We partner with a number of large public relations and marketing agencies, and the issue they always face is the lack of technology knowledge. As discussed any community related social programs will eventually run through IT, and once IT gets a whiff of the PR agency being the catalyst for the program – it becomes a bunker mentality. As Aaron mentions it gets stalled or killed in the risk aversion stage as marketing and PR can't refute or guide a risk averse IT team.

In addition, we have found the key to selling in social media programs is the ability to track and analyze ROI on the effort. For years we've been selling social media programs into the business group, but until we were able show the ability to measure ROI, it was always one of those “Trust us, you should be doing this” pitches.

Why do we always seem to fall back to territories? Isn’t it time we all grew up in business and learned that the most successful entities are those that harnassed the skills in a way where EVERYONE contributes and advances? When will some people learn it’s not about dogs marking their corners?

(Sorry – you touched on a frustrating issue in my professional life.) Thank you for bringing this up. I hope people will listen to the cooperative vocie.

To illustrate this, one example I can think of is a Fortune 1000 enterprise software and services firm that I work with. This firm is organized along major solution areas. Each area has the usual functional units – marketing, sales, support, etc and these units report into a senior executive.

This same senior executive also has reporting to him a customer organization and the activities of this group touch upon all the customer facing functions of all the major solution areas. One of the goals of this group is on customer maintenance and retention.

Social software to them is being considered in the context of the desired results of enhanced customer engagement. The social tools selected really are based on how appropriate a means of communication they are for the task at hand. Once the strategy is set, the technology is then validated, selected and implemented with IT’s help.

It’s not to say that this is as smooth as I’ve described it – the ‘customer organization’ is only just emerging so processes and policies are still in their infancy along with the usual office politics. But the point I’d like to make is that social tools are meant to complement and enhance the programs and activities of the customer organization e.g. on maintenance and retention.

And it’s the business side of the enterprise where this begins with IT its traditional ‘enabler.’

Maybe not in a direct sense. That’s why I say the “perception” of our employees is that it is. When you consider applications like google docs and MS Office Live that enable employees to work and collaborate outside the traditional isolated environment, and expect IT to adopt and support them, then yes, I think from that perspective the web does become a part of a technical system.

Good point on the HR comment.

I agree with all sentiments. In my experience, it was the business who started the buzz. We created a small and simple platform just to test the water. With immediate adoption, it was evident that we as a company *needed* this.

Executive sponsorship on the business side was key. Especially in big companies, a strong voice to advocate for the need can help work wonders as you work through traditional processes and obstacles.

A strong partnership with IT is equally important. As noted in this post, IT has much to gain from centralizing a Web 2.0 offering. After six or so months, we’re in the fortunate position of having complete buy in from IT (in fact, they now want to create an IT centric community for 1k’ish people), strong business support (our new SM offering was just highlighted at a global management mtg) and a very vibrant and active community that’s growing leaps and bounds everyday.

I believe the business needs to spearhead the effort – but cannot do so in a vacuum and needs to partner tightly with IT. While a point person in the business needs to serve as lead, it’s imperative that the voice of the community help drive the overall direction.

Is the web really tied to technical systems? Or is it really just an easy to use platform for anyone to publish their thoughts and share with others.

It’s quite possible, and we’ve not even discusses this here, if the new web is really about people, then perhaps HR is a big stakeholder.

I understand that there is a need to assume some of the risk in order to reap the benefits of Social Media, but where is the tipping point between acceptable risk and success? Is that something that can even be defined?

IT is traditionally considered an enabler. It allows the enterprise to function through the use of technology. Times are changing. IT needs to move away from being an enabler to being a contributer playing a key role in business strategy. Why IT? In my situation, all heads are turning to IT for the answers because the perception is that Social Media is married to the Web, information systems, various software and applications, etc, all of which are managed under IT. Generally speaking, users expect transparency from the IT organization. There is no desire to understand even at a fundamental level how IT and business strategy are coming together. Users just want the tools. I think this is another hurdle that needs to be overcome. As the separation between Business and IT continues to close, there needs to be a general understanding across the board of how it all ties in. Perpective: We all understand the value and benefits of our autos. We all also understand the risk of driving recklessly. We are not all auto mechanics, but we know enough about them to realize the risk and dangers when abused.

This is by far one of the most difficult challenges I have faced in IT, but also one that I am excited to face.

Excuse my rambling..
Ed Stafford @pixel8r

We partner with a number of large public relations and marketing agencies, and the issue they always face is the lack of technology knowledge. As discussed any community related social programs will eventually run through IT, and once IT gets a whiff of the PR agency being the catalyst for the program – it becomes a bunker mentality. As Aaron mentions it gets stalled or killed in the risk aversion stage as marketing and PR can’t refute or guide a risk averse IT team.

In addition, we have found the key to selling in social media programs is the ability to track and analyze ROI on the effort. For years we’ve been selling social media programs into the business group, but until we were able show the ability to measure ROI, it was always one of those “Trust us, you should be doing this” pitches.

The question of sponsor is a key element of any change. The adoption is made possible by having people with influence supporting it.
The spread of Enterprise 2.0 makes this point clearer that the one of web2.0 but there is no real surprise.

Experience shows that effectively it is people from business who traditionally lead “Enterprise2.0″ projects. They have special needs in engaging conversations with customers or facilitating social interaction to make structured process work. IT people focus on data, security and big processes like ERP, CRM and Emailing systems. As a consequence they often put communication and knowledge sharing issues on the back burner. Add to the fact that traditional software editors and IT consultancies – their natural contacts – are out of the picture in terms of social computing (partly because they see no way how to make gooood money out of it) and you get a pretty decent picture.

Now there is another element we have to take into account. If media announce it’s going mainstream, organisations are still exploring the impact and benefits of social computing. Passion and exploration still are the main factors for real adoption. Simply because passionates are the ones these days who know how we can make things happen in real life. And on this one, it is not question of whether one is young or old, whether one is on the business side or the IT side of the organisation.

BTW, I like what Melany says in her comment, irrespective of who rolls it out, the teams (IT, marketing, support, product) all need to work together. @astrout

Everyone involved must feel empowered to respond to conversations taking place within the community.