Renaissance Reflections

RSS Thought Leadership via SMinOrgs and GCDEL

Most of Renaissance Strategic Solutions' thought leadership comes through the two digital communities founded by Renaissance's Principal, Courtney Hunt:

• The Social Media in Organizations (SMinOrgs) Community
• The Global Center for Digital Era Leadership (GCDEL)

This thought leadership is provided indirectly through Courtney's curation of news articles, blog posts, videos, and other resources that are shared primarily through the LinkedIn groups and Twitter accounts for each:

• SMinOrgs LinkedIn group
• SMinOrgs on Twitter (@SMinOrgs)
• GCDEL LinkedIn group
• GCDEL on Twitter (@GCDELstream)

Direct thought leadership is provided through the following blogs:

• SMinOrgs S.M.A.R.T. Blog
• Digital Era Thinkers Blog

The SMinOrgs email blasts listed below provide links to some of the thought pieces and guides Courtney has written and will give you a sense of the breadth and depth of her thinking and analysis: 

• Spotlight on LinkedIn

• Introducing GCDEL...SMinOrgs' Sister Community

• Recruiting in the Digital Era 

You can access even more pieces by visiting the respective blogs and/or the SMinOrgs email archive.

To stay current on Courtney's Digital Era thought leadership, please join SMinOrgs and/or GCDEL (visit their respective websites for details on where and how), or connect with her directly on LinkedIn.

Social Media Engagement: Guidance for Rookies

Earlier this year I wrote a series of SMinOrgs S.M.A.R.T. Blog posts targeted to social media rookies and others who want to engage more efficiently and effectively. These posts capture many of the "Welcome to the Digital Era" themes I highlight in the presentations I give. Scroll down to read more about: 

• Social Media: From Novelty to Utility
• Social Media Engagement: 7 Rules for Working Smart, not Just Hard
• Social Media Engagement: 5 Guiding Principles
• Social Media: Coping with Time & Information Realities 

I have been publishing one-two S.M.A.R.T. Blog posts each week so far this year, and I am going to try keep that pace up for the foreseeable future. To make it easier to share the posts with email subscribers, I have "chunkified" the posts based on unifying themes. Future "chunks" will focus on:

• Digital Era competencies
• Creating private social networks
• Legal and ethical considerations
• Managing digital communities 

Most of the posts have already been written, so feel free to explore the S.M.A.R.T. Blog if you'd like to read them now. If you want to be notified of new blog posts as soon as they are published, please subscribe to the blog.

 

Courtney Shelton Hunt, PhD

Founder and Community Manager, SMinOrgs and GCDEL

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Social Media: From Novelty to Utility

Media hype notwithstanding, social media is still a novelty to many professionals, especially those in leadership positions. Rather than viewing them as a radical departure from traditional communication approaches, however, it's better to think of them as "new tools for doing old things" and to remember that digital technologies are facilitators and enablers, not an end unto themselves. As the Digital Era progresses, best practices for managing social media as a utility are emerging. These best practices include focusing on the strategic as well as the tactical, effectively managing human capital resources, and managing Digital Era risks. 

Click here to read the post.

 

Social Media Engagement: 7 Rules for Working Smart, Not Just Hard 

Written for both individuals and organizations, this post provides high-level guidance for rookies who are just getting started with social media, as well as those who are looking to add more structure, focus and discipline to existing initiatives. The guiding principles address topics such as setting goals, assessing the operating environment, conducting a communications audit, developing a plan of action, acquiring knowledge and skills, incremental implementation, and managing time and information.

Click here to read the post.

 

Social Media Engagement: 5 Guiding Principles 

Extending the ideas in my previous piece on social media engagement (7 rules for working smart, not just hard), this post offers 5 principles to guide the efforts of both individuals and organizations. As with the previous piece, it is targeted to rookies who are just getting started with social media, as well as those who want to regroup and redirect their efforts. The guiding principles include proceeding with "mindful flexibility," listening first then talking, being strategically tactical, balancing idealism with pragmatism, and emphasizing quality over quantity. 

Click here to read the post.

 

Social Media: Coping with Time & Information Realities 

In our overcommitted, busy lives, lack of time is a common lament. The time challenge is exacerbated by information overload and the speed with which digital technology continues to change. For social media rookies in particular, these challenges can be overwhelming. This post highlights certain immutable realities of the world in which we live and work and offers guidance for how to cope with them. 

Click here to read the post.

 

Related Resources

  

The Managing Your Professional Brand in the Digital Era email from last month includes links to more posts targeted to social media rookies, including giving yourself a digital makeover and enhancing your LinkedIn profile (a wildly popular how-to piece). 

The Spotlight on LinkedIn email from last fall has links to more posts addressing topics like status updates (including Twitter) and the effective use of groups. Future posts will include Part III of the LI profile series and some guidance on using the poll feature.

Bridging the Digital Divide: Competencies and Training

I recently published two follow-up pieces to my post The New Digital Divide: Thoughts for Leaders and Laggards in the Social Media in Organizations S.M.A.R.T. Blog: 

• Digital Era Competencies: How Do You Stack Up? offers food for thought for individuals to assess the extent to which they have the necessary knowledge, skills, and abilities to be successful in the Digital Era. 
• Social Media Education and Training: Pro or Con? Please Discuss… revisits previous debates in an effort to gather current perspectives on social media education and training, not just from early adopters but also from folks who have just started climbing their own learning curves.

Introductions to each post are provided below.

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Digital Era Competencies: How Do You Stack Up?

Do you have the knowledge, skills and abilities necessary for success in the Digital Era? Regardless of the sector you work in, your professional discipline, your place in the organizational hierarchy – and to some extent your career stage – there is a core set of competencies necessary to effectively leverage new technologies to achieve your goals and objectives. My latest post highlights some of those competencies in four general categories – concepts, platforms, tools, and skills – in addition to identifying unique competencies for managers and leaders.

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Last week I published The New Digital Divide: Thoughts for Leaders and Laggards, which was inspired in part by my efforts to help individuals and organizations adapt to Digital Era realities and adopt new social and digital technologies and tools. At the end of that piece I highlighted the importance of leadership – including self-leadership – in bridging and crossing the divide. As new technologies increasingly permeate every aspect of our personal and professional lives, it is incumbent upon all of us to prepare ourselves to be successful in the Digital Era – not just as workers, but also as citizens and community members. No matter what our starting point may be, we must take it upon ourselves to understand new digital technologies and make educated and informed choices about which technologies we will embrace and leverage. We must also commit to learning and excelling at the competencies necessary for Digital Era success.

My latest post focuses on those competencies. It’s an extension of some of the ideas I shared in a presentation I gave last fall at the University of Michigan’s Ross School of Business entitled Social Media: Beyond Marketing, Throughout Your Career.  It also builds on the benchmarking work I did when I created a master’s degree specialization in social media and online communities for Northeastern University.

When giving career management presentations to professionals of all types, I’ve increasingly found myself highlighting the need to think about a new set of core competencies required for success in the Digital Era.  As social tools and other digital technologies become more integrated into our work lives, it has become increasingly evident that developing certain knowledge, skills and abilities is important for a wide range of professionals in multiple disciplines and at all levels (see, for example, slides 6-15 from the Ross School presentation, as well as the SMinOrgs Social Media Primer). These competencies, however, seem to get short shrift in articles and discussions about social business and enterprise 2.0 applications, which tend to emphasize the importance of cultural values like openness and transparency. As I have argued in different ways elsewhere (like this post), it’s possible to successfully leverage new digital tools and technologies even in organizations with more closed, traditional cultures. But it’s almost impossible to be successful if people don’t understand what those tools are and how they can use them. Culture may eat strategy for breakfast, but when it comes to digital technology, competencies eat culture for lunch.

Click here to read the post. As always, your thoughts are welcome. 

 

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Social Media Education & Training: Pro or Con? Please Discuss…

Questions about social media education and training often result in passionate discussions about the relative value of formal and informal learning when it comes to acquiring the knowledge, skills and abilities necessary for effective digital engagement. Most of the participants in these discussions are early adopters who have successfully bootstrapped their own education and therefore believe that “learning by doing” is the right approach. My latest blog post revisits the question in an effort to gather current perspectives on the issue, not just from early adopters but also from folks who have just started climbing their own learning curves.

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About a year ago I observed and participated in a number of debates regarding the best way for people to acquire knowledge about and develop skills related to using social media (see this post for links to some of them). Many people argued (often vociferously) that learning from experience was not just the best way to learn, it was the only way to learn – and they rejected the notion that social media skills and abilities can be developed through training. A number of people also asserted that credentials such as social media certificates are useless, and that the offerings behind them are generally worthless.

Earlier in 2011 I had done extensive benchmarking to identify current offerings in social media education and training while I was developing a social media and online communities specialization for a Master’s degree program in communication (see this post for details). There wasn’t much out there then, and not much seems to have changed in the fifteen months since. Lately, however, I’m seeing more buzz about formal offerings, and I’ve learned about two companies – one a well-established business media company, the other a technology start-up – who are making social media training a core service offering. Are we seeing a shift…?

In my latest blog post I share my updated perspective on the value of a formal approach to developing and increasing not just social media expertise, but digital sophistication more broadly. I invite others to share their points of view as well, and to engage in dialogue and healthy debate.

Click here to read more and join the discussion.

- Courtney Shelton Hunt, PhD

Social Software Implementations and Change Management: A Judokan Approach

The principles of judo should be applied to the change management efforts necessary for successful social software implementations, including enterprise 2.0 (E2.0) systems, social intranets, and digital communities. The core idea is to recognize and accept individuals and organizations as they are, rather than as they should be, and to work with current realities rather than against them. This post offers food for thought about better approaches to achieving social software goals and objectives and invites others to share ideas and examples to further the dialogue.

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Many social software and enterprise 2.0 ( E2.0) discussions focus on certain underlying cultural values that are critical to successful implementation of new technologies and tools. These include openness, empowerment, innovation, and engagement. Related discussions on the change process often emphasize the need for leaders to embrace these cultural values before the change process can begin. I agree those values are important, but I wonder if it’s in our collective best interest to emphasize them so much. Even if they’re not willing to admit it, many organizational leaders find ideas like openness and empowerment threatening, and their views on notions like engagement can range from “touchy-feely” to “a nice luxury we can’t afford.” And even if leaders themselves espouse and embrace these ideals, existing organizational cultures, structures, systems, and staff may not allow their enactment.

So what’s a change agent to do? Try to force change? Wait until the organization is really ready before moving forward? Perhaps, rather than thinking of approaching E2.0 initiatives and the cultural changes associated with them directly, we would be better served by an indirect approach.

Judo is a “soft” martial art; literally translated from the Japanese, it means “gentle way.” Founded by Kanō Jigorō in the late nineteenth century, it embodies many principles that can be applied to the change management process – not for the purpose of winning in a competitive sense, but to achieve mutual welfare and benefit. The core idea is to achieve maximum results with minimum effort by applying principles such as:

• Yielding, leverage, balance, momentum
• Open-mindedness, self-reflection,  empathy, respect
• Intense concentration, discipline, mindful flexibility

Recognizing and respecting the true starting point for both individuals and organizations, and yielding to it and working with it rather than fighting it, could significantly increase the likelihood of success. As E2.0 initiatives gain momentum, smaller successes breed larger ones. In addition, cultural values associated with social technologies can become integrated into the fabric of the organization and internalized by individuals. In other words, even if they’re not an input, they can become an outcome.

Too often, because of anticipated resistance (perceived or real), we take an adversarial approach to change. In truth, however, the best way to influence and move others may be to change ourselves first.

What do you think? Does a gentle or yielding approach to change resonate with you? Do you know of any organizations where these principles were applied successfully? Please share your thoughts, examples, and questions to create and further the dialogue.

- Courtney Shelton Hunt, PhD 

Image: Microsoft clipart

SMinOrgs' First Official Group Photo

As I mentioned in my last post, I recently participated in The Conference Board’s Social Media Strategies for HR (SM4HR) Seminars in New York City. And as fate would have it, a number of other members of the SMinOrgs Community were there as well - some as presenters, some as attendees. I had hoped to get a group photo of all of us, but the best I could manage was this photo of some of us as we were leaving on Tuesday. Here's who's in the shot, from left to right:

• Elizabeth Lupfer
• Victorio Milian
• Mystery woman (not a member - yet)
• Steve Boese
• Jennifer McClure
• Yours truly
• Christine Hess
• April Ozcan (not a member - yet)
• CV Harquail

Other SMinOrgs members who participated include:

• Steven Lambert
• Eric Meyer
• Monica Swanson

It was a great event overall, with high-quality presentations and lots of rich content. The thing I liked best, though, was the growing synergy I sensed. Clear thought leaders and champions have emerged, and there's a strong feeling of camaraderie and mutual support. We're still in the very early days of recognizing the impact of new digital technologies in organizations - and particularly in understanding the leadership role that HR professionals can and should take - but the clarion call is getting louder.

We live in exciting times...

- Courtney Shelton Hunt

PS - I just created a board called SMinOrgs Photos on our Pinterest page. I'm looking forward to adding more photos from future events!

The New Digital Divide: Thoughts for Leaders and Laggards

The digital divide has increasingly become about knowledge and adoption of new technologies rather than access. Which side of the divide are you on - are you a leader or a laggard? This post offers insights into the factors contributing to the growing chasm between those who have embraced and leveraged new technologies and those who haven’t. It also offers suggestions for bridging and crossing the divide. Dialogue is encouraged and insights and questions from others are welcome.

For most of the early part of the Digital Era, we viewed the digital divide primarily in demographic terms such as geography, socioeconomic status, and age (see this Wikiepedia entry for details). But as digital technologies continue to improve, get less expensive and grow more widespread, those gaps are closing or becoming less relevant. Gaps based on knowledge and use, however, remain strong – and in fact may be getting larger. Over time it seems – and especially with respect to the adoption of social and 2.0 technologies in organizations – the digital divide is defined less by “we can’t” and more by “we don’t wanna.”

In this post I share my thoughts on six key realities that help put the current divide in perspective and offer food for thought, particularly for later adopters and technology resisters. It’s not intended to be an indictment against laggards and luddites – rather, my intent is to offer a practical assessment and generate dialogue about the challenges we face as technology increasingly outstrips our willingness and ability to embrace, adopt, and master it. To help us figure out how to move forward, I also share a few ideas on what it will take – both collectively and individually – to bridge and cross the divide.

What other realities and challenges do you see? What questions and concerns do you have? What additional ideas would you offer for bridging and crossing the divide?

As always, your comments and questions are welcome.

- Courtney Shelton Hunt, PhD

PS – I’ll be following this post with one focused on how everyone can increase their digital competencies. Be sure to check back and/or subscribe to the blog (via RSS feed, email and more) to be notified as soon as it’s published.

 

Understanding the New Digital Divide

The more I speak to and work with individuals and organizations to help them adapt to Digital Era realities and adopt new social and digital technologies and tools, the more clear certain realities become. Here are some I’m reminded of on a daily basis.

It’s never been so easy to do so much with so little. The technological and financial barriers to adoption of incredibly powerful tools and platforms are generally very low. Free and low-cost options are abundant. In addition, software-as-a-service (SaaS) and cloud-based networks reduce (or eliminate) the need for large investments in hardware. New software and hardware also dramatically increase the ease of design, drastically reduce the time to implementation, and significantly enhance long-term system flexibility.

New technologies create a “people paradox.” Although the idea is counter-intuitive to many, people are much more central to the Digital Era opportunities and challenges we face than technology. As I discuss in Social Media: From Novelty to Utility, digital technology is an enabler – a means to various ends rather than an end in and of itself. We must view these new technologies as sources of power and recognize the importance of human beings in determining the effectiveness of our ability to harness and manage that power.

The (r)evolution is bigger than we think. Many people falsely assume that new technologies only impact organizations in certain sectors (e.g., consumer goods and services), specific functional areas (e.g., marketing), and individuals in certain types of jobs and professions (e.g., IT) or at particular stages in their work lives and careers (e.g., digital natives). The reality, however, is that new technologies potentially impact every type of worker, in every sector, at every career stage and every organizational level, throughout the world.

We get in our own way. Though technological and financial barriers may be low, psychological barriers to new technology adoption are very high. These barriers are both cognitive and affective, and each type of resistance reinforces the other. The foundation of the resistance is a lack of conceptual understanding of how new technologies enable the pursuit and achievement of traditional goals (i.e., they’re new tools for doing old things (in new ways)). This lack of understanding leads to:

• Underestimating opportunities
• Overestimating challenges
• Misestimating risks

We live in the past and like to play it safe. Temperamentally, most humans have a tendency to look backward rather than forward. We concentrate more on “how things have always been done” rather than what’s possible. We’re also generally risk averse, especially when evaluating options that can produce potential gains. Given a choice, most of us prefer the “devil we know” to the “angel we haven’t met yet.”

We’re conditioned to be Luddites. Another significant barrier is that most organizations – from schools to public sector entities to for-profit enterprises – are dominated by Industrial Era thinking and operations. Ironically, even though our natural tendencies are cognitively subjective, procedurally relational, and interpersonally social and collaborative, most of us learn and work in environments that emphasize objectivity, linearity, and (isolated) individualism.

Bridging and Crossing the Divide

To me, leadership is the key to bridging and crossing the new digital divide. And it can occur in multiple forms:

Thought leaders and champions need to not just trumpet the “cool” aspects of new technologies, but also their practical benefits. They need to frame their arguments from the perspective of what people need to hear rather than what they want to say. And they themselves need to think bigger and more broadly about the phenomena they’re touting.

Formal organizational leaders need to educate themselves about new technologies, their applications, and their implications. Doing so will enable them to provide the strategic direction and the capacity – especially in terms of human capital – their organizations need to move forward. It will also enable them to adapt their leadership styles to enhance their ability to be successful in new operating environments.

Educators at all levels – and especially in higher education – also need to educate themselves about new technologies and their applications and implications. They need to then use their new-found knowledge and understanding to update their curricula and pedagogical practices, as well as their research questions and methods.

Informal leaders who understand new technologies and their benefits and challenges can help others make the necessary transitions by being champions and cheerleaders, leading by example, and offering guidance, instruction, and encouragement.

Self-leadership means we will all take it upon ourselves to understand new digital technologies and make educated and informed choices about which technologies we will embrace and leverage. We’ll also commit to learning and excelling at the competencies necessary for Digital Era success.

 

Related Resources

10 Digital Era Truths

12 Hopes for 2012: Enhanced Adoption of Digital Technologies

The Social Media ROI Challenge: What it Really Means (and 7 Related Faulty Assumptions)

Social Media: From Novelty to Utility

Social Media Engagement: 7 Rules for Working Smart, not Just Hard

Social Media Engagement: 5 Guiding Principles

Social Media: Coping with Time and Information Management Realities

What Does it Take to be a Leader in the Digital Era?

Digital Era Leadership: The Role of Business Schools

Social Media Education and Training: Where We Are. Where We’re Going.

Social Media Policies and More: Checklist Guidance for Managing Digital Era Risks

Most organizations – even those that are highly engaged with social media and other digital technologies – are not addressing Digital Era risks as comprehensively or deeply as they could or should. This post helps organizational leaders close gaps in their risk management strategies by offering checklist guidance focused on both outcomes and processes. Additional recommendations are welcome.

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Recently I participated in The Conference Board’s Social Media Strategies for HR (SM4HR) Seminars, and one of my roles was to facilitate a working group session entitled “Social Media Policy and Beyond.” During the small group discussions and large-group report outs, I was pleased to hear how many organizations are engaging in best practices such as:

• Recognizing that policies and guidelines have to be customized to match the culture and operating characteristics of the organization
• Involving representatives from multiple functional areas to develop those policies and guidelines
• Providing interactive training for employees to ensure they understand their rights and responsibilities
• Reviewing policies and guidelines at least annually to ensure they’re current

At the same time, however, it was also evident that most of the organizations were not addressing Digital Era risks as comprehensively or deeply as they could or should. To help others avoid or close similar lapses and gaps, I thought it would be worthwhile to update and reshare the checklist guidance I included in Social Media Polices: Necessary but not Sufficient.

What else would you add to the list? As always I welcome your comments and questions.

- Courtney Shelton Hunt

PS - Please refer back to the longer post for more comprehensive and in-depth treatment of the topic. Although some of the content in that post is now dated, the core principles and recommendations are still very relevant.

 

INTRODUCTION

Every organization needs to think about and be prepared to manage the risks associated with operating in the Digital Era. It doesn’t matter whether social media is part of the organization’s strategic agenda, or if the organization itself has any deliberate digital presence. It also doesn’t matter how large the organization is, whether it’s for-profit, BtoB or BtoC, or which industry or sector it operates in. To put it simply:

If you employ people, you should have a social media policy.

Digital Era risks exist regardless of an organization’s focus on technology, and/or the personal feelings of that organization’s leaders about social media and other 2.0 tools. Managing those risks is part of the cost of doing business, and managing them well can be a competitive differentiator, in both the economic marketplace and the war for talent. Generally speaking, however, there is no simple solution or “one size fits all” approach, and a “fix-it-and-forget-it” strategy is one few organizations can afford.

Creating a social media policy of some sort is necessary for all organizations, but it's hardly sufficient to manage all the Digital Era risks organizations face. Drafting and implementing a social media policy should be considered part of a larger effort to ensure that an organization’s employment policies reflect Digital Era realities, and that both employees and managers understand not just the “new” rules, but also how “old” rules apply in the new era (see Social Media: From Novelty to Utility for best practice guidance for managing social media). Organizations must also reexamine and update their operational policies, as well as their legal agreements and contracts. And if they have active digital communities, both externally and internally, they need to have proper engagement guidelines in place, as well as updated crisis management plans.

Enhancing an organization’s ability to manage Digital Era risks requires leaders to think about both outcomes (the “what”) and processes (the “how”).

 

OUTCOMES

There are several things every organization should do to ensure they’re managing Digital Era risks with a holistic, systemic, and integrative approach. Here’s a high-level checklist of the main activities:

• Determine your overall strategic approach to leveraging social media for both internal and external purposes. Although the strategy is likely to change, it’s a key starting point that lays a foundation for understanding the necessary changes to existing policies, guidelines, and agreements.
• Develop a social media policy for all employees.
• Review/revise all operational and employment policies to reflect Digital Era technologies (both hardware and software) and realities.
  • Note: The longer post provides a more detailed treatment of the legal landscape, including business conduct considerations, labor and employment considerations, and the changing legal environment.
• Craft social media guidelines for employees who interact with outsiders and/or represent the organization via social media channels.
  • Note: as discussed in the longer post, there are important differences between social media policies and social media guidelines. Be sure you understand them.
• Create and/or update your user agreements and guidelines for the intranet and other internal systems – especially those that include 2.0 features and functions.
• Update employment agreements (e.g., non-compete agreements) and other legal documents (e.g., non-disclosure agreements) to reflect Digital Era technologies and realities.
• Address “ownership questions” related to social media accounts, content, and digital networks, particularly with key agents (e.g., officers, development professionals, marketing and sales folks).
• Determine a fair and consistent (and realistic) approach to monitoring, enforcement, and discipline.
• Create posting guidelines and moderation rules for outsiders who may engage with your organization via one of its social media channels (see this blog post for more on managing comments in online communities).
• Incorporate social media and digital technologies into your general crisis management plans and develop a specific crisis management plan for your digital properties.

 

PROCESS

Ideally, organizations should be proactive in managing Digital Era risks, rather than waiting for a threat or crisis to force them to reactively develop and implement a hasty solution. Thoughtfulness and thoroughness are important, but time is also of the essence. Therefore, it’s important to proceed with “mindful flexibility,” which requires being both strategic and goal focused, as well as adaptable –and to emphasize procedural efficiency as well as effectiveness.

There are a number of web-based resources that provide detailed guidance on developing and implementing social media policies and guidelines. Here are some of my recommendations:

Create a policy team

• Involve multiple stakeholders from relevant functional areas:
  • Externally-oriented groups: marketing, sales, public relations, customer service
  • Internally-oriented groups: human resources, knowledge management, IT, organizational development, learning & development
  • Both: in-house counsel
• Employ outside experts who can provide sophisticated guidance from various perspectives:
  • Social media and other digital technologies
  • Federal and state laws and issues (and perhaps global too)
  • Business development
  • Human capital management

Develop a project plan and guidelines

• Set clear deadlines so you don’t get bogged down by bureaucracy and semantic arguments.
• Coordinate the policy/guidelines initiative with other social media development and implementation initiatives (see Part 7 of the Social Media Primer for more).
• Identify overarching principles, goals and objectives that will provide a framework for your revision efforts and reflect:
  • Industry and nature of the business
  • Strategic priorities (both in general and in relation to social media)
  • Guiding values (including ethics)
  • Cultural context and workforce characteristics
  • A balance between legal and business perspectives
  • A balance between employer and employee perspectives

Review, refine, and create policies, guidelines, legal agreements, etc.

• Identify the best approach to specifically addressing the use of social media.
  • Options include developing something new (i.e., a single, multi-faceted policy, or multiple policies) or updating existing polic(ies) – or some combination of the two.
  • It’s okay to leverage benchmarked resources to create both policies and guidelines, but ensure they’re properly vetted and customized as needed. Note: The longer post provides links to dozens of examples that can be used as a starting point.
• Try to build as much durability into the policies/guidelines/agreements as possible:
  • Balance broad, general wording with specificity
  • Recognize that the digital engagement of both individuals and the organization are going to increase over time
  • Allow for flexibility as new case law and regulations develop
  • Prepare for technologies, platforms, and devices that could be used in the future

Provide training and ongoing communication

• Prepare and provide training for
  • Community managers and other “official” social media users (including crisis management)
  • Non-managerial employees
  • Managerial employees
• Communicate the final policy/ies, guidelines, and agreements and establish a method for providing regular reminders using a multimedia, tiered approach.
• Where necessary, have all employees sign updated agreements.
• Include training focused on digital risk management in new employee orientation and supervisors’ training.

Lather, rinse, repeat

• Plan for regular reviews/revisions to policies, guidelines, and agreements to reflect new technologies, legal/regulatory changes, and case law.
• Offer updated training for employees and supervisors at least once annually.

What Does it Take to be a Leader in the Digital Era?

How should we define the keys to successful leadership now that we are fully immersed in the Digital Era? This post shares diverse perspectives on the core characteristics and offers preliminary thoughts on integrating ideas and identifying themes. Readers are invited to contribute additional ideas, insights, and analysis.

Background

As the Founder of both the Social Media in Organizations (SMinOrgs) Community and the Global Center for Digital Era Leadership (GCDEL), I regularly think about the keys to successful leadership, especially in the Digital Era. Last summer I decided to formalize my thinking by developing a set of core characteristics for Digital Era leaders. After working on an initial list of defining traits, I thought it might be worthwhile to crowdsource additional ideas. So I posed the following question via the Digital Era Thinkers (DET) Blog, on LinkedIn, and in a number of digital communities:

Thinking across sectors and disciplines, but focusing on the role of digital technology in organizations, economies, and societies, what do you think are the most important aspects for leaders to be successful?

The response was fantastic. Dozens of people weighed in, many providing thoughtful, interesting, and enlightening insights and perspectives that highlighted the complexity of the issue.

It was immediately evident this was going to be a bigger undertaking than I initially thought. So I asked Jerry Carducci (who has written guest posts for both the DET Blog and the SMinOrgs S.M.A.R.T. Blog) to join me in creating a unifying structure to make sense of the ideas and themes that had already emerged, as well as the new thinking that was likely to develop as the project continued to evolve. We then invited Karin Wills, another thoughtful Digital Era thinker, to join the project as well.

 

Diverse Perspectives

The raw feedback to my initial query (including some responses from me) offers great food for thought:

Defining Characteristics of Digital Era Leaders – Comments

A few things to keep in mind as you review these comments:

• The comments are grouped by source, which are listed in alphabetical order. All the sources are hyperlinked, though most require membership to access the details. If you have problems with the hyperlinks, please send a message to DEL@gcdel.org and we'll help you troubleshoot.
• The comments are listed in chronological order within each source, with the oldest listed first. They are copied exactly as they were originally typed, with no editing. The authors’ names are not included because most of the comments were made in semi-private spaces.

Additional thinking on the subject can also be found through the following:

• Social Power And The Coming Corporate Revolution
• S.M.A.R.T. News: Social Leadership I
• Recent discussions on GovLoop
  • How Will the Advancement in Technology Affect Leadership Styles in the Future
  • Government 2.0 Club discussion (beginning April 9, with link to post above)

 

Integrating Ideas and Identifying Themes

As Jerry dived into the details and we had several discussions about how to integrate our own perspectives with the input of others, we identified a few key themes, including:

• A Digital Era leader can be characterized by both the presence and absence of specific characteristics. We must think about not only what they should do, but what they should not do.
• The distinctions between what it takes to successfully lead a technology company and what it takes to lead other types of organizations are becoming less pronounced.
• Certain leadership characteristics (e.g., strategic thinking) are timeless, whereas others (e.g., relationship management) require a degree of redefinition. Still others may be altogether new.

Here's one proposed way of organizing the requisite skills (click to enlarge the image). We know there are others and will continue refining our perspective, but this provides something concrete for people to consider.

Your Thoughts?

  As we move forward with the project, we’d like to invite more people to weigh in on the fundamental question, as well as some of the nuances that the initial set of perspectives has surfaced.  Specifically, we’d love to hear people’s thoughts on the following:

• What characteristics (including traits, knowledge, skills and behaviors) do you think leaders need to have to be successful in the Digital Era?
• Do these characteristics vary based on leadership role within the organization (e.g., team based, mid-level, C-Suite and board room)? Should they be weighted differently?
• Do factors such as sector (e.g., public, private, nonprofit, education, healthcare) create a different set of critical success factors? How about factors like workforce characteristics, market and other demographics, or geography?
• Would the same factors apply to cultural, social and political leaders as they do to organizational leaders?
• Are there hidden and forthcoming trends that should be factored in the analysis?

We look forward to and welcome your views along these lines, as well as any additional thoughts and insights you’d like to share.

- Courtney Shelton Hunt, PhD
- Jerry Carducci
- Karin Wills

Managing Your Professional Brand in the Digital Era

Four recent SMinOrgs (Social Media in Organizations) S.M.A.R.T. Blog posts focus on professional branding, including enhancing your LinkedIn profile, dressing for success in cyberspace, and new best practices for phone calls. This post provides a recap of and links to these posts, which were some of the most popular SMinOrgs posts so far this year. Though they're targeted primarily to social media rookies, even more sophisticated users can find a gem or two.

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I have been publishing one-two S.M.A.R.T. Blog posts each week so far this year, and I am going to try keep that pace up for the foreseeable future. To make it easier to share the posts with subscribers to the Digital Era Thinkers blog, I have "chunkified" the posts based on unifying themes.

The focus of this "chunk" of posts is professional branding. Scroll down to read more about:

• Enhancing Your LinkedIn Profile
• Dressing for Success in Cyberspace
• Thinking before You Dial 

Future "chunks" will focus on

• Guidance for social media engagement
• Creating your own private social networks
• Scrutinizing the social media activity of job candidates, employees, and students
• Managing digital communities 

Most of the posts have already been written, so feel free to explore the S.M.A.R.T. Blog if you'd like to read them now. If you want to be notified of new blog posts as soon as they are published, please subscribe to the SMinOrgs blog.

Courtney Shelton Hunt, PhD
Founder, Social Media in Organizations (SMinOrgs) Community

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Enhancing Your LinkedIn Profile

In late January I wrote the first part of a 3-part "crawl-walk-run" series on LinkedIn profiles. I published Part II in early March. The popularity of these pieces serves as a great reminder of how many people are still social media rookies looking for best practice guidance. Here's a recap of each:

7 Simple To Dos for LinkedIn Rookies to Enhance Their Profiles

This post provides seven basic recommendations that can help LinkedIn (LI) rookies upgrade their profiles from anemic to respectable. These tasks can be tackled in as little as an hour (and no more than a half-day session) and will produce a solid basic presence that also lays a foundation for future development.

Click here to read the post.

Enhancing Your LinkedIn Profile II: 7 More Tasks and 21 Tips

Building on the earlier post, this piece offers additional guidance to help professionals upgrade their LI profiles incrementally. It describes seven tasks that can be tackled in one sitting or over several sessions. These tasks include adding digital links, creating a summary and adding specialties, selecting representative skills and expertise, and customizing one's public profile. Each task includes specific tips that reflect best practices and/or maximize the profile's potential effectiveness. 

Click here to read the post. 

Check out the Spotlight on LinkedIn email from last fall for links to more posts addressing status updates (including Twitter) and the effective use of groups. Future posts will include Part III of the LI profile series and some guidance on using the poll feature.

 

Dressing for Success in Cyberspace

Building on the popularity of the LinkedIn profile pieces, as well as some of the things I have written about the practice of social screening of job candidates, I decided to create updated guidance for individuals to properly manage their professional brand in the cloud, not just on earth...

Dressing for Success in Cyberspace: Giving Yourself a Digital Make-Over

You pride yourself on your professional appearance and demeanor. You strive to create and maintain a strong identity and reputation within your organization, with your clients and peers, and in your industry. But are you as diligent a custodian of your professional brand in cyberspace as you are in the physical world? If not, you probably need a digital make-over... This post provides guidance for critiquing, updating, and maintaining your digital presence to convey a positive professional identity in cyberspace throughout your career.

Click here to read the post.

 

Think before You Dial

Transitioning to a new era requires not only understanding the proper etiquette for using "new" tools, but also rethinking what were once considered acceptable practices. With that in mind, I wrote...

Think Before You Dial: 3 Reasons Unplanned Phone Calls are a Poor Practice

In the Digital Era, new definitions of acceptable and unacceptable behavior have to address not only new ways of communicating, but traditional forms as well. This post offers three reasons why unsolicited, unplanned phone calls are generally a poor practice and reinforces the idea that we must constantly think about the best ways to maximize the efficiency and effectiveness of our communications, for both ourselves and others.

Click here to read the post.

Allstate "Social Media Boot Camp" Presentation Excerpts

In August 2010 I was invited to speak at Allstate's Supplier Diversity Exchange. This video clip includes excerpts from my presentation and the Q&A session that followed. Even though a year-and-a-half seems like an eternity in "social media time," the concepts and ideas I shared then are still relevant today, especially for social media rookies.

You can watch the embedded video below or view it on SlideShare. I hope you find it valuable.

- Courtney Shelton Hunt

 

Allstate "Social Media Boot Camp" presentation excerpts

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Blogging: A Comprehensive Beginner’s Guide (updated)

This blogging beginner's guide is intended for people who want to incorporate blogs into their organization’s social media efforts but aren’t sure where or how to begin. Individuals interested in blogging for personal/career management reasons, as well as folks aspiring to be professional bloggers, may also find the guide useful in helping them get started. The guide focuses on external blogs, but many of the concepts apply to internal blogs as well. This guide updates and extends the original blog post published in May 2011.

To many professionals blogging is still a foreign concept. Although virtually everyone has read them and some may even comment and subscribe, when it comes to thinking about how to leverage the tool themselves, people often freeze. They feel intimidated because they think their writing skills are not good enough, pressured by the prospect of having to create fresh content on a regular basis, and/or uncertain of how they are going to manage the time commitment.

Cyberspace is full of blogging “best practices,” rules and tips. Many of these guides are great, but they are not necessarily comprehensive and/or designed for people who are just getting started. Therefore, I thought I would create my own guide based on my interactions with social media rookies over the past few years, as well as my own experience as a relatively new blogger (since March 2010). The guide was originally published as a (long!) blog post in May 2011. The updated version updates and extends the content, in addition to presenting it in a more polished format.

You can view the guide through the embedded link below or directly via SlideShare.

As always, I welcome feedback. If you disagree with one of my recommendations, have a tip to add, and/or feel something was unclear, please do not hesitate to add a comment or question to the blog post or SlideShare page, or send an email to blogtips@sminorgs.net. Thanks!

- Courtney Hunt

 

Blogging: A Comprehensive Beginner's Guide

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