Posts Tagged ‘online communities’

Institutions as Mobilising Networks

Thursday, September 2nd, 2010

The book I’m reading at the moment is “The Future of Thinking: Learning Institutions in a Digital Age“. The book links to a number of themes I’m interested in, particularly developing knowledge content and user generated content (and also a number of the drivers indentified in the recent NCVO future of membership report).

The book looks at how new technology such as social networks and virtual environments will change how people learn. And although the book is aimed mainly at higher education, there is plenty of read across into the membership organisations as many are knowledge-based and/or educational.

I’ve just finished the chapter titled “Institutions as Mobilising Networks” which contrasts how institutions are often viewed - as rule-driven, centralised, old fashioned and slow moving - with how they could be - trend setting, dynamic, agile and innovative.

The key opportunity (or challenge, depending on how you look at it) is: to use social media and learning environments to aggregate, coordinate and disseminate knowledge and facilitate learning - to mobilise the network of members and other potential participants.

Taking up this challenge could dramatically improve engagement and knowledge development in an institution’s area of interest.

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Clay Shirky - Cognitive Surplus

Tuesday, June 29th, 2010

Clay Shirky launched his new book “Cognitive Surplus” at the LSE yesterday evening (also available: podcast and video). The “Cognitive Surplus” comes from a combination of the increase in free time since the mid 1900s and the recently developed medium for coordinated action.

This follows “Here Comes Everybody: How Change Happens when People Come Together” which is one of the seminal texts for the impact of social media on society.

As well as presenting some excellent material from his book, I found him a very engaging speaker. His main theme (amongst a fair few) was that digital communications and social media is providing opportunities for previously unmet social/psychological needs. So, it has provided opportunities for example, to counter attacks on Indian women considered by right-wing activists to be behaving inappropriately.

He suggested categories of opportunities:

  • Communal - there are numerous examples of communities of people with common interests sharing photos, jokes, etc.
  • Public, such as Wikipedia.
  • Civic - where there could be significant impact on our culture, such as political opposition and moves to much more openness in medical records.

    • Among his examples, conclusions and suggestions were:

  • It has taken 100 million hours of effort so far to create Wikipedia. This may seem large, but the US population consumes more hours of TV commercials than this in a weekend.
  • The power of brands will decline significantly.
  • Marketing and communications professionals need to switch from their current approach of either being in broadcast mode (advertising) or receiving mode (research), to a far more conversational approach.
  • In the third world, mobile is far more important than PCs, so incorporating SMS into solutions needs serious consideration.

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    Cultivating Knowledge through Communities of Practice

    Thursday, June 24th, 2010

    A very interesting slide set - Cultivating knowledge through Communities of Practice - from Steve Dale, the information architect for the award winning local government “Community Hub” online community. He sets out the fundamentals for setting up and encouraging Communities of Practice and the different ways of sharing and developing knowledge.

    The presentation takes is business-focused (rather than IT-focused), looking at the methods and roles to get successful Communities.

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    Power of Information Taskforce Report - NFP Summary

    Thursday, March 19th, 2009

    The recently released Power of Information Taskforce Report points the direction for the much wider use of Government Information in the UK. The report was commissioned by the Cabinet Office Minister, Hilary Armstrong, and was published in February 2009.

    The Taskforce made 25 recommendations to the government, ranging from much more open access to mapping and address data to ensuring that public sector information is made as simple as possible for people to find and use.

    There are several points raised in the report that are of particular interest to not-for-profit (NFP) organisations and some associated challenges:

  • Open government information - the government is urged to make information much more open, particularly to NFP organisations, through “backstage services”. There is potential here particularly for charities who engage with central government, local authorities, or the police, to be able to gain benefits both for fund raisers and for beneficiaries.
  • Online communities - the report makes the point that many of the most rapidly expanding groups are online-only organisations with no fees. This is a challenge to traditional membership organisations - how can you ride the wave of openness without compromising the values and financial stability of your organisation (part of the issue here is who you want to engage with - members or the wider public).
  • Map data - any move to make Ordinance Survey more accessible and potentially free to use for the NFP sector would be of benefit to walking groups and any group that has interest in GIS.
  • Policy data - many NFP organisations respond to government policy documents and consultations. There is potential to engage more rapidly and more comprehensively, with contributions across all stakeholder groups.
  • Challenge to openness - the government is being urged to open up its data. The challenge here is - is your organisation willing to open up your information and knowledge to the greater public good (or does this negate your unique selling point)?

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