Graduating Bloggers

As part of this blog, I try to capture "unexpected benefits" associated with our internal social media proficiency effort.

And, in this post, I'll celebrate our "graduating class" of proficient, external corporate bloggers.

The Value Of Corporate Blogging

Generally speaking, the state of affairs regarding corporate blogging is rather poor.  Corporate blogs are either recycled propoganda, or abandoned, or sound like they're written by the PR guys.

To be fair, I am a corporate blogger for EMC.  I am generally thought of as proficient, and have thankfully avoided many of the traps that have befallen my corporate blogging brethren in this industry.

We had an external consultant try to estimate the economic value of my blogging activities.  The guy came back with a Really Big Number that got everyone's attention.

Hey, all I want is my 10%, really ...

We all know that blogs are "naked conversations".  But what we've come to appreciate is that well-executed corporate blogs are really valuable naked conversations.

Speaking from my own perspective, I get well over 1,000 hits per day.  I can see my words and point-of-view echo through the space-time continuum.  Customers are influenced.  Partners are influenced.  Journalists and analysts are influenced.  My company is influenced, including my management.  Competitors seem to read every word.

Sometimes, it's a bit scary that such a powerful tool is in everyone's hands ...

But I want more proficient corporate bloggers for EMC.  Far, far more.

What Doesn't Work

Not surprisingly, a few people did the right thing (realizing we need more corporate bloggers), but went about it in a well-meaning but unproductive way.  They tried to make a case that it was their corporate responsibility, or create the perception that it was somehow expected that senior execs at the company should blog.  There were ideas around assigning MBOs, or creating other incentives.

Not much came from these efforts.

Why?  People blog when they're passionate about something, and they feel the need to share their thoughts with a very wide audience.  There's a few other hurdles, but that's the core of it.

No passion, no burning need to share your views -- well, no good corporate blog, IMHO.

So, while some were pursuing that strategy, I set off in a very different direction.

Back To Our Internal Platform

On our internal platform, we've been encouraging people to blog.  Not everyone does.  Of those that do, some show some natural passion and talent.

The act of having them do this in a relatively safe environment (e.g. behind the firewall), means that we can groom and graduate bloggers from internal to external at a regular cadence.  Every month or so, we'll have a few new corporate bloggers to join our ranks.

And, incidently, creating enormous value for EMC, as well as the individuals who are blogging.  BTW, they all love it, and can't understand what took them so long to get going.

Take a look at our currrent roster here.

Of the 12 bloggers you see there, I had an either direct or indirect hand in over half of these individuals, dramatically increasing our "blogger bandwidth" in a very short time, and with a very natural effort.

We gave people the opportunity to express themselves, found the ones with promising talent, and encouraged them to swim in the very big pool outside the firewall.

Len wrote a nice post about other aspects of this from an eBusiness perspective, worth reading.

A Question To Ask ...

What's the economic value of 12 or so competent corporate bloggers?   

I can't answer that, but -- in our industry -- it's generally agreed to be a Really Big Number.

Big enough, in fact, that it probably outweighs our total investment in the Clearspace platform, infrastructure and people.

And, with every passing month, it gets even more valuable.

Comments

[Rachel Happe]

I really like this idea of 'graduating' employees after they have proven themselves in a safer environment. My only question...do any women or minorities work at EMC?!? Kidding of course but it would be a good addition to your current roster.

Thanks for sharing this strategy.

[Chuck Hollis]

You're absolutely right.

While EMC is a reasonably diverse place (but always could do better), for some reason that I do not understand, none of our more diverse "voices" want to blog outside the firewall yet.

I am at a loss to explain why this is. But, like you, this bothers me, and I'm doing what I can.

[John Prichard]

I discovered this blog a couple of weeks ago. Since it reflected my observations of social behavior over the years, I read the entire thing from start to current.

I am the senior technical adviser in IT for a similar project just starting. I get the same kinds of projects you get for the same kinds of reasons. I like fresh snow where the rules haven't been written yet. Don't worry, I spent 20 years outside of IT too and agree that your knowledge of IT is quite accurate. I can't get even one of my steering team (business or IT) to read what you have written ... even when I made them a printed book in true chronological order.

I think your information and social engineering principals so valuable for them to know that now I am thinking of writing a 3-4 page synopsis of your guidepoints with pointers to your reasons and pointers to the subsequent results in your blog. 3-4 pages would not give your treatise justice but this is all that they will read at first anyway.

Then it occurred to me that you may have had to do something similar and that I should use this first.

Contact me if your interested and I will give more background in an email.

John Prichard
[email protected]
Systems Engineer
Texas Instruments

[Chuck Hollis]

Well, John, it seems that we are similar people on a similar journey, which is kind of cool if you think about it.

I've never had to make The Big Case with anyone here at EMC.

I'm fortunate in that I have enough corporate brand internally that I haven't had to distill everything down into a 3-4 page guide.

But, now that you mention it, that probably would have some value externally.

If you'd like to collaborate on such a "practitioner's guide" to implementing social media at large corporations, let me know.

I'd love to carve out some time to do something like that.