Furthering our discussion of how Information Technology (IT) departments sometimes frustrate efforts at speedy, efficient messaging by marketing communications professionals -- a discussion launched by Dee Rambeau here and embraced by David Johnson on his blog -- and taken up by Neville Hobson on his blog and germane to this week's discussion on Knowledge Management tools, I would like to weigh in with a quote from today's Wall Street Journal. The article is entitled, "Offices Co-Opt Consumer Web Tools Like 'Wikis' and Social Networking," by Vaughini Vara.

"For some, trying new technology has meant defying reticent IT departments. Last year, Jeff Nolan moved from SAP's venture-capital arm to an operational role at the company and wanted to start an internal wiki using software from Socialtext, Inc., a Palo Alto, Calif., stat-up funded in part by SAP's VC arm. The IT department said no, bringing up privacy issues and other concerns, but Mr. Nolan signed up anyway. Employees could access Socialtext online, which meant Mr. Nolan didn't have to use SAP's equipment to run it. Later, when the IT department saw that the wiki had been a success, it agreed to manage Socialtext hardware that sits at SAP, which gives the company more control over it."

"'They realized that the world would not stop spinning, and the sky would not fall, and that it actually had benefits,' Mr. Nolan says."

Okay, Neville, the clash with IT is not a thing of the past. This is a real problem today in large businesses, educational institutions, nonprofits, and government agencies. We need to put some solutions on the table.

STEVE O'KEEFE
V.P., IAOC

Sharing information doesn’t have to be complicated or convoluted. Of course, many software manufacturers want to you to believe ...   more »

So if we believe that what we know is learned through stories, some boring, some riveting, how do we get people to share what they know through a good story? It’s difficult in corporations to share stories and then to store them so that other people can find and reference the information to do even better things.   more »

Everyone loves a good story. Or so the saying goes. Since the dawn of time, storytelling has ...   more »