Why Social Business is Real Business

Here is my presentation from the Software 2012 conference in Oslo, Norway that closed today. The presentation is in Norwegian.

The Future of Collaboration: Everything melts together!

- What will happen to good old email? Will it die? Will it live? Or will it transform?

This is the question that will be asked by thousands and thousands participants from all over the world during the week ahead at Lotusphere 2012. This is the place to be if Collaboration and Social Business is what you care about.

I am not at Lotusphere this time and I do not know what will be announced from IBM during the week. But if we look around us on what is going on in the market and in the social collaboration world, we could make some qualified guesswork. So here is what my crystal globe tells me:

The melting pot
Everything will melt together; Email, chat, documents, blogs, activity streams, phone, sharing, discussions, communities and – not at least – business applications. You will all recognize it from lots of IBM presentations from the last years: Social Everywhere!

We know that documents (read: Sharepoint) have no value unless they are connected to people with skills on the documents content. They will have no value if you cannot find them without knowing where they are. They have no value if you cannot transform them into activities in teamwork with others. They have no value if you cannot attach discussions and people to them. To understand documents we have to get help from others. That is why even content management systems have to become social, in the meaning that both readers and editors are connected and able to collaborate on the spot and on the minute.

Social business apps
Even business applications get social! No matter what business application you are using at the moment, no matter what website you are on – they will all get the social tools you need to access skills, information, people, discussions and bookmarks in context with what your job is or what you are working on right now.

Social Everywhere means that you will se chat, unified communication (phone), email, discussions, people search, file sharing and search, task management, audio and video – everything melted together. All in one environment – in your preferred work space. On your preferred platform and device.

Social wherever you are
Mobility will be of high importance. Wherever you are you should be able to collaborate in a social context, doing the same actions you do by using a PC in your office. Your office will no longer be in a building, but in your pocket and in your head.

- Where is your office quarters, Arne, people ask me when I am on travel. And my answer is always the same: – Here! Just where I happen to be in the moment!

Will email die?
But what happens to good old email? Will it disappear? No, it will be there, but it will be different. Your traditional email client will transform into a social collaboration client. Unless you use Outlook, of course. Microsoft does not seem to catch what is going on in the market place. They seem to be stuck in their understanding of social as email and document sharing. I have never seen a presentation from Microsoft talking about social. But I have heard about a Microsoft presentation saying: – We don’t do social! That is probably why you have to buy loads and loads of third-party stuff to try to make Microsoft social.

Will Lotus Notes die?
So what will happen to the Lotus Notes client? Well, part of it has already happened. It’s based on an open platform so you could plug-in every social application you fantasy may let you think of. And I believe you will see that coming on even stronger. I believe you will se an even stronger social collaboration client coming. And I believe you will se social email that integrates with whatever you have from before, no matter what email server you use. I believe you will se email that appear in you intranets website being in context with your job and activities you are working on.

Desktop office will die – slowly
I also believe that in the future you will not need to install a productivity suite like Microsoft Office on your computer. Text editors, spreadsheets and presentations will be an integrated part of your intranet. And it will be compatible with almost any document standard you might want. And, as if that wasn’t enough – your documents will be social – in the meaning that more that one editor will be able to work at the document at the same time – simultaneous editing! Of course this productivity suite will be enabled in every setting you may be – intranet, business application, collaboration suite – wherever, whenever ad on whatever device.

Tomorrow is on monday!
IBM is the undisputed number one leader into the new area of collaboration. I am convinced that IBM will show you this at Lotusphere 2012. I am sure some of my predictions will come true during the week – at least it will be i that directions. But we will have to wait for the details and the demo’s!

I believe the future will be here already on monday morning! Have fun!

Social Business is Real Business!

Change or die!

If a modern business want to stay a modern business in today’s business climate – it has to change their way of working and collaboration – and become a true Social Business.

The headline Social Business is Real Business is the title of my speech at Software 2012, a three-day conference from 7 – 9  february, held in Oslo, Norway.

- Well, we have a page on Facebook, so we are already social! I am sure you have heard this from many IT-managers, PR and Communications Advisers, CIO’s and CEO’s. They are using a few Social Media and think they are social businesses.

It simply isn’t that simple!

What about all the internal processes? How do geographically fragmented companies collaborate internally? How do they connect with each other? How do they share knowledge? How do they find the right employees with the right skills for the right project – in minutes?

- We use email. We share documents!

So you do what all the others do? How do you differentiate yourself from your competitors? And, to be honest, what value does a document have, except securing a lot of work for those who file them? Does documents make any money for your company? Even if they are shared?

Of course not! You may read as many books and documents you want, but they does not create any value until the knowledge in these documents are transformed into activities.

Only people doing activities are creating value! That is why your business has to become people and activity oriented! That is why you have to integrate social collaboration tools into every business process and into every application, so you can connect people to other people, connect people to information and create insight through the whole organization! And to achieve that you have to create a transparent organization!

It’s all about culture!

Culture eats strategy for lunch! No matter what strategy you have. It is all about your corporate culture. A culture of sharing and collaborating transparently.

A true Social Business does more than using public social media channels. That is well enough for marketing, media and public relations. But it does not make your company and employees more skilled, more effective, more engaged, more nimble.

Therefore you have to rethink how you do your business internally. Find out how you can connect every employees brain cells together so that they become more creative together, use their collective IQ for the company’s and their own growth and value.

That is, shortly, what Social Business is all about.

I will talk more about that at the Software 2012 Conference. See you there!

Social Business boosts you financial performance and increases share value!

Transforming your traditional business into a true Social Business will increase you revenue, make your employees more productive and  finally boost your companys finances and share value!

It is not me saying this, but McKinsey, in their article “ How social technologies are extending the organization” published on their website McKinsey Quarterly.  They have made a study among 4.200 global executives and have done some interesting findings.

When adopted at scale across an emerging type of networked enterprise and integrated into the work processes of employees, social technologies can boost a company’s financial performance and market share, respondents say, confirming last year’s survey results.

Executives at internally networked organizations note the highest improvement in benefits from interactions with employees; those at externally networked organizations, from interactions with customers, partners, and suppliers. Executives at fully networked organizations report greater benefits fromboth internal and external interactions.

Read for yourselves here!

Social kudos releases energy in your business!

Ever wanted to tap a colleague on the shoulder and say ” Well done!” but not being able to do that because this colleague was on the other side of the earth?

My father, who had his management skills from the army, once told me: – If you want to criticize someone for doing a bad job then do it under four eyes. But if you want to honor them for a well done job, do it in public!

My father was wise man. But he lived in those days when social business was practiced face-to-face and you could formerly smell a mans fear or joy.

In todays fragmented world, where we are all over the world and our employees and bosses are spread around, unable to meet you face-to-face. How do you do that?

Give them a Kudo on the social intranet! Let the whole company see that this man/woman has done a hell of a good job and is an excellent employee! In IBM we use a small widget called BlueThanks where we send out gratitude to someone we think deserve it.

For those of you using IBM Connections there is a super solution for this. The IBM Business Partner ISW has made a solution named Kudos Badges. With this you can send Kudos to those you mean has earned them. And the Kudos Badges will show on their profile page!

Remember all those badges you earned when you were a scout? Remember how proud you were? Remember how you looked up to those who had more badges that you? Remember how much energy that gave you? How much this inspired you to get more skills and become a little better every day? That is what Kudos do to you. It empowers you and releases your energy.

So why not check it out? The link is here!

Ginny Rometty visited my home office!

After her first day in her new role, IBM’s CEO Ginny Rometty, visited my home office!

She actually looked me into my eyes and told me about her dreams and visions for IBM in the time ahead. Good old Sam Palmisano never did that. He was a good boss, but he only sent me an email where I were only one of more than 400.000 receivers. Nothing wrong with that, but Ginny looked me into my eyes. And that means a lot more to me. It creates trust!

What Ginny did was establishing a community called THINKtogether in our internal social network IBM Connections and published a video where she spoke about her thoughts and visions for the future. This was a very personal way to do it and made me feel like she talked to me only.

I call this good communication. She did it the way an excellent communicator should. Engaged, confident, friendly and trustworthy.

And the community she established gave the community members an opportunity to comment on her message. She let the door open for dialogue with her fellow IBM’ers.

This tells me that Ginny Rometty is already showing leadership by using the new way of working – via social collaboration tools – not by using the old and boring email technique.

This tells me that Ginny ( I always use the first name of people who have visited me at home) is a true social collaborator and understands fully what a Social Business is.

Does Social Software have any value?

If you are in doubt wether social software has any value for your company or not – do like you always do: Measure it!

Well, thats easy to say and more complex to do. Maybe that is the reason for so many managers say: – Social is a waste of time and money. We make refrigerators. What is so social about that?

They believe “social” is what their kids do. Facebook. Kids stuff.

But is it really? Why not give “social” a chance, read up on it, have a look at professional social solutions for businesses. And why not measure the value of it and make it a business case?

- How do I do that, you might ask. Easy. There is help. IBM has published a new White Paper with the title “Measuring the value of social software”.

The white paper looks at how to measure the effectiveness and value of a social software initiative, what tools are available to capture key metrics, and what to take into consideration when establishing a measurement approach.

• Contents
• Why measure?
• Defining objectives
• Types of measurement
• Measurement levels
• Measurement tools
• Sample reports
• Creating a measurement approach

Download the White Paper here (PDF)!

Is social business the reason for IBM’s success?

Yes! That is my short answer to the title of the post.

A year ago I traveled around Norway on a Lotus Roadshow presenting Social Business as a concept for transforming businesses into a new age.

One of my foils showed the value growth of IBM shares vs. Microsoft shares from 2005 to 2011. Why I chose 2005? Because that was the year IBM wrote the first business guidelines for the use of social media and started with our first steps within a new way of collaboration.

One of the most imperative reasons for IBM’s success is the fact that the use of social collaborate tools has made it possible for the company’s 400.000 employees to increase their personal productivity, get access to relevant information faster and build a sharing culture.

Of course it is not the social collaboration tools only that is the reason for this success, but it is a main part of it.

IBM Connections and IBM LotusLive are now the main tools I use for collaboration both internally and externally in my daily work for IBM. At the end of each work day there are only five emails I have not dealt with. These maximum five emails are flagged and is the first actions I do on the following workday.

I move more and more of my collaboration both with colleagues and customers into IBM Connections (internally) and IBM LotusLive (externally). I use Communities and Activities heavily and thus have full control of everything (documents, presentations, emails, files, todo’s, plans, links, deadlines etc.) on every matter I deal with.

And it has changed my life from having my head and brain capacity totally occupied by my email inbox – to having structure and better brain bandwidth for creative thinking.

Mark Fidelman has written an interesting article in Business Insider sharing some of the same thoughts I have myself. He also take a look at the share value asking if the use of social collaboration tools is the reason for the growth.

Read his article here!

Ingen bruker sosiale verktøy mer enn IBM

IBM tar egen medisin. De snakker ikke bare om å være en Social Business – de er selve supereksemplet på det å være en moderne sosial forretning. Hele organisasjonen er gjennomsyret av sosial samhandling, både i tanker ord og gjerninger. Her er litt statistikk fra 2011.