Upcoming: 2010 conferences calendar (and what are they good for)


Yes, the social web continues to change this consultant’s and analyst’s work – it’s changing the ways we think, interact and work. Yikes, one could say that the plethora of networked information and virtual network opportunities should be enough for everybody, but I don’t care for information overload fears and shivers.

Thus information-(over)loaded conferences are fine for me (that is if they provide some inspiration, they’re always wonderful and productive interruptions …), but besides these and some other reasons of going there as a freelancer, it’s basically about the opportunity for meeting old friends and real networking. They are chances to have the real personal conversations that deepen networks. And that’s why here’s my preliminary schedule for 2010:

First and right around the corner is Lotussphere, next week in Orlando. I am basically sitting on packed suitcases, but the whole event has it’s own tag here already and will trigger a lot of posting for sure. More coming up later on …

Did I say real conversations need face-to-face contact? I need to reframe this, otherwise my participation in the Virtual Enterprise 2.0 Conference on February 2, 2010 won’t fit, huh? I expect this to be equally good as my virtual participation in last year’s E2Conf in San Francisco (much of it is buried inside tweets and bookmarks, alas).

Now, it’s so much easier to participate in such an event than actually getting there, that’s why I am hesitating to register for Lift Austria in March. But the topic “Enable!” is as tempting as Vienna in spring …

Mechanistic models and a deterministic worldview may have worked well for the last centuries, but are not apt for the upcoming challenges we are facing today. Rather, we need completely different concepts and attitudes, accepting that the underlying processes escape our control and are unpredictable. It seems that the concept of “Enabling” is the key to this shift of thinking. Enabling is the art of carefully configuring adequate levers (physical space, networks, resources, etc.) that best support specific innovation processes, such as idea generation, prototyping, market entry, etc.

OK, then, on with already booked events – starting with re:publica April 14-16 in Berlin – Germany’s blog, social media and digital society main event. Then CeBIT & WikiCAMP in March, the german LinuxTag 2010 in Berlin (will see if I can make it there, June 9-12) – because it may collide with my travel plans for the 2010 E2Conf in Boston, June 14-17. Later this year I will try to return to Copenhagen for another reboot …

Add to this several BarCamps – including the Barcamp Nürnberg (February), Barcamp Furtwangen (May), BarCamp Bodensee (June) and possibly BarCamp Ruhr too (may collide with Lift Austria, sigh).

Oh, and right – I need to get some work done in between as well 😉

Above picture of cute calendar work http://www.flickr.com/photos/booberrystudio/ / CC BY 2.0

Social capital RoI – preserving collaborative networks and work-life balance

I am in the midst of collecting interesting thoughts and remarks from the Enterprise 2.0 Conference this week in San Francisco (while preparing for the Enterprise 2.0 SUMMIT this week in Frankfurt) and this one caught my eye. Noticed this too during the life video stream from the conference, but it was only a side-remark then, and it’s more interesting in terms of RoI and “collaborative performance” than one sees at first sight. During a panel Booz Allen Hamilton VP Art Fritzson and senior associate Walton Smith shared their experiences integrating social and collaborative software into the BAH consulting business and argued like this (via Thomas Claburn at Information Week):

Enterprise 2.0, properly implemented, can create a barrier to exit.

[…] it can help companies retain valuable knowledge workers by weaving social bonds into the fabric of the workplace.

“People think twice about leaving and giving up all that”

Sounds a bit like “silk bondage” replacing the iron cask of lifetime-employment – but I wouldn’t be so negative, would I? It’s probably more about designing a workplace people enjoy and allowing the growth of employee’s social capital is good business practice with (hard to calculate but substantial) side benefits. Preserving functioning teams (and collaborative networks) by keeping people from leaving for good is one good benefit, OK.

Yet I wonder how this ties in with a caring for work-life balance – nurturing human-relations to colleagues, partners and bosses is vital, but this isn’t the social life of people alone. Entertaining a campus cafeteria, pet barber shop and sports facilities might be good for people with work-related friends mostly, but this is worrying me a bit. What’s your take, am I too negative and “german” again?

Oliver Marks and Andrew McAfee at the Enterprise 2.0 conference

During the last two days I have spent the better part of my nights listening in to and participating in the discussion at the Enterprise 2.0 conference in San Francisco. This wasn’t only Twitter, quite some documenting took place in Google Wave too (that’s global collaboration, me and Dan editing the same blip while being literally thousands of miles away from each other, for #nirvana we only need to sort out the time zone problems). Some notes and thoughts are still forming and may end up in a frogpond- or enterprise2open-blog post soon …

Until then this video is a good thing to watch, Oliver Marks (who happens also to be one of the headliners at next week’s E20SUMMIT) talking with Andrew McAfee (new book here: Enterprise 2.0: New Collaborative Tools for Your Organization’s Toughest Challenges) about the conference, it’s target audience and about the current state of the discussion around Enterprise 2.0.

We discuss the strengths of the event – the evangelists and middle ranking employee success stories – but also note the need for impressing on senior ‘C’ suite decision makers in organizations the business value of these modern ideas and associated technologies.

There are at least two interesting things to notice in there, one: the discussion is evolving quickly and the experts have since long stopped to mull over questions of definition, why even of questioning RoI. The real topics are now the necessary steps we all should take to get the C-Suite from “being interested” to becoming active sponsors – and how to explain the tangible benefits of collaborative performance. Systems are ready and able, experienced consultants ditto and may work for the satisfaction of being the change you want to see money. Gentlemen, please let your projects start.

The other thing is the obervation I absolutely second that middle-level people aren’t the roadblock, in fact they are the necessary ingredient of Enterprise 2.0 success and make out most of the participants both at the Enterprise 2.0 conference and the upcoming E20SUMMIT. This isn’t by chance or “because they were told to go” but because they feel the need and the willingness to change with and by Enterprise 2.0.

Dirk Röhrborn im Gespräch – Enterprise 2.0, Microblogging und Pre-Conference-Workshops

Im Vorfeld des Enterprise 2.0 SUMMITs habe ich einige Interviews mit Akteuren und Stakeholdern der deutschen Enterprise 2.0 – Szene geführt. Bereits im Mai – direkt nach dem MobileCamp in Dresden – habe ich u.a. neben dem Interview mit Frank Schönefeld von der T-Systems MMS (hier im ECM World-Blog hat Björn noch einige Anmerkungen notiert) auch ein Interview mit dem Geschäftsführer von Communardo, Dirk Röhrborn gemacht (ebenfalls im ECM World-Blog zu finden – “Interne Kommunikation mit Social Software unterstützen – Interview mit Dirk Röhrbörn“)

Im Mittelpunkt dieses Gesprächs stehen […] Entwicklungen im Bereich Enterprise 2.0. Einen besonderer Fokus wird dabei auf die Aspekte gelegt, wie durch Social Software die interne Kommunikation – sei es auf Projekt- oder Unternehmensebene – unterstützt und gefördert wird. Durch den erhöhten ‘Fluß’, wie auch die Transparenz für alle (weil öffentlich einsehbar) […] kommt es zu einem Effekt des ‘schneller und besser Informiertseins’

Interessanterweise ist Dirk gerade in San Francisco bei der Enterprise 2.0 Conference – direkt nach dem Confluence Community Day ging sein Flug – und teilt uns von dort seine Eindrücke, u.a. zur Situation im Markt für Enterprise Microblogging, sowie zur Einführung von Enterprise 2.0 in Unternehmen in seinem Blog mit. Daneben haben wir beide heute morgen auch kurz geskypet, eine Zeitverschiebung von 9 Stunden macht es dabei möglich, dass beide Gesprächspartner gleich müde sind, wenn auch aus unterschiedlichen Gründen …

Gerade Dirks Rückblick auf Dion Hinchcliffes Session finde ich spannend, nicht zuletzt weil Dion auch nächste Woche auf dem E20SUMMIT im kleinen Kreis eine “Masterclass”, d.h. einen ähnlichen Pre-Conference Workshop anbieten wird. Daneben wird er auch Keynotes und Panels (mit-)gestalten, kurz gesagt: ich freue mich unheimlich ihn wieder zu sehen und mit ihm über die Zukunft von Enterprise 2.0 zu diskutieren.

PS. Wer sich noch schnell für eine Teilnahme am E20SUMMIT entscheiden kann, dem bietet der (Community-Manager-)Blogger-Promotioncode “e20sfp” einen Rabatt von 200€ bei der Registrierung.