Mar 06 07
Innovation
by Renn Vara
I’ve had some interesting conversations this week. Without giving names, they included the creator of the original user interface for Google, the Chief Marketing Officer of a longtime Silicon Valley chip company, and a management consultant who’s building an exclusive online community of IT leaders for Cisco. We talked at length about innovation in business communication. The bottom line from all three of these tech leaders: “Just because we can do it, doesn’t mean we should.”
Take the idea of social networking. This is the concept of blogs, podcasts, live chats and discussion forums all working together as part of what might be called a communication system. All three of these people had similar views. Being techies, they like the idea of building like-minded communities over the web. It plays to their passion and to some degree, their busy life styles.
But they had some cautionary wisdom to share. First of all, they stressed the need for creating these tools around a common application or function. Meaning, as one of them said, “Don’t expect busy people to join a social network just to be social.” Instead, tools should work in conjunction with a task or area of responsibility that will coerce participation in a discussion forum or podcast.
For example, database engineers working out a common problem or CIOs needing to stay on top of technological innovations. Here were some of their general comments and views, paraphrased of course, and in some cases, embellished a bit:
- Don’t call it social networking. Business leaders who have bottom line responsibilities don’t take kindly to terms like that. Call it something functional like communication system.
- Don’t think it will work for everyone. The CMO I talked with had actually built a system, tried it for a year and then gave up. Basically, no one came.
- Know that the system is a minor part of the job. The real work is in making the content fresh and engaging the audience to ask questions, give feedback and share ideas. And then imagine doing this all the time. Easier said than done.
- Before you build it, clearly identify your audience and your objectives. If it’s customers, what do you want them to do? You may find that blogs and podcasts aren’t the way to go. A simple email or snail mail may do.
- Remember that everyone is busy, particularly those folks who make big decisions and write large checks. Reading interesting blogs may not be at the top of their list of things to do.
- And remember, innovation morphs and develops. Don’t invest too deeply in today’s innovation without being mindful of where it’s going.
The one constant in innovation is change. With that said, obviously I’m a big fan of blogs and podcasts. It’s what I do. But at the same time, I know it’s not for everyone. Sometimes a simple conference call will do. Or how about a real novelty: a face to face meeting? Imagine, people talking to people. Now that’s innovation.
