In an earlier post I mentioned that Jonathan Burns and myself were given permission to blog about a web 2.0 value disruption project that is currently underway.  This post is number three in a series that is expected to run until mid May.

Previous value-disruption project posts

1. Introduction
2. Project Scope

We often hear about the generational divide that exists when discussing web 2.0.  Those under 35 or so, live social networking and therefore get it.  Many of  those over 35 find social networking strange and don’t understand where and why it’s useful.

With that in mind Jonathan and I have been watching the reaction of the participants in this project to determine the degree to which this phenomenon is playing itself out.

After 60 days my assessment is that this phenomenon is somewhat valid, but with other more important drivers at play.

It’s been true that older generations struggle with what this web 2.0 project is all about.  For example:

• Older participants, especially outside the core team in the wiki collaboration project are not participating in the 3 wiki trials with the same vigor as younger participants.
• We are using a project wiki ourselves to manage the project.  Some of the older participants need more hand-holding to get them up and running.
• When discussing potential applications the younger generation is able to forecast how they and others can use it quickly.  The older ones, not so much.

On the other hand, there are participants in their 50s and older who are right in there.   They are engaged, enthusiastic, and running experiments such as trial blogs, mini collaboration projects, or notification groups with micro-blogging.  And they can forecast how it will benefit them as good or better than some younger folks.  Furthermore there are employees in their 20s who are showing no interest whatsoever.

So what gives?  What really distinguishes between those who are engaged and those who are not.  Is it really age that drives engagement with Web 2.0?

My take on the generation divide

While it has some validity I don’t think that’s the key driver.  From watching this diverse group of employees I believe two others drivers are just as important in determining who is engaged and who is not.

1. Their level of curiosity
2. They see a personal return

Level of Curiosity

You know these kinds of folks.  They are always curious.  They are the ones that watch documentaries and provide historical anecdotes in conversations at parties.  So when something new comes along it provides them a way to feed their curiosity.  That’s why there are great-grandmothers out there in their late 80′s in local community centers teaching Microsoft Word and PowerPoint  to recently retired executives (my mother).  I’ve noticed this characteristic is prevalent in those with high levels of engagement in this project.  Curious people are just more comfortable dealing with the ambiguities and uncertainty of a value-disruption project.  However, curiosity only partially predicts engagement.

See a Personal Return

Curiosity by itself  isn’t enough.  People who are deeply engaged also see a personal return.  They perceive that what they are working on will directly impact them and provide them some kind of personal work-benefit.  For example, greater recognition, faster access to experts, easier tracking of documents, whatever.  When a team member sees a direct correlation between what they are working on and how it will benefit their specific situation, engagement goes up.

So, my take is that curiosity and personal returns are far more predictive than age in determining who will be attracted to web 2.0 in the workplace.

Implications

Here are four implications I see.

1. When populating your innovation team, whether web 2.0 or other, make sure you have a good mixture of curious people.
2. Screen the team to ensure they have a  personal stake in success.  Explicitly uncover what will it mean to them.
3. Extending that idea further, share the personal returns amongst team members.  When John understands why Jeanille is attracted to the project he can make subtle changes to his team interactions and deliverables to support what Jeanille is looking for, and vice versa.
4. On a consistent basis during reviews ask people to share their greatest learning, even if it doesn’t directly support the project deliverables.   This sharing of learning will reinforce their drive for curiosity and indirectly, their engagement.

Your thoughts

• What is your experience on web 2.0 and the age divide?
• What effects of curiosity and personal return have you seen on your projects?

Thanks you for visiting http://www.ennova.ca

Jonathan Burns and I are currently working on a web 2.0 project with a client in the services industry.  We’ve received permission to blog on the project as it happens, agreeing to keep the names confidential.

Our purpose – Share value-disruption learning

It was formally launched on January 6th and it’s scheduled to run to mid May 2010.  The project scope involves creating three applications: blogs, internal collaboration, and A Friends of ____  site.  As a business model design expert with a practice in transforming businesses so they can value-disrupt a market, I’m most interested in blogging about our experiences in the following areas.

1. The generational divide
2. Methods for creating and managing risk reduced plans
3. Building and maintaining project momentum
4. Dealing with ambiguity resulting from project scope design
5. Disruption effects on the business model
6. Disruption effects on their markets
7. Team interactions and the role of trust and evangelists
8. The role of web 2.0  technology in managing the project.

Of course, what I post on is contingent on what happens so I won’t necessarily be following these topics in order.

Jonathan is web 2.0 technology guru, amongst other things, and so he’ll likely be blogging from a more technical side.  You can see his blog here.  I’m planning to blog once a week, time and constraints permitting.  Monitoring both blogs should give you interesting insights on:

• Web 2.0 installations
• Business technologies that are available
• How to deal effectively (or not) with ambiguous projects
• The power of disruptions and
• A host of other insights we can’t yet anticipate.

We’re excited about sharing our insights as they happen.

So stop by, or better yet, connect to us via the RSS feed on the blog as we tell the story of this project.

What other topics would you like to see?  Are you running any disruption projects that you can share?

Thank-you for visiting http:ennova.ca

Since February 2009 Jonathan Burns and I have had the privilege of speaking to over 100 CEOs of Canadian firms through the Presidents of Enterprising Organizations network and the Women Presidents Organization (WPO) on the subject of Web 2.0.

Here’s what Jonathan has written about our experience.

The companies whose executives have seen the presentation include Lyreco, Energizer, McMillan, Toronto Board of Trade, Consumer Impact Marketing, Melitta, Kids Help Phone, GEO Global Network, Tyco/DSC, Swiss Natural Sources/Swiss Herbal, Wardrop Engineering, Jan Kelley Marketing, Marsulex, Kinectrics, Progistix Solutions/SCI Group, Peerless Electric, Pathway Communications, Glenway Golf & Country Club, Junior Achievement, the College of Massage Therapists of Ontario, RHR Canada, Triumph International, Summerlea Office Solutions, LaserNetworks, Soft Care Corp, HostMySite.com, Aseco Integrated Systems, Greenblue Systems, Skyway Wind Energy Group, Torino Drywall, 360 Visibility, StaffClick Personnel, Blazing Design and The DOUG Agency.

Most CEO’s have heard of web 2.0 but they don’t really know what it is. When I ask them they say “it’s Facebook and Twitter and all those kind of web programs my teenagers use.” At the start of every meeting we ask them to share how Web 2.0 makes them feel. From younger groups (CEOs in their 40s) I hear “exciting, opportunities, possibilities, connections.” From older CEOs (50+) I hear “it’s weird, my kids are into it but I don’t get it, an invasion of my privacy, I feel left behind, I feel a loss of control, I feel overexposed, it’s a big waste of time.”

The big idea I share with CEOs is that Web 2.0 is fundamentally about the shift from publisher generated content to user generated content. Leveraging web 2.0 for your business means harnessing the incredible power of user generated content. But it requires a huge paradigm shift and many companies are getting left behind.

In a July 2009 global survey of 1,700 executives on Web 2.0 by McKinsey & Company “69 percent of respondents report that their companies have gained measurable business benefits [from Web 2.0], including more innovative products and services, more effective marketing, better access to knowledge, lower cost of doing business, and higher revenues.” Click on the chart to the right to see the details of this.

I quickly realized that the technology aspect of Web 2.0 is of secondary importance and it’s rarely why the implementations fail. The primary issue is always people and their work processes or online habits. The introduction of internally facing web 2.0 technologies into a workplace is fundamentally about changing people’s work processes, the way they get their work done. And if it it’s not planned around and integrated into the way users currently get their work done, then you have a sure recipe for failure.

The other observation I made is that internal web 2.0 applications are often brought on by the IT department to solve a particular problem and are rarely considered in the broader context of the firms business model: how they are organized and how they make money. Yet when you consider how you might leverage the power of user generated content in the context of a firm’s business model you open up the potential to enable significant profit growth by making strategic changes to the actual business model.

Today most small and mid-sized firms will be able to find ASP/SaaS (ready made) solutions for their Web 2.0 needs. We have spent time researching and engaging with the top ASP/SaaS solution providers for implementations for 5 users all the way up to enterprise installations for thousands of users so we can recommend the best solution for your specific needs. We have also researched the best technology partners for customized solutions if you want to build off your existing Microsoft Sharepoint platform and get more functionality than the ASP solutions provide.

Companies that are finding our services most useful are $10-500 million Canadian companies where the leaders are aware of web 2.0 but don’t understand the opportunities it presents or how to move forward to capitalize on them. Our particular specialty is guiding management teams through the discovery, decision and implementation phases built on a mutual understanding of the firm’s business model.

If you know anyone who fits this description we’d be happy to have a chat with them.

Thank you for visiting www.ennova.ca