Emergence of Social Business Design

I’ve long been a fan of the work of XPLANE for visually explaining complex concepts and ideas. I recently received a broadcast email from them announcing their acquisition by the Dachis Group. (Dachis has also acquired Hinchcliffe & Company, and Headshift.)

“Social business design” is a fundamental element of the Dachis Groups’ offering and approach to serving its customers. They define it as “Social Business Design is the intentional creation of dynamic and socially calibrated systems, process, and culture. The goal: improving value exchange among constituents .“

Now, I'm sure you've all heard of “social engineering”, which often has negative connotations linked to individual, group our large scale manipulation. Social business design is, by contrast, more closely linked to what Ram Charan refers to as “Shaping the way people work together by leading the social system of your business” in his book KNOW-HOW :The 8 Skills That Separate People Who Perform from Those Who Don't.

(It also sounds remarkably like facilitation in the context of organizational development / management consulting in an emerging social networking / “Enterprise 2.0” context.)

I find this a very interesting, and exciting, development. I’m looking forward to seeing how this concept evolves.

Is this the new “knowledge management?”

Stoyko on the "The Lump of Knowledge Falicy".

Peter Stoyko has composed a great essay titled "The Lump of Knowledge Falicy" wherein he very articulately distinguishes between the stock/flow view of knowledge and KM and the learning /social view, and points to some of the problems associated with an unbalenced focus on the former.  Well worth the read.

In conclusion Peter states: "It’s time to recognise the true nature of knowledge, which has a lot to do with human psychology, socio-political relations, and the anatomy of the brain. Data and information are important for organisations. But some knowledge can’t be shoe-horned into portable and pliable documentation. We have to avoid the lump of knowledge fallacy because it’s causing managers to ignore important sources of insight and creativity. And it’s causing managers to fund learning activities that promise a quick-fix instead of those which produce the long-term intellectual growth of employees."