In 2006, it was decided that traditional IM approaches were not working at NRCan. The information explosion was continuing, our information resources were treated as isolated repositories, and most fundamentally there was no broad-based IM culture in the Department. Despite the fact that NRCan had an award-winning IM Awareness program, most employees did not understand. They did not understand the value of IM, nor did they understand its relevance – and what’s more, most employees lacked the competencies to administer the (admittedly complex) set of IM processes. Information Management needed to be rethought, and a new approach needed to be taken.

Beginning with a new vision, NRCan focused its attention on building a single, coherent and integrated knowledge base. More important was establishing a single gateway, through which all information sources could be accessible. From documents to databases and from intranets to blogs, all sites needed to be integrated and made broadly accessible.

Because of their potential to impact the way we capture, share, and manage knowledge, collaborative technologies quickly formed the central pillar of our IM strategy. Employees are motivated to classify and manage their information using these tools, and can do so effectively. This is a dream that seemed unattainable in the world of shared drives.

Faced with the challenge of harmonizing these new systems with our traditional, subject-based methods, NRCan adopted a multi-faceted classification approach. At the heart of this new classification structure is the recognition that the tools have changed. Traditional IM classification methods were trapped in a paper-bound, physical world. With new search engine technologies we could explore simplified approaches that are easier for our communities to use – and easier to use means more readily accepted. Operating on a search engine base makes matters easier. Just look at Google! Social classification systems now motivate more employees to take a role in classifying information, both broadening and diversifying the spectrum of IM. For instance, NRCan’s wiki pages are categorized extensively by NRCan employees, largely because they know that by applying a category to the content they create, they are immediately sharing their information with the whole department. They do not see information categorized and then lost in the deeper levels of a shared drive never to be seen again.

Modernizing records management to inhabit the electronic rather than the paper world has become a key pillar in the new IM. The work around e-records and retention is charting a course away from the paper mountain and towards the true root cause of the department’s information explosion: the electronic mountain. For every paper record created in the last 15 years, there is at least one electronic correlate. At NRCan, this is now taken as a fundamental principle.

Underlying the new world of IM is a fundamental recognition. By empowering our employees through an organizing vision that everyone understands, by simplifying the classification structures and by providing collaborative tools, we are making information and knowledge broadly accessible in shared environments to the whole department. At NRCan, an IM culture is emerging in ways that have not been seen before.

A bright sunny day last week, and like every sun-starved Canadian in the spring, I could not resist an unscheduled walk at lunch time to enjoy the fresh air and rejuvenating warmth. But… I’m one of those pale, freckled types… who burns and never tans. As I navigated the gravel in the office parking lot, I was glad that as part of a regular morning ritual I had put sunscreen on before makeup.

What does this have to do with Government 2.0 or Collaboration, one might ask?

It struck me on that walk that preventive protective measures made great sense – especially to mitigate that risk that comes early in the season, before any tolerance to the sun has had a chance to build up over the summer. Isn’t this preventive layer needed for our departments and public sector employees making that first enthusiastic venture out into the bright light of world of Social Media?

A few months ago on my regular blog, “Candy and Aspirin”, I drew the analogy of The Sun, The Cave and the “a-ha” Moment to describe that moment of understanding and clarity one gets when the potential and possibilities of 2.0 technologies and practices are first grasped. Using the allegory of Plato’s “Cave”, the sun represents that bright light of true knowledge – that sense of truth and enlightenment that comes with discovery of the reality outside of our narrow inward-focused perspectives.

But the realization made on that walk last week was about the potential for a new and energized person or department to ‘get burned’ in the excitement of those first days engaging in social media or online collaboration. The opportunity to be open, engaged with peers or constituents, brings with it tremendous rewards – but also the risks: risks of being too exposed, of getting a little burned, of regretting the rush into openness.
Government departments looking to become more externally engaged need to be diligent and look closely at education and awareness for the individual public sector employees tasked with this outbound social networking or collaborative web communication. Very clear guidelines, boundaries and appropriate use policies are absolutely essential as the first building block to a social media strategy. Nothing can be more detrimental and bring a shadow over a move towards transparency than repercussions over inaccurate disclosure, inappropriate commentary or poor representation of the department’s mandate.

Policies and guidelines need not be perceived as barriers to transparency or a hindrance to better engagement. Think of them as your department’s Digital Sunscreen. Don’t let your valued and trusted internal experts get burned.

Want to learn more about the Plato’s Allegory of the Cave and how it relates to the world of 2.0 in just 2 minutes? Click this YouTube link and find out.

So far, most Canadian government departments and agencies are concentrating on Web 2.0 for internal collaboration.  In our department, the decision to keep the scope of Web 2.0 solely to internal use was an easy one, as we felt it was important to ‘walk before we run’.  However, now that we have spent the last 18 months introducing  Web 2.0 technology to the department and the community is getting comfortable with Web 2.0 concepts, it is time to ask ourselves if we are ready to use Web 2.0 concepts for external collaboration.  Are we ready to advance to the next level of Government 2.0?

Many government organizations are still leery of the risk of open information sharing and collaborative authorship for internal use, while some, who have embraced new technologies and new ways of working, have accepted that the risks are small and are far outweighed by the benefits.  However, are the risks for external use different?  Perhaps, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t explore where Web 2.0 does make sense for Government.  

There are some obvious quick wins….the use of YouTube for video to broadcast messages to a wide audience, blogs for information sharing and feedback, the use of networking sites such as Twitter and FaceBook to assist with recruitment.  But, what about the use of wikis…how big is the risk of engaging in active dialogue in online media, or even more, inviting the contributions of all Canadians to help set priorities and develop solutions?  Web 2.0 provides a way to bring people to the table that otherwise wouldn’t have the opportunity to be there.   It gives the platform to not only find and retrieve information, but also invites their contribution and their feedback.  It not only allows them to share ideas and opinions with government, but also with each other.  Imagine the power of that level of engagement.  

By trying this out in some small chunks, we will be able to assess both the value and the risk of new approaches and address any challenges as we meet them.   Just as was done for internal Web 2.0, this will allow us to ‘walk before we run’ for external engagement.  But the time is now…..so let’s start walking! 

Last week I had the very good fortune to share a panel discussion with Mr. David Tallan – one of the drivers behind the Stewardship & Web Portfolio initiative, in the Office of the Corporate Chief Strategist for the Ontario Provincial Ministry of Government Services.  The topic is was I’ve been working on for the last two years: “What Do Records and Information Managers Need to Know About Web 2.0”?  We’d collaborated in advance – I’d overview the industry trends and emerging best practices for 2.0 adoption in public sector and highlight the risks and rewards, then David would then turn the topic specifically to how the Ontario government was piloting, prototyping and exploring new forms of inter-departmental collaboration as well as new forms of 2.0-inspired citizen engagement and communication.

But what struck me as we were getting set up and settled into the conference room was the buzz in the audience.  People were already talking, debating and sharing their current projects: what was worrying them, what new approaches they wanted to explore.  I turned to David and said, “we have to talk fast, this room needs lots of time for questions and discussion at the end”…

Clearly public sector is on the leading edge of this new generation of collaboration. Tangible business problems were raised and discussed among the panelists and with other participants in the room.  How can newer, simpler forms of web-collaboration tools – such as wikis, maybe community workspaces – be used to handle knowledge management and corporate memory preservation challenges? How can we better measure the consumption rates and usage patterns of communications published through blogs?  And how to public sector information professionals walk the fine and often-changing line of using external social networks for program awareness, public relations, citizen engagement when their access to such sites are often limited from their work computers?

The topic of corporate memory preservation inside government as the demographic shift slide towards that long-projected retirement bubble is one I’ve been researching for several years.  A significant factor in how information and content management systems can be used to mitigate long term risk of the loss of electronic culture and work product.

An extremely valuable discussion with a full room of public sector professionals wanting to learn more about new social media tools to better fulfill their citizen service mandates…  looking forward to more of this type of interactive discussion in October in Ottawa.

Last week we discussed the concept of a “social” workplace and the value of collaboration among public sector information workers.  But where is the real return? What specific areas can benefit most from an investment in collaborative technologies and encouragement of better communication of information?

Managing Human Capital

Recruitment, attraction and cultivation of a skilled public sector workforce remain an expensive challenge, even when economic conditions expand the pool of candidates. A flexible and committed workforce who can fill critical gaps during periods of staff turnover and use collected intelligence to prioritize tasks can only exist when information is simple to find, and experts are ready to share.

Skills and learning management, expert finders, employee on boarding and mentorship, alumni networks, succession planning, and career development: these are the key functions that often determine an organization’s ability to attract, maintain, and cultivate a talented employee base.  Collaborative tools deliver in-house networks that weave the strong social fabric of trust, connection, and shared goals among colleagues.

Self-Service and Peer-to-Peer Empowerment

Time spent on repetitive tasks, struggling with email inbox overload, trying to track down the right person to answer a question – sound familiar? As departments downsize, right-size, reorganize, merge, spin-off, or decentralize, complexities compound, and productivity and a sense of accomplishment suffers.  Disengagement sets in.

Organizations that build a Social Workplace can make effective use of simple and intuitive content creation tools. Measurable productivity gains, reduced search times, efficient reuse of shared content are demonstrated with web-based authoring tools for FAQs, project knowledge bases, best practices, or meeting notes. Employees who are encouraged to share their educational background, previous work history, and expose hobbies and interests very often are called to share these formerly hidden skills on new projects. Easy location of in-house experts, regardless of level or role, becomes a natural part of internal knowledge discovery.

Transparency and Corporate Governance

Poor decisions that contribute to negative business results are often made without the benefit of internal expert consultation. One-to-one communication tools – including email – are not conducive to open, vetted discussions on risks, precedent and implications. Organizations with narrow definitions of compliance that focus only on retention rules miss the opportunity to proactively root out and shed light on risky behaviors or patterns.

2.0 technology and culture also delivers a compliance educational opportunity beyond mere publication of statements or policies. It allows rich media, peer to peer discussion, and online interaction to deliver a compelling vision of enterprise goals and expectations. Audio, video and rich graphic content forms transcend language, geography and generations to communicate acceptable practices and instill understanding. 

The Virtual Enterprise

Providing an equivalent online Social Workplace experience for employees who work away from the physical office is an important aspect of employee engagement and productivity. Geographical separation can lead to a disconnection from team or organizational shared goals.  Adoption of a Social Workplace allows distributed organizations to offer the same virtual water cooler networking experience to remote staff as the more traditional office employees.  Opening awareness to hidden skills and undervalued experience, finding common interests, and building personal trust and networks is the value of the human connection we find among our colleagues. The Social Workplace now brings this to the virtual enterprise.

Enable the Front Line

Service representatives, program managers, help desk staff, inspectors, and emergency responders are mobile professionals who require accurate timely data at their fingertips and they move quickly to execute on opportunities.  Often the most accurate intelligence on field conditions, public concerns, hazards, or safety issues will come from peers—this is the buzz, the scoop, the first-hand observational knowledge. The pressure to be in tune with issues can be impossible when individuals are left to fend for themselves.

Organizations that get better at capturing and disseminating the intrinsic knowledge in the field will find competitive advantage with the Social Workplace. Quick and easy web or mobile capture of data, images, or text notes shared with a broader team leads to timely awareness of trends and conditions on the road. This field intelligence needs to become part of mainstream corporate memory. Seeking input directly from front line services deepens collected wisdom and shows responsiveness to changing conditions.

It’s great to be back on the GTEC.CA blog as we ramp up for the main event in October 2009. What a year it has been for the world of Government 2.0 and enterprise collaboration.  Use of social media and online communities for citizen engagement are now routinely front page news. “Enterprise 2.0” has moved from the fringe of public sector priorities into the mainstream, and early adopter departments and agencies worldwide are showing tangible and measurable success.

But what are organizations really trying to accomplish with a 2.0 strategy? Why is a renewed emphasis on collaboration important to the departmental mission?  Beyond the hype, beyond the fluff – what the real objective?  Ultimately success in the knowledge economy –whether public or private sector – rests on connecting the three fundamental elements of business: People, Processes and Content.  Balancing these three elements is not as easy as it seems. As public sector workplaces became automated in the 1980s and ‘90s, this world of “1.0” meant focus on process and content – the rapid rise of email, of shared network drives, of workflow tools endlessly routing items into inbox task lists: transactional content was pushed and pulled from eyeball to eyeball.  Process and Content? Yep! Got it covered.  People? Err… not so much.

Public sector employees personify contributors to the knowledge economy:  program development, delivery of citizen services, protection of infrastructure and populace, regulation and monitoring to ensure high quality of life for residents.  Information is the lifeblood of public sector activity – and this content comes from people.

When we talk about this new generation of collaboration -  inspired by the tools and practices of the 2.0 phenomenon -  we often hear the term “social”:  social networking, social media, social computing.  Social in this context does not mean leisure, or fun and games, it means people. It means bringing the human voice back into the wired world of the electronic workplace.  Organizations wanting to adopt a 2.0 strategy are seeking a more Social Workplace.  The “Social Workplace” is an ideal expression of Web 2.0 technologies to connect people with their peers and with critical content and information. Culturally, it helps break down hierarchical and administrative barriers to innovation and idea exchange among rank and file employees. Technologically, it introduces simpler content creation and communication tools and uses the Web to bridge geographical and generational gaps.

As Web-based collaboration becomes energized by the introduction of social and rich media, sharing and maintaining quality content can accelerate employee productivity. Where individual knowledge was previously hidden, successful teams are seeing shared information and experiences becoming part of broader organizational culture. Employees who actively share their knowledge emerge as experts, and departments that encourage employees to share their knowledge build stronger peer-to-peer and community networks, accelerating internal productivity gains. Providing a variety of simple, interactive, personalized community tools accessible over the Web or smart phones can achieve measurable positive results in this Social Workplace.  In Part 2 of this discussion, we’ll explore the essential scenarios best served by the Social Workplace:

• Attraction, retention, and better use of talent as part of human capital management
• More transparency in corporate governance and communication
• Enablement of front line staff to respond and serve
• Support for a more virtual enterprise
• Respect and protection of institutional memory

Stay tuned…

As a consultant focused in the Employee and Organization Performance space, I came across an interesting Reuters post linking enhanced productivity in employees who use Facebook and YouTube at work. The article noted a University of Melbourne study that showed people are about 9% more productive when using the Internet for personal reasons while at work.

In today’s widely accessible, internet-based collaborative environments, one could question the ability for employees to maintain focus on their day-to-day activities. To this point, I have seen countless private and public sector examples where tools such as Instant Messenger apps or community collaboration sites were locked down or blocked.

With the entrance of a new generation in our workforce comes the increased adoption of on-line social networking and collaboration tools. Taking away the ability of this generation to work and interact within these environments limits channels for enhanced connections both personally and professionally. 

I’d be considered a Generation X employee, joining the workforce around about the time when email became mainstream. When I joined Accenture in the mid-90’s, voicemail was the chosen vehicle for broadcasting Corporate messaging to our global workforce. Email quickly followed as the channel of choice for connecting employees, which was made possible through laptop enablement (note: I recall the strong policy and leadership messaging that email was to be strictly used for business purposes). We then brought the intranet online and provided the ability for employees to share knowledge, messaging and ideas via websites and collaboration rooms.

Thinking back to the technology we used when I joined, I’m fairly certain that in 1995 I used to get 2 voicemails per hour (which admittedly a number of them were from friends lining up plans for the weekend or suggesting menu items for dinner).  These days I’m getting about 2 voicemails per month, and most of my networking is via email, some of which are understandably social (and “unproductive”) in nature.

I can’t speak to the vehicle of choice for staying connected before this technology stuff. However I can only speculate from newspaper cartoons and TV shows like Madmen (set in the 60’s) that there was a time where the water cooler was the collaboration tool of choice for work and non-work related topics. People stayed connected and engaged with colleagues and friends. They shared ideas, topics of interest, lined up dinner plans, arranged socials and followed up on work projects. Out of interest, check out Wikipedia where it can be duly noted that the water cooler is called out as a social networking tool.

I have to wonder, how much productivity was actually lost by keeping the water flowing? Were employees who had daily water cooler social interactions more or less productive than desk-chained colleagues? Seeing as how I have yet to come across an example of a water cooler “lock-down”,  I can only un-scientifically speculate, backed with some methodological research thanks to University of Melbourne, that social networking technology is in fact a useful tool to maintaining a more productive workforce.

As we delve further into Web 2.0, in government and industry alike, we are seeing the power of the community, the eagerness to collaborate and the excitement brought on by new ways of working.  We see employees eager to share their knowledge, expertise, and energy on work that falls outside of their typical boundaries.  In turn, we should be able to leverage the power of communities coming together to produce results faster and better than ever before.  Sounds perfect!  But, there is a challenge…..

We find that our organizational structures and management policies are not always conducive to supporting these new ways of working.  We are faced with managers worrying about employees ‘wasting time’ on new technology or doing work that falls outside of their defined roles and responsibilities.  Our compensation systems reward people, well defined teams and concrete deliverables.  Management hierarchies have leadership positions defined and accountable for results.  These structures and policies were put in place to create well-managed and high-performing organizations.  But, how does this formal, hierarchical structure leverage and compensate the power of communities?  What needs to change?  This is the management challenge we face….. 

 Gary Hamel, ranked as one of the world’s most influential business thinkers, and according to Fortune magazine “the world’s leading expert on business strategy”, writes about this dichotomy in his book The Future of Management.  Two quotes from the book resonate with me as I watch Web 2.0 take hold at Natural Resources Canada.   

“The web has evolved faster than anything human beings have ever created—largely, because it is not a hierarchy. The web is all periphery and no center. In that sense, it is a direct affront to the organizational model that has predominated since the beginnings of human history. No wonder managers feel a little queasy when they venture into the far reaches of cyberspace, like space travelers who’ve arrived on a planet where up is down and down is up.”

“How do you discover radically better ways of leading, organizing and managing? The short answer: You look far beyond the boundaries of today’s “best practice.” You look someplace weird, someplace unexpected. To glimpse the future of management, you must search out the “positive deviants,” organizations and social systems that defy the norms of conventional practice.”

The current approach creates conflict….and in order to resolve it we will need to be flexible, creative and open minded to accepting new ways of managing work, and also to rewarding and compensating employees in new ways.  This could range from compensation and classification through to delegation of work.   Perhaps the best model would be to create a community of managers and employees equally contributing to challenging the status quo.

Feeling queasy yet?  Don’t worry.  The feeling will pass once we all start to embrace change and all the opportunities it brings with it.   

You can think about it….

You can talk about it…..

You can worry about it ….

Or, to borrow from Nike, you can just DO IT!

In our work environments, we sometimes fall into patterns of complacency…we find it easier to follow the traditional approaches laid in front of us even when we know there might be a better way.  It would just take too much time and effort to get buy-in to change…..or would it? 

What if a community got together to do it?  All it takes is one person to get it started, to bring together individuals with a shared interest…and it is amazing to watch it take off from there. Web 2.0 allows us to leverage the power of the community through collaborative approaches to work such as crowdsourcing.    

Making change happen means you need to take action, and sometimes that means taking some very bold steps and accepting a certain degree of risk.  You have to have confidence in your idea, but it doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to know all the answers, because your community can (and will) help you.  Believe in the wisdom of crowds.  Like-minded people, are coming together in communities and building on each others’ ideas.  This makes a good idea a truly great one that is representative of a broader community..

Don’t be afraid to challenge traditional approaches.  “What is the worst that can happen?”  Unless the risk is significant, (and be really firm about defining significant) continue on.  Find your advocates…and perhaps not in the traditional sense of organizational hierarchy or governance.  Instead, seek out those who share your vision, and have the same passion for change….and the same sense of urgency to make change happen.   It is these three factors, vision, passion and urgency , that are, in my opinion, keys to success and what will give you the confidence to be bold and to accept risk.  When viewed as competencies, we see these factors as strong leadership qualities…..when shared among a community, this gives you something phenomenal! 

 Although still in its infancy, government departments are starting to exploit the power of communities.  It is fascinating to be part of it.   

On June 26 2008, the Federal Sustainable Development Act passed into law. While Bill C-474 has many noteworthy aspects, a significant facet is the inclusion of performance-based contracts. Departments and agencies named under the Financial Administration Act will now be preparing a sustainable development strategy containing objectives and plans for the department or agency that complies with and contributes to the Federal Sustainable Development Strategy, appropriate to the department or agency’s mandate. And public service executives will be measured on their ability to meet the objectives defined within their organization’s strategy. Failure to do so may impact public servants’ bonuses. In a July 21 article in the Globe and Mail, journalist Bill Curry synthesized the significance of the bill. “Failing to protect the environment will carry consequences. For public servants, the law now forces managers to write environmental goals into employee contracts relating to bonuses. Employees who fail to meet their environmental targets will lose bonuses.”

It is possible for government departments and agencies to deliver substantial improvements to sustainability with some very achievable initiatives. In our last blog post, we described the triple-bottom line benefits of telework. Improved online collaboration tools, such as video conferencing, telepresence and web conferencing, can now leverage technology breakthroughs to deliver on the promise on effective meetings without the need for business travel. A report last month by the Global e-Sustainability Initiative, a group of technology companies, and the Climate Group, an environmental organization, estimated that up to 20 percent of business travel worldwide could be replaced by Web-based and conventional videoconferencing technology.

A very practical consideration for using online collaboration tools is that usage can be measured quite easily as can the environmental savings in terms of carbon emissions. TELUS will be showcasing its collaboration solutions at GTEC.  Now, choosing measurable initiatives is key to success, not to mention your bonus payout.