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

Life Without eMail – Year 6, Weeks 1 to 20 – (Back to Basics)

You know that moment when you realise that everything you have done in the last 5 and a half years has not been really worth while at all and forces you to go through a massive hard reset, challenging your main core beliefs, in terms of what has motivated you quite a lot in this whole Social / Open [r]evolution space over the course of all of that time? Well, that is the “moment” I have just been experiencing in the last 20 weeks of Year 6 of “Life Without eMail” culminating this week with something I thought I would never be able to see, say or talk about again. And while I can imagine there would be plenty of you folks out there who may be wondering whether I am on the brink of giving up on giving up corporate email, I am afraid nothing further than the truth, despite the fact it may look as if I have lost the war (on email) altogether. I am still as strong as ever in wanting to think outside the Inbox, but acknowledging a fact that I never thought I would be pondering about much, after all of this time being heavily involved with social networking for business: going back to basics!

Indeed, I am not too sure what may have happened, but over the course of those 20 weeks (Yes, I know, that’s 5 months right there!) I have noticed a steady increase on the overall amount of incoming emails I have been receiving at work and it’s been rather interesting to see this phenomenon developing further along with intrigue and awe at the same time. It started already on my previous job role, and continuing along in the new one, where it looks like despite the huge shift towards embracing social technologies at work, the volume of incoming email has skyrocketed to levels that have brought me back to the beginning, in 2008. Yes, that drastic.

All along, I have been reflecting on the potential reasons as to why my fellow IBM colleagues keep insisting on relying for vast majority of interactions on email vs. social tools and while I may not have all of the conclusions sorted out and in place, just yet, I can tell you I’m starting to believe it’s more than anything else because people, in general, don’t feel comfortable enough, just yet, it seems, about narrating their work, working out loud, for the benefit of others, including total strangers, and therefore they still prefer email as that is a medium they control in terms of reach, access and knowledge shared.

How illusory, I know! I have been mentioning in both Twitter and Google Plus how surprising this sudden change has been for yours truly and a couple of folks have suggested whether in part this is all due to the recent change of jobs I have gone through, and the fact that I am now exposed to a larger target audience, where vast majority of that IBM population do not know me much, (nor of my work habits): the email-less man who IBM gave birth to in February 2008. It could well be, but then again it was already happening from the beginning of the year when I was still doing my former job, which makes it even more intriguing altogether.

I am certain that, at this point in time, you may be wondering what this is all about and what do I mean when referring to the fact I am now back to basics, once again, having gone through a massive reboot of everything I have been doing in the last few years on walking the talk, leading by example, with my extensive use of social networking tools in a business context. Well, it looks like I am now going to resume a more regular blogging frequency on the topic of “Life Without eMail“, because apparently many folks out there, within my own working environment, have never heard of it and still keep bombarding me with email after email, resulting in a rather alarming increase of email volume to handle, implying as well for that matter, and I am myself spending a whole lot less time in social networks while processing it along accordingly. 

Yes, during Year 6 – Weeks 1 to 20, I have gone from the good average of 15 emails received per week throughout the year for 2012 to, currently, 31.25 emails received per week, which is just huge compared to the range of emails received in the last 2 to 3 years. Take a look into the weekly progress report from those first 20 weeks, and please do pay attention at the data from Week 20. It will be rather telling altogether, so you can see what I mean:

You could say that the vast majority of that incoming email volume has been provoked by my new team members and, to be frank, that hasn’t been the case, at all. Most of our collaboration and knowledge sharing happens in open, social spaces, for folks to participate in as they may see fit, along with some other protected, private ones. What I have noticed though, is a sudden increase of incoming email volume from people outside my immediate teams and for a good number of reasons that I have spotted so far. Because I am now working in a completely different area (Have gone from IBM Software Marketing, into IBM’s CIO Organisation) I have seen plenty of email traffic that would be flagged as political, bullying, unnecessary reporting, delegated tasks on to you, and a whole bunch of other aspects that have clearly reminded me why I got started with ditching corporate email back in the day. And while I have tried to be rather condescending and understanding that not everyone wants to buy into living social AND open, I think I am just about to harden up substantially and become bolder when challenging people’s behaviours on how they keep abusing, and killing, each other’s productivity.

I guess after 20 weeks waiting for those folks to re-adjust some of their behaviours and become more socially savvy, and not seeing much progress along the way to adapt to that new kind of mindset, it’s now probably a good time to awaken that outrageous optimist heretic, free radical, corporate rebel, hippie 2.0 side of me and fight back! I guess it’s time for me to start challenging, just like I did at the beginning, how people work and entice them into open up their eyes AND minds into new, more effective ways of getting work done through social / open streams. 

You may be wondering why do I bother about all of this, after all, right? I mean, I proved the point for a good number of years that it is possible to live a life without email, so why keep things running as we move further along? Well, probably because I am stubborn enough to believe all of these digital tools will eventually help us transform how we collaborate and share our knowledge, making it much more purposeful and meaningful altogether. Probably also because over the course of the years I have learned to become more patient, and be resilient enough, to persevere and continue to walk the talk accordingly to show and demonstrate how it’s possible to have such a life without relying so badly on email to get work done or, even, to justify it. Probably, because, deep inside, I still feel rather strong about challenging folks, through constructive dialogue, and practical hints and tips and other pragmatic advice, about thinking different, about fighting that inertia that has trapped them for years in thinking “eMail as the default knowledge sharing, communication and collaboration tool, so why would I change? Not worth it“. Well, it is worth it. It always has been worth it and will always be…

I suppose I am an outlier, a rebel with a cause, after all. And after this week, in particular, even more so, once I am done with it and I finally received the total amount of 99 emails (As you can see from the report shared across above) in a single work week! Goodness gracious me! 99 emails!! That’s the highest number of incoming emails I have received for a single week in almost 6 years!! [Previous one was 60 in 2008]

And talking about rebels with a cause. This working week, which is now a thing of the past, reminded of an interview I got done with one of the smartest people I have had the pleasure of spending some time with to learn what Social / Open Business is all about, along with a whole new concept that I am sure you would all be hearing about plenty more, over the course of time, around smarter workforce. Yes, I am referring to the absolutely delightful interview I had the pleasure to be invited to by Rudy Karsan, CEO of Kenexa, an IBM company, and which he then wrote about on this rather insightful blog post under the heading “Introducing The Smarter Workforce Profile: Luis Suarez“. 

Why does it remind me of where I am, right at this moment, when I am stating “I am just going back to basics“, you may be wondering, right? Well, initially, because, to date, it’s probably the most accurate, insightful and relevant interview I have given, out there, on the topic of Social / Open Business and “Life Without eMail“. It basically explains why did I start it in the first place, how I have been moving along with it, and what’s meant so far, and, most importantly, what drove me to kick it off as far as benefits are concerned and on the working week where I have received 99 emails for the whole week, it’s a tremendous refresher, and a huge energy boost, to identify, refine and remind myself why, despite the hard reset, there is no turning point for yours truly, other than keep pushing, and perhaps not as gently anymore as I have in the last few months. Here is one of my favourite quotes that pretty much describes what I do and why I am so passionate on this topic: 

“[…] This  convinced me more than anything else that social is the way of the future, and I found his courage inspiring. What came out of my conversation with him was that there were three things that drove him to do this.

The 1st was to bring about efficiencies. The 2nd was that outcomes are better when people collaborate rather than compete. I was fascinated by his notion that email is more of a competitive than a collaborative norm, as it is more about ‘I’ than ‘Us’. The 3rd was that social is the ideal venue, according to him, of teaching–and all humans have this yearning to teach and share knowledge–because somewhere, somebody will find our words meaningful and respond accordingly. What struck me in particular was that there are very few people I know who have no almost no sense of fear in their decision-making, and Luis is one of those. He is driven more by purpose which enabled him to overcome fear. Now, lots of books have been written about how to be an entrepreneur and how to do things very differently, and I think that is fascinating to watch somebody in a massive organisation like IBM be able to execute on their vision of the world because their sense of purpose is stronger than fear of consequences.” [Emphasis mine]

Yes, I know, I would be drooling, too! In fact, I still am. Feel free to read further on through the interview itself, if you would be interested, while I would ask you to bear with me for a few, while I try to clean up the mess on my keyboard. But that’s it. Those are big, big words that, over the course of last few months, i seem to have forgotten, ignored or neglected altogether, and somehow I need to get them back: Efficiency, Outcomes, Collaboration, Teaching, Meaning, No Sense of Fear and, my favourite, Purpose. Not bad to put them all together as an opportunity for me to re-focus on what I need to keep focusing on, specially, after nearly 6 years gone by: Life Without eMail not just for me, but for everyone else around me, too! 

Indeed, it’s a larger group, a much larger one, but then again I’m fully committed. Remember, I’m pretty stubborn, rather resilient, flexible enough to understand the dynamics and act accordingly and, above all, incredibly patient to keep pushing for that business transformation of how we share our knowledge and collaborate further through Open Business. You could say I have just re-gained my status of a Rebel with a Cause, because, to me, it just feels like it. 

This whole new experience for myself of what has just happened this working week with such a high number of incoming emails may have just signalled how I may have now reached the bottom of it all, a new beginning, a completely new beginning, and from here onwards I suppose there is only one way left: upwards and onwards!

Thus here we go. Upwards and Onwards with “Life Without eMail” through the point of no return and using our usual Google Plus Community to continue to help educate, teach and facilitate further into that Open Business Transformation, while we keep going for repurposing email in a work context and put it back where it belongs, at long last!

Hope you will join us! 

The Future of Open Business At Stake

About a year ago, I put together an article where I was reflecting on the fact of how plenty of the early thinkers of Enterprise 2.0 and Social Business, the social evangelists, were starting to become rather scarce and very rare to be seen out there on the Social Web. So I wondered where were they? Well, a year later, I think I may well know now where some of them are. Doing perhaps the very same thing that most of us would not have expected and find somewhat rather strange: getting their work done protecting their turf.

Almost a year later, my good friend Euan Semple pretty much nailed it when a couple of months back he put together this rather insightful and very thought-provoking piece under the suggestive title “Defend your mess“, where he stated what happens when people begin to notice your efforts, as a social business evangelist, facilitating the adaptation to social networking behaviours in your business. To quote: 

“But it was beginning to be noticed by other people; people who were less experienced on the web; people who liked things tidy and organised. We came under pressure to make the forum more structured. They wanted a structure that reflected the organisational structure at the time. They thought that people would find it difficult to navigate if it didn’t follow the familiar patterns“

I guess nowadays it’s what most people would be calling Collaboration, but this time around happening through social software tools. In fact, for vast majority of practitioners social / open business is all about, and just about, collaborating with your peers, although perhaps nowadays with a fancier set of collaborative and knowledge sharing tools. So if you look into it, it seems that we are still putting lots of lipstick on the pig, because apparently we don’t seem to have progressed much from that obsession of living social into what I feel is much more interesting and exciting altogether: Transformation.

In another superb, and worth while reading article, Matt Ridings, pretty much detailed what the challenges are in terms of how enticed we may have become with diving into social business, but perhaps not pushing far enough in terms of provoking that social business transformation I just mentioned above. To quote: 

“My frustration lies not in their understanding of ‘what’ a social business looks like, but rather their lack of understanding in ‘how’ an organization can make that transition. The prevailing view seems to be that if we simply show companies what all the benefits and traits are that they will simply ‘become’ those things. ”The organizational culture must change!”, “The technologies must be put into place!”, “The hierarchy and silos must fall!”.

While all true to one degree or another, these are still statements of ‘what’ must happen and not ‘how’. The most important factor missing here is a ‘why’. Why have organizations evolved in the way they have? It is only through understanding that evolution that one can design and justify a means of effectively changing it.“

I suppose I know now where a good number of those social business evangelists are hanging out nowadays. They are not necessarily hiding out behind the firewall, as it may well have been perceived for a while, nor are they bored with the whole thing and decided to move on, but, on the contrary, they are fighting the good fight, “defending their mess”, as Euan mentioned on that article, by helping those new to this whole brave new world of social / open business to get it right. To think different. To live different. To adapt to a completely new world where business interactions are totally opposite to whatever has happened in the past. And this is where the challenge comes up, because those new to social / open business are those very same laggards who have been waiting long enough to see how they could structure, control and manage the whole experience through rather tight, strict and cumbersome business process that certainly don’t allow those chaotic, unstructured, networked, hyperconnected behaviours, that social networking tools inspire, to flourish and disrupt the entire organisation around the edges into a new way of thinking. That one of Openness and Transparency.

And that’s why organisational, or team, silos keep flourishing more often than not, even today, despite plenty of efforts that have been tried for a long while to be done with them once and for all. Yet, that doesn’t seem to have happened as we keep seeing how more and more practitioners keep claiming that for as long as they are collaborating they are doing social business. Well, not really, because, eventually, we are not changing much of our own behaviours in terms of how we have traditionally collaborated and shared our knowledge, even though the tools suite is different, much different. 

This is where I feel we are going to have one of the biggest challenges yet to be seen within the corporate world, because on the one hand the social / open business evangelists are excited all of their efforts, hard work and energy are, finally, at long last, becoming mainstream within their own organisations, so they are all rather excited about it. And, in a way, they have started to let it go, thinking things would be all right as they just start to look after themselves. And then on the other hand, we are starting to see how that mainstream is just absorbing all of that effort structuring it, formalising it, and establishing a rather tight and strict series of business processes around social that, if anything, are starting to strangle all of that emergent flavour that social networking for business has been having all along and bringing it down to its knees and, once again, straight back into the organisational silos, what we have been traditionally calling collaboration.

Now, don’t take me wrong. I am pretty much in favour of collaboration and knowledge sharing. I have always believed it’s what dictates the mere survival of every single organisation in today’s more complex than ever world. However, what I have been seeing for a good couple of years now is how by having social business become more mainstream within the corporate world the kind of collaboration that’s encouraged is that one that we know just far too well: the one happening in small, private, secretive, opaque teams that pretty much don’t care about anything else that’s happening around them. And that’s just wrong, because it’s proving we may not have learned much over the course of the years in terms of what we should be aiming at: Open Collaboration, across silos, organisational units, geographies, countries and what not. Porous organisations swarming around, anyone?

Yes, silos are good, they are there for a reason. They have a purpose. We should treasure and nurture them, but, at the same time, we should also challenge their own existence, thinking that, unless you have a pretty good reason to have that silo, where you would want to protect specific knowledge flows because of the confidentiality or sensitivity of the information, then there isn’t a reason to have one and this is what I feel us, social / open business evangelists, should be fighting for in terms of “defending our mess”, i.e. fighting our turf. Or as Euan himself stated brilliantly: 

“Don’t let people try to tidy up your internal use of social too soon. At least let it find its feet before you start worrying about mess. Mess is in the eye of the beholder. 

Part of your job as the instigator of social in your organisation is to defend it. You are there to keep reactive forces at bay until the tool achieves a robust enough culture to look after itself. This will probably take years.“

And that is exactly one of the main reasons why you may not have seen much of me, and a whole bunch of other social evangelists, out there on the Social Web in the last little while. I, too, have embarked on keeping up that fight, more than anything else, because I am just not ready yet to let go all of that hard work, energy and strong effort put together over the last decade around Social / Open for then seeing some bean counters, lawyers and social wanna be pundits destroy all of that work of emerging digital tools helping transform the way we do business, just because they want to get their way, ignoring everything / everyone else. Yes, somehow I suppose that ignorance has always been very brave, if you know what I mean. 

No, it doesn’t mean all of a sudden I have become anti-social either, not at all. Perhaps I am now even stronger and more committed to the cause than ever before. My good friend Greg Lowe described it pretty well in a recent tweet he shared across: 

Please don’t confuse busy with anti-social. Unsuccessfully trying to find that balance.

— Greg Lowe (@Greg2dot0) May 23, 2013

Yes, indeed, I am not too sure whether I am, myself, succeeding as well in terms of finding that balance now that my interactions behind the firewall seem to have taken a life of its own in terms of me needing to focus on internal work rather than spending time on the Social Web out there. In fact, I am starting to think that, given how things are moving along, I may just need to resort my external exposure to those idle moments in between work and personal life where I can dip in my toes, see what’s going on out there, get a breather or two, raise my social periscope up, see what my extended networks have been up to, and if I don’t see them, by any chance, I’m starting to come to terms with the fact that they are probably just defending their mess, just like I am doing myself, or as Matt himself concluded: 

“These leaders need help. They face a difficult task balancing the competing interests at play. While I suppose you could measure their effectiveness based upon whether they are tweeting or not, might I suggest they have plenty of other things on their plate that are more important“

That’s it. That’s what it is all about! Don’t worry, we are not gone, we may have gone silent for a bit, at times, it may look as if we have just disappeared, but we will always be there. It’s just that we are ensuring that social / open business transformation doesn’t get bastardised, once again, just like Knowledge Management did 18 years ago, when vendors and consultants decided, on behalf of all of us, that KM was all about team work and siloed collaboration. This time around it’s vendors (Once again), along with marketers, bean counters, lawyers and command and control, process driven zealots, the ones who keep insisting on designing and shaping up the workplace of the future thinking they know better than everyone else, no matter if you have been there for a long while. 

Well, we are not going to let go that easily this time around, are we? Some of us have learned from that KM past and, somehow, I suspect we are not very willing to go and commit the very same mistakes, once again. There is just plenty at stake at this point time. Essentially, the workplace of the future: 

Industrialisation of Social Networking for the Enterprise

Or, to put it in other words, automation of your social networking presence. That worrying topic has been in my mind for quite a while, and, lately, even more so, specially, seeing how plenty of people continue to automate, even further along, their online digital footprints with the argument, amongst several others, that they have got to do it, because they just can’t find the time anymore to make it happen in a natural, authentic, self-driven manner. Yes, it happens. Yes, it’s a topic that worries me, because we are then running the risk of commoditising our very own online presence(s). And what for? Is it worth it? Probably not. Have we forgotten that with social networking for business we are all in it for the long run? Versus just the quick win of a few hundred followers or a quick sell through that automated post? Where did we leave behind the social business transformation?

For a good couple of years this is a topic that has started to concern me more and more, since I have begun to notice how plenty of times when you start engaging through online social networking tools, specially, on the Social Web, you bump into a whole bunch of interesting posts with relevant links, only to respond back, with the hope of starting off, or following, a conversation, and then to find out that no-one is at the other end, after all. In fact, they have all left and they have just got bots / machines doing the work for them. Pretty much like we have been doing with email for a good few years. And just like we commoditised email back in the day, it’s starting to look like we are commoditising social networking for business along the very same lines. 

Where did we go wrong? Why do we have to keep up with that constant urge towards busyness (and bursting online activity) vs. pause, reflection and adding relevant value where it may apply into the overall conversation? Haven’t we learned from the recent past? I mean, haven’t we learned that social networking tools are just not another marketing channel, but purely a conversation amongst peers on a common interest and with a strong urge to connect further along? Have we forgotten how for a conversation to take place out there in digital channels both parties need to be present and for real, like the authentic you and your thoughts, versus just another bot doing the work for you? And that if one of the two parties is not there, for whatever the reason, there is nothing wrong with that? It’s part of your overall digital footprint that we seem to keep forgetting about time and time again, but both providing value and being silent are two sides of the same coin, that is, you, that we all take and accept gladly. Thus why do we keep it up? It’s just unsustainable, rather insane and perhaps a bit tad disappointing that whenever you decide to participate in online conversations because you feel  that people are there sharing along, you find out they left the building long while ago! 

I am surely glad I am not the only one thinking about this relevant and important topic, specially, from the perspective that once we may have industrialised social networking I suspect it will be just too late to revert back. Mike Allton shares similar reflections on a rather interesting article under the suggestive heading of “How to Destroy Your Social Media Credibility through Automation“. An article that I can certainly recommend and which keeps reminding me as well how silly such automation can well be for a specific brand (And that includes your own personal brand for that matter) when you have got an automated digital presence and all of a sudden a global event (Specially, if it is an extreme negative) changes the whole game on what you have been trying to share out there, and portrait, when you are gone, but that everyone else can see the true, harsh reality: it’s no longer the authentic you and your messages, but those of a bot which schedules posts to show up on whatever the frequency.

Now, this has also been a topic that has been in my mind over the last few weeks, specially, when I moved into a new job inside IBM that has provoked a shift of focus from external interactions into internal ones mainly. During all of this time I have been thinking hard about what I would want to do, whether I would want to automate part of my digital external footprint, or just disappear into thin air with that new focus area of behind the firewall interactions. It’s not an easy one, for sure, because in most cases people expect you to be out there, and, if you aren’t, things aren’t going to be the same anymore. It’s starting to look like if you are not out there, online, sharing along, whatever that may well be, you are no longer worth it, because you won’t be showing up in their streams as often as you are doing nowadays. Have you ever felt that feeling of abandonment? It will come. In fact, that’s the main reason why I feel most knowledge workers have automated their own online social media presences; that is, to show they are still there, even just for the sake of it (never mind the value), even though they are not.  

Is that what I want to do with my own digital footprint? To sacrifice it and automate it in such a way that whenever I would share something it would no longer be me, the real me? I know how this issue may not concern plenty of people out there about their own digital footprint, but it does concern me. Last thing that I would want to do is to lose that authenticity and honesty in terms of being you behind your online digital tools’ presence. I am actually thinking that at that point, I may as well just go dormant  and stop sharing altogether. 

Thus while reflecting further along on this topic, I actually realised that I may not need to do anything that drastic altogether or, even, automate my way out of being an active 2.0 practitioner, specially, in the Social Web. And in this particular case it’s interesting to see how the clue was provided to me by one particular social software tool that most folks still keep being rather keen on terminating it. Yes, of course, I am talking about blogging. I am talking about how blogging helps every knowledge worker out there to realise that in terms of social networking for business, we are all in it for the long run! And, as such, it’s ok, it’s actually, advisable, to take time off. To go for periods of silence where things happen around you, but that people still know you are there, even if remote. To go for that relatively short, or long, hiatus, where things take another course, where the focus shifts elsewhere because the job requires it to a certain extent. 

The important thing is to always come back. To help people understand that while you may have been quiet sharing along those insights, opinions, conversations and what not, it doesn’t necessarily mean you are not reading or learning from them, along the way as a lurker. That’s what blogging is wonderful about. It allows you to have pause, to reflect on what really matters, and to shape up your own online digital footprint sharing what you feel provides the most business value in your interactions. Blogging lives on a different pace altogether and while this year, later on in December, I will be celebrating my 10th year blogging anniversary, I guess I still feel I’m just learning so much from that writing experience of one’s opinions and reflections that there is always something new out there.

So much so that I am sure you may have noticed how I have become a little bit quieter, more than usual, in one of my Big Three social networking tools for business: Twitter, while I have kept up with the online interactions and exchange for the other two (IBM Connections and Google Plus). The blog is different, because it’s an integral part of me, it’s an extension of my brain, my thoughts, my experiences, my know-how, my digital self-being and, as such, it will always be there. However, just like some times in the recent past, I may take a few days off from blogging, I know I’ll always be coming back to it. And I am starting to think that this may well be the very same approach I will adopt for other social networking tools, where I will become a whole lot more focused, purposeful and meaningful on how I interact thinking that while keeping up a presence out there may well be rather good, I think I am going in for the long run, for sharing in smaller portions part of what’s in my mind at the time, but ensuring that it is me the one sharing it and not whatever the bot in place. 

That’s part of the dialogue, the authenticity, and the brutal honesty to share across that while I am fully aware I will not be able to keep up with the same pace of interactions held online, externally, outside the firewall, like I have been doing in the last few years, it doesn’t necessarily mean that people can’t no longer find me. I’m there. I will be there. It’s just that I am thinking I’ll be focusing more on pausing, reading and reflecting on what other folks share across, and keep quiet myself unless I have got something really useful and valuable to share out there. 

I guess you could call it an attempt to redefine your own online digital footprint and personal brand, when things at work take a radical shift towards behind the firewall interactions. Perhaps that’s indeed what I have been thinking about. And in terms of the choice I would go for that I feel would represent me better I am thinking that I prefer to go silent and learn from others reading along than to automate an online presence that I know won’t be fair to anyone out there anymore, including me, since you are probably going to expect me and yet I won’t be there. Well, I will be. But in a different shape. I will be reacting, I will be conversing and participating, but with pause, challenging myself on how I can keep up adding value, versus adding unnecessary noise and pollution to already existing digital channels that I am sure we all have been having enough with lately. 

Thus if you see me going quiet for a relative period of time, don’t worry, I am not gone, I am not hiding, I am not giving up on my external social presence just like that. I am just listening and learning, from the lurker side of things, knowing that what I’m after is having that opportunity to continue build and nurture those personal online business relationships, but without industrialising it all, nevertheless still keeping up with that same authenticity, openness, transparency and engagement that I always thought was the best part of social networking tools. It’s just that this time around it’s becoming a whole lot more focused and on target of what I would want to do: keeping up with the learning curve of the networks I am part of by amplifying what I think provides value vs. just adding more unnecessary irrelevancy. I think I’m going to spare you all having to go through that. Something tells me that, in the long term, we will all be much better off …

What do you think? Think automation of your own online digital presence has had a significant impact that you would want to share along with us? Has it helped you? Has it damaged the health and trust of your social networks? I would love to learn more what you think in the comments, please… Thanks for taking the time to share your experiences. As usual, they are *greatly* appreciated.