Thursday, December 20, 2007

Facebook in the Enterprise - WorkLight

Tony Karrer found this little gem...WorkLight.
So now you can use all the power of Facebook as your company social network. I'm sure there's a militant IT manager out there somewhere willing to tell me why this will NEVER work. So, let's hear it. Why can't a tool like this be successful as the basis for your companies social network?

I'm not exactly sure how WorkLight does its magic, but perhaps anyone out there that's tried this out could blog about your experience and help spread the word. I'd love to hear about your experience.


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4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I have one opinion about a barrier to its success: time. Or, the perception that time is being wasted while using it and the further judgment that you must not have enough work to do. Unfortunately, those are real opinions that currently float around my organization that recently implemented blogs. In a way, I can see some truth in the fact of simply not having time - half the organization is staffed by office employees paid hourly. With high volumes of work, it's hard enough to get everything done - much less read blogs, newsletters or participate in a social networking program.

bschlenker said...

You, Mr. or Mrs Anonymous, have a very valid point. I remember the same perceptions 10+ years ago about this new thing called email, and the world wide web. Its a slow process for organizations because they don't actually think of you as a human being. You are "headcount", another piece of the giant machine. Like a broken gear, you can be replaced with another "headcount". Hourly employees, especially, actually ARE hired to do NOTHING but the specific job they were hired for. Businesses have objectives and trust me when I say that human intervention is a LAST resort. If the job/process can be automated it will be. There is far too much overhead with headcount.
I don't want the gal at Starbucks to stop making my coffee to twitter about it.
This is why businesses are starting see the value in creating new jobs/positions that attend to the social networking function. Its rare and its new but these are just a few jobs of the future. Set yourself up now and start showing people that you can improve the customer experience by creating community around a brand.
Thanks for the comments!
Cheers!

Anonymous said...

Email is a great example. A communication and information sharing tool that rolled out to much skeptism, but succeeded because it served a definitive purpose. I believe that's one of the biggest challenges in implementing these new technologies: showing exactly how they serve a purpose. Can you say better, faster, cheaper? Gotta start somewhere.

Jolly tidings,
Mrs. Anonymous

Anonymous said...

Brent,

More and more we in corporate America are in the business of moving data around. When we think of the inefficiencies caused because we don't happen to know the right person with the right piece of information at the right time, social networking becomes not just an interesting idea, but a vital tool for success. I'm starting to wonder why every large company isn't using it.