Enterprise 2.0 Highlights – Think Differently, Work Differently

And with the start of a new week at work, here I am again, ready to pick things up from where I left them last week, detailing some more about the various highlights from the Enterprise 2.0 conference event in Boston that took place a couple of weeks back. This time around, and before I venture into sharing some further insights from the corresponding days and their packed agendas, I will go ahead and cover what, to me, has been one of the major key learnings from the entire event itself. Something I have noticed has changed this year, and on the right path, too, and perhaps signaling the tipping point of no return. But let’s see it with an example …

A few days back my good friend Laurie Buczek put together the first blog post (Of many more to come, I am sure!) over at her new "home" (i.e. Her new Internet blog Beyond the Cube – Welcome, Laurie! – Gotta love that title, too!), which, to me, is one of my favourite reads so far that captures really nicely the nature of that tipping point I just mentioned above on where we are with regards to Enterprise 2.0 adoption within the corporate world. Check out "Think Differently. Work Differently."

Plenty of really good quality stuff in there! At the same level of a recent blog post she put together  under "Why Intel is investing in Social Computing", and which I referenced over here, as well as the very insightful video interview she did with Stowe Boyd just recently for Open Enterprise 2.0 (Which, by the way, was one of the other stars from event in Boston).

Like I said, go ahead and have a good read. You will find plenty of amazingly inspiring quotes and I thought I would capture a couple of them over here, so that I can use them as examples of what that major highlight at Enterprise 2.0 in Boston was all about. Starting with this one:

"At the heart of becoming a social enterprise is a new path to think differently, connect instantaneously, discover serendipitously, innovate radically and work differently"

She then makes it personal and shares the business value she is getting from making use of social software tools herself, while at work:

"For me personally, I have found a lot of value in a transparent method to provide updates, disseminate information & gather feedback directly from stakeholders across the company."

To then wrap up with another brilliant quote that touches base on that tipping point comment I have mentioned already a couple of times, which, I think, puts it nicely where we are with Social Software Adoption within the enterprise:

"Welcome to living and breathing social computing. It truly takes thinking differently in order to work differently. […] It is all about becoming a true social enterprise that harnesses knowledge & people power to stay ahead of the competition"

Yes, indeed, that’s one of the major key highlights from the conference; for the first time ever, a vendor driven event like the one in Boston has now moved passed that social software tools focus and matured into realising the key challenge is the social computing adoption within the corporate world and in a business context. Forget about the tools, forget about everything related to IT, and processes, perhaps, too. And welcome to the challenge that is awaiting all of us out there:

Overcoming whatever barriers to try to transform the traditional corporate world as we know it and progress further into that new model of engagement where work doesn’t get done in a hierarchical manner as such anymore than through the collaborating and knowledge sharing that will be happening more and more through networks and communities.

Are you ready? Have you moved passed that social tools focus already? Are you ready to dive into the heart of the matter and truly experience such transformation that will regulate the 21st century corporate world from here onwards? Ready to engage in the new Knowledge Economy?

I bet you all are! So let’s do it! Let’s focus on what we need to focus and let’s get the job done!

(Many thanks, Laurie, for being such an inspiration once again! And welcome on board to the Internet Blogosphere! Glad you could finally join us!)

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