Penny Edwards is working on a study regarding managing wikis in business as part of her MBA Technology Management research with the Open University, UK. She has published a survey about wiki management on her wiki, focusing on people who use or manage wikis in the business environment.
The survey takes approximately 10 minutes to complete. If you would like to help out, follow the link and fill in the survey. Your participation would be much appreciated.
The Executive's Ultimate Travel Resource is the home page for a new wiki site developed by the publishers of Executive Travel Magazine
This introductory comment from Executive Travel Editor Janet Libert -
You, our readers, have an amazing knowledge of--and strong opinions about--business travel. I encourage you to share your tips, experiences and thoughts, plus tap into the insights and learnings fellow frequent business travelers contribute.
It is a great idea and, for a new site, seems to have quite a bit of content. It's not quite as intuitive as one would hope, but the Search function generates a fair amount of information for any city or airline. The Navigation box on the left and the Toolbox on the right are nicely applied, as well. The site is built on WetPaint, a platform with which I am not that familiar but fairly impressed given the attractive appearance.
Try it and contribute something (although most of the contributions appear to be limited to blog-style commenting).
In a recent piece from BtoB Online, author Richard Karpinski examines the impact various media are having on the enterprise. A few quotes from the article...
"Video is really mature from an audience perspective, especially webcasts," said Stacy Malone, VP-interactive media director at Universal McCann. "Beyond that, there's a huge opportunity in video content hosted on b-to-b content sites. But it's been a challenge to get publishers to move in that direction. It's a huge opportunity for publishers to embrace."
Less clear in their impact are wikis (interactive Web pages where users can contribute as well as consume content) and social networks (sites that enable networking and communications among groups of users).
Predictable, I suppose, but I have a theory about the wiki adoption (one I’ve stated many times before). The audience is not perceiving wikis as a ‘collaborative’ medium. Just like the perception that has been ingrained by wikipedia, people view it as a place to get information. Some percentage of the population (2% is my estimate) has a need to ‘vocalize’, therefore they tend to be the content (or information) providers.
Wikis can be more than information repositories. They can be the actual place where groups of people collaborate, communicate, and actually accomplish whatever teams of people need to do. This is a far more productive approach to working in groups than relying on email.
Until companies start promoting and using wikis in that manner, it will remain a fringe technology and companies will miss out on the best productivity tool since email (ironically)..
Michele Martin writes The Bamboo Project Blog and has just started a wiki designed to try to make Web 2.0 more simple, concrete and comprehensible to nonprofits. The wiki is called Web 2.0 In Nonprofits and she is using it to provide basic information and examples.
In a recent email to me, Michele suggested that she and I seem to share some of the same frustrations as far as helping nonprofits to see the value in these tools. She would appreciate it if you'd take a look at the wiki and add any ideas, thoughts, etc. that you have about how nonprofits can use wikis. She is looking for outside contributors to add their approaches, case studies, how-tos, and philosophies.
Michele also hosted the recent Carnival of Nonprofit Consultants - it is a regular event hosted by a revolving set of bloggers. Her most recent post describes this month's results which were
...examples of how nonprofits are using Web 2.0 tools in their organizations and on simple, how-to's for using various tools.
These are contributions from various nonprofit bloggers about using wikis and other Web 2.0 techniques to facilitate nonprofits' use of those tools. I contributed my essay on Habitat for Humanity.
Give Michele some props and leave a comment or two at her site.
The tech players on the west coast have conferences, summits, and other events (here, here, and many others) where everyone in attendance knows about wikis and other web 2.0 tools, is excited about it, and can't wait to talk to and about other people who are excited by it.
Where? The West coast, of course.
Here's a thought - why not have a conference with these luminaries in a place that has possibly heard about web 2.0 but still doesn't have a clue? Places like Atlanta, Charlotte, Philadelphia, St. Louis, Houston, Chicago or (God help me) Cincinnati?
Maybe you'd start generating some buzz amongst some business types that could really use the stuff for productive, profitable purposes.
I was recently contacted by Andreas Gohr, author of Docuwiki and administrator at wikimatrix.org – that really nice site that compares features and functions of a growing list of wiki engines. Andi alerted me to a simple little survey that was being conducted by Tim Bartel, an information management student at the University of Cologne.
As part of his diploma thesis about Wikis in Enterprises, Tim is conducting this survey and he needs our help by completing the survey. He is looking for responses from folks working in enterprise environments where wikis may or may NOT be in use. The survey is quick – a dozen or so questions. It took me 2 minutes, so do him a favor – click on this link and fill it out.
It’s a good start, but I do have one criticism – the survey should have included a question about WHERE wikis are being used in the enterprise – IT and relatede technical areas OR in rather non-technical administrative and business process areas?
I suspect I already know what the answer to that one is.
This is the first of what I hope is a regular series of posts where I use real situations or articles and recast tham as hypothetical wiki scenarios.
David Warshaw helps companies and nonprofits develop strategic volunteer programs. His article in CharityChannel titled “Companies are from Mars; Nonprofits are from Venus” lays out the good intentions nonprofits and companies have in collaborating and the reasons those intentions go astray.
Companies -- from the Fortune 500 to small local firms -- are investing in programs that support their employees’ community activities, greatly increasing the pool of talented volunteers ready to serve community needs.
This should be terrific news for agency directors and volunteer resources managers. Yet many nonprofits find it very difficult to tap into this expanding resource. Could it be a communication and expectation gap? Are “companies from Mars and nonprofits from Venus” when it comes to figuring out how to best involve employee volunteers? …most nonprofits are challenged to integrate groups of employee volunteers into their programs.
Warshaw's article is very good and you should read it as I am only quoting from a small portion. He provides 12 steps for any nonprofit that wants to successfully engage corporate sponsored volunteers and manage a more successful collaboration. Warshaw’s Recommendations are In italics. I expand on each recommendation to suggest how a wiki might facilitate Warshaw’s advice with “The Wiki Difference”:
“… successful agencies know that engaging workplace volunteers needs to be a managed process based on open communication and a spirit of partnership. On the often-winding road to success, these steps are key:
1. Set your organizational goals. Know what you have to offer and what you want to get from a company relationship. Know, too, the limits of your capabilities so you don’t get into more than you can handle. “
The Wiki Difference - Start off with a private wiki space accessible only by a small team that can use the space to brainstorm, define, and refine the goal. Use the same space to anticipate issues and obstacles that must be overcome. Eventually, this same space can used for the service delivery phase and opened up to those corporate volunteers who will be assisting the nonprofit.
2. Make contact with an interested company, either directly or through an intermediary like a volunteer center or the Corporate Volunteer Council. Think early about building a long-term relationship, not just about the one-time transaction.
The Wiki Difference – after the preliminary face-to-face, phone calls, emails, and ‘getting to know you’ encounters, that initial corporate contact should be granted access to the private wiki space to get an immediate understanding of the nonprofit’s goals, culture, specific service delivery ideas, and any other information that will serve to foster a quick and effective relationship building. This corporate sponsor (and others as they become part of the group) should have free rein to add new comments, suggestions, status, and documents.
3. Know who on your staff is going to manage the relationship. And, just as important, who at the company will champion your needs within their organization.
The Wiki Difference – Roles are a key concept in any group undertaking and the wiki can be used to reinforce those responsibilities. You can literally define people and roles on the wiki with User Profile/contact pages. More importantly, role behaviors can actually be applied in the wiki. Instead of using email and cell phones exclusively, use the wiki to establish and delegate tasks, roles, and responsibilities.
4. Align your goals and the company’s. Be sure the expected ROI is attainable and fair to both sides.
The Wiki Difference - Of course, defining and aligning goals doesn’t need to be a collaborative effort, internally or with the corporate sponsor – powerpoints are the traditional medium for this ‘feel good’ exercise. But you’d be surprised to see how diverse the opinions are when you do this in a more collaborative manner. Using a wiki internally first to define those goals (while anticipating what the corporate sponsor’s goals are) and then inviting the sponsor to participate can be an effective approach at getting your internal team on the same page and then impressing the corporate sponsor with how well you are on their page as well.
5. Agree on scope, schedule, budget, etc. What is the time frame? What will the volunteers do? How many will be needed? Who pays for what?
The Wiki Difference – the logical next step to Goal Setting (Step 4, above) is Project Planning. Doing that on a wiki allows for instant input from those who will most directly affected by project plans. Issues, obstacles, requirements can be captured collaboratively without relying on endless emails, attachments, and presentations.
6. Reach agreement IN WRITING. This doesn’t mean a formal contract. No nonprofit should have to get caught up in the bureaucracy of a corporate legal structure. But an exchange of letters (emails) of understanding signed by both the agency and company lead representative will verify that the project outline discussed in meetings or on the phone is understood by both sides.
The Wiki Difference – OK, here’s the payoff. Does anyone NOT see how much more easy and effective it is to have the sponsor involved in the process as it is developing on the wiki and having the ability to state directly, on the wiki, “Yes, I agree” or” No, we need to change something”?
7. Plan, plan, plan... and plan some more. Do it jointly with the company. Don’t let them off the hook. Getting to the details is vital. Sophisticated company volunteer programs will assign a “project manager” to work with you. This may be different from the champion working on the general outline. If they don’t, ask them to. The bigger the project, the more important the project manager is. They will be the liaison with company volunteers, help acquire resources (e.g., extra tools, lunch for the volunteers) and secure agreed-upon financial support. They should also be on site to direct the company resources.
The Wiki Difference – A wiki is nirvana for a project manager. If the PM can master the art of avoiding email (and getting the team to use the wiki instead of email). ALL of the attributes mentioned are accomplished on the wiki. Developing plans on the wik WITH all the stakeholders increases the likelihood plans actually reflect reality; status reports can be a thing of the past; and team members are always aware of the mission, tasks, and accountabilities.
8. Include an introduction to your agency in the project. Provide information about your agency’s vision, mission and services. Provide a tour if appropriate. Each satisfied volunteer is a new PR person in the community.
OK, not everything should be done on a wiki – face time is important, too. And, although a static website can have the ‘vision, mission, services’ statements, so can the wiki.
9. Implement the project -- the proof of good planning is a plan that works!
The Wiki difference – Yes, use the same wiki you used for planning. As the process unfolds, use the wiki for updates, accomplishments, issues, needs, questions, etc, etc, etc.
10. The day after? Sorry, you are not done yet! Measure the results against the ROI goals and the specifics of the plan. Did the work get done to satisfaction? Did the volunteers enjoy the experience? Did the agency get value from the project? Did the company? This again should be done jointly between agency and company representatives. It is vital that assessments be honest and open about the bad as well as the good.
The Wiki Difference – ask anyone who has done large corporate projects – “Does anyone ever go back and validate the ROI (or any other benefits) that were planned in the beginning? Does anyone even remember what it was?” The beauty of using a wiki comprehensively from beginning to end, is that the ‘benefit claims’ are always there, front and center. It is something that should serve as a constant reminder to the team as to why the project is being undertaken in the first place.
11. Celebrate your success. This can be as simple as a pizza party at the end of the project or a thank you letter to the CEO. Creativity can bring dividends, and build the relationship for the future. .... gives the volunteers recognition in front of their peers, gets the message about your mission to a broader employee population, and helps the volunteer manager recruit more employees to participate next time. Did you or the company take video or photos? Can you make a display board for the company lobby?
The Wiki Difference – Plan the party on the wiki. Post pictures before, during, and after the party. Post pictures during the project. Post some funny stories along the way. Have the CEO post a comment once in a while. Have some fun.
12. Finally, don’t forget publicity. Some nonprofits are shy. Very few companies are. While there can be tension about a company putting out a press release that appears to exploit their volunteer efforts just for PR purposes (we call this the “gee what a great company we are” press release), there are many ways to give appropriate positive credit to all involved, and at the same time get your message across about mission and service......
The Wiki Difference – Or they might align very well. If they do, many wikis allow for turning a private, password-based wiki into a public wiki (but read-only capability). This can be an interesting way of publicizing certain types of volunteer programs – like Habitat for Humanity projects.
Take a look at the links over there on the left. These are nonprofit organizations, resources, service providers, and experts. They all have some common attributes:
1. Nonprofits need to get things done – deliver services
2. Getting things done requires hands-on people – clients, staff, volunteers, and stakeholders
3. People need information that is constantly changing
4. Information needs to be easily communicated, readily accessible, and regularly updated
5. Communication is typically poor, expensive, or both
Its all about service delivery and wikis facilitate the dynamic information needs for any nonprofit group. The nonprofit arena has a huge benefit to be realized using wikis as a simple, seamless communications platform allowing more people to better serve for faster results.
Once nonprofits start demonstrating this, maybe the light will go on for the enterprise arena.
Dave Pollard (“How To Save The World”) observes the lagging adoption of social networking tools and he is wondering why. He notes that…
One of the purposes of the new flood of social networking tools is to try to organize, facilitate and improve the effectiveness of conversations and collaborative activities. The power and promise of these tools was and is considerable, and a year ago Steve Barth even predicted the demise of group e-mails (in favour of next-gen wikis and other more dynamic tools). But most of these tools remain underused or hardly used at all….
Amen - on both counts. For all the hype in the blogosphere, I have seen very few examples of social networking tools actually being used in the enterprise, nonprofit, or civic arena.
Pollard identifies three categories of the population by the percentages each has adopted certain types of tools – the majority use phone, email, and face-to-face meetings; 20% of the population uses Skype, discussion forums, and weblogs; and a mere 2% use collaborative Web 2.0 tools like wikis. 20% seems high for that middle group and I am fairly certain the majority of that 2% in the last group are still from the technical developer ranks.
David Wilcox (“Designing For Civil Society”) agrees with Pollard’s observations and has seen the same thing in the world of civic involvement.….
It's reassuring, if depressing, to find global networker and commentator Dave Pollard reflecting my own more limited experience of the extent to which people use online tools. He identifies a 80/20 professional digital divide…. My general experience is that maybe one in ten people in nonprofits and public organisations that I meet go beyond basic email and web.…
Amen again (and 1 in 10 is way too high). Wilcox also makes this very insightful observation …
So many commentators on social networking concentrate on the 2 per cent of enthusiasts, throw in more tools and exhortation, and I think can just end up making people feel yet more depressed and disempowered.
In other words, if you ain’t in the choir, the preacher ain’t talkin’ to you.
Pollard and Wilcox have pointed out how Web 2.0 is missing the mark and this cuts to the chase of where I want to go with this blog going forward. I want to have a more dedicated focus on nonprofits. I’ve added nonprofit-focused organizations, blogs, support sites, and volunteer opportunities to my blogrolls and I’ve gotten rid of the esoteric navel-gazing blogs that pretty much have no impact on anybody’s life (A-listers or not).
Web 2.0 bloggers are obsessed with ‘the next big thing’ in mash-ups, social sites, open source gizmos, or public wikis. As soon as a topic gets some traction, everyone in this very small but vocal community is talking about it ad nauseum. While there are some anecdotal examples of effective real world uses for Web 2.0 tools, most of it remains a mystery to the real people in civic or work groups who could actually use and benefit from it.
All these technologies and heavy traffic sites appear to be ‘ends’ in and of themselves as opposed to a ‘means’ to an end – which is what small groups of people working to a defined goal really need. Personally I think we need a lot less ‘talk’ about Web 2.0 technologies and start demonstrating some actual ‘walk’ with examples of where it is (or should be) working.
So why am I focusing on wikis and nonprofits? Not that I’ll stop writing about Enterprise opportunities since all mission based groups have the same attributes and challenges, but the Enterprise arena has some special obstacles that I have just grown tired of banging my head on.
The problem with the Enterprise arena (aside from the usual cultural issues) is that many of the changes an organization could employ are good but implementing them requires a literal pit stop. Since the daily business of business doesn’t allow for pit stops, one is constantly trying to change the tires in the middle of the race. It just doesn’t happen without a pit stop and a crew that knows what it is doing. When a pit stop IS approved, the pit crew doesn’t seem to know a tire wrench from a pineapple.
The nonprofit arena on the other hand has some special opportunities that would be incredibly satisfying to have a hand in realizing and the cultural obstacles are not quite so frustrating as they are in the Enterprise. Doing things effectively in the Enterprise world is hardly ever appreciated and, as I mentioned in a post some time ago, cheap solutions are not taken seriously in the Enterprise world. At least in the nonprofit world, doing something effectively AND cheaply is seen as a virtue.
Real work in the nonprofit world, like the Enterprise world, is small groups collaborating for the purpose of actually achieving some defined objective. We are constantly involved in multiple dynamic groups and concurrent projects. Whether you are an Enterprise worker or a nonprofit volunteer, you are typically working in 10-20 groups or projects of varying size, scope, and members at any given time.
It never changes. What also never changes is the convoluted way these groups operate and the missed opportunities of the Web 2.0 wave (which is the essence of the Pollack and Wilcox posts).
Wikis hold a huge potential for nonprofits to radically improve their service delivery model - far more than any other Web 2.0 tool. I want to see that light go on for as many nonprofits as I can motivate.
But, nonprofits also have a problem (again, aside from the culture and resistance to change) - It’s the lack of any incentive for using it. What would motivate nonprofit supporters and participants to use a collaborative social networking tool instead of email?
What if, in the course of using this new and effective way to collaborate for services delivered, there was a financial payoff for the nonprofit, as well? Isn’t there a way for nonprofits to realize significant revenue like the current online ad channels do?
There is a way to do this. I have a model in mind that can generate lots of ad revenue for nonprofits as a passive revenue stream (the more they use it, the more they make) but that is something I’ll be pursuing through other avenues.
The summer has been busy and I'm contemplating a more focused direction for Wiki That! Stay tuned.
Dan Russell writing at Creating Passionate Users has some thoughts about designing effective user interfaces (UI). Now the target audience for the post is software designers, but I think the message applies very well to those people who set up a wiki for a group to accomplish something.
Anyone who sets up a wiki for a group to do something is, in effect, creating a user interface. The group will form an impression based on their first view of the wiki which can have a crucial 'make or break' effect on the usefulness of that wiki in facilitating the group's purpose.
We all have a tendency to create things (documents, spreadsheets, wikis, plans, powerpoints, etc) based on our own instincts and sense of intuition and, more often than not, we are disappointed when the group doesn't go bonkers with joy over what we did.
You might feel intuition is the best way to understand the problem of designing an interface. You rely on your intuition, you trust it, maybe you even feel that it’s the source of deep insight and creativity.
But you’d be wrong.
The problem is that our disappointment is misplaced. We are typically disappointed in the group for not seeing the beauty of our creative thinking when, in fact, the fault lies with ourselves for not understanding the group's intuitive nature.
Great points made in this Industryweek article titled "Collaboration In The Supply Chain Speeds Innovation". The author, John Paul Williams, is a global operations executive leading innovations in manufacturing, quality, and engineering and he has implemented Lean Manufacturing & Six Sigma methods. A read through the article and you get the sense that he knows what he's talking about.
My disappointment, however, is that he left out any mention of the one common tool that can be used to facilitate the collaboration, documentation, and process of each and every recommendation he makes - a wiki.
Presumably the means of communicating is the "same ol', same ol" email, phone, webcast, where someone/everyone is left to their own devices to capture the outcome of all this communicating and rehash it it in multiple, random forums where everyone is left to their own devices to figure out how to access it for future reference.
Mr. Williams advocates excellent tried and true practices. He talks about visual communications (video, pictures, meetings), frequent communications, continuous improvement, Kaizen, etc.
The achilles heel of all that effort, however, is the lack of any means to effectively conduct that communicating and maintain all the derived knowledge in some common context so its collected once and not lost. What is missing is a communications platform that can convey all the information Mr. Williams advocates and allow the participants to continuously discuss, brainstorm, debate, and resolve issues.
Use a wiki.
I do like that list of common attributes 'these innovative teams and organizations have in common' for successfully doing innovation. This list also applies to what wikis can successfully facilitate:
In the U.S., productivity improvements in the overall economy from 1977-2002 were 53%. Manufacturing, typically the leader in new innovations, increased productivity by 109% during the same time period. (U.S. Census Bureau). So what traits do these innovative teams and organizations have in common? Recent studies into creative organizations and projects uncovered the following common denominators:
- Creative discontent with current situation;
- Tolerance for uncertainty and ambiguity;
- Cross fertilization of idea from different fields of knowledge;
- Willingness to take risk and strong culture of experimentation, constantly trying and testing small improvements;
- Participation in richly connected social networks;
- Questioning accepted knowledge, testing/search for true cause and effect;
- Reversing a process, willingness to examine problems from many perspectives; and
- Culture of learning.
Euan Semple writes "The Obvious?" and had this recent post:
As I get to see more and more organisations I sometimes get overwhelmed by a feeling I can only describe as melancholy at the number of clever, well meaning people in business who spend their working lives making it harder to get things done
As one who spends most of his time actually deep inside the bowels of companies assisting them with whatever obstacles and objectives they are trying to deal with, I can only agree. I don't think people actually TRY to make things more difficult, but there is a tendency for people to develop their own individual approaches to everything using the limited tools at their disposal and, rather than working towards more and more streamlined approaches to working as a group, they end up distancing themselves from each other and the organization as a whole.
It is a constant in every company I have ever seen.
And for what it is worth, I suspect that tendency will continue as Web 2.0 products start seeping into organizations. The mass of individuals will randomly adopt those tools that they find enhance their individual experience, but the net effect on the collective group will continue down the path of inefficiency, confusion, and frustration.
A committee is a group of the unwilling, chosen from the unfit, to do the unnecessary. - Anonymous
I would like to add a new category of links called 'Workplace Productivity'. I am initially disappointed at the scarcity of such sites relating to the enterprise - plenty of sites for 'Personal' productivity, but not much found dealing with the productivity of people working in groups for the purpose of getting more done better and faster.
I did find this great article, however from one site that will definitely be added to the list - "The Next Wave In Productivity Tools - Web Office" from Rod Boothby. It is a very nice overview of all the choices enterprise execs need to be considering in the very near future. You should read the entire article, but here is Rod's conclusions (his reference to 'Web Office' is not a product - it is a generic term similar to Web 2.0):
There are five reasons why any senior executive needs to start thinking about Web Office now:
- Web Office technology will make partnering and out-sourcing more efficient by creating a platform that can seamlessly support virtual ad-hoc teams. Thus, it will quickly reduce your costs.
- If you have any competitors using Web Office technology, they are going to have a significant productivity lead over you. Web Office will be as big and important as email, and you wouldn’t imagine running a business today without email.
- Your new hires are already using this technology. The MBA class of 2006 has lived and breathed the web since they were in high school. If you don’t provide company endorsed solutions, they will end up using tools that are available on the open Internet until you do.
- Most importantly, Web Office will help you to increase the pace of innovation within your organization. As I explained in my last paper “Turning Knowledge Workers into Innovation Creators”, constant innovation is the only business strategy capable of producing a stream of above average profits. To achieve constant innovation, senior executives need to bring everyone into the effort. Web Office is the ideal tool to help achieve that goal.
- Web Office is cheap. You will get a lot of bang for your buck.
I found this excellent blog written by Dr. John Sviokla, Vice Chairman of DiamondCluster and a 12 year research and teaching veteran of Harvard Business School. From his Diamondcluster bio...
For the past nineteen years, Dr. Sviokla has been pursuing one simple question: How can executives create value with technology?
He provides great answers to that question on his blog with thought provoking metaphors and comparisons of business realities with history and sciences. This, from his latest post....
Why, you might ask, am I ranting about architecture? Well, I believe businesses face a dilemma similar to the modern architect, because the digital description of reality is to CEO what structural steel is to the architect -- it allows for the reinvention of every core assumption.
Lots of pithy, big picture thinking here - check it out.
The Future Tense blog on the Corante Network has a new 'Conversation Leader' - Giovanni Rodriguez. Mr. Rodriguez, a Principal at Eastwick Communications (a west coast PR agency) will be writing on topics relevant to our interests here. From his first post...
I'll attempt to begin a new thread in this conversation, focusing on the study and practice of emergent organizations. It's a topic that's been brewing for some time at my agency, Eastwick Communications, and it's a topic that each of my Future Tense collaborators have spent a great deal of time thinking about and debating. I'll start tomorrow with a question that we'd all like to pose to the business community, and I'll follow up with a short essay about a recent study Eastwick conducted on an increasingly popular collaborative technology tool: the wiki. Stay tuned.
He is also soliciting nominees of organizations that are 'officially supporting social media inside the enterprise to promote values associated with emergence -- staff autonomy, business efficiencies, and open culture.' I may have a nominee or two....
I'm looking forward to following his thoughts - check it out as you try to get your organization to see the light.
Safe to say that, if asked, most of us would say the people in this picture are ‘riding their bikes’.
But, ask any one of these people what they think they are doing and they will tell you ‘where they are going’. They won’t even mention the bicycle - The bike is only incidental.
Like email, spreadsheets, cell phones, and even bicycles, we were all fascinated and intimidated by the ‘tool' when we were first introduced to it. Over time, however, we have become less aware of the ‘technology’ and more focused on what we are actually accomplishing with it.
We no longer think about ‘learning’ spreadsheets, email, cell phones or even riding a bike. We do it without thinking about the tool. We have tasks to complete and objectives to achieve. When we ride a bicycle, we don’t think about the mechanics or keeping our balance or even the fact that we are riding a bike. We just GO somewhere. It’s a means to an end.
Wikis are the same thing. It’s just an incidental tool – a means to an end.
The challenge with using wikis isn’t so much about learning ‘how' to use it as it is about looking past the fascination and intimidation of a new technology and seeing the possibilities of the tool as a simple, effective means to get more done, better accomplished, and delivered faster by a group of people committed to some common goal.
Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.
Winston Churchill
The biggest obstacle for wikis is still adoption and the two biggest components of that are email (which makes it easy NOT to do wikis) and basic human nature (a reluctance to change, take the steps, mandate it, and make it successful).
You are a manager, supervisor, or other kind of leader of a group or function that collaboratively works on numerous tasks and requirements. Failure to deliver is ultimately your responsibility. You and your people get it done, but you live on email, attachments, things falling through the cracks, and the occasional irate customer. It's not seamless, it's not productive, and it's not fun.
You've heard all the claims about ease of use and the benefits of adopting wikis, but it isn’t going to happen in your company, is it? Here is a simple step-by-step process for making your life easier, your people happier, and your efforts more productive (Warning – this has an edgy, ‘no-nonsense' tone to it).
• Select a wiki product. If you are just starting out and you fear the likely outcome of 'requesting' your company to provide a wiki solution, then you have 3 choices each of which assumes you are going to just do it and beg forgiveness later (when you will be proving how beneficial it is to the organization!):
1. Have someone in IT that you know is already using a wiki solution internally set you up with a private space; or
2. Select a hosted solution that will cost you $5/month for as many people as you want to access it (pay for it out of pocket and skip lunch once a month if you have to). PBwiki offers a single password for any member to use; Wikispaces offers a unique ID/password for each member; OR
3. Have a technical developer type you trust download some freeware onto a web accessible server (offsite or behind your company's firewall).
Granted, this approach MAY imply a conflict with some company policies, but you know what happens when you ask first. Just do it and beg forgiveness later. Of course, use common sense - it's not worth getting fired over.
• Organize how you will use it. Play around with it first and get some pointers from someone who is familiar with the particular product you selected. There are lots of ways to organize a wiki, but here is the simplest – The Home Page is just a chronological listing (or any other order you feel comfortable with) of each new task or requirement that comes along. Each item in that listing is actually a page link to a separate Page where the person or team will do the work – all the communications that are normally done in email and any deliverable that comes out of the process.
• Use a simple process. On each new page (requirement) state what needs to be done (the same way you would in an email). List the names of who is responsible. Those people use that page to provide updates, questions, ideas, solutions, tasks completed. On the Home Page, someone can periodically update the status of the various line items.
• Mandate its use by your people. No, you’re not going to ‘try’ something new. You need to explain the layout, how you will be creating pages on the wiki the way you ‘used to create emails’, how your people will communicate on each wiki page instead of email, and how each page will, in effect, be the complete audit trail of whatever was done to work and complete that requirement. Stray emails relevant to any particular task need to be steered back into the wiki with a reminder to senders or receivers (e.g., “Great question/suggestion – see the wiki for the answer.”). Yes, the tone and approach you use with you folks will depend on the culture and personalities of the group – maintain a firm but gentle approach however in requiring its use.
• Constantly review and keep the content current. Now, instead of hammering people with voicemails and emails, you can quickly go through every task and see what has been done, any issues, and leave your own comments/suggestions. Keep the Page links on the Home Page current, but don’t DELETE any links of completed tasks or projects. Cut and paste the Page Links from the Home Page to an Archive Page. You want to keep these links and pages because they are the complete audit trail of everything done for any task your group does. Modify the approach and Page formats as people get used to it and improvement opportunities present themselves.
• Track some basic measures that prove you did the right thing. If you do it right, you either will never have to write another status report OR creating status reports will be a heck of a lot easier. Emails should be reduced substantially. Task and project quality should improve significantly. Cycle times will be reduced. And, perhaps most importantly, you and your people will have a better sense of what is happening, be more relaxed, and generally nicer to work with.
Be positive and flexible. You won’t get it perfect the first time, but you’ll never have to start over. This approach allows you to adapt, improve, act on suggestions, and get everyone to contribute. But you may have to be something of a ‘bad guy’ at first.
Still see obstacles?
Here’s the most likely one – you are just stretched too thin to take the time to start something (easy as it is) that would ultimately get more work done better in a faster time frame with the staff you already have. Catch-22.
Contact me. This is what I do.
And if you are an Executive or decision maker that is feeling the pinch of eroding productivity, how about cutting some slack for your people and just let them do this?
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