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Enterprise 2.0 Adoption Research from Cecile Demailly

by Bill Ives

March 10, 2010 at 3:44 am · Filed under Adoption, Enterprise 2.0

Cecile Demailly at the French consulting firm, Early Strategies, recently completed an interesting study of enterprise 2.0 adoption. The report, Toward Enterprise 2.0: Making the Change in the Corporation, is based on an online survey conducted between November 2009 and January 2010. The participants included a primary set of people involved in enterprise 2.0 deployment, and a secondary audience of well-informed users of enterprise 2.0 applications and projects. The majority of participants were European with 18 percent from the US. The report stated that they mostly belong to CIO/IT (38%), followed by HR (16%), Communications (12%) and Marketing (12%).

A number of themes for successful enterprise 2.0 adoptions emerged from the data. Like many others, the respondents indicated that, “though technology is important, it is not about technology.” The report went on to state that, “moving toward enterprise 2.0 is not a standalone game; it has to serve the overall corporate vision. The transformation has to plant its roots into the organization’s culture and strategy.” The report used Schein’s organizational culture model, and the Early Strategies’ Enterprise 2.0 maturity model. It segmented the transformational requirements into three levels.

At the organizational level transformation must support a strategic vision. This could be a broad goal such as being a pioneer in the area or a more focused one such as moving toward more corporate social responsibility. At individual level, the transformation has to help with the daily work. The broad goals of the organization may not be top of mind for the employees who have to undergo a change in the way they work and/or the tools they use. Getting the job done better and more efficiently will be the main driver for them. At management level, an enterprise 2.0 transformation needs to help create a different and more accurate and up-to-date management model. I believe that the transparency built into enterprise 2.0 tools and practices can certainly address this management goal if used properly.

I think this is a useful approach and these three levels need to be working in harmony for the general health of the company, as well as any enterprise 2.0 adoption efforts. The report also states that the benefits on all three levels need to be communicated widely during the adoption process. So far these results are consistent with most management and technology transformations. The report goes on to offer some new insights that may be more specific to enterprise 2.0.

First, it stated, “although there are complex impacts on management, it is important to note that by simply participating, managers transfer their status into the new paradigm; while not participating creates a real discrepancy.” I would agree as the nature of transparent tools changes to course of work. I know of one firm that had its first project come in under budget when they adopted enterprise 2.0 management tools. They attributed this to the transparency as everyone could see what has happening at all times in the process so accountability was clear and continuous improvements were made (see Changing Organization Behavior at XM Radio through Enterprise 2.0).

Next, the report stated, “Middle management appears to be the organization layer where adoption is the slower, or most difficult, for all types of organizations and at all stages.” Now this has frequently happen in organizations going back to the Roman army but it remains an issue to address. Booz Allen spent the majority of its change management efforts on this level as it moved to an enterprise 2.0 collaboration platform.

The third point was, “Networking tools (rich directory, profiles, microblogging, forums, tagging, …) may be deployed just before collaboration tools (wikis, groups, …), or together, rather than the other way around or not being prioritized.” Some of the vendors have recognized this and are prompting their networking tools as a “Trojan horse” before getting into the more complex process of aligning collaboration platforms to work processes. These networking tools can show quick returns and provide a means for viral marketing of these benefits.

The report suggests that, “communicating externally about the internal change may help to change the mindsets internally.” This is an interesting idea. Those that have been successful in enterprise 2.0 are by definition early adopters who often like to promote their efforts in the external world. This external promotion will indicate the importance of the transformation, as well as potentially provide more pride within the workplace.

Finally, it added that it helps when “new educational modes: mentoring and collaborative learning, structured or unstructured, when the community takes care of improving each one’s participation.” I have always found that collaborative peer learning produces the best results. Enterprise 2.0 tools now allow for this peer learning to be more effective. For example, I have seen several instances where switching to blogs in the learning platform dramatically increased results.

I think these are all excellent points. There is much more in the thirty eight page report as I have just touched on a few highlights. It is available at the Early Strategies web site.

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Jon HusbandMarch 10th, 2010 at 9:54 am

I think that this is a critical point .. one that, along with the middle management chokepoint, must be considered an ongoing organizational development (OD) challenge. “Simply participating” is a necessary first step to what I believe will make a new model of management necessary (as Gary Hamel gas suggested in the book The Future of Management).

Bill IvesMarch 10th, 2010 at 11:40 am

Jon – Thanks for your addition and pint of emphasis. I feel that the transparent nature of the tools can change behavior. While we need to go beyond this it is a first step in the right direction as you suggest. Bill