Creating policies for blogging, social media, and the like is a murky area for most organizations. And let’s face it: most of us don’t actually enjoy writing this stuff (or maybe that’s just me). This is why it’s always nice to find a list of good policy examples from which we can swipe and alter for our own purposes. Enjoy!
http://123socialmedia.com/2009/01/23/social-media-policy-examples/
I love Iron Man. It just happens to be one of my favorite (and best written) comic book series being published right now. And as for the movie…I saw it twice in the theater and I’ve seen it three times since buying it on DVD. On my daily walk this morning, Black Sabbath’s Iron Man came up on my iPod and I started to think about scenes from the movie. One particular scene flashed across my thoughts and led me down an interesting path of reflection.
[SPOILER ALERT: the scene below is a crucial plot point so if you haven't seen Iron Man...Wait...you haven't? Okay, hurry up, buy it, and watch it...then come back. I'll wait.]
Toward the end of the movie, Tony Stark/Iron Man battles his business partner, Obadiah Stane, who proves to be a megalomaniacal character with no remorse when it comes to selling weapons to both the U.S. and the terrorists that the U.S. fights. Stane also manages to steal the designs of Tony’s armor and has his engineers secretly build a much larger, more powerful version, which – at least in the comics – is referred to as the Iron Monger armor. So, this final smackdown between two metal giants becomes one between creator and imitator. Which, to me, is the connection to the fallacy of best practices.
Because Stane didn’t understand how his armor really worked, he became overreliant on someone else’s technology. Our heroic Iron Man took advantage of this by climbing on his back and ripping out Stane’s weapon targeting system which ultimately proved to be crucial to the villain’s defeat.
This isn’t the first time I’ve teed off on best practices (see here), but I’m also not completely opposed to them, either. The critical difference is how they are applied. If you blindly accept best practices without fully considering how they’ll work or without determining how they’ll integrate with your own systems, then you’re missing the whole point. And you’re likely in for a surprise when you find that you get some exceptionally poor results.
Instead, try this: BE UNIQUE for goodness sake. You have all kinds of creative ideas floating around your organization. They exist inside the heads of your people. Rather than looking for that next great idea outside your organization, look inside. Your people are the ones who have an intimate grasp of the challenges you all face…and likely they have some solutions, as well.
This idea and plan for Endiscouragement is not mine, but I wish it was. It comes from David Donathan at University Business (via LibraryBytes). David’s article is called Stifling Initiative and it proposes ten never-fail ways to kill innovation without actually saying “no.” With tongue firmly planted in cheek, he describes the reason why this is a practiced skill for managers:
Unfortunately, there are always those who just don’t get it. You know-those who think organizations need to adapt to remain competitive, that change is good and results in greater efficiencies, that failure to adapt to “modernalities” is evil and counterproductive. Since they usually mean well and truly believe they are trying to improve our situation, we don’t want to cull them from the herd (besides, who wants the hassle of trying to break in the newbie?). It usually suffices to discourage these people to the point that they fall in line and stop agitating. How do we get them to stop? How do we encourage the status quo without driving them to leave? I call this unique program “Endiscouragement: The Fine Art of Encouraging No Change Without Being Perceived as a Naysayer.” It has ten simple rules, which, if judiciously applied, will gradually lead the agents of change to conform to the culture of no that we are so carefully trying to preserve.
My personal favorite is #6: “Have you talked to … about it?”
While similar to rules 2 and 3, this rule is more nefarious in that you have appointed the agent of change the instrument of her own endiscouragement. The agent of change will wander from one overworked, disinterested employee to another as each key person refers her to someone else who needs to be “in the loop before I can help you.” Eventually the agent of change will be locked into a self-instigated merry-go-round of eternal meetings. Best of all, she will be so busy trying to deal with all the meetings for her proposal that you will be able to call her to task for not being attentive to her job.
The sad thing is that most of these rules are practiced in organizations not out of maliciousness or Machiavellian cunning, but out of a simple (and usually unconscious) belief that this is how the corporate world operates. Which leads me to a couple of related questions:
What does your organization do to encourage dynamic innovation at all levels? What does your organization do to stifle innovation? If you want to truly engage your employees, your answers will lead you to some interesting conclusions.
I hope everyone has had a wonderful and meaningful Thanksgiving. With all that’s going on in the world, this year’s holiday has been a time for me to reflect on all that I’m thankful for in my life. And perhaps just as importantly, to appreciate the hope and potential that each day brings.
In my readings in business anthropology, I found this story which really speaks to how we create our own sense of thanksgiving each day in our work. The key is in our approach:
In one training exercise, new employees are sent into a small village dressed in plain white uniforms and are required to go door-to-door asking residents for simple household chores that they may do without pay. The trainees must do this alone and may not return to the training facility until they succeed in finding work. The exercise is not as simple as it may appear because doing a favor for someone in Japan creates an obligation, meaning that strangers are not eager to accept gratuities. After being refused several times, the young trainees usually find that they are happy to do whatever work they are offered, no matter how menial or onerous. This experience is meant to teach them that it is not the nature of the work that determines one’s attitude toward work, but rather one’s attitude that determines the way in which the nature of work is perceived. (emphasis added)
Marietta L. Baba, Anthropological Practice in Business and Industry (2005)
What are you doing to extend the feeling of thanksgiving into your daily work?
For those of you who follow football, the firing of Matt Millen should not come as a great shock (and for those of you who happen to still follow Detroit Lions football, it likely comes as a Day of Liberation). If you don’t happen to follow or care for the american-style pigskin sport, this is just another example of what happens when you hire someone to manager your operations who has technical experience and passion, but next to zero management ability. The fact is that while anyone can be a manager, not everyone is actually good at it.
One of Millen’s former employees, coach Steve Mariucci, had this to say:
Matt’s interest really wasn’t there. I don’t think he was equipped with his background to do a good job. He certainly had an interest, certainly loves football, he certainly has a passion, but I think his skills would say that he simply didn’t have the experience to do a good job in management.
That’s not to say that he couldn’t have learned and honed his management craft because let’s face it…management is something that can only be learned through practice. However, judging by the fact that he made rather curious personnel moves throughout his tenure and other poor decisions that led to a 31-84 record over the last eight seasons, I would wager against that idea.
But luckily, failing doesn’t mean failure. Here’s hoping that Millen does find what he’s good at and runs wild with it.
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