E L S U A ~ A KM Blog Thinking Outside The Inbox by Luis Suarez

Archive for August, 2010

Top 10 Reasons to Ban Social Media in the Organisation! — Really?

Posted on Aug 3, 2010 | Categories: Collaboration, Communities, Enterprise2.0, Hippie 2.0, Innovation, Knowledge Management, Social Enterprise | 4 Comments

Oh, dear, it looks like the Hippie 2.0 side of me wanted to stir the pot some more and come about before the usual blog post later on in the week. I guess there are times where you bump into a couple of links here and there that surely make you think about things twice and spark that brighter side of you that just wants to grab your attention for a couple of minutes, before going back to business. Well, it happened again! This time around with the Top 10 Reasons to Ban Social Media in the Organisation. If you haven’t watched that YouTube video yet, don’t wait, stop what you are doing right now!, and get yourself ready to enjoy 3 minutes of pure laughter, good fun, and a wicked sense of humour!

Yes, that’s right! A wicked sense of humour on a Tuesday? My goodness! What happened? That’s just so inappropriate! Can you imagine having fun at work for three minutes on a week day? What would your boss say about that? I bet before you know it, they would come along and ban ALL access to social software tools outside the firewall, because they all think you are goofing off, wasting your time (And that of your colleagues, and the business altogether!) or just simply because they feel they have lost control over you, or their message. I bet they would be thinking you can’t be trusted, because you are not generating enough business revenue for their enjoyment and eventually they would be questioning why you keep bothering…

So, why not? Why can we not have fun @ work? Wouldn’t that make us all much more content with the working environment we are part of? Wouldn’t that help us build more trustworthy personal business relationships with those who we collaborate and share knowledge with the closest? Wouldn’t that eventually help us become more effective at what we do? (Haven’t we realised just yet that we are already spending more than one third of our lifetime purely at work?) I am not sure what you would think, but I bet it would!

If you don’t believe me, here are a couple of links that my Hippie 2.0 side brought to me earlier on today. The first one shared through Jane Hart‘s blog post under the same title, which points to this YouTube video clip:

The title and the first couple of paragraphs from this blog entry say it all quite clearly. There you have got the top 10 reasons why every business should ban social media from their organisations… Ok, ok, do you really think so? I bet for each of those reasons you could come up with half a dozen that would counteract each and everyone of those arguments.

What? You can’t come up with those many reasons to provide a consistent argument on why every business should be adopting social software tools? Oh, dear, not to worry! I have got some good help for you in here. Go to this particular link (Sorry, not going to say much more about it, you would have to click on it!), get yourself with a cup, or two, of coffee or tea, get your mouse and fingers ready and start clicking away! I can guarantee you within the first few click, click, click, you will come up with a whole bunch of rather solid and varied arguments that will help you address plenty of those concerns with banning social media. Yes, I tell you! I can guarantee you that! But you would have to go into the Web site and click away, ok? Here it is again …

Ok, let’s wrap up this blog entry… Did you have enough good, rock solid, arguments already to convince your organisation it makes sense to dive into the world of social networking for business? Still not? Goodness! It looks like a tough one, right? Well, fear not! Let me get my Hippie 2.0 side out and about once more and share with you one last link, which is another YouTube video, that lasts for a bit over 2 minutes, and which I am sure will do the trick for you, no matter what! If not, judge for yourself and watch through it:

It’s from Gary Vaynerchuk, from a couple of years ago, and under the suggestive title of "New Media is the tipping point where Good finally beats Bad". It’s amazing to see how spot on Gary was over two years ago, don’t you think? Tremendously accurate, in my opinion, and surely right on the money! He, too, would make for a perfect Hippie 2.0, I bet! And you? What about you? Want to join us? You know, the waters are lovely, the conversations are just getting started and we are happy to wait for you… Whenever you are ready … Whatever the time it takes you …

Tags: Social Philosophy, Hippie 2.0, Movements, Culture, Corporate Values, Values, Business DNA, Making A Difference, Hippies 2.0, Banning Social Media, Organisations, Workplace, Workforce, Knowledge Workforce, Humour, Fun, Fun Stuff, Fun @ Work, Jane Hart, Gary Vaynerchuk, Good, Bad, Trust, Loyalty, Employee Engagement, Business Value, Personal Business Relationships, Trustworthy, Enterprise 2.0, Social Software, Social Networking, Social Computing, Social Media, Collaboration, Communities, Learning, Knowledge Sharing, KM, Knowledge Management, Remote Collaboration, Innovation, Networking, Social Networks, Conversations, Dialogue, Communication, Connections, Relationships, Productivity

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How to Avoid Multitasking – The Pomodoro Technique

Posted on Aug 2, 2010 | Categories: Collaboration, General Interest, Innovation, Knowledge Management, Knowledge Tools, Personal KM, Productivity Tools, Social Enterprise | 11 Comments

Do you still remember the article "Is Multitasking Bad for the Brain?", that I put together a few weeks back over here in this blog? I am not sure whether you do or not, but I’m certainly having a blast myself at the moment moving away from multitasking on my day to day work after putting it together, specially for that area where multitasking was the king for me so far: meetings. However, things have developed even further from there and I have also successfully stopped it altogether for a bunch of tasks and various other activities. And all of that thanks to The Pomodoro Technique! Yes, indeed, I’m officially hooked up!

I think the first time I heard about the Pomodoro Technique was from Steve Rubel himself a few months back. I am not 100% sure whether he still makes use of it today, but I must confess that all along I was a little bit skeptic about it myself, thinking that it may not be the most effective thing to do to carry some tasks where you would need all of the focus and attention you could possibly spare. Once again, I was wrong!

It took me a few months later to realise that multitasking, while it has its many benefits, it also has a bunch of drawbacks, specially if you are trying to do something where you would need your full attention to accomplish it. And that blog entry I mentioned earlier on in this post surely has been quite an eye opener for me. Fast forward a few weeks later on and I get to bump into one of those short video clips that just makes sense!

Have you checked out Greg Head‘s inspiring and thought-provoking 5 minute long Ignite Phoenix video presentation on The Pomodoro Technique? If you haven’t, you should! Specially, if you don’t believe in multitasking and are looking for a new way of getting things done, mainly for those activities where you feel you could do without any interruptions.

The video clip lasts for a little bit over 5 minutes and in it Greg describes quite nicely how it actually all works. If you would want to read further on the instructions you could have a look into the blog post he put together describing the event itself and how that technique works out eventually. And if you would want to take a look further and take it for a spin yourself, like I have started doing in the last couple of days, if you are using a Mac, you could use Pomodoro for Mac, which works beautifully.

I bet you are wondering what my experiences have been like, since I started using it applying this technique, right? Well, I could probably just summarise it with a single word, or may be a couple of them: it just works! Yes, that’s right! For the last couple of days I have been using Pomodoro for Mac for those tasks and activities where I would need to focus perhaps a little bit more than usual and forget about any interruptions and it’s worked wonders! Those tasks / activities are now a thing of the past, when till just recently, they may have lingered for a little while longer than expected and eventually not coming out with the best of results.

So there you have it; the multitasking machine I once used to be, is now a thing of the past. Instead, I have got a few bursts of great concentration and focus spans throughout the day that help me get a better grasp of my own productivity and, funny enough, I have found it so helpful that I’m already starting to apply this Pomodoro technique to my social networking activities as well. But I guess that would be the subject for another blog post. For now, I will leave you to start playing Greg’s YouTube video and see if it would also be inspiring for you, just as much as it has been for me so far …

(Ok, now that you have watched through it, did it make you go and give it a try, and, if so, did it help? I would love to know whether it did the trick for you, too, or not, and whether you are thinking about reducing some of the multitasking you have been doing lately … Feel free to share a comment or two sharing your experience, whenever you have got a chance… Maybe, perhaps, on your "next pomodoro"…)

(Update – August 2nd 2010: Quick update … My good friend Martin Lindner just tweeted this great tip I thought was also worth while sharing across over here:

"Did you know the graphically nice #pomodoro timer app? for me, it is definitely supportive. http://is.gd/dYIhX"

I blogged initially how I was using Pomodoro for Mac for this, right? Well, Martin just shared this link to a nice, rather visual, nifty app that would work for Windows users. So if you are in Win you may want to give that one a whirl! Many thanks, Martin, for the great tip! Greatly appreciated!)