Social Business (R) Evolution

Social Business
(R)evolution
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 Copyright 2011 – Martijn Linssen martijnlinssen.com
1/24
Social
The current world is abuzz about Social. Social

networks, social media, Social Business: all things social.
People, Twitterati and even a small number of companies
embrace the diverse ideas and notions of Social, trying to
sell and implement them
That movement is a natural counter reaction to the events

that have occurred over the last centuries: industrialisation
and automation has allowed industries, companies and
societies to grow beyond belief
Where in the 1600’s the Dutch East India company was the
largest private company in the world with 50,000 employees
1
, nowadays a company like Walmart has 2,000,000
employees, and there are hundreds of companies around
the world with more than 100,000 employees: the top 50 of
the Global 500, sorted by number of employees, ends at
256,000 for Daimler2
Countries have equally super structured themselves: around

1600 China had 120 million inhabitants, and the whole of
Europe 78 million3. Today, China counts 1,300 million
inhabitants, and Europe 730 million
Countries and continents increased tenfold in terms of

population, companies forty-fold: unbelievable edifices
of organisation have become required to uphold them.
Hierarchy, a seemingly endlessly scalable organisation form
with one man and a Board of Directors, or a King or Queen
and Parliament at the top, and the final product- or
customer-facing employee, or person, at the bottom, many
levels down
On the other hand, people have become much smaller

organised on their own level: family size has imploded over
the last centuries4. Where there used to live 3 generations
or more within one household, that now is usually one or
two. The average number of children per household has also
declined from an estimated 5 in the Middle Ages5 to 2.5 now
1
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dutch_East_India_Company
2
http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/global500/2010/performers/companies/biggest/
3
http://www.enotes.com/peoples-chronology/year-1600/population
4
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_family
5
http://www.histoire-pour-tous.fr/en/dossiers/95-moyen-age/2630-croissance-demographique-au-moyen-
age.html
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The distance between the two different parts of the

equation has thus increased over time. Every-day
society and company size grew larger and larger, while the
direct and daily circle of close relatives grew smaller and
smaller.
Like a rubber band this contrast has been stretched and
stretched, and now seems to be snapping back. There is a
call for Socialisation where the organising form is
wirearchy6: horizontal networks over vertical pyramids
There are three kinds of Social: Social media like Twitter

and Facebook, social networks that have explosively
increased in size due to these media, and Social Business
(Design). Whereas Social Business design is coined by
Dachis7, the term Social Business is now more generally
embraced after Enterprise 2.0 – a highly tool-centric focus-
has become less appealing over the years
A big advocate of Social Business is Stowe Boyd:
A social business is an organization designed consciously

around sociality and social tools, as a response to a changed
world and the emergence of the social web, including social
media, social networks, and a long list of other advances.
Metaphorically, a social business will seem more like a
village than an army, and where a lot of 20th management
approaches will be obsolete. We can expect these features:
* ubiquitous use of social tools, and social networks,

* greater levels of personal autonomy,
* self-organization of groups and projects,
* very porous boundaries with the world,
* high reliance on non-financial motivation, or personal
meaning and purpose,
* internal marketplaces for ideas and talent,
* and senior management operating more like Hollywood
producers or investors than autocrats.8
A new world forming in the old world: evolution or

revolution?
Evolution is growth, revolution is change. Like the dinosaurs
evolved into animals of enormous size, unable to evolve
back, certain companies might face their fate as well, or be
subject to revolution. However, that seems to more apt for
societies and countries, and not companies, looking at
6
http://www.wirearchy.com/what-is-wirearchy/
7
http://www.dachisgroup.com/social-business-design/
8
http://www.stoweboyd.com/post/910572413/defining-social-business
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Tunis, Egypt, Lybia, and possibly also Yemen and Algeria at

this very moment
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Social enough?
The question is: what is not social enough to what

extent?
Again dividing the world into companies and societies, it is
clear that Social benefits in those areas where "size
matters"
Villages, small towns, rural neighbourhoods all are of

small size and seem to fare well, and intimacy is relatively
high. People know their neighbours by name, know what
they do, what their daily schedule is, might pay each other
frequent visits and exchange greetings or a few words when
they meet. There might be exceptions to that rule, but not
significant ones.
Cities, metropoles and metropolitan areas are on the other
side: not hundreds or thousands of inhabitants, but millions,
sometimes tens of million. People live in relative anonymity,
sometimes not even knowing even a single one of their
neighbours by name, passing each other in silence on the
streets
Local grocery stores, the well-known corner store,

small companies with up to 50 people, SMB – all those
are of small size as well. Usually the employees know each
other well, there is a low level of formality and they know
most customers as well.
People get recognised when they enter a store, or do
business – it is all rather intimate.
Multinationals, large companies, enterprises, Global 500:
these are vast organisations where one will never get to
know all colleagues, simply because there are so many of
them that they come and have gone before you had a
chance to meet them.
At some point people stop introducing themselves and start
wearing name tags or badges for convenience - the same
anonymity as in large cities is encountered
The trick with companies is the fact that people can be

customers, but also employees – sometimes both. Some
parts of social focus on customers, some on employees -
but both evolve around intimacy versus anonymity
When you know each other well, or fairly well, the threshold
for interacting is low. Vice versa, when there is a low
threshold for interacting, people will get to know one
another relatively easy, and well.
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Proximity among others makes for that, but this isn't a mere
physical one: cubicles don't really make for good interaction,
nor do apartment buildings, nor elevators - you can also be
too close to someone.
Distance: having colleagues in another building, region or
country however doesn't make for good interaction, if you
don't have a reason to interact with them: they'll probably
join, and, after a few years, leave the company without you
even noticing
The proximity - distance balance seems to coincide

with the intimacy - anonymity one. If there are 5 people
in a room, chances are very high that they'll first ask each
other questions, rather than someone else. If 100, there's a
different outcome.
However, you can't know the unknown. There is a 100%
chance that you'll interact more on Twitter and Facebook
with people across the globe than people living within a mile
radius of you; simply because you happened to get to know
the former, and not the latter.
Also, the tools are only needed to cross time and space; if
you don't need to do so, a face-to-face interaction is
preferred, and tools not needed. Do you call your neighbour
on the phone, or simply pay him or her a visit? Do you email
the person sitting across your desk?
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Social and Social Business
What are the drawbacks of this anonymity and distance in

societies and enterprises? Why would we converge from
the current world to the new world, be it by evolution
(gradually) or revolution (radically)?
Over the past years, social (business) evangelists and

devotees have described what social is, how it would work,
and how it would evolve - mainly focusing on society or
the customer, and not so much on the employee
Today, the world is getting increasingly connected. 500

million users on Facebook, 150 million on Twitter, 100 on
Orkut, 100 on LinkedIn: that is three quarters of a billion
people. That does include abandoned or scarcely used
accounts, and possibly only 10% of all these is actively
using social media across social networks - but still, that is
an enormous amount of people
All this happens with free tools, and out of free will. It
leads to new business via conferences, events, and products
such as microblogging that operate via a freemium or even
completely free model. However, the distance between this
digitised social world and the old-fashioned world is
increasing, and people are calling for a revolution - but that
is not likely to happen
Social isn't a fix for everything - nothing ever is. But existing
business could benefit from the current movement(s) out
there, the question being: which business exactly?
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The promises of Social Business
Many promises are made, and they all focus on closing the
gap between companies and customers, as well as
employers and employees - or vice versa. Social CRM
advocates claim the Social Customer is in charge now,
rather than the company, and Social Business advocates
stress an increasing autonomous role for employees and a
decreasing role for management, especially the middle layer
So there are two "battle fields" for Social: inside the

company, between employer and employee, and outside the
company, between company and customer. Connecting
employees to employees across business-, geographical and
political borders will be having effect as well, just as
connecting people to people is having already
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Employee to employer
Where can Social make a difference? In large companies

where employer and employee have become
disconnected by the distance in between them - not
the local corner stores. Ever heard of Entrepreneur 2.0?
Local corner store 2.0? SMB 2.0? No.
Enterprise 2.0 was the phrase, implicating that the size of
enterprises has caused a disconnect between employees and
customers - among others.
Professor McAfee made a second attempt to define his
Enterprise 2.0 definition back in May 20069 but never
answered any of the 65 comments to that post - proving his
theory wrong by showing that mere tools will simply not
make a difference or change old habits
Social can heal the wounds the enterprise inflicted on

people. People who go to work in the morning, and return in
the late afternoon or evening, and wonder why they're doing
all that, other than keep providing for their families.
The question is: if they haven't done that for themselves,
how can (Social) tools make them change their ways?
The most plausible answer is: given the lack of human

experience by the employee in large companies, the
introduction of the notion of Social Business could make
them feel better, hence more productive, thence the
business could benefit from that.
So there is a break-even somewhere, between company size
and employee involvement - here is how companies
evolve
Everyday a few companies are formed, nowadays one could

indeed have an idea in the morning and a company in the
afternoon. Many ideas lead to entrepreneurship, and
successful entrepreneurs get personnel and grow into a
company
A company can grow into a hundred, a few hundreds, a few

thousand employees: even if they all stay in one place, their
numbers will cause them to spread over different floors,
departments, and a 3 hour lunch time span because they
simply can't be seated and fed all at the same time
Such a company can become large, or even larger: an

enterprise.
9
http://andrewmcafee.org/2006/05/enterprise_20_version_20/
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Fair to say that an enterprise is connoted by some form of

anonymity: at least half of all employees won't know the
other half, possible one employee will only know up to 25%
of all employees by face and / or name. Their sheer number
drives not only a vertical separation across different floors,
but also a horizontal one across different buildings or even
locations. What kinds of enterprises are there?
A multinational is a large company, split across borders in

multiple locations: one will definitely know just a small
percentage of employees worldwide.
Needless to say that getting to know and keeping known
your fellow employees will be hard, across all that
distance
A bureaucracy is a different institution. Whereas there

can be a relatively good form of close personal contact in
enterprises and multinationals, a bureaucracy exists by way
of anonymity. To be able to treat each other - employees
and customers alike - with bureaucracy requires a certain
degree of carelessness.
Not knowing each other helps to uphold that lack of care
and respect. Rapid takeovers in succession, frequent
reorganisations, internal relocations, all that helps to keep
transparency low, anonymity high, and care out of the
window. It's pretty much how good neighbourhoods
grow into ghettos: when and where you end up only
knowing yourself and your neighbour next door (at best)
A faceless bureaucratic institution is the summum of a

bureaucracy. It is an organisation where the walls are so
thick and the organisational layers so dense, horizontally as
well as vertically, that no one has an incentive to do his or
her job anymore. The entire system is so overgrown that
anyone can safely blame someone else because the chances
of that someone else being reached in order to verify the
story are 0% - absolutely nil. Faceless bureaucratic
institutions can be easily recognised by an utter lack of
reward and punishment.
It's an organisation where anonymity and lack of care
have grown into or even beyond the extreme
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Customer to company
When it comes to companies and customers, the story is

different, but similar - distance or proximity is the major
factor once again. This time, it's the distance the customer
is willing to "bridge" in order to get the product or service
Are you buying a candy bar? A pack of cigarettes? A car, a

house? An insurance policy, a credit, a mortgage? Just a
beer, or your favourite brand? A tyre for your car? All
different products, with an entirely different lifetime, brand
awareness, and customer interest
The shorter the lifespan of a product, the less you'll

care where you bought it. The less difference between
buying product A from company X or company Z, the less
customers will care. Special products, unique products,
"feel-good" products, products that make a direct appeal to
you, those are different
The shorter a product's lifespan, the higher the chance that

the customer will remain unknown to the company
The longer the lifespan, the more time and energy

you'll want to invest in it, and the more difference a
good relationship will make
The higher the price, compared to other products, the more

you'll expect of a great product - in pre-sales, product itself,
and after-sales: the complete package
The longer a product's lifespan, the more data and

information a company will have on its customer
Somewhere along the lines, products change to services,

image: that 20,000 dollar watch is not just a clock, it's an
image - a personification. And people play a very large role
there in selling it. Social could add value in customer-
facing and employee-driven segments
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Employer to employee
There are companies where people see their manager every

day, and there are also companies where managers only
exist on paper and people get their appraisal at end of year
from a project leader, account manager or anyone else who
is not their manager
Infinite amounts of greyscale in between these two

extremes, but the employer-employee relationship is not fit
for benefiting from Social: Social is about connecting
unknown people to unknown people, establishing ties
that weren't there before. Called weak ties, these ties might
become strong, and turn into relationships as we know
them.
There already is a relationship between employer and
employee - they know each other and can easily get in
touch. Telephone, email, the tools have been there for
decades to cross that distance - Social is not adding
anything to that
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Employee to employee
There are plenty of examples where microblogging tools add

value to an enterprise. In a way, they are nothing more
than a company-wide email from an employee asking a
question, followed by a Reply-to-All. While frowned upon in
"emailtiquette", microblogging platforms are the place to be
for this way of communicating - they are in fact nothing
more than the old fashioned bulletin board where questions
are asked "to the world"
These tools cross national, regional, departmental and

time boundaries the same way telephone and email
have or allowed for, but telephone has a single point of
entry, and for some reason email groups and distribution
lists hasn't caught on as a way to reach hundreds or
thousands of like-minded people at once - it is the all-or-
nothing approach of enterprise microblogging that seems to
be successful - but there's more to it than that
We've had Usenet groups since 198010. In the nineties,

bulletin board systems11 were followed up by forums12 -
these served the same purpose and allowed for the same
interaction.
But, back in the 80's, only techy innovators and early
adopters had access to the internet. As a consequence,
Usenet groups have become associated with flame wars13
where users abuse one another like in ordinary scolding.
In the nineties, internet access became a little more
widespread but was limited to dial-up - every second
counted
Corporations started using forums for sharing knowledge,

but these also were via dial-up. Paying the bill for that
helped, but didn't make it widespread. Most communications
were dealt with on paper, and email wasn't something you'd
have to check daily.
With the spread of "ease of dialing in", and the current
"always on" of Internet access, be it locally to your house or
nationally when on the road, tapping into The Stream has
become a rule rather than an exception. Going across ISP
borders, there are still gains to make: the costs for roaming
are exorbitant14, but will change over time, just as
10
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usenet
11
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulletin_board_system
12
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_forum
13
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flaming_%28Internet%29
14
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roaming#Roaming_in_Europe
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outsourcing and offshoring benefit from differences between

countries that exist now will evaporate over time
What is Social? Does Social exist, really? Hasn't it

always existed? Some people argue for the latter, but the
truth is that many people are getting connected to each
other simply because technology and price allows them to.
The people's revolution of Tunis and Egypt weren't made
possible by Social, but by technology: flat rate Internet
access, and mobile to access it, turning each and every one
of them into a mobile headquarter and / or journalist.
Twitter and Facebook made for convenient platforms,
as the first global read-write single source of entry
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The benefits of Social Business
To answer that question, we need to look at another factor:

not size / distance or intimacy, but humans and machines
IT basically provides humans with machines. Or more

accurately, human tasks are slowly replaced by machine
tasks where possible
It takes time to turn human tasks into machine tasks, so

basically they shouldn't change while being built. They also
shouldn't change much after being built. That's why building
houses on sand was considered foolish millennia ago
already.
It's almost exactly like portrait painting. It's a lot easier
doing that when the model sits still, and when done the
result looks much more alike if the model doesn't change
too much after that
Knowing the how, now the question is: which human

tasks can be replaced by machines, or automated?
The closer you come to business, the more humans you'll

need. The further you move away from business, the more
machines you can use. Basically, business needs people,
and machine needs infrastructure
That puts humans on top in the IT food chain, and machines

at the bottom. Although arguably both depend on one
another and couldn't live without...
Having said that, there are very different properties for

humans and machines:
Machines serve automation. They are (and must be)

rigid, because what runs directly on top is simple and
static: great for storing business rules, they handle data
very well. They sit in the infrastructure layer
Humans serve people. They are (and must be) flexible,
because what they support is complex and dynamic:
great for handling business exceptions, they handle
information very well. They are part of the business layer
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Rules versus exceptions
The difference between rules and exceptions might

seem clear, but there is a fine line in between: known
errors. What are rules, what are exceptions, and what are
known errors? Understanding this is crucial to determine
where Social Business can, and can't, make a difference
In IT, the difference is clear: business rules are the rules

needed to follow in order to achieve a desired business
outcome of a business process, stepping through its process
steps.
Known errors? Functional known errors that can occur

during each process step, causing the process to double
back because business requirements weren't met.
An example would be someone trying to withdraw money
from an ATM without having the required funds,
Foreseeable, however unfortunate for the person at hand,
and thus a rule that is part of the business process, yet not
one leading to the expected outcome.
Exceptions? That is quite another story. Not talking

programmatic IT exceptions, but business exceptions.
If you want to have a perfect product, you will just follow
the business rules, and the known errors - but trying to turn
exceptions into known errors just doesn't give you a cost-
efficient return on investment.
Building an earthquake-proof tower in an earthquake-
sensitive area makes sense, but will you build it to
withstand an atom bomb?
No. It would take so much money to do so (let's just
assume it's doable) that it will make you a laughing stock
among the competition. While an extreme example, still, if
that event occurs, you will have to handle it.
Because exceptions can't be predicted, and they relatively

seldom occur, they can't be automated, and are thus left to
people to handle. But what if the same exception occurs
among communication borders? Even if there is no fix
present, it might be added to the list of known errors, and
automated, vastly saving time and cost of employees having
to handle it - and that's where Social Business kicks in
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Social Business definition
Having said that, here is my definition of Social Business:
Social Business deals with business exceptions rather

than rules, requiring flexible answers to complex
questions in dynamic environments. As such, it isn't
about giving predefined answers to predictable
questions, it is about giving unpredictable answers to
undefined questions.
Social Business serves best where an increased
distance between people on all sides is negatively
affecting business as a whole.
Social Business is best for establishing ties between
unknown people
Where would Social Business be applied best - inside the

company? Which department, which kind of people, where?
And where would Social Business be applied best - in
between the company and the customer? Which
industries, markets, sectors?
We can take the properties of social business as defined

above and see where they would make the biggest contrast:
after all they should fix an existing problem.
Doing so, we will even find out why Social Business is good
for some, and not so good for others
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Social Business Magic Quadrant
A Magic Quadrant for Social Business is depicted above.

It's a company-customer view, rather than an employer-
employee or employee-employee one
Focussing on the fact that Social is all about people handling

exceptions, diminishing the distance in between them and
connecting people across barriers, there are certain places
where Social will do more bad than good, simply put
Assembly lines, industries producing intermediate

goods: those are product-driven and product-facing. Any
chance of Social playing a positive role there? I doubt it,
that will do more wrong than right, from a company-
customer point of view.
Business rules are the rule here, and business exceptions
signs of extreme danger, rather than something unexpected
that can occur.
Business lines like these can outsource and offshore just
about everything, because it is all defined down to the very
last bit - not depending on people to fill in the blanks;
because there are no blanks
Product-driven yet customer-facing are food brands like

Coca Cola and McDonalds, who sell an experience rather
than a product. A drink is a drink, a burger is a burger, yet
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these companies sell an image rather than a good: they

deliver a product, but distinguish themselves by service.
They do that by making sure their product and service is
consistent all over the globe, yet diversified by country
Product-facing and employee-driven are brands such as

Zappos, that sell shoes yet deliver an extraordinary
customer service, including a 365-day return policy, and
24/7 customer service - they took an ordinary product and
turned that into an experience. Apple is an example there
too: a whole lot of human input is used to determine the
final product
Customer-facing and employee-driven are companies

that deliver services, rather than products: barbers or hair
stylists, system integrators, outsourced service desks
Where could Social attribute most in the company-customer

relationship? Where the focus is least on the product, and
most on the service - from a company-customer point of
view. Yet, there's an extra dimension: Social connects
unknowns, not knowns. Social CRM is an oxymoron 15 as
CRM is about existing, known customers whose full details
are on record within a company: Social can in this case at
best target unknown future customers among the ranks of
millions of fairly anonymous people - and once
"customerised", Social channels won't be used to address
them: they'll be put on record at the company and
addressed through the usual channels
So Coca Cola and McDonalds could benefit from Social

Business, by narrowing the gap between unknown
customers out there and their products and services - but is
that distance negatively affecting their business? And are
they willing to handle business exceptions?
Not product exceptions, their products are identical all
across the globe. Customer exceptions then, or service
exceptions? Most likely, but what kind and to what extent?
Zappos could very well benefit from Social Business, if

not doing so already, offering an always-on customer
support for their online sales, narrowing the distance and
putting people in contact with other people, handling their
product exceptions. These goods last considerably longer
than the ones above, which makes sense. Their price is also
considerably higher
15
http://www.martijnlinssen.com/2011/02/social-crm-oxymoron.html
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System integrators and hair stylists? On the one hand

they deliver services, on the other they know their
customers fairly well.
Outsourced service desks may be a good example here, who
deal with unknown customers by default, across a large
distance, and only handle exceptions.
They could greatly improve their service, that's for sure.
Make people feel known, not treating them as anonymous
one-size-fits-all employees, try to pinpoint their exceptions
to known, but service desks usually don't want to see their
customers a second time, let alone a third time.
Possibly the really best example here would be fashion
brands, turning unknown customers into trusted and loyal
fans?
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Social Enterprise Magic Quadrant
Within the enterprise, the same picture applies, again

replacing business rules by product, and business exceptions
by people
The employee value increases per quadrant, and this

gets really interesting.
To the bottom left are e.g. the people in outsourcing and
off-shoring, at least they should be: highly predictable,
boringly static work to be done there that anyone else could
do without prior knowledge.
To the upper right are e.g. the highly skilled people that
know and face their business and the customer's. Highly
experienced in matters on both sides, they function as
interpreters / translators, usually business-wise but
sometimes even including IT. They know both worlds inside-
out as well as outside-in.
To the bottom right, e.g. the marketing and sales
department. They operate on top of the product but are
specialised in outside-in thinking, trying to find ways to
attract more different customers to the same product.
To the upper left, e.g. secretaries and staffing. Experienced
in inside-out thinking
Looking at companies and system integrators in

particular, it is noted that often the upper right is off-
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shored or outsourced because that's where the cost is

highest. Think of help desks and customised software
development.
Is that the right motive? Maybe, but is it the right place?
Would that mean Social Business is bad for outsourced and
off-shored business? In my example, yes - but not in the
current situation where many customer-facing and
employee-driven work is outsourced or off-shored
Places less likely to benefit from Social Business are

the customer-facing, product-driven departments, reaching
out to each other in order to collect experiences gained from
previous engagements.
Employee collaboration and information exchange via a
single platform will function much like the old suggestion
box, where this time feedback is enabled, processing speed
is maximised, and everyone can contribute. Again, Social
Business will help to connect unknowns to unknowns, so this
will be beneficial for a global or multi-national company
where Enterprise 1.0 frontiers are preventing information or
knowledge exchange between employees
Places more likely to benefit from Social Business are

the product-facing, employee-driven departments, reaching
out to each other in order to collect experiences gained from
the internal processes.
What is there to optimise? Usually, a lot. Seemingly
disparate experiences across frontiers can, once again,
move part of exceptions to known errors.
Worth automating those? That depends on quantity of their
occurrence, and quality: similarity in exceptions can turn
them into known errors
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On the money
So where is the money? What tangible business benefits

are there to be retrieved by giving parts of your business a
Social Business edge?
The simple truth is that collaboration across borders can

turn an isolated business exception into a repeated business
exception pattern.
On a logical level, exceptions can become known errors and
sink into the lower layers of automation, or simply stay
where they are and be handled via a generic script.
Either way, people will have more time for other activities.
On a more human level, frequently asked questions can turn

into frequently answered questions, once more moving
humans out of that equation so they have more time for
more other activities
Yet, Social is about connecting unknowns to unknowns,

turning them into knowns: at some point there will be no
more unknowns to know, simply because you've reached
information saturation.
If your business is doing so well handling your customer
service across social channels, that simply means your
current channels are failing16
What is the business case for Social Business? Doing the

same with less, or doing more with the same. As Social
business is all about people, that means you can choose to
do more with the same amount of people, or the same with
less people. Turning exceptions into known errors or even
rules means a higher degree of automation, diminishing the
need for humans there as well
Do I foresee a Social Business Revolution? No, none at all. I

do foresee a slow Social Business Evolution, in some
departments of some companies, which are employee-
driven and facing unknown customers.
I also foresee a small, slow Social Enterprise Evolution for
those companies where knowledge sharing and
management has failed for decades - then again that
encompasses the vast majority of companies...
Sorry, I really tried. Have I maybe overlooked something?
16
http://www.martijnlinssen.com/2011/01/social-customer-service-proving-you.html
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Social Business (R) Evolution

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Social Business (R) Evolution

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Social Business

The current world is abuzz about Social. Social

That movement is a natural counter reaction to the events

Countries have equally super structured themselves: around

Countries and continents increased tenfold in terms of

On the other hand, people have become much smaller

The distance between the two different parts of the

There are three kinds of Social: Social media like Twitter

A big advocate of Social Business is Stowe Boyd:

A social business is an organization designed consciously

* ubiquitous use of social tools, and social networks,

A new world forming in the old world: evolution or

Tunis, Egypt, Lybia, and possibly also Yemen and Algeria at

The question is: what is not social enough to what

Villages, small towns, rural neighbourhoods all are of

Local grocery stores, the well-known corner store,

The trick with companies is the fact that people can be

The proximity - distance balance seems to coincide

Social and Social Business

What are the drawbacks of this anonymity and distance in

Over the past years, social (business) evangelists and

Today, the world is getting increasingly connected. 500

The promises of Social Business

So there are two "battle fields" for Social: inside the

Where can Social make a difference? In large companies

Social can heal the wounds the enterprise inflicted on

The most plausible answer is: given the lack of human

Everyday a few companies are formed, nowadays one could

A company can grow into a hundred, a few hundreds, a few

Such a company can become large, or even larger: an

Fair to say that an enterprise is connoted by some form of

A multinational is a large company, split across borders in

A bureaucracy is a different institution. Whereas there

A faceless bureaucratic institution is the summum of a

When it comes to companies and customers, the story is

Are you buying a candy bar? A pack of cigarettes? A car, a

The shorter the lifespan of a product, the less you'll

The shorter a product's lifespan, the higher the chance that

The longer the lifespan, the more time and energy

The higher the price, compared to other products, the more

The longer a product's lifespan, the more data and

Somewhere along the lines, products change to services,

There are companies where people see their manager every

Infinite amounts of greyscale in between these two

There are plenty of examples where microblogging tools add

These tools cross national, regional, departmental and

We've had Usenet groups since 198010. In the nineties,

Corporations started using forums for sharing knowledge,

outsourcing and offshoring benefit from differences between

What is Social? Does Social exist, really? Hasn't it

The benefits of Social Business

To answer that question, we need to look at another factor:

IT basically provides humans with machines. Or more

It takes time to turn human tasks into machine tasks, so

Knowing the how, now the question is: which human

The closer you come to business, the more humans you'll

That puts humans on top in the IT food chain, and machines

Having said that, there are very different properties for

Machines serve automation. They are (and must be)

Rules versus exceptions

The difference between rules and exceptions might

In IT, the difference is clear: business rules are the rules

Known errors? Functional known errors that can occur