Transforming Organizations: Participative Media & the Power to Convene
by Jenny Ambrozek
Conversations with Truman Company CEO Mark Bonchek are always thoughtprovoking and his words from an article interview a year ago drifted back to me reading Matthew Hodgson’s TheAppGap post in search of a meta adoption model for Enterprise 2.0 and Government 2.0.
Discussing the topic “Organizing to Connect Intelligence: Broadcasting Innovation” Mark Bonchek told me:
“..for a 21st century CEO, or senior leader, the “power to convene” is job one. In particular, recognizing the power to convene of those who have both a stake in the challenge and the knowledge to contribute, be they internal or external to an organization.“
Clearly we need look no further than the rollout of President Elect Obama’s key appointments to date, and today’s announcement of the new Paul Volcker lead advisory board , for the “power to convene” that comes with offical leaderships roles. However, it’s my observation watching the impact of participative media, (initially forums and more recently those labelled Web 2.0) on organizations is driving the “power to convene” both deep into, and beyond, traditional official responsibility structures.
Stowe Boyd talks about “the individual is the new group”. Enabled by email, wikis, traditional blogs, microblogging and social networking platforms, both official IT and public consumer, today any individual has the “power to convene” a group, share and promote their knowledge and expertise.
When colleague Victoria Axelrod and I conduct workshops a slide that invariably causes nods is this explanation of the impact of social technology on the locus of control in organizations:
In his TheAppGap post Matthew Hodgson writes:
“When considering adoption strategies for moving to Enterprise 2.0 the message is clear — think strategically and take into consideration the effects of culture from a personal as well as an organisational perspective.”
To me a key factor in whether or not organizations willingly adopt, or resist, implementing low cost collaboration tools that enable ideas and knowledge to flow more readily across organizations, is the propensity of leadership to want to control. I wonder if your experience matches mine that very often TheAppGap is management that chooses “control” over appropriate “controls”?
~ Jenny Ambrozek
