Monday, February 23, 2009

Six ways to make web 2.0 work

Via Jane Hart comes a timely article from the Mckinsey Quarterly on six ways to make web 2.0 work.

Last week I participated in a planning meeting for staff developers & an Education strategy group meeting on ‘Working on the Teaching and Learning Plan - Priorities, Realities and the way forward’ at. The Ed Strag group at CPIT is made up of senior management & is a think tank / talk fest / networking group which discusses various organisational strategies so that implementation of said strategy is democratised.

I have always seen the opportunities that Web 2.0 provided as a good way to assist with knowledge sharing, networking & knowledge creation within CPIT & the ITPNZ sector. I blogged previously on the power of wikis & especially about the books by Tapscott on wikinomics & Wikipatterns by Mader. Recently I had a brief read of Enterprise 2.0 implementation by Aaron Newman & Jeremy Thomas via Google books.

Small changes have taken place over the last two years at CPIT to improve organisational communications. Our CEO forums are all archived & there are opportunities for staff to join discussion forums on CPIT wide issues. However, getting people to engage with web 2.0 type tools in the workplace has been an up hill struggle. So the six recommendations come at the correct time to trigger some thinking about how CPIT could leverage web 2.0 to assist in promoting ongoing learning within the organisation. The recommendations are along with present context are:-

1) The transformation to a bottom-up culture needs help from the top:- We seem to have buy-in from the top but I don’t think the bottom knows about it.

2) The best uses come from users—but they require help to scale:- This is where staff development & IT need to assist. Staff development with providing pertinent training where required & IT with more user friendly ‘help’ facilities.

3) What’s in the workflow is what gets used:- Attempts have been made to include timetabling, planning and work plans into one area but at this time not all the elements are ready & so there is an interruption in workflow to do any planning or communication as our main groupwise calendars do not talk to our main timetable management system or to the organisational wide strategic planning database.

4) Appeal to the participants’ egos and needs—not just their wallets:- We showcase people who have good ideas but perhaps we are not using the correct forums, methods or not promoting these occasions well.

5) The right solution comes from the right participants:- Identifying the right participants is a key & then supporting, nurturing and promoting them. This is something we can still improve on.

6) Balance the top-down and self-management of risk:- We need to study this one more and adjust to our current context.

Web 2.0 is a tool that can be used to improve the flow of knowledge & innovation within our institute. This is especially so when faculties, schools and divisions are still working within vertical silos. There is still a need to harness the wisdom that is all over the institute by providing the right tools, building awareness of these tools & providing the right support at the right time so that the use of these tools can be maximised.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Technology is constantly changing. The www has now evolved into “Web 2.0” and is the second wave of the World Wide Web. Most of us still follow the textbook type of teaching, where the students are made to by-heart, recite and write what is taught by us. As teachers, how evolved are we in terms of incorporating technology with the curriculum?In an era of global connectivity teachers should be actively involved to make the students aware of the digital tools available and how effectively they can be used for learning purposes. Such learning methodologies creates a sense of “self directed” learning and problem solving attitude among students.

thanks!