Social Business Apps

Came across this quite interesting article about Harnessing the Power of Social Applications. This article is quite a refreshing one ... More so because it points out the way some companies are using the social apps ... And, opens up a lot of vistas ... You dont necessarily have to be in the high-tech industry to leverage these apps. Fiskars could do it ... And, to add to it, Barrick could do it ... The question simply remains how imaginative we can be, in applying some of these emerging technologies.

More than being imaginative, though, one of the things which is most interesting about web 2.0 is the fact that it would evolve ... evolve the way users want it to. Akin to the idea of the companies losing control to their customers, the technology "haves" are, and will in all probability, continue to lose control over the evolutionary path of technology, and it is the users who would come up with more and more imaginative ways to use this technology. And this, i feel, is for the better of the technology itself. As we can see, too, more and more, the experts tend to follow the trends rather than come up with theories about how this technology should evolve.

Somewhat similar to the idea posted at the IBM Podcasting Update. The key words being ...

IBMers go looking for it, it is most often not delivered through official means.

This is the very essence ... The organization would, in all probability, lose more and more control over the way information flows across until recently unusual channels, and this is already bringing about change in the processes of management, and is, in all probability, set to continue this.

Incomprehensible words

Andrew McAfee has written an interesting post about explicit content. While the concept as related is quite interesting, i quite agree with him when he says the wager is more of academic interest rather than of any practical interest.

I for one believe we need to be careful so as not to get into too much semantics, and too much jargon ... it could actually kill web 2.0. In fact, i think this is the basic difference between the way technology has evolved in the past, to the way it is set to evolve ... Technology of the future, to my mind, would need to be far more user-friendly (and I dont just mean this in terms of the features) than it ever has been. And, the jargon is an important part of this, i would think.

Coming back after that little meandering ... I do believe the explicit part of the content is the more important one from the viewpoint of the KM practitioner. After all, the concept of implicit content, if taken to its logical conclusion, is about what the user was thinking when they clicked on something. The clicks and what the user actually did buy is a manifestation of what they were thinking. However, when we think, every one of us think in ways which are quite different from one to the other. And, to be able to appreciate what the other person is thinking, one needs to understand the way they think (remember Dr. Watson being unable to follow the train of thought of Sherlock Holmes?). And, the way the other person is thinking is something which is conditioned by their perspectives, their "mental models" so to say, and also the context of the content.

These are the thoughts that lead me to believe that at least at this point (maybe there will be a day when we will be able to read what the other person is thinking, along with their train of thought, and their contexts), explicit content is what KM practitioners need to focus on. Lets master this first (and we are a long way from there), and then see where this takes us.

The Secret

I am these days reading a book ... The Secret ... The essence of the book is very interesting ... That what we are seeing in our life, are things which we have called to us, which we have attracted to us by persistent thought. Interesting ...

Though, to begin with, this can be quite a daunting thought. When we do realize that what we are is due to our thought patterns, that lays the responsibility for our wellbeing on ourselves. This can be a daunting thought to a lot of people. To me, too. But, thinking about it deeply ... One can see where this is coming from. One acts according to ones thought petterns, and like begets like, and ... Something which i would recommend to everyone, to read.

The Long Tail of KM?

Over a period of time, I have been thinking about one of the challenges facing "conventional KM ... the long tail. Actually, at a basic level, the long tail would be a corollary to Pareto's Law (or am I oversimplifying things here?). And, Pareto's Law would be applicable to KM as we know it. At least from the perspective of content. Lets face it ... all knowledge managers have to have a document repository with artefacts (documents?) being contributed to this repository from the business. Now, this is where the issue lies. With the long tail of KM, it can be seen that there are only a few resources which are accessed by a large number of people. This implies that there is a large number of resources which are appealing to a very small audience. The long tail ...

Corollary ... People expect KM to address all the niches in the business. And, this is where the question arises ... Can KM be all things to all people? Looking into this question at a deeper level ... Where do these documents come from. In most organizations, these documents are largely contributed by employees. Now, not too many organizations where people would be contributing documents related to the different niches of the business (by definition, most of the people in the organization probably dont even know these niches exist). The other alternative is that KM needs to invest in expertise in the different niches of the business to address the resource requirements of people in the organization addressing these niches. Question is ... How much is worth it!

KM will Happen ... KM or no KM

I have been thinking about this for some time ... and then, I came across this post by Luis Suarez. What got me thinking about this is the back-to-basics kind of thought process that Luis seems to be coming up with. Luis also refers to a post by Dave Pollard which I think I will take some time to read, and digest. Something to nibble on, and digest in a leisurely manner, I would say.

To bring in my perspective ... Over a period of time, I have been meeting folks practising KM in some form or the other ... and, coming up with an interesting conclusion. Something that I have summed up in the title of the post ... KM will happen ... KM or not KM. Even if there is no formalized KM mechanism, KM does happen. Take an example ... I was talking with some folks from the metals industry ... They have been fostering KM in a largely offline mode. Social computing somehow becomes more of the social rather than the computing part. Which got me thinking ... Back in the 90s, with the emphasis on TQM, the whole idea of Quality Circles was much the rage ... And, I am now trying to figure out ... How were these different from communities? There have been a number of replies I have got, but bottomline ... These are a group of people interested in a particular topic, coming together, with an aim in mind, to share their thoughts.

Which is something that happens even without formal KM ... And, has been happening for quite some time now ... a few centuries, maybe? People come together, communities are created without giving them the name ... And, there is quite a healthy exchange of thoughts. More and more, communities are becoming transient ... People come together, perform some things, and the community disappears ... But, this is to be expected, considering the changing nature of human interactions.

So, where am I headed? Simple ... I am talking about bringing the human aspect of KM more into the focus ... Somewhere along the way, KM became more and more about technology ... Actually, it started that way, and just that the nature of the technology changed over a period of time, from databases to web 2.0 ... But, the focus has to be on the people ... A lot of people have said it, but not many who have followed. Which is where the entire conundrum of adoption comes in. Any KM initiative is as effective as its adoption by people. Something I have written about earlier ... And, something which needs to be pushed ... As you would find in the writings of a lot of thinkers of KM, its about how many folks are actually going to use it.

Particular State of Reality ...

This might sound like a cliched one, and quite a few would think I am jumping to conclusions ... Take this as science fiction ... Maybe it is, but then, maybe it isnt ... I came across this article which talks in a simple way about parallel universes. Quite an interesting read ...

Now, I am not the types who has Quantum Mechanics equations for Breakfast ... Which is why this article kind of was readable ... Especially the last part ...

According to quantum mechanics, unobserved particles are described by "wave functions" representing a set of multiple "probable" states. When an observer makes a measurement, the particle then settles down into one of these multiple options.

Hmmmmm ... What this implies in simpler language (one which even I can understand ...), is that there are multiple probable current states of things. So, if I am sitting, thats only one possible state ... Another could be that I am jogging (horror of horrors!), or having a vacation by the beach at Gopalpur! :-) Or, maybe at Banaras! OK ... So, I got that pic from an Australian website, but then, Australia is the flavour of the winter, while Banaras is the eternal flavour!

But, we wander ... The point is, what I can conclude from here ... Does this mean there is nothing unique about reality? That what we see is only one possible state? That there are, simultaneously, other states which occur from the same event. The implication ... everything is transient. Everything an illusion! You catch an electron today, it has an "up" spin, you catch it tomorrow, it has a "down"spin ... So, wheres the guy spinning? Hmmmmm ... Interesting!

Storytelling ...

The ToI ran an interview with Yasuno Yuushi ... A quick search on google turns up photo results. The topic is Kamishibai ... the Japanese art of story-telling. And, how the advent of television led to the decline of the art ...

Kamishibai is the art of story-telling ... story-tellers would typically roam from one town to another on bicycles, and tell stories anchored by pictures ... These stories run in episodes ... Today, you hav e an episode which follows from the previous one ... much like the television serials. Similar art forms are to be found n India as well ... Whether it be the Ram Lila that is performed in Delhi ... in the walled city of Delhi ... where the Ramlila is performed in the form of episodes. You can find a sample program here. Or, whether it be the Nautanki.

The point I am trying to make here ... there are usually important lessons that comefrom these stories ... the way these stories are performed (not told, but rather, performed, which gets the audience to connect at multiple levels with the story being told, the most valuable being the emotional connection), lends to them an aura of reality, which enables people to connect with them.

Should this be something the art of story-telling in the organization adopt? We know there are story-telling gurus, and there are concerted efforts at knowledge-sharing using story-telling. What I am trying to understand here is how we can incorporate the human touch to stories. This, at times, seems to be missing ... and, folk art forms may contain some answers.

At another level, the art of story-telling can have huge implications for training as well ... in a lot of scenarios, training is conducted using ppt (pictures?), but the fun of the story is missing. And, this is the one major disconnect between the way stories are told, and the way the connect is missing in trainings.

Parallel Universes ...

This is an interesting one ... More and people are coming up with the idea that there are, pribably, a number of parallel universes, which are replicating each other. They are telling us, that just as I am writing this at this moment, similarly my replica (alter-ego) is also writing something on similar lines ... or, just as you are reading this, your alter-ego is doing the same. The ToI ran a story on this ... Wikipedia has a number of entries on parallel universes.

Not going into the Mathematics of Many World Interpretations (MWI) for the simple reason that I couldnt understand any of them ... One statement caught my eye ... since every possible outcome to every event defines or exists in its own history or world.

From me understanding of the English language, this sounds like this ... the outcome of an event exists in the event itself. Which means that here we have scientific proof of the "reap as you sow" saying. The only thing that makes me uncomfortable about this is the assumed linear cause-effect relationship. While linear relationships gel well with the western world-view, i believe they are quite contrary to the eastern world-view ... to us, the world is more a cycle, a web of things and events, rather than a straight line. I am not quite sure how this pans out, so you can expect more on this to follow ...

In the meantime, interesting to note ... something which was considered absurd science fiction less than a century back, is now mainstream science, with scientists talking about the possibility ... Which is why I would say ... Lets keep an open mind ...

Happy New Year

Its been a while, but here I am ... wish you a very Happy New Year ...

There ... Thats done. Now, to what I was writing about ... Andrew McAfee has written a nice one about Getting Facebook Ready for Work ... Quite an interesting read. And, this talks about an interesting piece ... Facebook for the enterprise. Something I have commented about earlier.

This was something which was waiting to happen, and I would think it was a matter of time before it happened. And, something which opens huge vistas for the adoption of social computing in the enterprise. This could bring the entire idea of social networking within the enterprise, though of course, there would still be the security concerns. But, security concerns notwithstanding, this, I would think, would be something thats here to stay. After all, these security concerns havent stopped organizations from hooking onto the network.

And, as we have seen to a certain extent ... this has the potential of moving the entire idea of sharing a few ntches up the corporate ladder, bringing it more into the centrestage.

e-learning Adoption

There was a question in linkedin ... about the reason which holds back e-learning. Why is it that adoption of a tool like e-learning is not high. And, even in companies where e-learning has been deployed, it is only in skeletal way, more like an item on a check-list. For a tool, the value proposition of e-learning is immense ... People can learn at a place and time they choose ... So, learning doesnt have to interfere with their day to day work, and they can have learning complement profession. That its not necessary that learning happens at the expense of work. This should be music to the HR folks, but somehow, its not.

While e-learning should play a much larger role than it does, i dont think it would really achieve what has been promised as its potential ... this is for one simple reason ... and that is, we are still human beings, and learning, in large part, is a social activity, much more than it is an intellectual activity.

Which means that the primary challenge to bring the social part into learning. The solutions which are found today address the intellectual part well, but ... I guess this is why you would find that e-learning works ok when you have experienced people upgrading their skills, but if you have to learn something new, e-learning doesnt really replace face-to-face learning. Some of this can be addressed by the rich context of virtual worlds, and the way they enable creation of a social environment, which enables us to learn with co-learners, while at the same time, maintaining some of the benefits of e-learning.