Employee Networking at Nokia

The HR Technology Conference is now two weeks past, but I had one more conference related note to write, about the presentation on the internal use of Web 2.0 technologies at Nokia.

The presentation given by Matthew Hanwell - Senior Director of Organizational Development and Change, covered the history of Nokia's engagement with Web 2.0 technologies for internal purposes, the current state of these technologies inside Nokia, and I think most importantly, offered some excellent insights and recommendations on how an organization might introduce these technologies in their environments.

Some of the tools that Nokia has deployed internally:

The Jazz Cafe - Essentially an anonymous forum, where employees could ask and respond to questions, carry on conversations, and at times, vent.  This was Nokia's first foray into Web 2.0 technology for internal use, and was extremely popular with the employees.  In time, other platforms and technologies have been implemented and grown in popularity, the Jazz Cafe forum still maintains a dedicated used base.

Ask HR - another anonymous forum, similar in nature to the Jazz Cafe, but dedicated to HR topics.  Employees can ask questions and get feedback from corporate HR ,and it also provided a great way for HR to check the pulse of the organization based on the nature and tone of the questions.

Blog Hub - Employees at Nokia are encouraged to blog, and the company aggregates the blogs into a 'hub' that serves as a kind of company wide repository and barometer of the organization.  Company management can monitor what blogs are popular, which ones generated the most comments, and what the overall trends are indicating about the mindset of the employees.

Video Hub - Similar to the Blog Hub, the Video Hub aggregates video content that is created by Nokia employees.  The interesting aspect of the video hub is that Nokia has trained over 200 employees worldwide in the mechanics of short video creation.  Skills like shooting, editing, and narrating these videos to produce effective and interesting content.  Notably, the video creators are charged with finding and documenting examples of employees living the Nokia values and using video to communicate these ideas across the organization.

News Hub - The Nokia News Hub is much like a classic corporate intranet news service, but with the added capability of employee comments, ratings, and discussion. It takes what could be a fairly standard and dull news feed and enhances the content and the experience.

There were several interesting take-aways from the session.  Most notably:

Inappropriate postings - Matthew reported that Nokia had never had to delete any postings on any of the various platforms that were deemed inappropriate.  The organization's members did effectively manage the policing of content.  Comments and ratings are extremely effective mechanisms whereby the community determines and enforces the company norms.  Matthew also pointed out the importance of allowing employees the freedom to use profile pictures of their choosing, rather than require everyone to use the more formal, 'official' company ID photo.

The employees are already talking - Nokia became aware of an employee that was maintaining what became a very popular personal blog where he wrote about the company and its products in sometimes not so flattering ways. Partially from this realization Nokia started down the path of creating a space for employees to blog and participate in online conversations in a platform where the company did not control the conversation so much as support it and learn from it.  Particularly in a large organization, there are almost certainly blogs, Facebook groups, and other online conversations happening among employees in 'unofficial' forums.  Better from the company perspective to host and more effectively monitor, respond, and support these activities.

Continuous innovation - Nokia started down the path of internal community building and support with the Jazz Cafe platform, and eventually migrated into other tools and technologies. While the Jazz Cafe was quite successful, Nokia did not stop there, but rather built on that foundation of success to expand into blogs and videos.  Technologies and the ways that employees will want to embrace new technologies to interact, discover, and collaborate are constantly evolving. Companies should understand and embrace this, and not get wed to a specific approach or technology as being the 'final' solution.

It really was an excellent session that left the audience with many solid ideas and concepts to build from.  While most organizations are not as large, or have the resources of a Nokia, the approaches and strategies could be applied to any size organization really, and at certainly fairly low costs.

Bottom line, the employees want to connect, share, and socialize, give them an opportunity to do all of these, and you will likely reap the benefits.

Google Sidewiki for HR

Since so many new tools and technologies emerge, seemingly every day, it can be hard for HR Professionals to keep up with all the new developments.  A question I get asked often is which of these flashy new tools might have real utility in the workplace, and which might better be considered as consumer oriented solutions.

Sometimes a new tool or enhancement to an existing tool is created that on the surface does not have obvious workforce related implications, but with some thought, and perhaps creativity, can be leveraged in an effective way.

One of these tools is the Google Sidewiki.  Introduced about two weeks ago, Sidewiki allows anyone that installs the latest version of Google Toolbar, the ability to add comments to any web page.

Once installed, Sidewiki appears as a browser sidebar, where you can view, add, or comment on entries made about that web page.

This video from Google gives a quick overview of the tool:

Thinking about the potential HR and workforce uses of an 'always on' commenting and feedback tool for any web page:

Candidate communication - Carry on discussions, offer links to more resources, and provide a bit more of a 'personal' experience to your corporate jobs pages. If nothing else, monitor the Sidewiki entries that may already be on your jobs pages.  It is not too far a reach to think that a disgruntled candidate may start using the Sidewiki capability to indicate any frustration or displeasure they have with the application process, or your company in general. If HR is the new marketing, then part of the duty is to keep an eye on what is being said about the brand.

Employee feedback - Chances are your HR and Benefits related information sits on your employee intranet, changes only about once per year, and is read only on an 'have-to' basis by your employees. Sidewiki can be a mechanism to inject a bit of interaction and interest to normally dull pages and content. If you operate in the kind of environment where getting changes made to your HR intranet requires forms filled out in triplicate and taking the IT manager to lunch, then leveraging a free, and no-IT necessary tool like Sidewiki may make sense.

Integration from 'static' web sites to social networks - Sidewiki can become a component of your integrated strategy in communicating your messages in social networks.  Sidewiki entries can be easily shared to Twitter, Facebook, and Blogger blogs, and help you achieve some consistency and reach in your message. In fact, as soon as this post is published, I will add a Sidewiki entry to the page and share it out on Twitter. If you see the Tweet and link to the entry, please let me know what you think of the tool and the process of sharing information in that manner.

Impetus to add social elements to HR/Recruiting sites - The aspect of Sidewiki that HR and Communications departments have to understand, is that it in 'on' whether you want it to be or not.  Even if your 'Working Here' page does not have a forum, integrated chat room, or even a simply 'contact us' e-mail address, candidates, current employees, past employees, heck anyone can add Sidewiki entries to your page. Since Sidewiki entries are largely out of your control (Google decides what is offensive and what entries are the most relevant, not you), you may want to finally join the cool kids and incorporate more and better mechanisms to engage employees and candidates that you can control somewhat.

To try out Google Sidewiki go to google.com/sidewiki to load the new Google Toolbar for Firefox and Internet Explorer that contains the new Sidewiki button.

Can you see any other, perhaps more meaningful uses of Sidewiki for HR?

Fail Spectacularly

Just like Michael Corleone in the Godfather, I'm trying to get out, but I just keep getting pulled back in.

Back to Chicago that is. 

The HR Happy Hour Show is returning to Chicago to broadcast live from the Fail Spectacularly event being held on November 4th and hosted by Laurie Ruettimann from Punk Rock HR and Jason Seiden from Seiden Leadership.

What is Fail Spectacularly?

It is an event, or really a party, for anyone that has seen their world turned upside-down by this crappy economy. It is a chance to vent, to share your story, and to have fun as only you can by listening to other people's failures.

So what will the HR Happy Hour show do at the event?

I am not sure exactly.  We may just open the mics up and live stream the on-stage antics, we might grab speakers as they come off stage 'Oscars style', or I may just roam around the event to see what interesting stories I can turn up.

Or quite likely the show will Fail. Spectacularly.

Thanks so much Laurie and Jason for inviting the HR Happy Hour to the event, and thanks again to Lois Melbourne and Aquire Software for your support.

See you in Chicago on November 4th!

Many, many thanks to official HR Happy Hour show sponsor Aquire Software for making the remote show possible.

Work and Networks

Since many organizations have adopted or are considering adopting technologies to facilitate internal employee social networking, naturally research is beginning to surface as to the success of these internal networking projects, and that is also aimed at understanding the enablers and barriers in the technology adoption.

This week I came across an excellent study titled 'Motivations for Social Networking at Work' (PDF link) from IBM Research that discusses the internal IBM social network called Beehive. Thousands of IBM employees participate in the network that is meant to facilitate connection, sharing of interests, and very importantly in a large organization, expanding one's network beyond the immediate work group to colleagues that were previously 'invisible'.Flickr - e.phelt

The IBM Research group undertook an extensive study of participation and usage patterns to better understand the true impact of Beehive in the company, and while there are many interesting findings (I really recommend reading the entire study), I thought it very interesting to focus on a key question; Why do employees share information on the network?

The research revealed three main motivations for employees to participate in the social network that they termed, Caring, Climbing, and Campaigning.

Caring - Connecting with co-workers on a personal level was found to be the most commonly cited benefit to participating in the network.  Particularly in a large, global, distributed organization like IBM, where the opportunity for face-to-face contact with many colleagues is limited, this 'caring' element was critical. Connecting on a more personal level helps engenders affinity, which in turn leads to an increase in collaborative interactions.

Climbing - The researchers used the term 'climbing' to describe individual's motivation to participate in the network to further their career development and aspirations to 'climb' the corporate ladder. By active participation in specific technical topics, people could be seen as 'thought leaders' and could potentially leverage that position to land better assignments, more high-profile projects, and further their careers. In addition, similar to external social networks like Twitter and LinkedIn, simply making connections and building out one's network was seen as a benefit, and in fact necessary to long-term career growth.  In a large company it can be easy to get 'lost', but by actively participating and connecting in the internal social network some employees felt that this was a way to make a name for themselves.

Campaigning - Gathering support for projects and ideas, driving traffic to personal profiles, and project web pages was termed 'Campaigning' by the researchers.  Employees interested in using the social network for this purpose emphasized the ability to get their ideas more visibility with senior managers as an important factor and a major motivator to participate in Beehive. Most notably, the ability to connect with a wide range of influencers and potential supporters outside of the traditional, hierarchical structures was seen as an essential element of Beehive. Users could build coalitions of support for their ideas and projects in ways frankly impossible in the 'old' manner.

What does this all mean to organizations that are considering launching similar projects to give their internal networking projects the best chance for success?

Make it personal - The internal network can't be all business, all the time.  People (most anyway) want to share some personal information with their colleagues. The ability to connect personally has consistently been shown to be an important aspect of ongoing and productive workplace collaboration. Let folks post their favorite about their favorite sports teams, swap recipes, and upload personal profile pictures.  Don't feel like every post, comment, or contribution has to have the 'official' stamp of approval.

Individual value - Employees will only continue to participate and contribute if they see a direct personal and individual benefit. Whether it is easier access to information and expertise to help them solve their problems, or a way to build their reputations as leaders.  Employees will give of themselves and of their knowledge, but they have to see the benefits back to them as well.  Make sure that you build ways for employees to see how participation will truly help them in their current jobs, as well as in their career goals.

The Big Boys have to play - Many technology projects stall, or even fail due to lack of executive support.  Internal social networking projects are no different.  But in addition to the vague concept of 'support', these projects may also require active participation.  When employees see executives and directors as active participants and contributors on the network it can have a dramatic effect on overall enthusiasm and participation.  Just like the company holiday party where everyone wants a little face time with the boss, connecting with leaders and executives on the network can be a really important driver of the overall success of the project.

Definitely take a look at the entire piece from IBM Research, there are lots of excellent insights as to the motivations behind internal network participation.  We are getting past the point of wondering about the right technology to choose for these projects, and arriving at the much harder place of figuring how to make them work.

I would love to hear from you on what motivates or curtails participation in your organization's communities?

Back on the Chain Gang

Tonight on the HR Happy Hour show, 8PM ET, we will be talking Work/Life Balance, keeping yourself sane when getting pulled in 100 different directions, and maybe even if the fundamental idea of work is truly changing (or should change).

Joining Shauna and I will be Leanne Chase from Career Life Connection and Chris Ferdinandi from Renegade HR.

Does it even make sense to be talking about work/life balance issues with millions of people out of work?  For many of the unemployed, 'life' sucks right about now, and any 'work' would do. So maybe it is foolish to even discuss the topic. 

But we will.

My son attends a program for about an hour or so each day after school to bridge the time from school dismissal until I or his Mom are through with our 'official' work days and can take him home. It is just an hour, he generally has a decent enough time there, so it really is not that much of a problem.  But from time to time I have had to stop by the child care center early in the morning, perhaps as early as 6 or 6:30 AM to drop off a check or a note, and almost without fail I will see parents carrying sleepy or even still sleeping small children into the center.

Parents that are usually well-dressed, driving nice cars, hauling really young kids to daycare in the cold and dark, almost certainly so they can get themselves to an office somewhere by a prescribed time.

Every time I see that it makes me very, very sad.

And that is the reason I wanted to do this show.

I understand work is work and when you have a job working for someone else, you don't get to make the rules.  Sometimes the rules stink.  They are archaic. And they have more to do with maintaining some kind of post-industrial status quo that serves primarily to make managers and owners lives easier.  If they know where everyone is and how long they are meant to be there that is one less variable to actually have to manage.

Talking about Work/Life issues on the show this week may not really solve anything, or make anyone's situation all that better.  But it will hopefully add just another small piece to the puzzle that maybe one day will result in no more business suit wearing parents dragging sleeping, freezing kids to daycare at 6:30 in the morning.

But until then, we're Back on the Chain Gang.