Communication | Bertrand Duperrin's Notepad

Is measuring online influence bad for customer service ?

January 30, 2012 By Bertrand DUPERRIN Leave a Comment

Summary : now that lots of tools exist to measure online influence (or whatever we think it is), businesses are perfectly tooled to target their messages and communication programs. Provided they get the notion of influence right. On the other hand there’s another trend that may be dangerous in the future : using a tool that’s adapted to one shot operations to systematically define the level of service and advantages a customer deserves. This may lead to decreasing the standard level of service and break the relationship with true loyal customers that will notice that his loyalty and financial contribution are less valued than the number of followers others may have.

Now that anyone can exist on the web, the worldwide network as become a wonderful platforms to measure one’s influence. And this concept has been brilliantly sold to internauts and businesses. The first need to become influent to exist, the second need to know who’s influent in their ecosystem. And guess what ? Agencies and vendors all have “the” solutions that will measure influence in an objective and undisputable way. Influent internauts will benefit from a kind of “recognition label” and businesses will be able to focus their efforts on those who deserve it (understand : serve influencers better).

Such an approach my distract businesses from what matters and lead them to failure.

Let’s start with influence. Influence on the web has been a very trendy topic for years but no objective definition of what an influencers is has really emerged. It’s not easy to do anything when no one know what it’s about. The upside is that anyone can use his own definition, what surely makes his solution unique. Is influence a matter auf audience size ? Everybody says no…but no one can neglect such an easy way to reach many people. But being listened is one thing, influencing is another. No credibility matters in the definition. But how to measure it ? Most of all, influence has to do with context : one can’t be credible on everything. A couple of example :

• Mary has tens of thousands followers on twitter. Influencer ? Yes for some, not for others that will say she’s “negatively followed”, because of our mistakes, hand people follow her to see ser fail.

• Robert has 200 followers? Influencer ? Surely not. But he’s a specialist of frog breeding in polluted urban environments. He’s very influent in his niche. But only when he talks about frogs.

• Kevin has thousands of followers and is very influent on digital marketing. All industry professionals recognize he’s in the top 10 list. But when he talks about restaurants, knowing his taste (or lack of) no one listens to him. Bad news for the famous 3 stars restaurant that offered him a free lunch, expecting a mention from Kevin.

So, we can use any criteria and even admit that one may be positively influent while negatively popular (people follow him to make fun…but they follow), one thing is sure, influence is vague and subjective.

But since there are a lot of services offering to measure influence on the web, businesses logically wonder what they could do with it.

What did we see these last months ? Events where anyone could go…provided their “Klout” was high enough (Klout is one of this tools supposed to assess how influent people are). Businesses also use such tools to prioritize customer service and even do “a little bit more” for some. Hotels are using similar tools to decide whether upgrading customers or not.

After all, there’s nothing bad here ? What can be reproached to a business favoring, among its customers, those who are the most listened to ? Those with the louder voice ? Nothing if we only consider it’s a communication operation. But, seen from the customer service side, they’re moving on a slippery ground.

Do you need a brand strategy on the social web ?

January 9, 2012 By Bertrand DUPERRIN Leave a Comment

Summary : the presence of brands on the internet is a major concern for businesses entering the social web. But there’s a big difference between thinking and definining oneself as a brand and an ogranization. A brand is the expression of an identity while the organization is rather an action driven approach to customer service. Both should come together but, unfortunately, the social channel is often owned by the people in charge of one of these two approaches at the cost of the other. As recent surveus show, customers, even if they appreciate appearances, often prefer to value the execution of the promise. It’s time for organization approaches to replace brand strategues on the web.

Every time a new platform or service is launched on the web, the first question that comes is “how to make brands exist there.”. From a personal standpoint, as an internaut, I find it exasperating. I don’t want to rub shoulders with a brand or to become “friend” with it, most of all when it corrupts the system. You may retort me that I sometimes interact with brands and appreciate it. In fact I appreciate these interactions as long as it helps me to satisfy one of my needs. According to what I see, the more a business acts like an organization and less as a brand the more it succeeds at satisfying my needs. And, according to reports I mentioned in a previous post, it seems that I’m not the only one who thinks this way.
What is the difference between a brand and an organization ? And what are the deep consequences of the differences between a brand oriented approach and an organization oriented one ?

A brand is a matter of identity. “This is who /what I am, what I embody, my image”. Having a brand strategy is unavoidable when we see how much time we’re spending online and to what extent our online experiences impact our lives and decisions. Brands have to be known, have to let people discover and know them better, deliver a message that’s better understood when carried by conversations instead of declaration. So, having an online brand strategy is vital. But not enough. The post I mentioned above clearly shows that internauts, contrary to received ideas, don’t value neither social conversations with brands nor being part of a brand community. They want concrete and operational outputs.

For instance, let’s consider a clothing business. It can hire a kind of muse that will embody and carry the brand, make people buy its products. But if the product has a poor quality or when it need some cleaning, I not sure that asking the muse will be of any help. Not because the muse won’t want to help, but only because it’s not her job.

Another example. Everybody knows that I appreciate KLM a lot. Of course, they have a very good brand strategy but this is not the reason why I began to watch them and pay attention to what they were doing. It all started because of their effective organization strategy that once turned what could have a nightmare into a nice travel experience. Without excellence in customer service, brand strategy has little value and may even be counterproductive.

Welcome to communication departments 2.0 (or social com’ depts)

October 13, 2011 By Bertrand DUPERRIN Leave a Comment

Summary : with new generation intranets coming in the workplace, many departments will have to redefine their role in these new systems…and even acquire one. Among them, communications departments. Intranet has been their prerogative for a long time but its new nature leads them to share it and redefine their own strategy. Embarrassed, they’re struggling at taking the lead or do it in a clumsy way. “Social” communication departments will need to master new lever that are, among others, viralization, information lifecycle, new ways of sourcing and take into account a factor that’s been ignored till them : employees’ attention at work.

Among the corporate departments impacted by the emerging new ways of working and the tools that come with, communication departments are in front line. We often talk about HR, management (middle or not), considering, even wrongly, that their job is to do a top-down business and that they have nothing to do in 2.0 things. This is a huge mistake because they are often in charge of driving things that go beyond their dedicated field without having been prepared for that or are been told that the brand new social intranet 2.0 is coming and that they need to find their place in. In short, as I had to witness these last months, even when they have the power, communication departments are often left alone in this change process.

They have to quickly face a challenge that’s both clear and complex : position themselves, their business, strategy and operating models in this new environment that is coming, whether they want it or not.

Some jumbled hints….

• What role ?

The role of a communication department is to ensure that the corporate message is broadcasted to employees and is understood by them. This is something that won’t change.

• What field ?

With the next generation of intranets coming, the game field is becoming much wider. And communication departments are wondering how they’ll drive all these things. Their field will stay the same (corporate message), the social networking part being more for people in charge of collaboration, business units and teams. To quote a sentence I recently heard : “ok….the range of the tool is wider…I need to find what my zone is and what I have to leave to others because even if I own the intranet, a part of it is out of my competences and goals”.

That doesn’t mean that a smart communication department should not use the social networking part in a direct (sourcing) or indirect (virality) way.

• What operating models?

This is a domain where things are moving fast, for two reasons. The first is that the coming of new intranets combining traditional communication tools with social networking ones makes new things possible. Second is that’s a good news because the way things used to be done was not relevant anymore.

Broadcasting a message does not mean putting it in front of employee’s eyes to consider the job has been done. First because it does not mean the message was read. Employees attention being limited, if the message does not meet a present need they move to something more important. Then because reading the message does not mean understanding it. Last, the message could be of no interest for some people today but become essential tomorrow. What makes new way of operating necessary.

First, why remove a message when another one comes ? Haven’t you heard about the long tail ? That’s not because something has to be said that what was said before becomes irrelevant, useless. Instead of removing let the archives accessible and when employees will search a matter not only they’ll find this content but a “like”-like button will help them share it with their network.

The “like” is the bridge between corporate communication and social networking. It will help those who have read your message to share it with their contacts that did not (or did not want) and will pay more attention to it if a trusted person says it’s worth. Doing this you add virality to your toolbox. Before you could only force a message on people’s home page, now you’ll be able to use your readers as promoters and reach people who seldom have a look at what you say.

Note that with these two systems you’re discovering two concepts that are quite new in internal communication : longer lifecycles for you content and better broadcasting through virality.

Now comes the problem of having the message understood. It needs feedback and conversation mechanisms. “What ? People will be able to react to corporate contents ?”‘ Why not. In fact they’re alreay doing but in you back. The question is to know whether your goal is to display the message or make sure people get it. More and more organizations are doing things that way and no one has died…

How to keep the humane side of moments of truth in online customer relationship

October 3, 2011 By Bertrand DUPERRIN 1 Comment

Summary : even if social media are a good means to make the humane side of the company more visible in the customer relationship, online relationships still struggle at making the most of moments of truth that are key in the service economy. As a matter of fact the human factor plays a big role in such moments and has a big impact on the value felt by the customer. To make up for this lack, it’s important to “put employees on stage”, even occasionally, or to mix online and offline experiences in order to create the feeling that will impact what customers will feel and how they’ll subjectively value the service. But there are two requirements for this to work : an actual service that can be valued and the right culture to behave this way.

When a company uses social media as a channel to manage customer relationships, it could be for different reasons. Because they need to be where the customer, when he’s there. Because it increases responsiveness. Because they make it easy to track weak signals that are about the company but are not directly send to her. Because they make the relationship more humane and more engaging. Let’s focus on the last point.

Nothing is more impersonal than a company that tries to communicate. And things aren’t even better when a company tries to interact with her customers. At best you get a cold message delivered through an anonymous voice. At worse you get a ticket number from the customer service department. In fact things can get even worse when the rules of traditional communications are applied to customer service, what often happens when the communication department starts to try to take care of customers for the only reason they own the social media channel. Using a channel they own to deliver things they don’t master often leads to catastrophes (remember….it’s all about multiplexing). Sometimes, some manage to cross the chasm and, behind the interaction, you don’t feel the cold corporate mechanism but someone who takes care of you. That’s what I call an online guardian angel. This kind of qualitative interaction that make customers feel that, behind the customer relationship/service job there are fully engaged and committed people is more likely to happen on social media than anywhere else. It’s impossible to have the same impact with a contact form. Some may say a phone call should be better at that…but most of time you’ll be answered by someone working at a call center who has nothing to do with the company in question, only following a script to try to answer you. Most of all, you’ll have to fight with the vocal server for a long time to manage to talk with a real human being.

Despite of that, even with the help of social media, online relationships are a true challenge for organizations. When you’re in front on someone, in real life, you can se her attitude, motivation, attentiveness to do something for you. During these moments of truth you can feel more than the corporate customer service policy : you can feel the personal committment of the whole staff. Or not. So, even if some companies ask their employees to sign with their initials the message they publish on the enterprise twitter account, there’s still something missing. Something to compete with these moments of truth when they happen in real life.

Hence the idea to “show” the employees from time to time. Of course it’s only a communication performance around customer relationship that can only be one-shot but they aim at showing this commitment on customer satisfaction. As a matter of fact there’s one thing to be kept in mind : in the world of service, the perceived value matters more than the objectively delivered value. Impressions are essential.

In some ways we can say that Lipdubs, that were very popular a couple of years ago, were a clumsy try in this direction. But they did not deliver any message, any value proposition. But, with time, we began to see more clever and relevant ways to create the “moment of truth” effect on an online interaction.

Google + : an enterprise tool ?

September 23, 2011 By Bertrand DUPERRIN 1 Comment

Summary : Can Google Plus become a major player in the enterprise software field ? It will depend on its positioning and the efforts Google will make to understand a field where things have always been difficult for them. Google Plus is not a social networking platform but brings relevant answers to exchange and communication issues that are more related to email than social networks. Anyway, Google Plus, will not only have to fill some gaps to become a credible enterprise tool but will also need to learn how to integrate in the complex ecosystem of existing enterprise applications, most of all for usages they’ve never been good at. Google has the means of his ambition provided he proves he has de right culture

After a first post on my first steps with Google +, it’s time to deal with the question that’s already in many people’s minds : can Google + become an enterprise tool. Let’s be clear : I’m not talking about using this tool for brands but as an internal work tool for employees. In other words : will Google Plus be a game changer the day it will be a part of Google’s enterprise apps pack ?

As a matter of fact, many see Google + as the missing link of Google’s enterprise off which still lacks a collaboration/social/conversation part. Until now, Google has always been very good at search, online office tools (which is a first level of collaboration but limited to documents) but has never been successful when trying to go further. Google sites despite being useful and powerful only meet a small part of people’s need and the “Wave” experiment…was only an experiment. Too early, too improvable, too powerful but too ununderstood…Wave was “too” too many things and Google decided to kill it instead of improving it. But it’s sure that they learnt a lot from Wave when they started working on Google +

Hence the reflex of positioning Google plus as Google’s Trojan on the enterprise social software market, on the enterprise social network part. But Google plus has nothing of an enterprise social network platform. It’s not a social network in the strict meaning of the word because it does not allow to validate the link between two people in an explicit way. You’re in my circle(s), I’m in yours but it doesn’t mean anything more. This is way even Twitter founder’s once said that Twitter was not a social network…even if it’s easier to consider it as such. It’s not either an enterprise social network because it’s functionalities are too light. Of course, integration with Google apps can solve a part of the problem but not the whole problem. Groups and communities also lack for an enterprise use.

First steps with Google + : a not that social broadcasting tool

September 9, 2011 By Bertrand DUPERRIN Leave a Comment

Summary : Google + burst into our lives with a lot of noise. This omnipotent killer application is supposed to revolutionize our tools and usage and, incidentally, give its competitors the kiss of death. But what’s really happening ? Behind a sober and exemplary user interface, a tool with an impressive interface even if it’s still in its early days. But there’s still a lot to be done before it becomes adult. The power of circles won’t be enough to hide the lack of a true community side, the absence of an API makes it hard to integrate in an already busy social context. As for guessing whether it can become an enterprise or not…the road is both long and unclear. In the end, Google + as it is today comes one year too late and it needs many lacks to be fixed before being seen as the tool of the future, despite an impressive potential. Google + may be a future rockstar…if its manager makes the right decision.

I’m very late at writing this post but it’s hard to judge a new tool in a couple a day, most of all when it’s a beta that may be quickly improved. Most of all, in the first days we all look to new applications either with lovers eyes or with rejection. So waiting a little to calm down is necessary.

I will start with a warning. Social as it is, any tool depends on each user’s context and needs. In other words, I’ll refer to my own experience and context and I’m not pretending that what is true for me will be true for anyone.

1°) Fluidity, soberness, efficiency

At first sight, Google + makes a very good first impression. We’ll discuss the possible future of the tool in the enterprise in another post but one things is sure : many major vendors should have a look at Google +’ interface. Sober design easy to access and understand functionalities, using Google + is a smoot and pleasant experience. Obviously, they have learnt a lot from Google Wave.

2°) The concept ? Nothing new !

To explain Google plus in a few words, I’d say that it’s halfway between a blog and a microblogging tool, that any entry is shared either publicly or with a group of people (gathered into “circles” or with only one person. Much more powerful that many tools Google plus competes with. But…

A couple of years ago, at the prehistoric age of social software, someone told me about a kind of personal notepad where each entry could be shared with on person, one or several communities. Unity for the author, granularity for the audience. It happened in the last days of 2005…was working well and is still working. It has a name : blueKiwi (many tools have adopted the same logic until then). Sincerely I could not refrain from laughing the first time I tried Google Plus, telling to myself : “Ah…with all their money and resources, 20% of employees’ time dedicated to innovation…it took them 6 years to reinvent blueKiwi and others…Congrats guys!”.

Ok. What makes the difference is circles.

3°) Circles are not communities and Google + is not social

Generally, social tools allow to address people or groups of people (often called communities). Groups or communities mean that any member is able to speak and start a discussion and not only answer to what someone else has said…which is the case for circles in Google Plus. For example, I can share something with a circle named “enterprise 2.0″ and the people in this circle will be able to answer and join the discussion. But if anyone wants to share something with the same circle, he should put it in the current thread of clone my circle…what is not possible as I write (except manually….good luck).

Considering the “people/user-centric” logic of the tool, that seems more the consequence of the logic than a lack or a mistake. But I’m not sure it will cover all the usages people are used to.

So, Google + looks more like tool designed for mass or targeted broadcasting than a social tool in the usual meaning of the word, with a community dimension. Receivers are quite passive and should stay in the place and role the senders decide.

Is your organization good at multiplexing ?

September 6, 2011 By Bertrand DUPERRIN Leave a Comment

Summary : Knowing who should drive and own social media in the organization is a recurring question. Experience shows that when the project falls to a “central department”, this latter often struggles to spread adoption outside of its own range, what causes the system to be underused or the emergence of internal competing projects. In the end, it’s a costly and counter-productive situation. New approaches a needed that rely on new methodologies and attitudes : those who own the platform need to learn to share it with others, involve them from the early stage, listen to their needs and let them use it the way they want to meet their own needs.

This post is a synthesis of many discussions that followed what I wrote on the use of social platforms both for external communication and intranet purposes.

Such projects are often owned by a department that drives them. That’s the reason why many organizations start by wondering which department should own social media.

When one owns something, he uses it for his own purposes. There are many reasons to that. Most of all because one does not know anything about others’ needs, because some uses are counter-cultural to the DNA of a given department or because internal power games and politics makes it logical to keep one’s projects for oneself.

Consequence : a communication department that drives an internal social network struggle at making the most out of its collaborative potential. Sometimes because they don’t want but, most of times because it’s out of their competence field for obvious reasons. Replace communication with HR, IT, Innovation or business unit, the result is the same. It’s no use to blame the people in question because the situation is often caused by the lack of means and the irrelevance of some uses regarding to their mission and not by unwillingness. In fact, most of time you can hear them say “We’d like to but don’t know to”.

Whatever the owner, a social networks serves for communication, collaboration, innovation, expert location, talent management, supports some processes. If each of these needs rely on a different tool and project, there are lots of chances everything fails.

That’s the same for external facing projects. Marketing, communication, innovation, customer care etc…should be able to use the system, whatever the official owner is.

That’s why we can see more and more competing projects that, in the end, cause unproductivity and waste resources, those needed to drive them, to implement them and, last but not least, employee’s attention.

As one of my readers said, these are only channels, channels that can convey many kinds of signals, of flows. I usually use the pipe metaphor. One can own the pipe but it does not mean that it can be used to convey lots of things, for several purposes, from and to third part people.

Organization will have to embrace the culture of multiplexing. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Management & HR, Software & Tools, Web & Usages Tagged With: Communication, corporate-communication, customer service, Human resources, intranets, intranets 2.0, marketing, multiplexing, social media

Enterprise social networks are not (only) corporate communication tools

July 19, 2011 By Bertrand DUPERRIN 5 Comments

Summary: social networks are great communication tools and that’s why many organization try to find them a place in their intranet landscape. This is sometimes confusing because they are not communication tools in the usual corporate meaning, do not support the same kinds of interactions and even not always the same people. In the end, communication teams feel uncomfortable, lost between the potential of the tool and their own stakes, a field where no compromise can be made. The solution is to be found in the articulation of the User Generated Content sphere and the corporate message one because, if mixing both can cause confusion and infefficacy, combining them allow interesting synergies within what is an intranet 2.0 that addresses without any compromises the needs of all stakeholders.

I’d like to say a few words about what seems to be one of the biggest misunderstandings about enterprise social networks : their part in the corporate communication field. Since social networks are communication tools and, as such, are often managed by the communication department, there are at least two reasons for organizations to try to use this pipe for their corporate communication. What is not always successful and causes headaches.

Let’s make some things clear before starting :

• Social networks are tool allowing communication, or rather exchanges, between employees. Ok, any CEO can have his blog on the network but it’s to have a more human voice and a less formal way of delivering his message and does not prevent the organization to keep a more formal way of doing things. The farer someone is from the top of the pyramid, the weaker the tie is between the media the person use and her position. Social networks are media for people and spread their voice regardless to their position. Proof : anyone can move to a new position and keep his media, even the CEO…

• Corporate communication is, by definition, a top-down activity that aims at evenly delivering the same message to a given population. What does not preclude to be able to start a discussion…or not.

In short, one is E2E (employee to employee) while the other is B2E (Business to employee). In the first case, people are speaking for themselves, in the other the enterprise is speaking, sometimes through someone’s voice. Even when someone speaks in the same of the enterprise because of his position, he gets the right to speak not from who he his but from the position he his while, on enterprise social networks people have the right to speak because they are employees.

Of course, corporate communication needs to become more human and conversational to improve engagement, to explain things, to get feedback… and so what ? The one does not preclude the other at all.

Communities and selfishnesses gatherings

July 4, 2011 By Bertrand DUPERRIN Leave a Comment

Summary : while it’s quite hard for enterprises to enter the good olds forums where fans have passionate conversations, they’re still very uncomfortable with the communities they try to agregate on the “modern web”, being uncertain about what to do or give to create a real engagement. In fact, all the problem is in the word “aggregate”. On many new media, and especially on Facebook, what is supposed to be gatherings of communities is rather aggregations of selfishnesses. Consequently, understanding what these “groups” are expecting is key to serve those so-called communities : communication, special offers and services. If you’re looking for belonging, engagement and passion, rather go elsewhere…where enterprises are hardly allowed in.

The web did not wait to become 2.0 to host communities. People who shared common interests or purposes used to gather, most often on forums, to share and discuss. Even if there were moderators and people who talk more than others, we can say that everybody was talking with everybody. And even when there was a “central person”, he or she was a member of the community and not a representative of a company.

What changed these last years is that enterprises tried to gather their own communities or into dedicated spaces on public platforms (facebook etc..). What did the forum become ? They’re still alive and organizations seldom have the right behaviors to be allowed in. That’s why they try to grab the leadership on other spaces. I also heard the funnu story of a large company who managed to deal with experts forums talking about their projects before realizing that those experts were more experts than the ones they had inside. In the end they reversed the process and asked those external experts feed them with thoughts and information instead of making the brand enter the forum.

So, let’s talk about these communities, most of all those hosted on Facebook. A closer look makes us realize one things : people have few conversations the ones with the others but talk a lot to the leading enterprise. In fact…the enterprise talks a lot and sometimes gets reactions, sometimes is being called out but there’s nearly no discussions between members. What may lead to the idea that members or fans are not there to meet together but to be with the brand to get personal benefits. It’s not of community of people but a gathering of individuals that want two ways but personal conversations with the brand.

Truth is cruel : those who love a brand or a product are still gathering but elsewhere, sometimes on old forums and prefer not be invaded by the brand.

There’s a notable exception : in B2B, many vendors managed to gather real communities on more or less private spaces but not on public platform, and managed to have real valuable conversations with their customers and users.

So, what are those groups that are brands want to manage of facebook ? The answer is key because it will help to find out how to deal with them in order to make the most of them, create a win-win relationship. They are gatherings of people who are obviously waiting for three things : information, special offers and service. So rather than communities, these groups are aggregations of selfishnesses that need to be fed and served because they will seldom help one another. Help happens elsewhere. Proof is how these groups behave in case of a crises : while in a real community people are helping each other until no one is in trouble anymore, here, people join the group because they have a problem and leave it once fixed (most of time by the company, by other members), without paying attention to other who may still need help. (Yes…people can become fans because they’re unhappy with a brand). And the success of the brand does not matter either to them, their only interest being their personal satisfaction.

People have long thought that the person in charge of such a system had to bring live to communities, stimulate conversations… Not at all. He has to bring information, send gifts and foot the bill when there’s a crisis. Less appealing…but better be lucid when it comes to build a system that works. Organizations need both communication and service professionals.

And what about Twitter ? Neither community space nor group…it’s a place of its own kind. But it may be the less non-community space on the web : no structured communities but lots of open conversation on any topic, and anyone is free to join. It may also be the place where the entry barrier to discussion is the lowest for organizations who want to join the conversations on them, provided they behave the right way.

Bottom line for any organizations ? If you want to play an active role in the system, have a service driven approach. If you don’t mind being more passive, create something appealing and let people do what want with. If nothing happens the problem may not be your approach but you product…(no media can improve bad products…) Of course, both can be done at the same time

Filed Under: Customer Relationship & Marketing, Management & HR, Web & Usages Tagged With: Communication, Communities, community management, Customer Relationship & Marketing, customer service, facebook, twitter

Internal communication and social media : move the filter !

May 3, 2011 By Bertrand DUPERRIN Leave a Comment

Summary : with the coming of social media in the workplace and the need for internal communication teams to let go and don’t care about what is not their responsibility, the question of information filtering is more important than ever. With the increase in the number of information sources and the need for communication team to fall back on their core duties, information has to be managed at the user lever on both a qualitative and quantitative standpoint. So filters will have to move : formerly set at the publishing level, it needs to move to the receiver level and rely on two pillars. A human one in order to make the concept of social filtering fully operative at a wide scale in the workplace (what is also a major issue in terms of training…). A technological one then because, until today, the social filter has not worked as expected and, moreover, the increase in volume of information will imply the use of intelligent tools to compensate for humans. Filtering is not about authorizing people to publish anymore but about filtering what they receive based on relevance in context.

Before, everything was clear : communication in the enterprise was the job of a dedicated communication department who decided what people needed to know and didn’t care about how employee reacted to this information. Today, this department is not the only source of information and any employee, team, unit will have its own voice.

Please notice that it’s a significant improvement. For what I can see, 2 or 3 years ago, most of the communication departments were more likely to fight against this uncontrolled form of information broadcasting while, today, most of them seem to have understood they need to share the power. That doesn’t mean they are very comfortable with this new challenge, what is is quite logical, but they’re now trying to find how to go with change rather than block it. Remember that it’s not obvious at all for a traditional BE2 team to support an E2E approach and that, instead of criticizing them, helping them to deal with this transformation is a more constructive approach.

It raises two questions : the first is about the place of the communication department on a socialized intranet and the second is about controlling the global information flow.

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