Emergent outcomes

Last week, I wrote about my company's thinking about social media, technology and why it's time to transform.  Here's another idea worth elevating and reblogging to continue the discussion.

Sean O'Driscoll says,

"The end goal is businesses that achieve their objectives faster, cheaper, smarter, etc. It isn't to build a social business. A social business is a viable means to an end, but not an end unto itself."

Agreed - business is about the bottom line.  Within a relevant time horizon, every manager wants to increase revenue, decrease expense, and manage risk.  A business has a vision and mission. Managers are guided by this end goal and raison d'être, employing resources according to strategic plans and budget constraints to produce expected outcomes.

But doing business socially changes the nature of outcomes.  We know how things work today - siloed, linear, traditional.  Transformation entails changing process, altering mindsets, and broadening reach with technology to produce outcomes much more valuable than expected.

In 1909, Henry Ford said, "Any customer can have a car painted in any colour that he wants so long as it is black."  In the 1990's mass customization was in vogue, as if customers really had a choice.  In 2009, we are in the world of democratized innovation as described by Eric Von Hippel (you can download his books for free, too!).

Operating a social business structure is an interim end, similar to operating a secure network environment, maintaining high workforce morale, and running an efficient process workflow.

With a social infrastructure in place, a company will manage its resources with best efforts to produce intended, or expected, outcomes.  In addition, the transformation will produce emergent outcomes.  Doing business differently will produce different results:  product breakthroughs, process improvements, and broader interpersonal connections.

We've seen what some companies can do with crowdsourcing in a controlled environment.  What will happen when every department in your company has the ability to do something similar?  For starters, visions and missions will have to change.  We should see divestitures and spin-offs of business units that are suddenly non-core.  No one will pretend that "customers are in control" - because we'll have a healthy, balanced relationship between producers and consumers.

Instead of burning cycles to ensure the production of expected outcomes, companies will thrive by seeking and capitalizing on emergent outcomes.

Comments

[Dave]

You do it slowly & incrementally; you find a champion at the appropriate management level (there's bound to be one person who gets it) & then work on organic growth from the front lines on up. The champion serves two purposes: 1 - they knock down barriers & opposition 2 - they act as a beacon of 'it's ok to work this way' for those who confirmation.

You will have a hard time trying to convince every executive along the way, which is why you need to build something organically that eventually becomes too large for them to ignore. If you are successful at that you will add champions along the way as they see employees becoming happier, more effective & more productive.

The devil is in the details, of course, but that's the high-level strategy I've found to be successful and am currently using.

[sean odriscoll]

Thanks for the quote Peter. I think the corporate cultural, structural and collaborative changes driven by social engagement initiatives will be substantial and permanent - this is a business transformation in many respects. Part of why this issue of means vs ends is important is pointing out that you can't have it both ways (at least at the same time). A social end on a given project or initiative may actually be ok - assuming the goals that were articulated made sense - learning, pilot, analysis, engagement, listening, etc. However, if an organization wants to talk hard numbers (ROI), then you better be willing to commit to the ends - the ultimate objective. Every business decision is inherently a risk/wager/hypothesis in this respect. So, if you've sold your execs on an ROI formula/bet associated with Social and then you find yourself articulating results that are really just activity - you missed. Instead, you might have been better to pilot and learn the activity, set the appropriate exec/finance expections and then derive the ROI model based on your experience in the project.

sean
www.antseyeview.com
www.communitygrouptherapy.com

[Max Kalehoff]

Pete,
Peter Drucker already cut to the chase for you: "The purpose of a business is to create a customer."
The way you get there and sustain is evolving, but one thing stays the same: creating a customer is fundamentally a social endeavor.
Max

[Jevon]

A few years ago I wrote about emergence in the context of social software and business ( http://socialwrite.com/2007/06/20/a-lost-soul-what-will-i-do-without-enterprise-20/ )

"At the core of Enterprise Social Computing, at the center of blogging and the ethos of Open Space is the idea that things emerge.

• Whoever comes are the right people
• Whatever happens is the only thing that could have
• Whenever it starts is the right time
• When it’s over, it’s over

How then do you plan the result of an emergent idea? All we can do is plan for emergence, which means that we can set up a supportive environment in which new ideas can grow. That is different from setting expectations. If you expect new products to get developed, then they probably will. If you expect teams to use social software to collaborate, then you will probably find that they do, but was that the best thing they could have done? You’ll never know, because you over-planned the whole thing."

[Chris Hall]

This is so timely, Peter, as we are having these discussions at work... :) The question that this change will bring is: how do you convince executives that these changes are necessary and win the hearts and minds of a middle management force that will have to implement the changes, with a smile, while losing most of their perceived authority?

Its not an impossible task, but it will be tricky. ;)

[deb louison lavoy]

A social workplace enables 3 important things: 1. efficient explicit communication - that is to say that teams and individuals trying to get specific stuff done can get it done more easily. 2. Compounding - the more that existing information and work can be leveraged, the more I can focus on the content of the brief or mrd than on the stupid template. the more I can find the information sources that were used to develop certain insight, the more I can follow, then innovate, rather than reinvent 3. Serendipity - the more people and ideas that I am exposed to, the more opportunity I have to make valuable connections - regardless of hierarchy or organizational boundaries.