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The shortcut to effective collaboration
March 3rd, 2010 Adil Tahiri Tags: CMS, enterprise search, knowledge management
Posted in CIO Agenda, Firm of the Future, Strategy & Innovation, Trends |
I am afraid there is none! Organizations must not expect instant change and added value simply by deploying new tools. The proliferation of standalone collaboration tools that have been hastily deployed without integration with existing enterprise content management systems and search facilities has resulted in very little contribution to the overall knowledge management capabilities of the organisation.
Collaboration is not a binary equation; it is about knowledge-sharing, the knitting together of communities and partnerships inside and outside the organization. The answer lies in a change of management & business processes and creating a culture that is conducive to collaboration, rather than just technology substitution. Creating or just finding existing communities with common goals and objectives that are empowered and prepared to challenge the norm is exactly what is required to create momentum behind the new tools. But achieving this depends on how much an organization is willing to forgo the command and control management style for an inclusive and collaborative one that tolerates new and even controversial ideas and ways of working.
Collaboration is clearly a socio-technological phenomenon where careful attention must be paid to people, process and technology if organisations are serious about realising the benefits of the social collaboration revolution. Maybe it is time collaboration strategy moved to the top of CIO’s agenda.
Adil Tahiri
Adil Tahiri is a technology strategy director within the Chief Technology Office and also a member of Atos scientific community. His current role involves collaborating with a number of colleagues globally, partners and customers to identify and exploit emerging and disruptive technologies for the benefits of Atos customers. He has been in the IT industry for 15 years and has led the technical delivery of a number of large and complex IT transformation programmes cross different industries. He has particular focus on data centre networking, server technologies, unified communication & collaboration, end-user computing and virtualisation/cloud technologies. Prior to becoming part of the CTO, Adil has held a number of senior technical consulting positions at KPMG, Schlumberger, Fujitsu Services and Atos Origin.
Yes you are absolutely correct that instant change does not happen by deploying new tools. You mentioned toleration of new and controversial ideas and ways of working. I sum up this as creativity. Creativity is key and it is not just “nice to have”. Each team member or collaborator must be creative in order for a collaboration to meet its stated objectives. However, creatvity and free expression of innovative/controversial ideas must be be underpinned by rigorous processes for collaborators.