CollaborativEye

Tapscott and Williams' Wikinomics is a good book, but is their subtitle ("How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything") hyperbole? Is this just more Biz School BS? Let's explore it and find out. These posts won't be a straight book review, so I won't cover everything, and I'll put my own spin on things and freely intersperse with my own opinions. Ok, enough for the intro...

Wikinomics has two primary antecedents:

1) Top-down: the rate of change in the world economy is out pacing current business structures. Business is stretching and straining, and something new is emerging. From page 30 in the book: "...the organizational values, skills, tools, processes, and architectures of the ebbing command-and-control economy are not simply outdated; they are handicaps on the value creation process...the old hierarchical ways of organizing work and innovation do not afford the level of agility, creativity, and connectivity that companies require to remain competitive in today's environment." The result? We are witnessing a transformation not simply in business methods, but in the very structure of business. Organizations are becoming more like dynamic organisms and less like "companies" (notice the military imagery). The lines of the organization will also get fuzzy, as individuals or groups of individuals dynamically bind together to create value, and then re-bind to create still more value, and so on and so on... If you don't buy this, consider this dagger from page 45: "There are always more smart people outside your enterprise boundaries than there are inside." Are you going to leverage all of that energy and talent, or be content with your current recruiting and hiring processes?

2) Bottom-up: People are changing. Yes, technology is in the thick of it ("Web 2.0"), but fundamentally people are changing in how they think, behave, and feel. Whether you call it the Net Generation, or the Wiki Workforce, it is undeniable that the generation pushing into the workforce has been raised on social networking, sharing, and collaboration. The Net Gen is not content to just consume information or media -- they want to be involved in the creation. Such environments are the antithesis of "ebbing command-and-control" hierarchies : e.g Napster, MySpace, Wikipedia. But will this cultural change really impact business, or will these Net Gen'ers grow up eventually and learn how to work in traditional environments? Tapscott and Williams make a bold claim in regards to this: "As workers, this generation [the Net Gen] will transform the workplace and the way business is conducted to an extent not witnessed since the 'organizational man' of the 1950s." (page 53-54). But why???? "These N-Gen norms - speed, freedom, openness, innovation, mobility, authenticity, and playfulness - can form the basis of a revitalized and innovative work culture...the N-Gen work ethic gives this generation a leg up as inherent innovators." (page 54). If this later statement is true, then it becomes obvious that N-Gen values are more than a passing fad or something only appropriate for social endeavors. If the Wiki Workforce actually opens the door to increased rates of innovation, then organizations who embrace these values and norms will reap rewards many times greater than organizations stuck in command-and-control methods.

wikinomics