There's been much talk recently about Web 2.0 tools,
mostly in the consumer market with companies and products such as
MySpace, Flickr, Wikipedia, and YouTube. Harvard Business School
professor Andrew McAfee coined the term "Enterprise 2.0" to
describe Web 2.0 in a business context, defining it as "the use of
emergent social software platforms within companies, or between
companies and their partners or customers."
McAfee established six key attributes of Enterprise 2.0 that he
describes with the acronym SLATES. We're all familiar with Search.
Then there's Links, which implies that the most linked-to
information must be the most relevant. Authoring says that everyone
has something to contribute. Tags provide content categorization.
Extensions use algorithms to find user patterns and make
recommendations. And Signals alert users to new content and
updates. These attributes explain what social computing
technologies such as wikis, RSS, and presence are accomplishing and
why they will play an increasingly important role in the future of
business.
Enterprise 2.0 provides a much needed change in our business
communication and productivity tools, which have been built largely
around E-mail. E-mail is the most widely used, or perhaps misused,
business application we have, yet we curse the ceaseless flow of
messages and spam. We struggle to find relevant information buried
in E-mail and question whether the right people have been included.
It's a closed medium that does a poor job of capturing and sharing
knowledge, a key ingredient in the success of any business and a
key feature of Enterprise 2.0.
Enterprise 2.0 tools will break the E-mail addiction and our
reliance on other outmoded apps. They unlock value in the form of
transparent, contextual communication, ease of access to
information, and more effective use of data inside applications, on
desktops, or in E-mail attachments. They let us capture the
knowledge and opinions in the minds of workers through simple
participation. Early adopters are finding them powerful and
liberating.
As with any new technology, adoption is critical to success.
People have to be willing to break their addiction to E-mail and
work in more transparent and public forums, such as wikis and
blogs. The shift to Enterprise 2.0 is as much about enabling the
right business culture as it is about providing users with the
right tools. The shift also will happen organically. As new
generations enter the workforce, they'll demand a Web 2.0
experience from their business apps. We're already seeing this with
young workers who are more accustomed to IM and Facebook than to
E-mail and restrictive applications. They embrace transparency,
share information, and willingly participate in public, digital
conversations.
This creates both a challenge and an opportunity for businesses.
Changes are taking place often unbeknownst to IT managers and with
little regard for IT policies and controls. This presents an
alarming reality for companies with potentially sensitive
information or in heavily regulated environments. IT must bring
some level of control and align Enterprise 2.0 with corporate
policy while not stifling its benefits. Striking that balance is
key to Enterprise 2.0 success.
But IT shouldn't just be reactionary. There's a real opportunity
here to drive the Enterprise 2.0 agenda as a strategic advantage.
This will become easier as business-grade Web 2.0 tools continue to
reach the market and best practices are established. New vendors
are emerging in droves to address this need, providing the
functionality of Web 2.0 tools with the security, integration, and
scalability required for commercial deployment. Existing software
and tools also are adding Web 2.0 features, providing a bridge from
familiar business-grade applications.
If the consumer market for Web 2.0 tools is any indication,
radical changes are ahead, with new rules and technology leaders,
and certainly more efficiency and value from business apps and
knowledge workers than ever before. Brace yourself for the new
Enterprise 2.0 reality.