Are you feeling crazed trying to keep up with social technologies but feeling like you are sliding further behind? Most of us are but there is another way to approach the challenge.
2. “It takes all the running you can do,
to keep in the same place. If you
want to get somewhere else, you
must run at least twice as fast as
that!”
- Red Queen
3. “Continuing adaptation is needed in
order for a species to maintain its
relative fitness amongst the systems
being co-evolved with”
- Wikipedia
The majority of humans – when they have the option – will choose relationships that provide financial benefits And meaning, empathy, relevance, & flexibility over financial benefits alone. These multi-faceted relationships also improve performance and productivity. [Monkey study in the 50s – baby monkeys choose furry mother over a bottle]
We typically don’t look at our organizational ecosystems and identifying the type of relationship we need with various constituent groups to achieve optimal organizational performance but I believe this is the crux of the social business movement – making a concerted effort to engage people at the level which best serves the organization. Most businesses already do this in some capacity – B2B firms know relationship selling yields better results than a transactional model. Professional services firms spend a great deal more on employee professional development because they are the key value creators. In that past, if organizations wanted rich relationships, the only option was to invest heavily in one-on-one mechanisms – in person meetings and events, phone calls, emails. This one-to-one approach is still required for a rich friendship or partnership – social environments will not entirely eliminate that need.However, what social business approaches have done is created more efficient methods of developing and sustaining relationships, particularly in what I call the Encounter, Recognition, and Development stages of a relationship.