Fortune Cookie Wisdom for Sales on Commission

Fortune Cookie Wisdom for Customer Service

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The Do's and Don't of submitting your resume

Don't have your mother submit your resume for you. 

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Fortune Cookie wisdom for sales: On making money

How Collaboration and Social Networks Improve Productivity

Report|McKinsey Global Institute

The social economy: Unlocking value and productivity through social technologies

July 2012 | by Michael Chui, James Manyika, Jacques Bughin, Richard Dobbs, Charles Roxburgh, Hugo Sarrazin, Geoffrey Sands and Magdalena Westergren

In a few short years, social technologies have given social interactions the speed and scale of the Internet. Whether discussing consumer products or organizing political movements, people around the world constantly use social-media platforms to seek and share information. Companies use them to reach consumers in new ways too; by tapping into these conversations, organizations can generate richer insights and create precisely targeted messages and offers.

Social media’s untapped productivity payoff

MGI principal Michael Chui discusses the potential value in using social tools to enhance communications, knowledge sharing, and collaboration within and across enterprises.

While 72 percent of companies use social technologies in some way, very few are anywhere near to achieving the full potential benefit. In fact, the most powerful applications of social technologies in the global economy are largely untapped. Companies will go on developing ways to reach consumers through social technologies and gathering insights for product development, marketing, and customer service. Yet the McKinsey Global Institute (MGI) finds that twice as much potential value lies in using social tools to enhance communications, knowledge sharing, and collaboration within and across enterprises. MGI’s estimates suggest that by fully implementing social technologies, companies have an opportunity to raise the productivity of interaction workers—high-skill knowledge workers, including managers and professionals—by 20 to 25 percent.

MGI’s report, The social economy: Unlocking value and productivity through social technologies, explores their potential economic impact by examining their current usage and evolving application in four commercial sectors: consumer packaged goods, retail financial services, advanced manufacturing, and professional services. These technologies, which create value by improving productivity across the value chain, could potentially contribute $900 billion to $1.3 trillion in annual value across the four sectors.

Two-thirds of this potential value lies in improving collaboration and communication within and across enterprises. The average interaction worker spends an estimated 28 percent of the workweek managing e-mail and nearly 20 percent looking for internal information or tracking down colleagues who can help with specific tasks. But when companies use social media internally, messages become content; a searchable record of knowledge can reduce, by as much as 35 percent, the time employees spend searching for company information. Additional value can be realized through faster, more efficient, more effective collaboration, both within and between enterprises.

The amount of value individual companies can capture from social technologies varies widely by industry, as do the sources of value. Companies that have a high proportion of interaction workers can realize tremendous productivity improvements through faster internal communication and smoother collaboration. Companies that depend very heavily on influencing consumers can derive considerable value by interacting with them in social media and by monitoring the conversations to gain a richer perspective on product requirements or brand image—for much less than what traditional research methods would cost.
To reap the full benefit of social technologies, organizations must transform their structures, processes, and cultures: they will need to become more open and nonhierarchical and to create a culture of trust. Ultimately, the power of social technologies hinges on the full and enthusiastic participation of employees who are not afraid to share their thoughts and trust that their contributions will be respected. Creating these conditions will be far more challenging than implementing the technologies themselves.

http://www.mckinsey.com/insights/mgi/research/technology_and_innovation/the_social_economy

Social Networking Policy considerations

By Mikal Belicroft

For as long as I’ve been writing about the National Labor Relations Board and social-media use policies, I’ve been advising businesses to ensure that their policies and guidelines for employees are reviewed and vetted by legal counsel. That’s because the NLRB hasn’t been a bit shy in ruling that a number of employers have violated the National Labor Relations Act when setting such policies. The problem was that the board hasn’t exactly been forthcoming in providing specific guidance with respect to what it wants to see in such policies and guidelines in the first place.

That all changed recently when the agency -- which is responsible for, among other things, investigating and remedying unfair labor practices -- issued a 27-page memo (PDF) on the topic. In it, the board reviewed social-media policies from several businesses that it claims run the risk of infringing on employees’ free speech and labor rights, then offered guidance for businesses going forward.

Among the recommendations to businesses when creating and distributing social media policies for employees are the following six points:


1. Know and follow the rules: All of your employees should be urged to read your social media policies and guidelines, and you should make it perfectly clear what is considered inappropriate, being assured that such acts will not be tolerated.

2. Be respectful: The board suggests that your policy explicitly state that employees should be “fair and courteous to fellow associates, customers, members, suppliers or people who work on behalf of the employer.”

3. Be honest and accurate: This includes never posting information or rumors that are known to be false.

4. Post only appropriate and respectful content: Specifically, maintain the confidentiality of company trade secrets and private or confidential information; express only personal opinions; don’t represent yourself as a company spokesperson without permission.

5. Use of social media at work: Don’t use company equipment for personal messaging unless it is work related.

6. Media contacts: Don’t speak to the press without checking with the company’s human-resources department or function beforehand.

The NLRB acknowledges in the memo that more fine-tuning of social media policies and guidelines on the part of employers will be necessary in the future. For example, warning employees about releasing confidential materials online might sound reasonable, but such action might prohibit those very same employees from discussing and disclosing information regarding their own conditions of employment, which the board considers a "protected concerted activity."