Can Talent Management Adopt a Social Networking Format
I was thinking this week that the onslaught of social networking could have somewhat of a profound affect on the way perfomance, goal appraisals and 360 reviews are handled. I mean from a social aspect where do we look for information about our friends, their achievements, thier links with other friends, what they have been doing etc, well its the social networking sites like this one. So whats to say that in the future to review an employee or asses there competancies or objectives that we wont use a similar process. Why wouldnt an employee have their own 'company social page' where they not only would update their details but also information about their work life and projects they have contributed too, as well as allowing peers and potentially external parties to comment, support and add evidence.
Any one thought about this... maybe its happening already?
Any one thought about this... maybe its happening already?
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Kevin Littlechild on -
Interesting concept that seems to be the end vision for a couple of globals right now including Microsoft who are running something called "microspotting" (sounds like a medical condition to me) along similar lines. One question that must be answered however is, would you as a business owner want to open your company coffers as it were, for all to see? We have already seen facebook and the like utilized as candidate databases for the recruitment industry, I'm not sure I would want to expose my talent to that threat.
Am I being a little too sceptical.........?
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Permalink Reply by Rosie Sherry on -
The obvious solution around this would be to have the social network as a private/internal application where those 'unwanted' people don't have access.
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Permalink Reply by Rosie Sherry on
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It's a really good point.
There are lots of people who put alot of effort into their Facebook, LinkedIn and personal sites to prove that who they are and what they do is of value. Not to forget that a social network site can really give people a sense of perspective where the organisation can be really clear about their goals and the current state of the business.
I would love to see more organisations get into the social networking as a tool to communicate and empower individuals to understand and become part of the eco-system. I believe there is a trend of adoption, but without clearcut tools to implement them it becomes difficult. Of course it's not just about the tools, it's also about getting people to use them. How do you get people to use an internal social network with the same eagerness for those that use the likes of Facebook or LinkedIn?
One potential example is Townsend which is a protype at the moment (apparently) and it seems like it is a private/internal Facebook clone.
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Permalink Reply by James Harrison on -
Rosie, your right. The successful adopters would be companies who hold this information for their internal use. Potentially it would also only be suitable for certain 'types' of companies, the googles and Microsoft’s of the world should attract the type of employee who is now used to using these types of tools (albeit externally) and also the type of employee that would see a benefit from entering this type of information within their workplace. There are huge benefits for employers knowing this type of information about their employees, as mentioned earlier there is the performance and appraisal benefits, but also for the ability to plan succession etc. I guess there would also be no reason that such a system couldn’t integrate or screen grab from a linked Facebook or Linkedin profile etc.
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Permalink Reply by Jackie Cameron on -
James
I have been working on a project with a group of 16 year old pupils in a local school where they have been researching the use of social networking in the workplace generally for Oracle and the very idea you propose was one they considered.
During the project they created a wiki - of which - as their external coach - I was invited to become a member. This wiki now stands as a record of their story. I think the "Company Social Page" you suggest could do something similar. Keeping a record for performance appraisal purposes would be a great idea. Gathering feedback as you go - another good idea. Facilitating peer mentoring - yup another good one. And making it portable - for the next job/role/employer - well the possibilites are endless!
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Permalink Reply by Jon Ingham on -
James, yes, some companies are doing this. Kevin is right that Microsoft are a good example and I describe others on http://social-business.blogspot.com.
But I also think it goes further that this - even just in HR terms there are opportunities for employees to gather their own performance feedback for example.
And the even bigger opportunity is in changing the level of performance itself, rather than simply management of this performance, ie through enabling effective collaboration etc.
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Permalink Reply by David Perring on -
Hi James,
Lots of technologies are already very established in this space.. whether you would call them "social" is another matter. Most of them have very corporate hard goals at their core such as goal alignment around objectives setting and 360 amongst others.
My fear is that the need to introduce more socially orientated technologies into the workplace to promote networking, connection and community would not find great resonnace with the, majority of corporate fossils who lead much of our industry.
Whilst employee engagement would be rooted in these sorts of activities and therefore it could be argued to drive discretionary effort... in my limited experience of what could be considered very enlighted organisations such as Virgin there is a really stagnant view that this would waste time rather than grow effectiveness... strange but true...
I guess everyone is waiting for the evidence that it drives shareholder value... and that is a step to far for most current research. The opportunity to innovate in organisations is tremendous, it just needs someone with guts and vision to be the first... Most of the OD people I know are still stuck in the "now now" conversations without even catching up with the "not now" connversations that happen everyday across the net... like this one... (Stephen Heppell) Personally I think there is a really retarded approach because most thinkers in this field who provide the majority of consultancy to leading corps are still very much stuck in the early 90s.
And don't even get me taking about corporate project blogs...
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Permalink Reply by James Harrison on
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David thanks for your thoughts. I actually work for an organisation that provides the type of technology that you refer to so im aware of whats in the market regarding goal alignment and appraisals etc.
Great point though regarding the user adoption / vision required for the social type approach. I have dealt with several clients who are discussing this type of approach and both are very dynamic type organisations who fell that they have the abilities and mindsets to adopt this type of vision. But i really dont think there are that many companies out there who have the correct foundations / leadership to even consider this type of project?
But, with that all in mind I think back 10 years when I started selling E-recruitment solutions. Back then no one knew what it was, what it did and no one really saw the value. Here we are a decade later with very few corporates without an online careers area on their site.
So although some of our famous corporates will take their time to adopt, there are some changes that will just become a fundamental business function that they cant ignore - well you hope they wont ignore.....?
Im just very intrigued about this whole area, im not a huge social network user myself but I do see the huge value in having as much information as possible regarding your employees, especially for Talent Managment purposes. Ill be watching it all very closely!
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