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The FASTForward Blog

John Chambers, CEO of Cisco at MIT on Enterprise 2.0January 7

Hot on the heels of our several posts on the article about Cisco in Fast Company, I just ran across this video from a presentation and Q&A he carried out at the MIT Sloan School of Management.

Thanks to Martin Dugage of France’s Boostzone Institute, who provided the following commentary on the video clip.

My emphasis below … I am reminded of Euan Semple’s classic post about implementing social computing (The 100% guaranteed easiest way to do Enterprise 2.0?), and I don’t doubt that one of, if not the, the hardest part is senior managers and executives getting used to the idea of less or different control.

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Cisco is undoubtedly a lab for E2.0, and Chambers is definitely in the pilot’s seat. His point about collaboration revolves around productivity and speed.

My attention was drawn by a couple of things he said, such as the new ability of the company to pursue 26 top priority projects at the same time instead of just one or two last year; or the fact that Chambers meets more customers now but less often face-to-face and more often virtually, less often one-on-one and more often as a group; or the fact that he had to get rid of 20% of his staff composed of control freaks w

The Emerging Math/Rules of Social Networks - Magic NumbersJanuary 3

If we are to use the power of the network effect to gain more leverage - I think it will be essential to understand the underlying math. For like all things in the natural world - such as say Gravity - there is a mathematical framework that underlies their operations. When Newton could describe how Gravity worked, the modern world took off. When we can do the same for social networks, we will be on our way to solving the great dystopia of our time - that we have succumbed to a machine model.

The power of the social world is like gravity or light. It seems mysterious. It is easy to wax mystical about it. But I think that what is emerging via observation - just like all good science - is the math. What is ironic is that this math is well known and has been part of human knowledge for millenia. It just has never been applied to the social world before.

It is of course the Fibonacci sequence - the sequence that nature uses to order all relationships if they are to reach their full potential. You may know of the key number that seems to be the limit of Trust for humans of about 150 - called the Dunbar Number after Robin Dunbar.

Many in the Blogosphere have been working on this. Many have seen the sequence emerge naturally in say Guilds in Gaming.

Twitter - the Leverage - where the ROI is foundJanuary 3

Doing more with less will be a goal of us all in 2009.

Twitter is going to help a lot of people to do more for less.

But how can you do this? Especially if you and/or your organization is new to the game? How can you get the reach that you will need to “see” what is really going on or get the help or information that you want?

A lot of the recent debate about Twitter has been about “Authority” who has the biggest megaphone. I won’t go into this except to say that what we know about social networks tells that it will be less about you and more about your inner circle.

It will not be essential for you to be the A lister nor will you have to have thousands of followers

Stowe Boyd has a powerful intuition about these things. His gut feel is that there is a sweet spot of about 100 in your Twitter group that gives you the best ROI - Time and Effort versus return.

I have suggested for a longtime that to ‘get’ Twitter you need to follow 100 people at least, for several weeks. This cursory recitation of stats suggests that there are thousands of users out there happily communing with a handful of friends. I don’t buy it. I bet most of those accounts with small use, small links, and small time online represent a fringe of uninvolved people who aren’t getting much value from the service, if they login in at all. The sweet spot is far nort

Bears and Bulls Ride Social Media into 2009January 1

 For my first post in 2009 I will share Peter Kim’s Social Media Predictions 2009. Now Peter did this two weeks ago and I am sure it has been commented on. I learned about it through Susan Scrupski who posted in on Knowledge Plaza. I will not repeat the details.

However, I am struck by the mix of bears and bulls on the social media market and presence for 2009.  There are more bears than bulls. That might not be surprising in a down market. However. I am hearing from a lot of enterprise 2.0 vendors that sales are up. However, this is a small, and likely biased sample.

There seems to be only one real bull - “Dwindling budgets suddenly make low-cost social media look like the pretty girl at the ball.” - Ann Handley - who was consistent with what I am hearing although she used a different metaphor.

In addition, there were a number of people who were somewhat positive but said that more accountability and ROI are needed. I would certainly agree with them. I also side with Ann against the bears. 

Last year

War 2.0 - The IDF are using YouTube and TwitterDecember 31 2008

Increasingly war today is a matter of winning the “people’s war” Organizations such as Al Qaeda have become masters at using social media to both train people and also to tell their story. Often actions are in effect stage managed such as the Fallujah killing of Blackwater men that was filmed throughout and broadcast immediately.

Until now conventional forces have kept away from learning how to tell their side of the story. Maybe - as with business - their essential bureaucratic nature and need for control - inhibited the use of social media.

But the IDF have decided that they have to get their story out there and are agressively using YouTube and now Twitter. Here is a neat summary with links from Global Dashboard.

Two of my favourite blogs, MountainRunner and Danger Room highlight the IDF’s attempt to win over the blogosphere using Twitter and You Tube. Why? Because according to the head of the IDF’s press team: “The blogosphere and new media are another war zone, we have to be relevant there.”

The YouTube channel was created with the aim of distributing footage of precision airstrikes. Interestingly YouTube took down some of the ‘exclusive footage’ showing the IDF’s op