When it comes to social media and my company, I feel a little bit like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz. Prior to August 2009, I was not really a social media participant. Yes, I had a facebook page and a LinkedIn account, but I was not really present or active in either space. In August, I simultaneously started this blog, opened a twitter account, and logged on to yammer at work. I made a decision that as a learning professional, I needed to embrace social media so that I could learn how to help others use it to capitalize on the informal learning that takes place through these tools every day.
I was excited that my IT department had recently made yammer available inside our organization. It made me feel that my company was being forward-thinking and innovative. But sadly, as I went on to yammer I discovered there were only a handful of users there, mostly from IT and Marketing. I invited others to join me as tried to make some connections and start a dialog around topics that were important for learning, but people mostly responded in ways that made me feel like I was annoying them. Much like Dorothy in Kansas, I felt unappreciated and misunderstood, so I clicked off yammer and went out in search of people who would listen to me. Dorothy left Kansas with a small basket and her dog Toto, and landed in Oz; I sat down at my computer with a cup of coffee and my dog Smokey at my feet, and landed on twitter.
When I arrived, I found it to be a strange and wonderful place. Like Oz, it was a little disorienting at first and it certainly had its perils, but after a while I found a few kind souls in the learning community to help me navigate my own yellow brick road. So for the last few months, I have been out there tweeting and bookmarking links with these fine folks. The list of people who I follow, and those who follow me, has grown at a modest but steady pace. I'm learning new things every day but lately a feeling of melancholy has set in. I have a longing to "get back to Kansas" and share these experiences with my own "family."
So today I decided to click on the yammer icon that has lately been sitting idle on my desktop. And there was Aneta from Marketing and Steve from IT (and not much of anybody else), just as I had left them. It was no glorious homecoming. Not much had changed since I'd been over the rainbow. But of course, now I am different. I've learned so much about the possibilities of social media on my trip through Oz/twitter. One thing I learned is that it takes patience to build a community. So I will yammer on, joining groups, posting quotes and comments, sharing links, and gradually I will build a community of learners - right in my own backyard.
I welcome any comments or suggestions on fostering informal learning and building communities through yammer.
Enjoyed this post as it is very true. One of my favorite blogs is The e-learning blog by Tom K from Articulate. I enjoy it because there are always really need quick tips on doing something I'm interested in even though of late I've gotten away from e-learning projects. Although I've tried to search Yammer from time to time, I find the communities really aren't YET communities, just a few folks really trying to get it going. There is chatter that abounds on our strategic transformation in our Microsoft communicator and probably other outside social media sources. Wonder if a social site within a specific company culture versus the grand world of cyberspace makes a difference on use and value?
ReplyDeleteNancy,
ReplyDeleteWhile Microsoft Communicator is a great tool for on the fly discussions and meetings, I think yammer has greater possibilities for reaching people beyond our own small circle of contacts. It gives us the ability to create and join groups, and to organize posts into categories using hashtags(#) which can be saved and are searchable. I have started threads using two hashtags so far: #managing and #engagement. On the first day of using the #engagement tag I got into a dialog with a manager about the engagement podcast series our department produced. She checked out our podcasts and has passed them onto to other people in the company. A small success; but I'm very encouraged by this!
Thanks for your comment.
Mike
Finding myself in a similar social media "Oz", I know where you are coming from. We have Yammer at work and I see so much potential. It has been a slow start, but I have found that having a Yammer Champion is the yellow brick road to success. This champion must click their heels and say there is no place like Yammer, there is no place like Yammer. They need to encourage/remind people to post (give them suggestions of what content they can post), use the private message feature for quick notes (so people are made of aware of that feature) and help people understand that a photo is part of the sharing package. Once we got a few champions on board, it snowballed. More and more are joining and posting to find out what is going on in departments around them. I think Dorothy would be proud.
ReplyDeleteDG,
ReplyDeleteI like your suggestion about having yammer champions. I was thinking of having my staff members become topic leaders: organizing and/or participating in groups around topics such as change management, leading virtual teams, employee engagement, etc. I think that may be a way for us to build some momentum.
Thanks for your comment.
Mike
Mike - love that idea. Great way to spur on discussion. I'm gonna figure out how I might do that at my work.
ReplyDeleteDG,
ReplyDeleteI'd love to hear how it goes for you down the road. Feel free to contact me through LinkedIn or twitter. You can use the links in this blog post to reach me.
Thanks.
Mike
I'm not sure that was Dorothy's message. I think the Tweets, Yammers, and Facebooks etc. are the OZ she realized she didn't need, to be loved. She had everything she needed without the illusory world. But that is just one man's opinion; one that doesn't belong to or follow any of them. I made a blog to see how it was done and how difficult it might be. I write to myself. I just don't think you should fool yourself that you are not in OZ. You are. Enjoy the journey for what it is, but do realize, it's not real. Peace.
ReplyDelete