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Articles in Insight

Learn By Doing – Why Training Isn’t Enough
February 28, 2010 – 10:04 am | Comments

We learn by doing.
It is a blinding glimpse of the obvious but somehow this point gets missed over and over as big companies approach social media by rolling out training.   Don’t get me wrong – …

Insipid Common Sense
January 12, 2010 – 10:04 pm | Comments
Insipid Common Sense

I am reading Tournament of Shadows – a history of Russia, England, India and the “Great Game” for empire in Central Asia.   I just came across this quote and fancied it too good not to …

The Social Web is a Culture of Invitation
November 23, 2009 – 3:09 pm | Comments

The Social Web is a Culture of Invitation. It has its own norms just like any other social group, be it a workplace, a chess club or a church. You earn your way to invitation through being present and slowly building trust.

Three Paradoxes of the Internet Age
November 7, 2009 – 11:20 am | Comments

Social technologies are cloaked in a rhetoric of liberation that tend to obscure the fact that never before have we handed so much personal information over in exchange for so little in return.

Technology is Your Business (?)
October 31, 2009 – 3:57 pm | Comments
Technology is Your Business (?)

The punchline for me is that if you are saying that technology isn’t actually your business there is likely a technology company that is realizing that they are actually in your business.

Past is Present – Nothing Dies on the Web
October 22, 2009 – 12:20 pm | Comments
Past is Present – Nothing Dies on the Web

In a normal social context you might think your brainless comment or slip of the tongue will quickly pass out of memory. On the social web you are often on-the-record, forever so judgment and a new sensitivity to the norms of the Social Web are critical.

Subscribing to People – Not Magazines. One More Reason Why Twitter Matters
October 4, 2009 – 8:57 pm | Comments

If you’re company is building an approach to Twitter – great. If you are focused on using it to meet business objectives – great. If you aren’t thinking about how Twitter can make everyone in your organization smarter – you are missing what I think is the biggest opportunity.

Social Media Goes the Way of Total Quality Management
October 2, 2009 – 12:03 pm | Comments
Social Media Goes the Way of Total Quality Management

In the 80s and early 90s Total Quality Management (TQM) was all the rage.   As the idea moved from concept to execution – TQM divisions were set up within large organizations.  Then a funny thing …

How Organizations Become Institutions – How Institutions Die
September 17, 2009 – 4:51 pm | Comments
How Organizations Become Institutions – How Institutions Die

I recently wrote a Radar post that generated a fair amount of discussion titled, “Stop Giving Newspapers Your Advice.  They Don’t Need It.” The point in that post was that we should stop doling out …

The Failure of Newspapers and What it Means to the Rest of the World
September 15, 2009 – 3:46 pm | Comments

This is a cross-post from Radar.
Speculation about the demise of the news business and advice about what they should do about it is everywhere. It makes for great, self-congratulatory sport but it won’t …