the whole effort will operate on the unspoken presumption that influence derives primarily from positional power, and that positional power translates into the ability to get things done.

That assumption is as naive as the belief that a company’s organization chart –– with its boxes and circles, its dotted lines showing who reports to whom — provides an accurate picture of how the organization actually works. Like org charts, “most powerful” lists reveal nothing about the human qualities of those who occupy senior positions, the web of personal relationships upon which they can draw, or the trust they inspire (or don’t inspire) in other people.

She goes on to share both her understanding of and experiences for how networks permit and accelerate the flow of information and her approach to identifying people who have the capacity for “fruitful collaboration”. These are people who transcend workplace silos and collaborate freely across traditional community boundaries - to get things done.

The glory of the whole thing is that these most likely unheard-of-people are the ones that can bring together the skills, knowledge, and approach to operate without hesitation of differing hierarchies or CULTURES.

My question is can we transfer these ideas inside of the walls of the traditional organization? Can E2.0 be a catalyst for bringing these folks to the fore of our organizations? I think a good reading of this article alongside Gary Hamel’s chapter on W.L. Gore [The Future of Management, chapter 5] should be required reading for E2.0 practitioners. It is a challenge to be achieved. Let me know your thoughts.

If it’s not a dialog, why waste the time.