Facebook users cost SMB’s thousands – says Telstra

As hard as we try, those of us in Social Media are always going to struggle when old media giants like News Corp decides to lay the boot into social media via one of the popular tools – in this case Facebook. The report from (News subsidiary) Adelaide Now is a clear attack on social networking and social media and is designed to do nothing more than instil fear in the minds of business owners. The headline pretty much gave away the bias of the article and upon reading it I had my expectations of a hatchet job pretty much confirmed.

What really stood out for me (other than the blatant bias in the article) is the comment from a Telstra Executive.
Telstra Business Executive Director Brian Harcourt was quoted in the article as follows:

“If an employee spends as much as an hour a day on Facebook, it can end up costing a business thousands of dollars in lost time over the course of a year.”

I’ve thought long and hard about this comment and whether to just ignore this or write a stinging rebuke. I really don’t follow the logic of a senior Telstra executive making comments like this. He’s basically telling the business community to lock down internet access or “god forbid” it will cost your company thousands of dollars.

Why am I confused by this comment (or frustrated)?

1. Telstra has been promoting itself as a leader in the social media space, espousing their brilliant efforts to connect to the community and providing the means for people to have dialogue.
2. Telstra recently announced your own internal social media policies with much fan fare  (or was that just a reaction to the @fakestephenconroy fiasco).
3. Telstra sells internet access – broadband is their bread and butter remember…

So, Telstra is telling the business community to curtail use of the internet particularly the evil Facebook as that is where bludgers congregate? That would be like Jeroen van der Veer (he’s the CEO of Royal Dutch Shell) telling his customers to NOT buy the Land Rover Discovery 3 V8 HSE because it’s a V8 and man they suck the gas down. Forget about the fact you could drive it sensibly and reasonably economically and derive much pleasure and benefit along the way – “It’s a V8 man; it’ll cost you thousands of dollars a year”.

So rather than be critical of Telstra, I’m going to help them. I’d like to put forward many of the points that (I suspect) Brian didn’t get a chance to in the article. I want to believe that Telstra believes – and knows this is not about bludgers; it’s about culture and engagement (remember the former CEO’s massive spread in The Boss Magazine last year where he talked long about culture and engagement?). Telstra knows this is about accepting that technology is good and things are changing.

I can imagine Brian and his colleagues looking at this research and wanting to say to the public and their valued business customers – “the research shows that business owners are worried – they don’t quite get it like we do. So because we’re innovative leaders, we’re going to contribute some of what we know and hold true, so that others can learn how to harness the potential and find a positive. Because it’s not about bludgers it’s about empowerment and trust”.

I am of the opinion that Telstra would get much more mileage (or column inch coverage) if they said this, or if they even went a step further and followed the lead of their global innovative peers like IBM, Dell, and Harvard by saying “Our message is don’t lock down. Our message is to allow dialogue, to embrace it through a set of mutually agreed guidelines. In fact, here’s our policies – take them and modify them.

We’re Telstra, so we’re going to contribute to the community. Because we believe this is the way of the future because we’re bloody smart and innovative, and we want you using our products.”

Isn’t that a much better story line than what News Limited concocted?

I like this model where Telstra uses their PR presence/muscle to go into the community and have the balls to say “come with us, we’ve got some great ideas”.

Social Communities – The Hidden Jewel of Social Media

Whilst everyone is getting slap happy about Twitter the one trend we’ve noticed that we believe is far more significant is the growth of social communities. A number of vendors have made significant technical advances such that I think the focus for many companies (large and small) going into the second half of this year and 2010 will be around building a sticky social community.

Social communities represent the coordinated use of many social technologies – blogs, wiki’s, forums, social networks, multi-media, ranking/voting tools etc. There are many examples of Communities already in existence. As a business and as individuals we actively participate in a number of communities both professionally and personally.

Communities can take many forms – from the low cost option of Ning through to the emerging leaders – companies like Awareness Networks, Mzinga, Igloo Software, and HiveLive.

Communities are nothing new.

True, in fact, for the past 6 years I’ve been a member of Australia’s oldest business community – The Executive Connection (TEC). TEC is an affiliate of Vistage International.

With more than 14,500 members, Vistage International is the world’s foremost chief executive leadership organization

Membership of TEC introduces you to a community of like minded senior executives – this is an important point that we’ll come back to as we start to develop some community strategies for TEC in the coming months.

The question is whether TEC can make the transition from a traditional community to a social community – one that is deliberate, capitalises on TEC’s inherent trust among members, reflects TEC’s premium reputation and senior executive member base, and one that delivers long term value.

TEC has a unique opportunity ahead of them. They have a premium service that has at its core business leaders who are striving to build better companies whilst maintaining a thirst for knowledge and personal growth.

What Does This All Mean?

In my opinion, Social Communities represent the Holy Grail of social media – and will be the critical, mandatory component of any business seeking to go down the road of Enterprise 2.0. But whilst they are the Holy Grail, they also represent the toughest challenge. A company like TEC can’t simply decide to ‘do’ community. It requires strategy, resources, planning, investment, and most of all – commitment.

In the coming months we’ll compile a resource pool of articles and content that has been shared with us. We’ve found these resources to be invaluable in helping us understand communities as well as working with our customers to scope, understand, and plan for future social community initiatives.