What is “Social” and why do I care?

Driven by the belief that knowledge is power and sharing is powerful, I dedicate my work to creating better understanding of the social tools that enable sharing of knowledge both in organizations and their stakeholders. The global benefit will be a greater use of knowledge resources to stimulate development and more effective and sustainable growth. Social begins with people.

The tools available today from new media to global networks and their events provide us with the ability to have far greater reach and impact with our social interactions. Handled wisely with strategic forethought, each one of us has the power to be a change-maker. With the right social strategy each organization has the power to make the world a better place, while improving their bottom line.

Social tools are not limited to new media or social media. They are the social interactions we have face to face that we support through online interactions. They are the communities we choose to support and participate it. They are the relationships that we develop and nurture over time that define us and the people that we interact with. They are the opportunities to interact with like minded people. When we understand how to use them more wisely.

Don't Waste Your Time on Social Media

Don't waste your time on Social Media. Make your interactions count. Having a clear Social Strategy and policy for your employees (and yourself) means the difference between return on your investment and sunken cost and time. Before opening the floodgates consider these steps:

Create a clear policy on what type of social media interactions are within the professional area of your employees. For example, human resources, should be using Linkedin and Facebook to review potential new candidates. They should also ensure that the company listings are current and appropriate. A great example is Boston based recruiting company Hollister staffing, where they are also active in groups for seeking new candidates from the experts.

Divide time between monitoring, replying and feeding. Some of this can be automated, and the tools are improving for monitoring. Be careful to keep it authentic. Too much automation in reply and feeding can have a reverse effect. One company to watch that is doing some interesting things here is Stockholm based Springtime. They do the filtering and deliver to the appropriate expert within your organization.

Keep it professional: When on the company twitter account, posts should be relevant and of interest. Share articles of interest to show your keeping current. When posting news, always link back to company blog or website. Provide time constraints. Keep the talk clean, limit slang and avoid swearing. Jeff Bullas in Sydney has written several great blog entries about the importance of linking back.

Learn how to use social media as a resource for new information both pre-existing and that which comes from requests. Teach your employees to do the same. The more clarity you have in your policy for social media use in the workplace, the more effective your team will be. They will thank you for it and you will see the results.

It is helpful to always remember that social media and networks are tools for knowledge sharing in a dialog, not simply new media channels. The sooner you create a clear policy for use, the better off you and your organization will be.

2BalanceU.com News

One of the beautiful things about being an entrepreneur is the opportunity to learn and make mistakes and learn more. After trying for three years to make 2BalanceU the portal for sharing resource recommendations around the globe, I realised we were going about it all wrong. The last thing we needed to do was to create yet another destination that fills our time, distracts us and requires us to learn how it works before we get anything out of it. The vision was right, empowering through simplified global knowledge sharing. But the approach was wrong.

What will emerge from the next version will amaze you with its simplicity and delight you. It will free you up by requiring less time and effort getting to what's relevant from the sources you already draw from and others that provide information important to you. You will be more effective through greater accuracy in sending out what we wish to share to your intended audience. We have things pulling us in so many different directions, because we are multidimensional individuals. The knowledge sharing tool will come out this Fall. This new tool will be build as a cooperative effort between 2BalanceU and Off The Red with the input of several Advisory Members to ensure we have a sound business model for sustainability. The new site will have a new name (we are still working on that part) and logo, so keep posted and I will let you know when we have it.

2BalanceU remains as a consultancy that provides the vision, the network and input to the executive team. This enables me to continue my passionate work and study of how technology has enabled the evolution of the women's sacred circle to the modern professional women's network. I need to find someone to fund my PhD work, as it cannot be done by the former 2BalanceU as planned. (Ideas welcome...) I will also continue speaking at global conferences on social media and network optimisation as well as empowering women in leadership through knowledge sharing. I find this work inspiring and very fulfilling as a great way to really understand the different needs and tools around the world used for knowledge sharing. I will also continue to consult on Internet strategy, particularly on how to engage consumers in dialog.

So thank you for your notes asking, when will 2BalanceU be "live" again. I am so glad to see there is interest and I appreciate your support. I am sure you will be happy with what is coming soon.

Putting a Pricetag on Knowledge Sharing

When you speak to lawyers, agents, consultants, accountants, they all have the same approach to sharing; they charge. If they do not physically send a bill they count it as "pro-bono" advising so they can deduct it because money=time. This is a very rational and professional approach. The question that has come up lately in several conversations is boundaries between sharing for mutual benefit, the value of credit for ideas, and the building of your brand through mastering expertise. It basically comes back to the same question of return on investment (ROI) but takes into consideration the benefit to the provider of knowledge as well as the receiver.

As is my nature and the nature of my work, I include the other social components in my ROI model that may not be considered in the traditional approach. So we are talking value creation and relationship building. On the soft side, we talk about "karma" and it coming back to you later. But that won't pay the bills and you can't get a loan based on the promise that someday your sharing efforts will pay off. And yet, what drives our creativity and the ability to learn from each other is often sharing. Here is a very basic model I have been using recently to determine whether what is shared should be followed by an invoice (of course, this should be agreed to in advance). But in most cases it ends up being driven by the receivers ability to pay.

Old Networks Using New Social Media

I have been working a lot recently on social media and network optimisation. So here is my "2 cents." Many women's networks, provide a great format and vision for the future. A common issue that many established face to face networks face is the need to connect their members online. The communities are more physically dispersed and in need of connecting for sharing and maximum effectiveness. It is for precisely this reason that social media sites like Connected-Women come about and are very much needed.


When building any organisation, whether it is a new entrepreneurial endeavor or an established business, it is important to focus on the vision. Building Technology platforms is an entirely different business than face to face networks. If advertising revenue is not part of your business model for the network, you do not need to drive traffic to your site. What networks do need to do is get information to their members. This can be done with a clean and easy to use Internet site, that is well connected to other complementary sites. What they need to learn is how to optimise where their members are already rather than creating yet another place and time consumer for members.

As I mentioned, this is a growing problem for established face to face networks with geographically dispersed communities. My best advice is do NOT build another LinkedIn or Connected-Women for your members. Create a space there (the sites which your members use) for members to interact with other members. They should have a way to identify each other as part of the same network within those sites. Of course, a membership directory is useful. But once they find the members they need, let them link to them elsewhere that they are already active. Non-profit networks have too many other great things to do with the limited resources they have. Don't waste resources on trying to keep up with building a new technology platform (that by the way will be out of date in a year so will need updating constantly in order to keep interesting for members).

This is adapted from my entry on a thread question on Connected-women.com about what we want from FCEM (World Association of Women Entrepreneurs). To see the complete thread click here

Looking at the ROI on Social Media & Networking

Economic Downturn has the world in a buzz. Where are they buzzing? The numbers are clear, to keep the economy moving and engaged, they are returning to and joining new networks. LinkedIn experienced a 25% percent membership increase since September alone. The question of whether that is simply the cast offs resulting from financial markets failure or whether they suddenly hit their tipping point remains to be seen. Given that other networks (both virtual and face to face) seem to be experiencing similar gains. Facebook is increasing by over 10 million users a month.

What is drawing people in (connecting, job hunting, entertainment, reconnecting, building businesses, knowledge sharing,...)? Whatever the cause it is encouraging. I plan to explore the impact further. We must invest further both in time and money in networks. We know they build strength in communities through knowledge sharing and simplifying connection. But it is important to recognise the implications of obtaining new clients, build professional skills and personal skills, connecting to new distributors, channels and markets, creating a sense of community that increases satisfaction, exposing us to new ideas and approaches, and more.

Simple knowledge sharing

We often take for granted the things that are most simple and common parts of our days. Providing the quick directions to the lost traveler, recommending a favourite article or book that provided a moment of inspirational thought, Finding a quick conversation table for the recipe passed on by a friend, discovering a new culinary delight from a passing dish and an appreciative "mmmm", can all provide a moment of quality that enriches our lives and others. Understanding that it is nearly universal that adjusting spectacles is a complementary service, has never ceased to amaze me. In this day of commercialism and rushed lives, I am thankful for these little moments that make me appreciate both my own and others knowledge and specialisations.