I love this quote from Alan Gutierrez’ blog: “If your employees are releasing confidential information, that’s not a blogging problem. It is a more general problem. It’s called incompetence.”
I like his five steps to launching corporate blogs. Actually, some things Microsoft did before blogging happened here was have awesome information-sharing systems. Are you sharing information with all your employees internally? Do you have good ways for employees to find out what’s going on? (This used to be an ‘open door’ policy). Let’s put it this way, one day I sent Bill Gates email. I wasn’t really expecting an answer. But he answered back within two hours. Freaking richest guy in the world. Cover of Time magazine. And he answered his email in 1.5 hours. And people wonder why I’m passionate about working here.
Oh, and Bill is slow. Ray Ozzie often answers within a few minutes. Not always, but amazingly often. And not just for me, either. I’ve seen both answer back average employees just as fast. Think that doesn’t make for better blogging? More loyal employees? An attitude of transparency? Oh, Steve Ballmer and Eric Rudder answer their emails too and I have a VP at Waggener Edstrom on my IM.
Another way to tell your company is ready for blogging? They have frequent presentations from both execs as well as regular employees and they share those presentations internally. How about the presentation that senior vice presidents gave last week about Windows Live? You’ll hear a lot more about what they showed us soon, but that presentation is available on our intranet for every employee to watch (that, and many other presentations are videoed and shared internally). So, now I know intimately what our execs are thinking about and working on and I can share that with you. I learned about things like http://favorites.live.com/ which I didn’t know about before (I’m using that now and am wondering if anyone has written up a review of that against del.icio.us?)
Another example? At Google every Friday the two guys who started the company have a company meeting. That’s a fantastic way to make sure that everyone in the company is on the same page.
Another way you can tell your company is ready for blogging? Does every employee have an intranet site? A place he/she can publish internally to other employees? Why is that important? Well, it builds a culture where people feel comfortable publishing. They can try their hand at publishing to a wider audience than email, but in a safer way cause it’s with coworkers.
I think it was those cultural things that let blogging happen at Microsoft. Well, that, and Joshua Allen took a lot of risk and just started blogging. At the end of the day, that’s what it’ll take to get your company blogging. Someone will need to take some risk. Here’s the deal. If you take risk and survive there are usually rewards. For me the reward is having a job that’s unbelieveable. I get to walk around Microsoft with a camcorder. And get paid for it. Unbelieveable. I pinch myself every morning. This morning Alex Williams asked me what’s next. I told him “another blog post.” Seemed to work pretty well so far!
Scobleizer 
Wow. How you get reply so fast?
On average it takes 3-4 days to get answer on email addressed to regular MS employee.
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Wow. How you get reply so fast?
On average it takes 3-4 days to get answer on email addressed to regular MS employee.
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Greetings,
It probably takes 3-4 days because they have to think long and hard about what they say, and what the official word is, to a customer (or would-be customer), whereas within the company it’s a quicker, more loose environment. Anything that makes them have to guard their words (i.e. communication with the outside world) gets put lower on their priority list, because it’s not something they WANT to do (unlike answering coworkers). Even if it’s their job, it’s human nature.
One reason MS blogging is good is it might get the rank and file more used to writing for a public environment regularly.
— Morgan Schweers, CyberFOX!
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Greetings,
It probably takes 3-4 days because they have to think long and hard about what they say, and what the official word is, to a customer (or would-be customer), whereas within the company it’s a quicker, more loose environment. Anything that makes them have to guard their words (i.e. communication with the outside world) gets put lower on their priority list, because it’s not something they WANT to do (unlike answering coworkers). Even if it’s their job, it’s human nature.
One reason MS blogging is good is it might get the rank and file more used to writing for a public environment regularly.
— Morgan Schweers, CyberFOX!
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> And people wonder why I’m passionate about working here.
Do you want to know why we wonder? Here’s why:
“I wasn’t really expecting an answer”
You should expect an answer.
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> And people wonder why I’m passionate about working here.
Do you want to know why we wonder? Here’s why:
“I wasn’t really expecting an answer”
You should expect an answer.
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Robert
Thank you for reading and linking.
I’m glad to hear that I’m on the right track, especially in regards to the hyped fears of bloggers handing over trade secrets.
Something about the solution offered in the article that sparked this[1]; that of creating a policy document, doesn’t sit right. It’s not a matter of policy but of experience.
I’m sure it’s true that people who do not ordinarily face the public might fall prey to the finese of the press, and divulge, but a policy doesn’t prepare a person for that.
I like your assertion that it is a matter of introducing the employee to the mechanics of publishing. In this case, if they’ve not published already, internal blogging can be used as training for external blogging.
Thanks for this insight.
[1] http://www.marketingsherpa.com/sample.cfm?contentID=3142
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Robert
Thank you for reading and linking.
I’m glad to hear that I’m on the right track, especially in regards to the hyped fears of bloggers handing over trade secrets.
Something about the solution offered in the article that sparked this[1]; that of creating a policy document, doesn’t sit right. It’s not a matter of policy but of experience.
I’m sure it’s true that people who do not ordinarily face the public might fall prey to the finese of the press, and divulge, but a policy doesn’t prepare a person for that.
I like your assertion that it is a matter of introducing the employee to the mechanics of publishing. In this case, if they’ve not published already, internal blogging can be used as training for external blogging.
Thanks for this insight.
[1] http://www.marketingsherpa.com/sample.cfm?contentID=3142
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I emailed Steve Jobs once and he replied within an hour. I don’t work at Apple. That’s why I’m so passionate about being a Mac user.
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I emailed Steve Jobs once and he replied within an hour. I don’t work at Apple. That’s why I’m so passionate about being a Mac user.
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del.icio.us works well with my Firefox on Ubuntu installation. favorites.live only seems to work with IE 6+ on Windows. So one works for me, the other doesn’t. Whats to review?
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del.icio.us works well with my Firefox on Ubuntu installation. favorites.live only seems to work with IE 6+ on Windows. So one works for me, the other doesn’t. Whats to review?
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I’m sure the reason YOU have a WagEd VP on your IM is NOT because the VP is creating so open door policy perception. It’s like so WagEd can quickly react when you go off half cocked.
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I’m sure the reason YOU have a WagEd VP on your IM is NOT because the VP is creating so open door policy perception. It’s like so WagEd can quickly react when you go off half cocked.
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you’re blithering makes me want to punch myself in the head
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you’re blithering makes me want to punch myself in the head
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Well said.
Its just like anything else. If you don’t have leaders to lead the employees, they will resort to what they know best. If they don’t know of any other way of sharing informating, they will resort to blogging in public.
You think blogging is bad… wait until u see users sending sensitive information over public IM infrastructure. That and sharing your private bookmarks using delicious or life favourites are good examples of what shouldn’t happen without certain level of understanding of where that information can end up.
How about public mail servers ? I know people who use gmail to share large files because internal mail servers have smaller file size limits…
New technology brings new challenges for older companies… and having people who understand it better to guide others within the company is very important. You can’t except every company to know about blogging.. but they have to be prepared for it.
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Well said.
Its just like anything else. If you don’t have leaders to lead the employees, they will resort to what they know best. If they don’t know of any other way of sharing informating, they will resort to blogging in public.
You think blogging is bad… wait until u see users sending sensitive information over public IM infrastructure. That and sharing your private bookmarks using delicious or life favourites are good examples of what shouldn’t happen without certain level of understanding of where that information can end up.
How about public mail servers ? I know people who use gmail to share large files because internal mail servers have smaller file size limits…
New technology brings new challenges for older companies… and having people who understand it better to guide others within the company is very important. You can’t except every company to know about blogging.. but they have to be prepared for it.
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In any corporate company the mantra in meetings is often “think what you can say, not say what you can think”.
That is unless you are the boss (or so rich that losing your job no longer matters) because the culture is often blamestorming and political backstabbing in order to climb the corporate ladder. If that were not the case BCC would not be an option on email.
Knowledge is still power and people still silo (hide) their knowledge and let only those they wish see it access. If we can replace email silo’s with more open systems like Wiki’s it would mak
e for a more transparent company structure. Don’t get me wrong sometimes things need to be kept secret and to a closed group but lower down the value chain (in the shark pool) it is often not required but it is the place most often were politics and knowledge silo’s occur.
Sam
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In any corporate company the mantra in meetings is often “think what you can say, not say what you can think”.
That is unless you are the boss (or so rich that losing your job no longer matters) because the culture is often blamestorming and political backstabbing in order to climb the corporate ladder. If that were not the case BCC would not be an option on email.
Knowledge is still power and people still silo (hide) their knowledge and let only those they wish see it access. If we can replace email silo’s with more open systems like Wiki’s it would mak
e for a more transparent company structure. Don’t get me wrong sometimes things need to be kept secret and to a closed group but lower down the value chain (in the shark pool) it is often not required but it is the place most often were politics and knowledge silo’s occur.
Sam
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“Another way you can tell your company is ready for blogging?”
Your stock flat out stinks:
http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?t=2y&s=MSFT&l=on&z=m&q=l&c=aapl
http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?t=2y&s=SUNW&l=on&z=m&q=l&c=aapl
You use what any magician tries to do: misdirect.
Question: name two computer companies who make the most noise in corporate blogging?
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“Another way you can tell your company is ready for blogging?”
Your stock flat out stinks:
http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?t=2y&s=MSFT&l=on&z=m&q=l&c=aapl
http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?t=2y&s=SUNW&l=on&z=m&q=l&c=aapl
You use what any magician tries to do: misdirect.
Question: name two computer companies who make the most noise in corporate blogging?
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The Windows Live Favorites Beta does not currently support the browser you are using.
The Favorites Beta currently supports Internet Explorer version 6.0 and higher.
Why is so hard for a company with a big muscle like MS to support two different browsers? Everyone is doing it with not much trouble.
You can’t “live” without playing lock-in
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The Windows Live Favorites Beta does not currently support the browser you are using.
The Favorites Beta currently supports Internet Explorer version 6.0 and higher.
Why is so hard for a company with a big muscle like MS to support two different browsers? Everyone is doing it with not much trouble.
You can’t “live” without playing lock-in
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Robert,
You don’t get blogging. It’s about listening, not writing.
Then we will need something to read – we expect it will be published on sec.gov for shareholders, press release on web-site for journalists, marketing/promotional materials for buyers or MSDN for developers.
We don’t want you to blur lines between all this information and offsetting all responsibility to individuals. We don’t need information under disclaimers like this one http://blogs.msdn.com/jledgard/articles/57710.aspx .
Something that we need – is company delivering products that will meet our expectations. To do this – you teach Microsoft on how to listen.
If your company unable to answer on private emails – why you expect it will be able to answer on feedback from readers?
Take a look on comments in Somasegar “Transparency – key to effective product development” blog posting.
http://blogs.msdn.com/somasegar/archive/2004/11/11/256210.aspx
There are comments spams for 1 year! Can you believe in this – ONE year?
How can you expect company be transparent if you don’t read/act on feedback from users.
P.S> Once I wrote email to Richard Stallman. He is biggest enemy of freaking richest guy.
So? He has answered it and we had good and productive conversation. I’m sure it was him answering emails.
But can you be sure it was Bill who answered on your email – but not one of his personal assistants?
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Robert,
You don’t get blogging. It’s about listening, not writing.
Then we will need something to read – we expect it will be published on sec.gov for shareholders, press release on web-site for journalists, marketing/promotional materials for buyers or MSDN for developers.
We don’t want you to blur lines between all this information and offsetting all responsibility to individuals. We don’t need information under disclaimers like this one http://blogs.msdn.com/jledgard/articles/57710.aspx .
Something that we need – is company delivering products that will meet our expectations. To do this – you teach Microsoft on how to listen.
If your company unable to answer on private emails – why you expect it will be able to answer on feedback from readers?
Take a look on comments in Somasegar “Transparency – key to effective product development” blog posting.
http://blogs.msdn.com/somasegar/archive/2004/11/11/256210.aspx
There are comments spams for 1 year! Can you believe in this – ONE year?
How can you expect company be transparent if you don’t read/act on feedback from users.
P.S> Once I wrote email to Richard Stallman. He is biggest enemy of freaking richest guy.
So? He has answered it and we had good and productive conversation. I’m sure it was him answering emails.
But can you be sure it was Bill who answered on your email – but not one of his personal assistants?
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favorites.live.com> It took me a precious quarter of an hour to figure out that favorites.live.com requires first to install the 30M MSN desktop search stuff to finally be able to export my favorites from IE and to realize that drag and drop was almost impossible to organize large favorites plus the fact that there were no automatic synchronization between favorites left in IE on my laptop and the online ones which inevitably causes some regrettable confusion unless you decide to drop the IE favorites for ever.
We have in french a kind of slang reversing syllabes or letters and in our back slang the conclusion about favorites.live.com (as is) would be : parc parc parc !
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favorites.live.com> It took me a precious quarter of an hour to figure out that favorites.live.com requires first to install the 30M MSN desktop search stuff to finally be able to export my favorites from IE and to realize that drag and drop was almost impossible to organize large favorites plus the fact that there were no automatic synchronization between favorites left in IE on my laptop and the online ones which inevitably causes some regrettable confusion unless you decide to drop the IE favorites for ever.
We have in french a kind of slang reversing syllabes or letters and in our back slang the conclusion about favorites.live.com (as is) would be : parc parc parc !
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AT: >You don’t get blogging. It’s about listening, not writing.
Heheh! Thanks for the laugh. You realize that you’re talking to the guy who reads 743 RSS feeds, right? Translation: I agree. My first advice to corporate types is “read 50 blogs for two weeks before you even think of diving in.”
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AT: >You don’t get blogging. It’s about listening, not writing.
Heheh! Thanks for the laugh. You realize that you’re talking to the guy who reads 743 RSS feeds, right? Translation: I agree. My first advice to corporate types is “read 50 blogs for two weeks before you even think of diving in.”
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Well. It’s good that we agree.
Now convict others people inside MSFT to listen!
You already have a lot of communication channels – do not bet too much on bloging. It will be never silver bullet.
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Well. It’s good that we agree.
Now convict others people inside MSFT to listen!
You already have a lot of communication channels – do not bet too much on bloging. It will be never silver bullet.
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Robert,
The number of feeds you read isn’t an indicator of how well you’re listening. It’s just an indicator of how big your feed-dick is.
There is in fact, a difference
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Robert,
The number of feeds you read isn’t an indicator of how well you’re listening. It’s just an indicator of how big your feed-dick is.
There is in fact, a difference
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> And not just for me, either. I’ve seen both
> answer back average employees just as fast.
You’re not an “average employee?”
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> And not just for me, either. I’ve seen both
> answer back average employees just as fast.
You’re not an “average employee?”
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Sounds like a good idea, company blogging. We may have to try it.
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Sounds like a good idea, company blogging. We may have to try it.
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Blogging is a companies best friend when used right
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Blogging is a companies best friend when used right
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I was thinking about creating a blog for my company. Do you think that the time and effort put into it will pay off though?
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I was thinking about creating a blog for my company. Do you think that the time and effort put into it will pay off though?
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How can I creat a blog for my company? Please advise.
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How can I creat a blog for my company? Please advise.
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