I read an interesting post on measuring the value of social media by Nick Charney at his blog CPS Renewal. I found his post thought provoking as usual and, as usual, I loved that Nick issued a challenge to readers (mostly government employees I am assuming) to send him stories about social media experiences in government.

Nick presents his conundrum as follows:

“The more time I spend examining the use of social media within government, the more I think that measuring the value it brings is a near impossible task.”

I don’t agree that the task is impossible at all. At NRCan – and I appreciate the fact that our SM experience is going into its third year – we celebrated SM “successes” at every opportunity. By “successes” I mean, the innovative and sustainable ways employees are using tools like the Wiki, blogs, NRTube, Delicious, RSS Feeds, etc. to improve collaboration and knowledge sharing across lines of business and to change the way they worked. We go to great lengths to profile the “value” that this new way of working brings to the department.

Nick goes on to state:

“…the more I reflect on the situation the more I realize that we can’t quantify the value because we still rely heavily on traditional empirical standards. Don’t get me wrong I am not advocating doing away with empirical approaches but rather simply stating that social media is still so new to government that it would be premature to expect to accurately capture its value in a spreadsheet.

Perhaps the spreadsheet is the wrong vehicle. I don’t think it’s premature at all to quantify the value of SM in government. But why would you want to? The SM tools speak for themselves – not through quantitative stats like page views and hits but as they are used to replace “traditional” approaches in the way we manage information. For the first time ever (well, certainly during my six years at NRCan) employees are truly in control of the information they create and share. I believe this is due mostly to the availability and ease of use of SM tools.

I suppose you could count the number of emails with Wiki links vs the number of emails with documents attached. You could count the number of videos viewed on NRTube. You could probably even count the number of NRCan employees with active Twitter accounts. But to what end?

If you are looking at this from a GC renewal perspective, then I suggest you look at the big picture. In my opinion, SM helps distribute decision-making and leadership amongst all users. I agree that this is probably easier to measure from a qualitative perspective. But if SM is contributing to GC renewal – it most certainly is at NRCan – then is that not measurement enough?

Nonetheless, count me in on your scheme Nick, I have a few NRCan SM stories to share.

Late Tuesday afternoon, we launched NRTube which is NRCan’s internal, YouTube-like video sharing tool.  Consistent with our suite of tools, NRTube is open source with a simple interface.

The tool was quietly announced via an email from the CIO to all employees.  There was no great fanfare.  No balloons, no confetti, no big splashy posters.  Just a short message inviting employees to test out NRTube by using it as much as possible and posting any performance or other issues to a feedback page on our Wiki. 

What resulted in the 24 hours following the launch was inspiring.

1. At 8:28 on Wednesday morning I received an email message from an NRCan scientist with the subject line:  NRTube – no contest!  His message read:  I posted two videos at around 16:30 last night. Currently sitting at #1 and #2 most watched overall. #3 is so far behind we can’t see it in our rear-view mirror.
2. At 10:43 am I received a telephone call from a 2.0 colleague at NRCan absolutely giddy.    “Have you seen the stats for NRTube?”, he exclaimed.  “Check out the number of watched videos!”  At that time the number was 913.  It was pretty cool to watch the number increase as we continued our conversation and by the time I hung up the receiver about 15 minutes later, the number of watched videos had climbed to 1,191. 
3. At 1:58 I made a phone call to a Director in our Sydney, BC office with whom I am coordinating a Web 2.0 workshop for the Fall.  He sheepishly admitted he has spent about an hour of his morning watching some NRCan videos on NRTube and proceeded to tell me about his favourite ones.  

Wow!  On all three counts I was thrilled. 

Regarding the scientist, this is the same scientist who was luke-warm to NRCan’s suite of collaboration tools back in April when I first contacted him to set up a meeting.  When we finally met a few weeks ago to talk about how he and his group could begin incorporating some of the tools, I suggested he use NRTube, once it was released, to help him manage his volume of video.  This suggestion was met with indifference and a comment about not seeing the value of sharing his material with an internal audience.   And now, he posted 2 videos to NRTube within 15 minutes of its launch and by the next morning his two videos were, by far, the most viewed videos out of 21 videos posted. 

His initial reluctance to use the tools for internal knowledge creation and sharing is in keeping with most from the science community.  Scientists are quite adept at collaborating and sharing their knowledge – just not so much outside their community of peers.  But now, I suspect another Web 2.0 champion is born!

At the time of writing this blog posting, NRTube had 36 videos that had been viewed over 1,650 times.  I think I am catching my colleague’s giddiness.  The fact that employees are using NRTube is great.  That they are watching videos about NRCan science – amazing images of explosives testing, a succinct history of the Geological Survey of Canada, instructional videos on how to make our homes more energy efficient and more – is fantastic!  These videos are imparting knowledge. 

All of a sudden I feel that employees at NRCan are really beginning to see the value of Web 2.0 in the workplace.  There has always been a very active community of Web 2.0 champions, but it seems that NRTube might just be the tipping point that sees Web 2.0 tools become so integrated that we forget what it was like not to have them. 

Put out the tools and let the community decide how to use them.  Darn right!  For me, it’s the small victories that are the sweetest – one employee at a time! 

Last week I joined 70 of my GC colleagues at the first Web 2.0 Practioners Conference held at the Canada School of Public Service in Ottawa’s lower town. My first impression of this group of attendees was its level of diversity – age, discipline, department, and opinion about Web 2.0. The latter meaning mostly that while the group was generally unanimous in its appreciation of Web 2.0 for government, participants had many differing opinions about how Web 2.0 should be approached in government, what Web 2.0 tools should be introduced to government employees and the public and when these tools should be implemented.

The first in a series of four, this conference was pulled together in a matter of weeks thanks to the efforts of a small team with a big vision. It was promoted to federal public servants by word of mouth and on GCPedia (the GC “Wikipedia-like site designed to increase collaboration and information sharing amongst federal government employees). In fact most every other conference logistic was handled through GCPedia including planning, registration, agenda, table discussions and community development.

This event was also the first one that I attended with a Twitter board displaying the running Twitter commentary from conference participants and their communities. I have tweeted during other events recently and am fairly comfortable – though far from prolific – in the Twittershpere, but, to see the stream of comments in real time was fascinating and it gave me a whole new appreciation for Twitter and the value of broadcasting a message in 140 characters or less.

Within minutes, tweets were coming in from curious readers not in attendance wondering what this event tagged #w2p was about while others were thanking conference participants for the great tweets. That was my “ah ha” moment.

Might be time for a quick Twitorial:

• Twitter: A free, social networking tool allowing users to stay connected with other relevant users.
• Tweets: Individual posts of 140 characters or less responding to the question – “What are you doing?”
• HashTag: Label used to identify a common subject or theme often incorporating the cross hatch (#)
• Twitter Board: Running commentary of users connected by a common subject or theme.

So here we are, about half of us tweeting away; sharing what we are learning with our Twitter communities. In my case, I have 56 people following me, but if you do the math using that relatively low number of followers, the proceedings of the Web 2.0 Practitioners Conference (according to those tweeting) were broadcast to almost 2,000 people. What’s important to note here is that through this simple social networking tool, I and my colleagues were conversing about something we found noteworthy enough to share with others who find us relevant enough to follow. Yes, we were having a conversation – just like we would have had in the good ole’ days at the water cooler, in the elevator, at the coffee shop. Beauty is, the conversation now takes place in real time and with a greater number of people.

The phenomenon of emergent communities of practice at NRCan is one that’s been referenced repeatedly in our blog posts here. At NRCan, it really is fascinating to watch one community after another come to fruition over common interests and to see the energy and giddy enthusiasm of members who have self identified and are passionate about changing the culture of work. Communities of Practice (CoPs) are by no means new, but at NRCan their emergence seems to be directly connected to our Web 2.0 implementation that began almost 2 years ago. It was as if a new order of employee was created revealing wonderfully unexpected skills such as video editing, facilitation, subject classification, photography and countless others as well as, a new way of connecting, learning and sharing.

Some communities quietly meet on a regular basis to share and exchange ideas while others have created a niche market and are actively delivering products and services within the department. One such community is the Video Community of Practice (VCoP). In just over one year, this community has created some 15 videos for use in the department and by building in-house expertise, has reduced the need to outsource this requirement. Granted, some early productions will not be recognized by the Academy of Motion Arts and Sciences anytime soon, but that’s not the point – they meet a need, create an appetite for more video and make video as a knowledge sharing tool more accessible. The same goes for NRCan’s other CoPs – replacing “video” of course with the common element in each of the following:

• Technology Mentors (tech-savvy employees mentoring senior managers in the use of Web 2.0 tools)
• Learning Organization (providing planning, facilitation and training support as well as promoting Learning Organization concepts such as shared vision and values, continuous personal learning and systems thinking)
• Information Management (addressing IM issues through a horizontal approach)
• RADAR (creating weekly NRCan science and policy news aggregator to inform and support decision making)
• Shadow Team (bold, young policy analysts working alongside DM-appointed horizontal task team on NRCan’s international strategy development)

Community and social media blogger, Chris Brogan states in a recent blog post that “Community happens when people feel they’re among like-minded others and when they feel their contributions matter.”

As a member of four of these communities I find this work incredibly rewarding. My network of like-minded colleagues has increased exponentially, I am acquiring new skills and I am sharing my expertise with others. I also have the good fortune of having a boss who “gets it”. But, working as a community in a government context is not always easy. The issues of leadership, ownership, accountability, recognition, permission to participate and workload present huge challenges. Many of us still do this community work off the corner of our desks. Management promotes collective leadership but struggles with it at the same time. Old organizational structures and accountability and compensation frameworks rely on well defined roles and are based on individual contributions.

The question is no longer “should management change” but rather how management must change to fully leverage the opportunities associated with Web 2.0 and new ways of working.

Last week I made a passing reference to an interdepartmental meeting I participated in regarding government’s use of the social networking tool, YouTube to engage Canadians.  I was thrilled to learn about the wonderful video work going on across government.  A few examples:

Waking up Canadian is a quirky Citizenship and Immigration video announcing a change to the Citizenship Act affecting mostly those living abroad with rights to Canadian citizenship.  In this case, YouTube was an ideal channel.  The video was viewed over 100,000 times and was picked up by US media outlets.

Afghanistan Challenge is a joint initiative with NGOs and CIDA working together in a fundraising effort to improve life for Afghan women and children.  The GC will match funds contributed by Canadians.  In this case, the video is hosted on a YouTube channel.

Youth Privacy, a branch of the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada also has a separate YouTube channel onto which it is posting a variety of informational videos.  One interesting initiative was the video contest aimed at the 12 – 18 year old market designed to promote good privacy practices in the use of social networking tools.  A few of the winning entries are posted.

This is very exciting and the potential to reach broad audiences and initiate meaningful dialogue is enormous.  However, one thing that struck me during this meeting was the duplication of effort.   Many of us in government create our own YouTube channels to ensure our departmental brand is fully represented, while others rely on the search function of YouTube to drive users to their videos.  We all start from scratch in the creation of our videos.  Some of us hire agencies to do the work, others use internal resources.  We each have our own unique experiences with the approvals process of posting videos to YouTube – is it collateral? is it advertising?  We are all going through the same processes but re-creating the wheel each and every time.

Quite frankly, in government we are all still learning how to incorporate Web 2.0 tools like YouTube in our processes and infrastructures, but because of their ease of use and accessibility we sometimes tend to bypass certain processes in a valiant, well-meaning attempt to get on with the business of government.  But why are we doing it independent of each other? Let’s take this opportunity to learn together and build on the experiences of one another. In the end, I am pretty sure that Canadians don’t really pay much attention to which department – municipal, provincial or federal – is providing the service or product they need. Nor should we in government. Social networking tools are in fact, well, social in nature. We are a community of public servants working together to serve an audience of Canadians.

I wonder if we really need multiple government channels on YouTube. Can we not just create one GC YouTube channel to which we can drive all Canadians for information? While we are at it, let’s put in place centrally located image/video repositories, processes and whatever else is required to enable collaborative GC video creation. What’s stopping us from engaging Canadians to participate in the creation of music sound beds for our videos – a community creative commons of sorts? The allure of collaboration and recognition would be enough to attract even the most reclusive of basement jammers.

Basically, my call for openness, collaboration and sharing – the one I seem to make in almost every blog post I write – is the same. Default to openness. Enable collaboration. Embrace information sharing. These are not new concepts, but thanks to social networking tools, they are easier to integrate now than they’ve ever been. Let’s make it easy for Canadians to access us, trust our information and rely on our services. We owe it to them, don’t we?

(More on “The art…or is it the science…of working as a community” next week – the second of a two part blog post)

“There is something in the air, and it is nothing less than the digital artefacts of over one billion people and computers networked together collectively producing over 2,000 gigabytes of new information per second. While most of our classrooms were built under the assumption that information is scarce and hard to find, nearly the entire body of human knowledge now flows through and around these rooms in one form or another, ready to be accessed by laptops, cellphones, and iPods. Classrooms built to re-enforce the top-down authoritative knowledge of the teacher are now enveloped by a cloud of ubiquitous digital information where knowledge is made, not found, and authority is continuously negotiated through discussion and participation.”

Michael Wesch, “A Vision of Students Today (and what Teachers Must Do),” Encyclopedia Britannica blog, Oct. 21, 2008

If this is the state of university classrooms today, imagine what the workplace will look like tomorrow?

I came across Michael Wesch on YouTube about 2 years ago while I was researching collaborative technologies online for a presentation I was preparing. It was shortly after we revised our policy on acceptable use of electronic networks at NRCan. The debate about blocking employee access to social media tools like YouTube, FaceBook, Second Life and others was a heated one and pretty much divided right down the centre. I can’t recall what tipped the scales, but suffice it to say, the “nays” squeaked by and NRCan employees were not denied their right to learn, research, collaborate, investigate and network social networking tools. Phew! Without access at work who knows how many hours we’d be spending at home tracking users trends, collecting stats and finding cool videos and images online to embed in presentations or share with each other to fuel innovative thinking.

Many of my colleagues across all levels of government bemoan the fact that they are restricted access to social media tools altogether. In certain management circles I hear terms such as “disruptive”, “time-wasting” and a misuse of government resources – both people time and bandwidth” – used to describe these tools. Since when is learning on the job a waste of time?

I am attending a meeting this week with a community of my GC colleagues to share ideas on how government can effectively use YouTube for public outreach. Only problem is, YouTube cannot be accessed by the host department so we’ll be swapping our video stories via DVDs and memory sticks. Seems to me, universal access to a common platform like YouTube would make meetings like this more efficient and productive.

Are social media tools disrupting the classrooms and workplaces of the nation? According to Wikipedia, a disruptive technology is an innovation that improves a product or service in ways that the market does not expect, typically by being lower priced or designed for a different set of consumers.

In fact, Web 2.0 technologies become disruptive when they are forced into existing infrastructures. It is not until we integrate them into our processes and normalize their use will they truly transform the workplace. The students of Mr. Wesch’s class understand this concept. These students routinely mobilize entire communities in 140 characters or less (thanks to Twitter) while in the class room. They are improving their corners of the world in unexpected ways through innovation and collective decision making.

Is this behaviour too disruptive for government? Do we really want to discourage broad knowledge sharing and community development? Is it too soon for government to open up dialogues, relinquish some control and have a little more faith?

From someone who remembers the early days of the internet and the needless paranoia that ensued in the workplace – I say, open it up. Trust employees. They are already abiding by a code of conduct and working within the confines of policies and guidelines designed to protect them and the information they create.

And those students in Michael Wesch’s class? They are rapidly joining the workforce, and expect to have these tools at their disposal. They are not in the minority. All students graduating this year are not only fluent in these tools but have fully integrated these tools into their lives. They don’t know how to work any other way and the public service needs to be ready for them.

At NRCan we are in the second year of our Web 2.0 implementation. Depending on who you speak with in the department, Web 2.0 is the best thing since sliced bread, and is enabling employees to work more collaboratively than ever before – or, you might be met with indifference and a dismissive wave of the hand informing you that Web 2.0 technology has no place government and is just a passing fad.

Given that over half of all NRCan employees are actively using internal tools like the Wiki, blogs, discussion forums, polling software, social networking tools and, many are using FaceBook, YouTube and Twitter externally to share knowledge and mobilize communities, I would say with confidence that Web 2.0 is much more than a passing fad at NRCan.  By their nature alone, Web 2.0 tools are designed to be shared, used interactively and simultaneously.  They are about bringing people together, enabling interaction and building upon interests and expertise.  They are also immediate and easy to use. 

Why then, after almost two years do we not have 100% of NRCan employees fully exploiting our suite of Web 2.0 tools?

It’s all about change. 

As the “chief engagement officer” of Web 2.0 at NRCan (self titled to satisfy my long-standing desire to be CEO), I am always looking for interesting, new ways to engage employees.  My goal is to get them as excited as I am about changing the way government works.  I want to get them thinking about information differently – to get them experimenting with the tools and discovering for themselves the power they have to really make a difference in the department…in government. 

When we launched our Wiki with a departmental Hawaiian Luau and delivered an innovative podcast message from our Deputy Minister, we ensured that every single NRCan employee knew about the Wiki.  We have continued our quirky award recognitions, extensive Wiki training sessions and barn raisings, Web 2.0 orientations and we never miss an opportunity to promote the Wiki and other tools.  We celebrate many successes. 

Early adopters have embraced Web 2.0 and have become evangelical about using the tools to change the way they work.  Their enthusiasm is infectious.  The challenge now is finding ways to support and encourage those employees that aren’t quite so sure about Web 2.0.

My research tells me not to worry.  Not to get hung up on achieving a 100% take up rate.  The risk in putting too much emphasis on engaging those who are truly unwilling or afraid to change the way they work is in losing the support and trust of lead users. 

Engagement is a key enabler for culture change.   It increases awareness and builds community, confidence and trust.  By continuing to profile the innovation, creativity and bold approaches of champion users, we can demonstrate the value of Web 2.0 in government – the power it has to simplify administrative processes, to improve collaboration and to enable the integration of knowledge.   It is through consistent, innovative, fun, bold, risky, thoughtful and ongoing engagement that true culture change will begin to take root.