Johnnie Moore’s Weblog: The genie out of the bottle
All this inventive technology is being made available to just about anyone with a web connection.
How does it compare for engagement and collaboration with anything inside the firewall of organisations? I’ve argued before that, over the last few years, the technological advantage has shifted massively away from companies to individuals. I think we may only have scratched the surface of the impact this will have.
Yesterday I was talking to a potential collaborator who has some business inside of a big company. I usually work in the non profit sector, but this bit sounded interesting, I liked the potential colalborators’ expressed values so we are continuing the conversation. There was one bit that really struck me… a comment about their resiliience in dealing with slow moving, often self-contradicting companies.
My response was that I cope with the frustration and discouragement of working with monolithic organizations by focusing on the potential, possibilities and the growth that happens within individuals. Eventually these individuals influence their organizations, or they leave. It is potentially quite subversive. Change or lose your best talent.
Seriously, I need to write up my triangulation thoughts. This is relevant and is giving me a new frame to understand and talk about my work. But it is month end. Billing and Austraila prep rule the day!
Photo Credit: Creative Commons picture on Flickr from ElDave. Thanks!
Nancy,
I do know what you are talking about. What also helps (beyond helping the creative individuals) is facilitating that these “strange people” within an organization learn to recognize each other and find ways to network, support each other and become a critical mass. Either by themselves or by adding external actors (e.g. consultants, members of professional organizations, communities of practice etc.) to the network and gaining weight that way.
Cheers
Eva
As one working behind a corporate firewall where for valid security and compliance reasons, the access to internet collaboration and community tools is prohibited, I am interested in this line of thought.
I don’t know that anyone has figured out how to walk that fine line between open collaboration and maintaining compliance with regulations and disclosure rules.
I can say that there is a collaboration environment within the firewall. However, it occasionally is restricted to specific classes of individuals. Some day the software tools will be enhanced such to provide for both the collaboration that will enrich the individuals (and companies they work for) as well as provide the necessary data stream capture to keep the compliance and legal folks happy.