Concluding the FreePint Topic Series: The Social Enterprise
Jinfo Blog

By James Mullan

Abstract

As the FreePint Topic Series: The Social Enterprise concludes, James Mullan, co-producer of the series, takes a look back at some of the articles that have appeared and themes covered from governance and ownership to implementation tips, choice of platform and best practice in use of social features.

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In producing the FreePint Topic Series: The Social Enterprise, Shimrit Janes and I have been very conscious of the potential breadth and depth of articles we could have commissioned and written. Say the word social to anyone and a million different things come to mind, so it was important to us that we focused on articles that were both relevant and interesting.

One of the key themes to emerge from the series has been the importance associated with ensuring you have adequate support for a social enterprise solution.

In addition to this it's important to consider issues like governance and ownership as these are crucial elements in the success of a social enterprise project.

One of the other key themes, which I believe has come out of the social enterprise series, is that there are a wealth of tools out there, so it's important to look carefully at your requirements.

Getting Social Right the First Time

Some of the early articles in our series looked at what organisations need to do in order to make a social enterprise project successful.

Steve Bynghall in his article Making Social Succeed: What Organisations Need To Do provides some great guidance on topics like governance, ownership and the importance of identifying clear business reasons for implementing a social tool.

In an article from which many people will take heart, Richard Hare asks "What's the Problem with Enterprise Social?". In this article Richard looks at the development of social computing tools over the last 10 years and where we're heading.

Choosing a Social Enterprise Platform

One of the biggest challenges once you've decided to introduce a social enterprise tool is deciding what type of tool is going to best take forward the objectives of your organisation. There are a number of options available to organisations and two of our articles in the Series looked at the different tools available.

In-house development: the first of these is an article called Capco's Bespoke Collaboration Platform for Knowledge Sharing. In this article Rebecca O'Reilly looks at how a bespoke tool became the key tool with which Capco shared knowledge and communicated with each other.

This is a really interesting article, which also looks at how a culture of innovation and community building can help foster knowledge sharing and bring individuals together.

Choices and challenges: another article which provides some very practical advice on choosing an social enterprise platform is What to Look for in an Enterprise Collaboration Platform from Ben Wightwick.

In this article Ben looks at how the demands of organisations and their clients has seen the development of products which allow organisations to share files securely as well as take advantage of the benefits of social task management and social collaboration.

The article also looks at some of the challenges organisations might face when implementing an enterprise collaboration platform.

Does SharePoint Still Reign Supreme?

One of the most significant developments in recent years has been the increased use of SharePoint by enterprises both large and small. But does SharePoint deliver all that it promises?

If you're unsure about the allure of SharePoint then you'll definitely want to read my article Is There Really an Alternative to SharePoint? in which I look at some of the reasons organisations might not want to use SharePoint and some of the alternative options.

If, however, you do have SharePoint and are committed to using it then Sarah Dillingham's article SharePoint 2013 – Using Social Features Effectively provides a great introduction into best use of these social elements.

Interviews with Vendors

Given the very large number of products and solutions available in the market, we thought it would be useful to look at two of the newer products and their approach to knowledge sharing within organisations.

The first of these is a Q&A with Fuse which looks at how user-generated videos and social thinking can be applied to organisations' development programmes, and act as a bridge between offline and online social learning.

The second will be a Q&A session with Bloomfire, which will look at how Bloomfire makes knowledge creating and sharing within organisations easier with a view to overcoming the challenges that many organisations face in this area.

Editor's Note: The Social Enterprise

The FreePint Topic Series: The Social Enterprise ran from January to March 2014 to examine the ways that organisations are maximising internal social connections and knowledge management.

You can still register your interest to receive a free copy of the FreePint Report: Buyer's Guide on Social Tools.

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