As part of UBM’s Community Management 101 course, this post is a response to the Andrew McAfee’s blog post: Do’s and Don’ts for Your Work’s Social Platforms.
As the title suggests, McAfee offers a list of Do’s and Dont’s for engaging with social platforms at work, which is a fairly solid set of basic rules to follow. As other course participants have noted, there are many grey areas that aren’t covered, but its a very good starter for 10.
I found it hard to disagree with any of his points so instead have chosen to expand on them and add my own views on each.
The Do’s
Narrate your work: Self-reflection is a critical skill, and practising it in a semi-public forum can force a level of clarity of thought/focus that might not otherwise occur. After all, if you know others might read it, you’ll be more conscious of at least trying to make sense! Social tools allow your colleagues to add another perspective to this activity, adding value and providing more insights.
Point to others’ work: pointing to other people’s work both internally and externally helps people discover new information they might otherwise have missed, and can help increase your reputation as someone who has their finger on the pulse of a particular subject area. This might lead others to follow your updates in the hope that you might uncover some other gems, thus increasing your reach/influence if you ever need it.
Comment and discuss: This is a very easy and quick way to add value to a conversation and there are plenty of options: thanking the original poster for sharing their insights, empathising with people’s issues, or even answering questions.
Ask/answer questions: The key here is to give back to the community by answering the questions of others. It is up to all of us to foster a spirit of collaboration, so that people are more likely to answer our own questions when they arise.
Vote/give kudos: As well as showing who/where the experts are, its a nice way to thank people for taking the effort and time to share. Show your appreciation and encourage repeat behaviour – we all like a bit of recognition!
Talk about social stuff: This is a great idea, just be careful.
The Don’ts
There’s not much I can add here to add to the “don’ts” that McAfee listed. I find that a good general sense check is to ask yourself whether you would behave that way in front of a random selection of your colleagues (which is effectively what you are doing). The main thing I would add, is not to take too much without giving back.
My Takeaways
For me, the key thing to remember is that the wiki is a work tool, and that almost everything you add to it will be visible to all of your colleagues, including (UBM CEO) David Levin! We are all in this together, striving for a common goal, and we are all responsible for making the wiki a place where people feel comfortable in discussing various issues amongst themselves, collaborating and solving problems together, and sometimes having fun discussing which movie franchise had the best sequels.
What do you think?
