The Enterprise 2.0 Pitch

All this talk about Enterprise 2.0 has some employers scratching their heads and asking, "How can Enterprise 2.0 help my company? What problem does Enterprise 2.0 solve?"

A recent post on Tech IT Easy details five elevator pitches for Enterprise 2.0 adoption. Each elevator pitch caters to a different employee in the company; in this post we will discuss the CEO pitch and the Head of HR pitch.

The CEO Enterprise 2.0 elevator pitch is focused on improving innovation and productivity. When a company wants to improve a product, develop new strategies, cut costs, or improve culture, collaborative innovation communities are an excellent solution. The pitch: "Would you rank amongst the 65% of the executive disappointed with the level of innovation in their company?"

The Head of HR elevator pitch should emphasize improving employee morale and engagement. Employee job satisfaction is at record lows, which could translate to unproductive employees who "check out" mentally. Fostering a collaborative, innovate, empowering culture is an excellent solution to these problems. The pitch: "Hey I’ve heard that about 40 % of the workforce are either disengaged or disenchanted. What are we doing in our company about that?"

We recommend including an additional benefit in the pitch to HR executives and the CEO: a reduction of employee turnover. Companies may currently boast low turnover rates, but according to a recent survey by Right Management, 60% of workers say they intend to leave their jobs when the economy improves. Lowering employee turnover will result in substantial recruitment cost savings over the next few years. Executives list ROI as one of their main concerns regarding Enterprise 2.0 technologies; a reduction in employee turnover is an excellent example of potential financial benefits from an Enterprise 2.0 roll out.

Best Companies to Work For

Fortune's list of the 100 Best Companies to Work For was released Thursday morning, with SAS Company leading the way.  SAS, based in North Carolina, gives employees an impressive array of benefits:  subsidized child care,  unlimited sick days, a free medical center staffed by four physicians, and a 66,000-square-foot fitness center.  It's no wonder SAS boasts an incredibly low turnover rate of two percent.

Jenn Mann, Vice President of Human Resources at SAS, said the following:

"In a tough economy, SAS did not waiver from our commitment to our employees and the innovative culture that keeps them challenged and provides work-life balance. SAS’ continued success proves our core belief: Happy, healthy employees are more productive.”

The Top 25 on Fortune's List:
1 SAS
2 Edward Jones
3 Wegmans Food Markets
4 Google
5 Nugget Market
6 DreamWorks Animation SKG
7 NetApp
8 Boston Consulting Group
9 Qualcomm
10 Camden Property Trust
11 Robert W. Baird & Co.
12 Bingham McCutchen
13 W. L. Gore & Associates
14 Recreational Equipment
15 Zappos.com
16 Cisco
17 Methodist Hospital System
18 Whole Foods Market
19 Genentech
20 Devon Energy
21 NuStar Energy
22 Johnson Financial Group
23 Umpqua Bank
24 Goldman Sachs Group
25 Novo Nordisk

Anybody work at one of these companies? Tell us what makes them so great!

Afraid to Speak Up

Most of us have experienced a time when we wanted to share honest feedback with our superiors at work but for one reason or another couldn’t bring ourselves to say anything. There’s been a fair amount of research done on why people don’t speak up at work. And it won’t come as any revelation that the number one reason employees hesitate to give feedback is fear.

Amy Edmondson (Harvard Business School), a prominent researcher in this area, noted in a 2006 interview that she hadn’t yet “worked with an organization that has fully transformed itself from one of fear to one in which most employees would rate the organization as open or conducive to speaking up.” Granted, Edmondson’s research focused on large multinationals. And many companies have made significant strides in fostering a culture of openness since that time. Still, those in the trenches at the vast majority of medium-sized and large organizations subscribe to the following belief: in most contexts, speaking up at work about things you think could be improved is more likely to hurt your career than help it.

One of the purposes of TrueInsider is to give co-workers a forum for exchanging ideas and feedback with each other and with management – a safe place where they won’t have to worry so much about whether their well-intentioned suggestions will hurt their chances for the next promotion. Along the way, companies will hopefully begin the process of rethinking their feedback mechanisms and make changes that will take some of the fear out of sharing ideas with management.

Job Satisfaction Hits New Low

Do you plan on leaving your job? According to a new survey from The Conference Board, job satisfaction has hit its lowest level in 22 years, and 22% of employees plan on leaving their current job within the year.

According to the report, only 45 percent of the 5,000 respondents said they are satisfied with their jobs, down from 61 percent in 1987. Job satisfaction is down across all age groups and income levels, but the biggest declines are in the under-25 and the over-65 groups.

"Fewer Americans are satisfied with all aspects of their employment, and no age or income group is immune. 'Challenging and meaningful work is vitally important to engaging American workers,' adds John Gibbons. 'Widespread job dissatisfaction negatively affects employee behavior and retention, which can impact enterprise-level success.' "

So how do we engage these employees in this new era of social media? What is "challenging and meaningful" to them? Employees need an outlet to give feedback about their organization. Why? Because many employees feel powerless to improve their company. The company-employee relationship seldom involves communication about what is really going on. It is often one-sided communication - the company is talking to the employee but not listening to the employee's ideas and suggestions. People are rarely satisfied with any relationship, personal or professional, that doesn't allow for candid communication.

TrueInsider is working on some modern ways of engaging employees in this new age of social media. Contact us at info@trueinsider.com to find out more about what's next.

The Upside-Down Pyramid

The past few weeks have been packed with Top 10 lists about sports, companies, people, music. You name it...and there's a Top 10 list for it. In a New York Times op-ed piece published this Saturday, Bono of U2 presented a forward-looking Top 10 list: "10 ideas that might make the next 10 years more interesting, healthy or civil." This refreshing Top 10 list doesn't dwell on the past but rather focuses on the future. Of these 10 ideas that will change the world, one in particular caught my attention. Bono calls it "People Power and the Upside-Down Pyramid."

"A lot of us have seen or lived the organizational chart of the last century, in which power and influence (whether possessed by church, state or corporation) are concentrated in the uppermost point of the pyramid and pressure is exerted downward. But in this new century, and especially in some parts of the developing world, the pyramid is being inverted. Much has been written about the profits to be made at the bottom of the pyramid; less has been said about the political power there. Increasingly, the masses are sitting at the top, and their weight, via cellphones, the Web and the civil society and democracy these technologies can promote, is being felt by those who have traditionally held power. Today, the weight bears down harder when the few are corrupt or fail to deliver on the promises that earned them authority in the first place."

I completely agree with Bono. The Internet will provide employees with mechanisms that flatten corporate hierarchies and turn the corporate pyramid upside down. An integral part of TrueInsider's mission is to empower the rank and file to improve their workplace. The current employee feedback system is broken - employers spend money on employee surveys but get little or no feedback because employees fear their comments will not be anonymous. Any Director or VP at a major corporation has participated in these unsuccessful surveys. TrueInsider's solution is to provide a safe space for employees to give feedback and discuss ideas that will improve the workplace. Just as no person is perfect, no company is perfect. Just as individuals have potential to improve, every company can improve.

I envision a corporate world where every employee will have a voice. Most employees don't want to leave their company, they just want the ability to make it better. By harnessing the Web's collaborative nature, TrueInsider will enable employees to initiate real change to company culture and policies. I don't know when it will happen, I just know that it will happen.

Happy New Year!