On Thursday evening the Social Computing project team held a second focus group in Glasgow to get further perspectives on the benefits, risks and challenges associated with the use of social computing tools in the workplace.
In keeping with the blog entry on the first focus group, the discussion is summarised below. First we look at comments related to specific tools and then move onto the identified risks, opportunities and challenges. Interestingly too, in addition to the general issues faced by organisations, there was discussion on the LIS perspective on the tools.
Wikis
- Benefits included: potential for improved productivity and increased currency with greater ease of updating
- There is the ability to control the quality of content by having contributions approved before being published
- Version control and the ability to roll back to previous iterations of a document was seen as a plus
- Concerns include the ability to update anonymously, reliability and authority of contributions and associated legal implications. This was countered with the argument that the more who contribute, the better the quality
- Having a wiki operation in isolation from other internal systems is a limitation
Blogs
- Seen as a good way to disseminate information to staff and a means of engaging with your stakeholders
Social networking
- Effective platform to attract prospective undergraduate and graduate students to an organisation
- Keeping in tough with alumni is made easy with social networking tools
Discussion boards/forums
- In one organisation discussion boards are used for staff to post questions for reply by their colleagues. This is seen as a means for internally marketing one’s skills if you are able to answer the questions
Instant Messaging
- Lack of archiving of instant messages means that they are not available for future reference; but there is the same issue with face to face or telephone conversations. On the other hand, it offers an avenue for informal messages that are not important enough to archive
LIS attitude
- "We always look at the risks." We tend to thinks of the risks first, rather than opportunities but this is done so as to address the risks
- There is an issue around the validity of information recorded on systems. For example someone labelling themselves on Facebook as an expert in an area, when there are others in the organisation who are in fact more of an expert. There is no control of the terminology used
- Social computing tools are seen as an opportunity for LIS to market themselves and their resources. They can act as mediators. Eg: if staff are communicating on a forum, LIS staff can see what they are talking about and intercept if they can assist in finding the answer
- Tagging is by its very essence supposed to be for user generated tags, however LIS may prefer to decide the terms that information should be categorised by. User contribution can be used to positive effect by collecting the right terminology from staff and then using this to develop a controlled vocabulary
Benefits/opportunities of social computing tools
- Opportunity to promote knowledge sharing
- Possible to improve work practices with greater ease of updating
Challenges of social computing tools
- Winning buy-in from managers and articulating the benefits
- Not all staff may have the same access to tools and there is an expectation by some that they should have access to these tools. This may generate negative feelings amongst staff. For example, an accounting clerk without access versus a marketing person with access
- There is concern over control when working jointly internally or externally on social computing tools. How robust is your system and is everyone using the tools to the same standard
- Trust versus control between employers and employees. Everyone needs to know their rights and responsibilities and what is/isn’t acceptable
- Controlling these tools takes considerable time and effort
- The need for critical mass for tools to work and also the appropriateness of the tools to the groups size and to the task they are working on
- Social computing tools can be used for training needs analysis. Eg: discovering that is the secretaries and not the practitioners who are contributing. As training needs are visible there is an opportunity to use this to market your services and training
- Established and experienced staff have already got good contacts and networks in place. As they have this already in a manual sense, what is the benefit for them to convert to the electronic tools? Why would they want to share what has taken them so long to build up?
- Getting uptake may require a cultural shift. Some users (including LIS) are not actually familiar with the various tools and what they do
- Getting contributions is one thing but then how do others use and interpret the material if they do not understand your context when creating it?
- Establishing ownership of information in the public domain, which may lead to inadvertent misuse. As an aside: One member brought the Creative Commons license to light. This establishes the rights that third parties have to copyright material - it is an intermediary between all rights reserved and free-ware or no rights reserved: "some" rights are reserved
Risks of social computing tools
- Lack of control puts organisations at risk and there is a large potential of damage to reputation
- Lack of awareness of legal issues such as privacy and copyright
- On the flip side of the points above, trying to control staff to rigidly may kill their enthusiasm for the tools. Employees need to be trusted. Those who are out to cause damage will do so regardless of social computing tools being available
- People using the tools may seen to be time wasting. Example given of nurses on Facebook in the ward while families are visiting patients. Additionally there is the risk of bad PR in these circumstances
- The risk of non-adoption. Eg new graduates may choose their employer by the tools and access provided
- Risks are seen to be greater in closed/internal systems
- Is there an accessibility risk in terms of staff who are unable to use the tools as others do. Are organisations leaving themselves open to accusations of discrimination?
- Identity theft - is it a substantial risk or has it been exaggerated via the media? Are these tools really any riskier? It is up to individuals as to what they disclose but additionally, the burden of data protection lies with the organisations which hold users personal details
What is the greatest risk/opportunity/threat?
In summary, the group identified the following as the greatest risk, opportunity and threat
- Greatest risk: Potential for damage to reputation due to a lack of central control over published content
- Greatest opportunity: Improving on current work practices by implementing tools that are easier to use and update and better enable sharing, networking and flow of information
- Greatest challenge: Realising the full potential of opportunities and benefits that social and collaborative tools offer, in terms of buy-in, awareness and promotion, training, uptake, quality contributions
It is interesting to see that the same issues that were encountered when for example the internet was rolled out to staff desktops are cropping up again. We have the same set of problems with a new generation of tools
Thanks to all who have participated in the focus groups and contributed to the project.
The Project Team
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