Twitter is, as you may know, an extremely successful microblogging tool used by people all around the world. Its success has influenced organisations, large and small to create and implement their own versions of microblogs.
Since users of knowledge management 1.0 found it to be too centralized, restricted and controlled as well as the tools being too complex, knowledge management 2.0 allows for focusing in the individual and thus knowledge flows in direct communication. According to Dirk Roehrborn, managing director of finance, personnel and development services of Communardo Software GmbH, social media has allowed for improved communication which benefits knowledge management.
Microblogs are designed so that anyone can post something, but as Albert Einstein stated "only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I am not sure about the former", this may sound callous but the fact of the matter is that people do not always know what they are talking about. An employee might post a piece of information that conflicts with another employee's post. This can cause disruption within the organisation, especially if left unchecked. There has to be certain administration in place to regulate all the posts so that wrong information is removed as early as possible.
The entire essence of a microblog is that it should be short and thus to the point. Twitter feels that the optimum length is 140 characters, some people say this is too little to get your message across, however I feel it is sufficient for most organisations as it forces people to be concise and straight to the point (Suleman, 2011 - B. Com Hons IS&T) Because of the succinct nature of microblogs, people may wish to add url links to certain websites with more detailed information. These links lend to the advantages of microblogs, however, these urls are usually quite long and use up valuable character space and can be a disadvantage. Therefore, websites such as bitly allow people to shorten their urls while still maintaining the link to the desired page so much of the character space is conserved. With that being said, various organisations will have to set their own limits on the maximum number of characters a post may contain, as 140 may be seen as a disadvantage to a mission critical organisation for example a company manufacturing airline landing gear.
Microblogs are disadvantaged somewhat at the moment as they are not as yet integrated with other tools such as wikis, social networking and blogs. Another potential problem is that, although tags are possible, microblogs do not have appropriate tag management systems in place. One commonly used tag on Twitter is #usefulinfo, Suleman found that posts containing that particular tag may have been useful to the poster but the post was not useful for the searcher.
Microblogs are advantageous when being used for knowledge management as they can be utilised for both external and internal communications i.e. for microblogs can be used for communicating with customers and also only for employees to communicate amongst themselves. A further advantage of microblogs is that it allows for the spreading of information throughout an organisation quickly, so if there are some new developments taking place or perhaps some changes, the employees will be aware of it in real time rather than having to wait for the daily, or perhaps even weekly meeting that their company holds.
Because microblogs can be viewed by anyone, it will be easy for one employee who requires assistance to find another employee who is experienced in a particular area by reading relevant posts. This helps to prevent reinvention of the wheel and not making the employees solve one problem many times.
Markus Moller, a web developer for Conception in Germany, says that microblogging can complement a project plan but not substitute it. Technical barriers are removed through microblogs and each team member can inform the others on their progress according to the stipulated timetable. Markus feels that microblogs hold an advantage over intranets because they are short and employees cannot say they do not have time to type out 140 characters. Microblogs also remove some of the complexities and inhibitions associated with using intranets.
When using microblogs for external purposes, to interact with customers for example, a company can greatly improve its reputation. If customers are happy with the product or service they can post a short message on their thoughts of the company. Potential customers can even ask questions before actually doing business with the company and as microblogs are open to all, they view other customers' experiences and this may influence them to do business with the said company. However, the converse can also be true, where customers are dissatisfied and then post bad remarks about the company, this in turn will lead to other customers being dissuaded from doing business with the company. This opens up the unethical opportunity for rivals of a company to give negative reviews without any genuine basis for their complaints. These need to be avoided by asking posters to perhaps enter their invoice number or some other identifying piece of information so the company can distinguish the legitimate posts from the dishonest ones.
Nikesh, N. (M. Tech -2009) feels that microblogs can also be used for knowledge management in the form of FAQs for new employees to consult when they have any queries. This will allow them to become acclimatised to the corporate culture and possibly even shape it. This method of learning about the company will be very helpful if the new recruits are somewhat introverts and are too shy to ask what they need to know. Furthermore, the employees will have access to the FAQs 24/7 rather than being restricted to the traditional working hours if they need to find out something related to the company or their specific job.
References
http://www.slideshare.net/communardo/knowledge-management-and-microblogging
http://khatani.weebly.com/1/post/2011/09/using-twitter-for-knowledge-management.html
http://khatani.weebly.com/1/post/2011/09/mining-twitter-for-knowledge.html
http://www.slideshare.net/conception/corporate-twitter-how-to-use-microblogging-in-a-business-environment
http://www.slideshare.net/nikeshn/emerging-trends-in-knowledge-management
Proceed to Part 3 - Mining twitter for KM
Back to Knowledge Management page
Since users of knowledge management 1.0 found it to be too centralized, restricted and controlled as well as the tools being too complex, knowledge management 2.0 allows for focusing in the individual and thus knowledge flows in direct communication. According to Dirk Roehrborn, managing director of finance, personnel and development services of Communardo Software GmbH, social media has allowed for improved communication which benefits knowledge management.
Microblogs are designed so that anyone can post something, but as Albert Einstein stated "only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I am not sure about the former", this may sound callous but the fact of the matter is that people do not always know what they are talking about. An employee might post a piece of information that conflicts with another employee's post. This can cause disruption within the organisation, especially if left unchecked. There has to be certain administration in place to regulate all the posts so that wrong information is removed as early as possible.
The entire essence of a microblog is that it should be short and thus to the point. Twitter feels that the optimum length is 140 characters, some people say this is too little to get your message across, however I feel it is sufficient for most organisations as it forces people to be concise and straight to the point (Suleman, 2011 - B. Com Hons IS&T) Because of the succinct nature of microblogs, people may wish to add url links to certain websites with more detailed information. These links lend to the advantages of microblogs, however, these urls are usually quite long and use up valuable character space and can be a disadvantage. Therefore, websites such as bitly allow people to shorten their urls while still maintaining the link to the desired page so much of the character space is conserved. With that being said, various organisations will have to set their own limits on the maximum number of characters a post may contain, as 140 may be seen as a disadvantage to a mission critical organisation for example a company manufacturing airline landing gear.
Microblogs are disadvantaged somewhat at the moment as they are not as yet integrated with other tools such as wikis, social networking and blogs. Another potential problem is that, although tags are possible, microblogs do not have appropriate tag management systems in place. One commonly used tag on Twitter is #usefulinfo, Suleman found that posts containing that particular tag may have been useful to the poster but the post was not useful for the searcher.
Microblogs are advantageous when being used for knowledge management as they can be utilised for both external and internal communications i.e. for microblogs can be used for communicating with customers and also only for employees to communicate amongst themselves. A further advantage of microblogs is that it allows for the spreading of information throughout an organisation quickly, so if there are some new developments taking place or perhaps some changes, the employees will be aware of it in real time rather than having to wait for the daily, or perhaps even weekly meeting that their company holds.
Because microblogs can be viewed by anyone, it will be easy for one employee who requires assistance to find another employee who is experienced in a particular area by reading relevant posts. This helps to prevent reinvention of the wheel and not making the employees solve one problem many times.
Markus Moller, a web developer for Conception in Germany, says that microblogging can complement a project plan but not substitute it. Technical barriers are removed through microblogs and each team member can inform the others on their progress according to the stipulated timetable. Markus feels that microblogs hold an advantage over intranets because they are short and employees cannot say they do not have time to type out 140 characters. Microblogs also remove some of the complexities and inhibitions associated with using intranets.
When using microblogs for external purposes, to interact with customers for example, a company can greatly improve its reputation. If customers are happy with the product or service they can post a short message on their thoughts of the company. Potential customers can even ask questions before actually doing business with the company and as microblogs are open to all, they view other customers' experiences and this may influence them to do business with the said company. However, the converse can also be true, where customers are dissatisfied and then post bad remarks about the company, this in turn will lead to other customers being dissuaded from doing business with the company. This opens up the unethical opportunity for rivals of a company to give negative reviews without any genuine basis for their complaints. These need to be avoided by asking posters to perhaps enter their invoice number or some other identifying piece of information so the company can distinguish the legitimate posts from the dishonest ones.
Nikesh, N. (M. Tech -2009) feels that microblogs can also be used for knowledge management in the form of FAQs for new employees to consult when they have any queries. This will allow them to become acclimatised to the corporate culture and possibly even shape it. This method of learning about the company will be very helpful if the new recruits are somewhat introverts and are too shy to ask what they need to know. Furthermore, the employees will have access to the FAQs 24/7 rather than being restricted to the traditional working hours if they need to find out something related to the company or their specific job.
References
http://www.slideshare.net/communardo/knowledge-management-and-microblogging
http://khatani.weebly.com/1/post/2011/09/using-twitter-for-knowledge-management.html
http://khatani.weebly.com/1/post/2011/09/mining-twitter-for-knowledge.html
http://www.slideshare.net/conception/corporate-twitter-how-to-use-microblogging-in-a-business-environment
http://www.slideshare.net/nikeshn/emerging-trends-in-knowledge-management
Proceed to Part 3 - Mining twitter for KM
Back to Knowledge Management page