A Blogger in Their Midst
August 25th, 2003 by Hal
Harvard Business Review, Sept 2003, leads with a case study on blogger behavior at work. The case is kinda fun. A woman writing a blog calling herself "Glove Girl" is responsible for a big increase in the sale of the company's products, but she blogs without permission, and without following the company line. (Imagine that.) What is the CEO to do? [smirk]
As usual, HBR invites four 'experts' to offer their views on what to do. The advice is not bad. It ranges from figure out how to take this blog-marketing thing mainstream to what's wrong with the way you communicate internally that you didn't know Glove Girl was blogging.
Here are my comments:
(I used to be a Chief Operating Officer for a design-build commercial builder.)
- Create mechanisms for employees to engage fully in the mission of the company. Some people are just dying to make bigger contributions. Blogging is just one way to share ones voice.
- Blog with company bloggers. Ray Ozzie founder of Groove took up blogging and discovered his own voice along the way. (If you can't beat 'em, join 'em?) Learn first-hand how the blogging medium (genre) can support the company mission.
- Encourage group blogging. As companies become more and more virtual (physically separate) we risk becoming detached from our peers. A group blog, where each of us can post, read, and comment as it serves us and the group, nurtures relationships. Group blogging may be the safety net for distributed project teams.
- Bring the marketing department together with the company bloggers. Prepare yourself to mediate the conversation! My experience of bloggers is they are VERY well-intended. Help people find ways to create something new from an intentionality between the groups.
- Look for other 'marginal practices' that may be contributing to the success of the company. Instant messaging for supporting clients immediately comes to mind. Wikis for supporting the folks who are supporting the customers? How about unsanctioned websites?
Creating a blogging presence was too easy. It took me all of 3 hours on a weekend. Just imagine what is happening at work with all the 'friendly support' available! Don't wait…harness it.
Related Posts
- Grim Reader: Project Kaizen Co-Blogger for Wednesday Read Kaizen, learning, and coordination and you'll know why we selected this article as our Gang-of-Seven "plus one" c...
- Who’s the Project Kaizen “Plus One”? I've been asked about the listing of members at Norman's Kaikaku sidebar. The heading reads "Gang-of-Seven (plus one)...
- Claude Emond, Guest Blogger I'm glad to have Claude posting at RPM. It was Claude who gave name to these wonder filled times -- the project age. P...
- I’m still posting… For all my subscribers...Blogger and Bloglet have been acting up. I continue to write and post 4 or 5 times each week. ...
- What is (Project) Kaizen? I mentioned yesterday that we'd be featuring one additional blogger writing on project kaizen each day. While we're n...
September 18th, 2003 at 6:55 pm
I just did a case study on this very article. I found it pretty interresting, but I knew nothing about blogging before it. To be honest I hadn’t even heard of the concept. Quite interresting though becuase I knew two bloggers without knowing exactly what it was they were doing (including my girlfriend). I like your comments, especially about encouraging the group interaction.