I came across your blog after seeing you linked somewhere on Beth Kanter’s blog. I wanted to respond to your question about having to walk the line between Web 1.0 & 2.0. I recently started as a social media person for a large nonprofit – we serve as a resource to over 1000 other nonprofits in our state and advocate on their behalf. My goal is to facilitate better communication between us and our members, in addition to members and other members.

The big challenges so far have been that not all of our members have email addresses, many are not yet technologically savvy, and aren’t entirely comfortable with the web. So, I am working on a general strategy right now, trying to generate a buzz about us, while working to get our members to see some of the advantages of going online. I hope to eventually use our blog as a hub of information they can go to, ask questions through, and rely on for resources and tips from us and each other.

Additionally, a lot of the tips and nptech posts and ideas I have found are related to nonprofits with a specific cause. Because we have a more general purpose with different arms and subparts, finding the focus and determining how to best utilize social media for our broad cause with a broad range of members is definitely challenging!

Thanks for your comment. It inspired me to write my next post, about the first “Web 2.o” internal shift at our org, of simply using a CMS.

Two examples of market lag/current:
1) Microsoft has been pushing net enabled meetings with full technology implementations for over 10 years…way before Skype…way before major webinar providers…way before “2.0″.
2) I did a regular post on a dial-up bulletin board system in 1996 that receive comments just like this.

Too compensate for lag/current, vendors constantly struggle with ways to re-brand what is old. Seeing how we can’t all of a sudden call the internet something new and exciting the notion of “2.0″ as a re-branding to push the market forward makes complete sense. First we saw the widespread adoption of PCs; then, widespread adoption of internet; then broadband; then flood broadband net apps. We are reaching a new state of market awareness. But the apps being used the most are based on collaboration/communication trends that developed in the 80s (BBS) and pre-80s (distributed teams). Just like analog television with programming based on 1950s principles, we have an internet based on 1970s work principles. Web 2.0 net app developers are trying to change that…but organizations are not responding…some individuals are…but organizations are not. Again, it’s lag/current.

What we are NOT seeing is a shift in mass collaboration, teaming and communication; this despite a market flood of cool tech. It’s practice and work style that are “old school”. There is this huge collaboration divide. It’s not the difference in technologies, it’s the difference in work styles and approaches to work. Almost all leadership in organizations has had their collaborative and communication style molded, shaped, set and entrenched by what was customary in the 1970s and prior (e.g., a “memo”,or a “meeting”). Most persons under 30 have never drafted a memo. And term “meeting”…yeah, whatever.

Ten years from now the work place is going to be drastically different because more firms will be populated by persons who right now are in junior high school, high school and early college. The foundations of communication and collaboration for this cohort are drastically different from anything most anyone reading this is accustomed too. Communications instincts are completely different; enabled by mobility, emerging technologies and hyper-connectivity.

Now, I hate to say this, because I am in the over 30 cohort. But most persons over 30 have no idea what this shift is, and very few live it. Communication within work settings across cohorts gets worse before it gets better. Both younger and older cohorts are going to feel alienated and frustrated at times. Younger cohorts are going to be frustrated due to lack of access to communication media that are right part of their everyday reality (imagine yourself working without a pen or pencil); not hardware like phones or big honking PCs, but mobile devices and net apps…things that are becoming part of an entire cohorts everyday (text phones, social networking sites and social media). Older cohorts are going to feel alienated from an often times social result they feel like they had no large part in (“But wait! I was the committee chair.”)

There is nothing at all wrong with not using the latest and greatest. And everything can be done in moderation. One definitive reality is, to work in group settings and collaborate, each group member has to adopt norms that are conducive to the group’s survival and growth. If organizations want to attract, maintain and nurture young energized staff…this is the wake up call. No excuses, get on the 2.0 bus, else look for your organization to loose more young staff than it attracts. Over time you will be known as a “boring” and stagnant place to work with and for (think PC and Apple commercial campaign).

And if your organization has a business model that extends beyond 10-15 years, then start changing right now. It will take you at least half that long to move the organization to where communication and collaboration best practice is right now. It’s not too late. The bus will be making another stop by your desk in one hour. Are you getting on or not?

What a great first post – I look forward to more!

I found your perspective very valuable. Part of my work is being a community tech/global communications steward for a large, loosely structured international network, and the range of people within it have every possible variation of tech interest/ability/access. So I loved your comment, Kath, and completely identified with it.

I’m always juggling communication solutions that will work for everyone and yet not limit what can happen, so I was really intrigued by your idea, Johanna, of using a Web 2.0 approach, or if you will Web 2.o principals or values, rather than focus on the tools themselves.

After all, as we all know, it’s not about the tools, it’s about the quality and depth of our connections and conversations with each other, wherever it happens.

I’d love to hear more fro you about applying Web2.0 in this way, as an approach – both internally and in your organization’s outgoing communications.

I am just diving into this world as I’m taking on the communications work of a successful public school with one of the highest poverty rates in our state — after having worked on a college campus for a decade that was replete with resources. I’m investigating ways I can learn and tools that can be adapted to our needs without a big financial or intellectual cost. Have been told I should just camp out wherever Beth Kis, and her blog led me here.

The notion of identifying audiences very clearly is so critical and so complex. The vast majority of the families we work with are immigrants, and they are living in fear of information and how it flows. In our community the real communication happens person-to-person and porch-to-porch. I have modified the information I share with the state to protect our families from the INS. These are people who do not want to communicate with us electronically, and a large measure of our school’s success is predicated on careful, face-to-face listening. Yet these same families use Skype to talk to their families daily. It isn’t just who the audience is — it is the nature of your relationship with that audience.

On the other hand, our students are curious consumers of technology who we need to equip with tools to develop their voice and share their opinions. We want them to see themselves as thinkers with important stories to tell and want to help them learn to be heard. We have begun a few small experiments with digital recorders, blogs, etc. As with kids everywhere, they can’t get enough. That is great, but it is no substitute for them learning how to talk with one another, how to develop an opinion and express it, and how to disagree — my experience is that these things are best learned in person.

Then there is our staff — overworked and deeply committed. The best way for me to reach them is still to leave a written note in their mailbox or go find them. I’m trying to find ways to help them document their work and connect them to one another without asking for more of their time. Crazy talk?

Then, there is everyone else — oddly, perhaps the best audience I have. I’ve just launched a little area on Flickr to document the transformation of our former parking lot into a super neato playground. Our external community of supporters has really enjoyed seeing this and several of our teachers are being introduced to Flickr through this experiment.

I ramble. But this topic is a critically important one for me to negotiate. There is no extra money or extra time where I live these days. I welcome these tools, but only when they can support the relationships I am trying to nurture, not just the abstract notion of the constituency. Ya know?

Thanks for this.

Kath

Cheryl,
We also work with people who “switch off” when you mention technology. One attitude that seems to help is to *not focus on the tools.* The focus is on engagement; the Internet is one of many ways to help it happen.

Judi,
We moved from the IRL meetings to blogs with limited comments. We got the sense that our constituents needed more privacy to feel comfortable engaging more online. And they are engaging much more in email discussion. Invites were sent to a very specific group of people; membership is moderated. Perhaps there’s a group of your constituents who use email more than others? That might be a group to try an invite with. Only you know if you have room for an experiment; often a small Web 2.0 project failure won’t upset much, so why not try? (I know you have a tough group of constituents; unfortunately my dad has colon cancer, and though he’s only 68 & computer savvy, he’s likely to read online forums but not likely to engage.)

I am working on a post about internal tools for next week. Thanks again for all your great thoughts, everyone!

For our constituents, we struggle. We are a colorectal cancer patient advocacy organization. Many of our constituents are either sick, or older, or both. When we want to engage folks online, the only thing that appears to work is through our website and email. We have a number of bloggers updating our site on a near daily basis, and stats show that their posts get solid traffic. But RSS subscriptions are a small fraction of our site visitors, and even of those 75% are getting our RSS feeds via email. A few folks comment on posts, but not many.

So much of what we do is one-on-one or small group that doesn’t lend itself well to Web 2.0. We want people to feel ownership and generate their own content to share on social media tools (come on, who doesn’t want to cover their butt? ) but general public communication is still largely top-down and one way which frustrates us to no end. It’s still too early. For now, we stick to “go where the people are” and the reality is that we have to use old school methods to do that.