Goodbye Bounded Entity! How Employee Blogging Transcends and Alters Organisational Boundaries
Posted by Administrator on September 21st, 2005
By Jon Froda and Jesper Bindslev, Copenhagen Business School | E-mediator
Who are members of your PR and Corporate Communications team? And who are in effect their managers? When adopting employee blogging as a means of market communication the simple answer to both of these questions is: Everyone with a blog. The dynamics of employee blogging suggests that PR should be considered a management practice. As we seek to demonstrate in the following, PR as a management practice must be understood from a new perspective different from the bounded entity view. The role of PR becomes the management of social movements that transcend organisational boundaries.
Employee blogging: Transcending organisational boundaries
The notion of the corporation as a bounded entity is challenged by employee blogging. Rather, employee blogging is characterized by the interaction through various social networks that collaborate and influence each other across official departments, and organisational boundaries. We define the use of employee blogs in a corporate setting as “the presence of a chorus of personalised accounts in which corporations to some extend allow and empower employees to express their personal beliefs when communicating with stakeholders�. Thus, the chorus is multivocal.
Links, comments and syndication, the technological backbone of blogging, make employee blogs transcend boundaries through hyperlinked networks inside and outside of the organisation. Syndication makes these networks become tighter as information is spread across them in a rapid, snowballing manner. People who beforehand had limited access to one another, both within and outside the organisation by either physical boundaries or hierarchies, now speak more frequently. As blogs are a form for media and therefore publicly accessible, employee blogs attract and communicate with various stakeholders, be that other employees, customers, partners, interest groups, shareholders and many others. What is blogged, and what is discussed on an employee blog is read and negotiated by a larger audience both inside and outside the organisation as conventionally defined.
Control is partly lost in this process, as messages are perceived, discursively elaborated and reinterpreted based on the personal values, network and the environment of the employees. These processes of sense-making combined with the rapid-response-nature of real-time environments challenges conventional planned form of media execution, through which the PR department has control of the message until it reaches the relevant media outlets. Rather than corporate communication taking place largely within one or two departments, the corporate engagement with employee blogging turns PR into an organisation-wide practice.
Multidirectional communication alters organisational boundaries
Employee blogging is an example of multidirectional communication. By multidirectional communication we mean: “The process of communicating to multiple [and often random] audiences across multiple platforms in [close to] real-time�. This process is hard to control, but not impossible to direct and manage. However a fundamental precondition for affecting, guiding and understanding this process, is the rejection of the view of organisations as bounded entities as a conceptual point of reference.
Alteration of Internal Boundaries
By organisational boundaries we mean the boundaries as perceived by employees. Ideally two employee bloggers have no prior knowledge of one another and they may be located in different geographical locations. The way that the relationship between the two develops is different from the way relationships usually play out in organisations, and quite unique to employee blogging. The difference between employee blogging and introductions at seminars, training courses, cross-departmental teamwork, is that this introduction takes place in public. This is the case because one blogger is observing the dialogue between the other employee blogger and a stakeholder in the public domain. Perhaps the second employee blogger is even introduced to the first through other stakeholders. As the second employee blogger is observing and possibly engaging in a public conversation between the first employee blogger and the stakeholder, the new relationship between the two employee bloggers changes their view of organisational and departmental boundaries due to the fact that it alters how the organisational boundaries are perceived by the employee.
An example that shows this process in action is the account of Marion Vermazen, back then an employee blogger at Sun, she said:
At a big company like Sun disparate groups never cross paths […..] Blogging builds community. I’ve probably met more Sun customers and Sun employees outside of my division in the 7 months I’ve been blogging than I did in the previous 7 years. And I’ve learned something from each of them. The community building aspects are amazing. From my perspective it is one of the best things about blogging.
In short: Employee blogging enables not just internal and external relationship building, but an interesting mix of those two relations. Our aim here is to address how employee blogging as a practice, not only enables the outside to have a “peek inside the organisation�, but to demonstrate how it alters employees’ perceptions of organisational and departmental boundaries.
Employee bloggers get to see and take part in the interaction between colleagues and their stakeholders. This is what Marion Vermazen was getting at when she said that she had met more customers outside her division after she started blogging. The inherently dialectic nature of employee blogging entails a constant negotiation of organisational identity, visions and legitimacy.
The Illusion of the Internal vs. the External Conversation
Relationships between an employee blogger and a network of various stakeholders change the modality of information flow between the two. Hugh Macleod, on his blog Gaping Void, refers to this as the porous membrane. In his view employee blogging comprises the opening of multiple communication channels enabling the internal conversation to become aligned or at least in synch with the market conversation.
By large we adhere to the general idea that employee blogging dismantles the barrier for communication between an organisation and its market or stakeholders. However we do not agree with the notion of the organisation as a coherent entity with one internal conversation supposedly at odds with the equally coherent external market conversation.
Rather the organisation is better understood as consisting of multiple, and often conflicting, conversations. These are not merely “internal discourses�, but may as well be a combination of market and organisational discourses. Locating these multiple conversations, and this is especially true in large corporations, involves the study of personal networks and social movements that transcend organisational boundaries, constantly transporting meaning and providing the opening of the organisation towards the market.
Since there is no single ‘internal conversation’ the single membrane separating the ‘internal from the external’, does not help us to key in on the important dynamics. Hence the alignment of internal and external conversations looses its significance as an achievable objective. Moreover organisational boundaries take forms that elude the notion of an inside and an outside. Instead, to understand how communicational dynamics takes place across the organisation, we recommend looking at the characteristics of personal networks and social movements forming around individual employee bloggers.
The Impact of Personal Networks
The organisational powerbase of an employee blogger can be enhanced and dismantled as a consequence of blogging activities. Perhaps the most striking case, and granted it is not generic, is Robert Scoble. His creation, maintenance and cultivation of networks both inside and outside the legal boundaries of Microsoft have made him, and members of his network, powerful voices. The size of readership, number of inbound links, the reference in mainstream media, as well as the framing skills are crucial components in the building of such a powerbase. This new way of building a powerful position has implications for the organisation. Since these powerbases are publicly known, that is they are the outcome of mediation in the blogosphere they also have cross-organisational effects.
Examples of the utilisation of such powerbases are evident when Robert Scoble shouts out loud in public: No RSS? No downloads? No interaction? Fake content? You’re fired!, followed by a rant mainly arguing that one of his co-workers should be fired for setting up a “fakeâ€? website without RSS etc. ‘Yesterday I ripped the head off of a co-worker. He works in marketing on a major Microsoft product. I’m not going to identify it or him’ Scoble said. Another example is when Robert Scoble publicly states: Microsoft abandons gays? Not me and goes on ‘[…]…human rights is very important to me personally and I’m gonna take this up with the leadership of the company and support this cause’. In effect he is mobilising action.
Although the above examples of employee blogging are a bit on the extreme side, it does beg the question, who is in charge? This leads us to the final point, crucial to PR practitioners working with employee blogging, and that is the assessment of ‘who is leading who’?
The impact of Social Movements transcending Organisations
An employee blogger is influenced by and is influencing the work, practice values, decisions and rhetoric of employee bloggers in competing corporations. Already we have witnessed numerous examples of employee bloggers criticising and encouraging the practice and the formulation of blog- policies as well as communication strategies of competitors. Employee blogging evangelists, such as Robert Scoble, Steve Rubel [Have look at Steve Rubel’s post Why Apple Employees Will Blog in Revolt] and many others have had tremendous impact on the adaptation mode and the everyday execution of employee blogging over the past year. For instance, after announcing that IBM would encourage all 320,000+ employees world wide to consider engaging actively in the practice of “blogging”, an IBM post made it clear that:
“Ss these guidelines were being drafted, we drew heavily upon our own experiences as bloggers and the excellent prior art in this space graciously provided by Sun, Microsoft, Groove and many others who have drafted policies and guidelines for their employees�.
Most noticeable, however is the rapid spreading of “corporate blogging manifestosâ€?, “blogger code of ethicsâ€? endless “best practicesâ€? [See Fredrik WackÃ¥: Policies compared: Today’s corporate blogging rules], the evangelisation that “markets are conversationâ€? and the need for a “True Voiceâ€? to be a real blogger. This suggests that when an employee starts blogging he may encounter a conflict of interest. To whom is he really accountable? Is he accountable to his superior or the powerful voices of the blogosphere? Who is he asking for advice - his manager or his competitors? Who is in effect leading whom? This is when we suggest that regarding employee bloggers as members of a social movement that transcend organisations will enable PR executives to understand the strong extra organisational influence on employee bloggers.
Implications for PR and corporate communication
Three central implications can be derived from the above. Firstly blogging involves the participation in a social movement lead by blog evangelists who to a large degree influence the communicational practices of individual employees, even in competing organisations. The point is that managers of corporate communication are less in control of the execution of employee blogging than popular belief may suggest.
Secondly the uniqueness of employee blogging is that it takes place in public. The inherently dialectic nature of employee blogging entails a constant negotiation of organisational identity, visions and legitimacy. In practice the alteration of organisational boundaries occurs when an employee blogger is observing and participating in a conversation between one colleague and his stakeholder. This alters the way organisational boundaries are perceived by members, and has implications for corporate communications and PR. The organisation is best understood as consisting of multiple, and often conflicting, conversations. These are not merely “internal discourses�, but may as well be a bricollage of market and organisational discourses. Locating these multiple conversations involves the study of social movements, especially the personal networks which work as conduits through which meaning is constantly transported across the organisational boundaries as previously defined.
Thirdly, Employee blogging makes PR an organisation-wide activity. As a result, PR becomes a matter of managing employees, rather than crafting policies and press releases. The point is not that control is impossible, but rather that a different form of control is needed. To ensure successful employee blogging is not an invitation for randomness, PR must be considered a management practice. PR and Corporate Communications role in this regard will be that of managing a multivocal set of public accounts.
About the authors
Jon Froda and Jesper Bindslev are currently writing their Master thesis at Copenhagen Business School, Institute for intercultural communication and leadership. This article is not an account of the findings of our research, but rather an elaboration of the themes that are especially relevant for PR and Corporate communicators in general. The thesis draws on interviews with: Robert Scoble, Doc Searls, Stowe Boyd, Lenn Pryor, Matthew Oliphant, D.L. Byron, Buzz Bruggemann, James Cherkoff, Laurie Meyers (Hass MS&L), Michael Wiley (General Motors).
September 21st, 2005 at 4:20 pm
The emphasis on Blogging is understood but it is not just because of blogs that we see organisations as being the nexus of relationships, it is the basis of wealth creation in society.
As soon as you make the claims you have done here, and follow the logic through, you undermine Webber, stakeholder theory, economic theory, accounting as we know it and much more.
Welcome to the Relationship Value Model.
September 22nd, 2005 at 12:03 am
I think it is interesting that you really make no mention of strategy - biz, brand, and absolutely no mention of the collaboration required with HR. I really don’t think PR will need to become a management practice nor be responsible for employees. The implications are more broad than you suggest - that the PR profession will require new skill sets and mindsets - more of an organization development framework so that there is an understanding that what they too are responsible for is building the culture that promotes openness and transparency, etc. What will be required for HR professionals will be more of an understanding of the marketplace and the brand and overall strategy so it to can work to make sure internal and external messages are aligned.
September 22nd, 2005 at 11:39 am
Regina
Your comment is so 19th century.
PR is a management practice. It is the only management practice that creates new values.
Aligning ‘messages’ between parts of a company is counter productive. Organisations are not monoliths. Organisations are not hard bounded. Departments (HR, Accounts, Sales etc.) are typical command and control stuff designed for narrow minded (and failed) empire builders.
Organisations are social groups (a nexus of relationships).
Every manager is a PR person and every manager is an HR person. Both need a dialogue with each other to help them to become better at what they do.
Dialogue is the means by which values are understood, traded and thereby create new (mutually accepted and understood) values. That is why public relations are a skill set that all ‘employees’ need.
To find out how, go to the professional PR manager whose big task is helping the organisation use networks and channels to exchange and understand values, use them creatively and create wealth.
The management practice of PR is not in building a ‘culture’ it is to help people (’employees’, ‘management’) create a culture that exploits the values inherent in relationships.
Rather like a Blog.
September 22nd, 2005 at 5:11 pm
As an employee communications practitioner, I believe the value in internal blogging is the opportunity that it gives people to share stories. The stories can be true or not, about their careers or activities, about wins or losses - but it is that amalgam of information and emotion that makes the content compelling and brings the reader to new insights about the employee, his or her practice or the organization as a whole. And because it’s available to a group adds a sense of ‘theatre’ to the experience.
It is that sense of theatre that I find so fascinating, personally. A low digital wall divides the private and the public. For example, today, an e-mail feels intimate. Yet a posting is experienced with an audience. It is a group activity; it feels public.
Perhaps then a blog appeals to some element of human vanity and that by tapping this very natural desire to be watched and quoted, it serves a unique purpose and offers an effective and influential reach from one human to others.
September 25th, 2005 at 9:34 pm
David Phillips , Regina and Judy J - Thank you for you comments. We appreciate it. No doubt that the implications are broader than we suggest. But as PR is the focal point in Global PR Week 2.0 we placed our attention on implications for PR.
Regina – 2 points
Firstly, we are not saying that pr should become responsible for employees rather than HRM or other disciplines. Both, as David Phillips writes it, are important elements of managing. But we are saying that PR is becoming organisation-wide due to the fact that employee blogs visibilize and amplify the various elaborations employees have in relation to the organisation. Recognizing this implies a need for management to engage with PR to a larger extent than previous.
Secondly, as we see it the internal/external view of organisations and messages does not make sense from a communicational viewpoint. We do not agree with the notion of the organisation as a coherent entity with one internal conversation supposedly at odds with the equally coherent external market conversation. Rather the organisation is better understood as consisting of multiple, and often conflicting, conversations. These are not merely “internal discourses�, but may as well be a combination of market and organisational discourses.
Multiple factors question the notion of corporations as entities with an internal and external discourse. The global outsourcing of manufacturing, numerous mergers and acquisitions, the use of strategic partnerships, interim management, various inter-firm projects and the temporary nature of employment these days all show how organisations are in flux and how corporate discourse is in a constant state of negotiation and elaboration within the various networks the corporation participate in. Moreover, employees participate in local communities in which they discuss corporate discourse, with friends, family and others. The discourse is constantly negotiated by employees based on their world view, background, relationships and current enactment of the world. A network view of organisations, the nexus of relationship view presented by David Phillips or organisations as social movements makes much more sense considering the nature of contemporary business. And these lines of thinking involve the presence of multiple discourses.
One implication of this could be that rather than to focus on alignment of messages, employees should be encouraged to express their personal narratives of organisational life, products and action. By doing so, employees will become and army of translators who can constantly contextualize corporate narratives into the local networks in which they participate. And in this dialectic process, they will be given new sense to the corporate narratives through negotiations within the networks. Rather than aligning, it is about recombining the various discussions into new messages that fit the perceptions and life worlds of the local networks. This is a way in which the corporation will communicate effectively, while mutually absorbing new inputs leading to innovation, a major imperative for most modern-day corporations
Employees will become intelligent agents for the organization, working as intermediaries between the various networks, and the corporate overall strategy/mission. As a result, managers will need to be able to direct and facilitate these relations to the public through employees.
September 27th, 2005 at 8:27 am
Nice article. Employees blogging is going to have a really interesting effect on company culture. We have all worked at companies where the internal culture is either great or poor and know what a huge effect that can have on whether you want to get out of bed in the morning! Likewise, we all know companies where people are keen to work tend to have attractive cultures.
So (good) mangement teams try and nurture cultures that are productive.
I think internal blogs give the opportunity to delegate some responsibility for the development of company culture. Which I suspect is something that many managers would be happy to hand over!
September 29th, 2005 at 9:19 am
Jesper
Thank you for a most erudite response. I hope that in the very near future, to publish the empirical evidence to support these concepts and the Relationship Value Model postulate. There is one point that I would like to make which is that, while I think that it was right for Sonsino to postulate an organisation as a ‘nexus of conversations’ in his paper ‘Recasting Coase: A Theory Of The Organization As A Nexus Of Conversations’, the critical element is that there has to be a process of relationship building (using discourse but not always conversation) first.
Your analysis is right.
I only make the point in case someone should interpret the your comment about ‘market conversations’ and conclude that this is the basic driver. Before the conversation begins, there is the relationship need. The fundamental in all wealth transactions (including market conversations which are the mechanism for creating wealth through interactions with consumers) is relationship creation, sustenance and development.
It is for this reason that I pour scorn on much of the intangible asset reporting and balanced scorecard accounting. In most of these models a value is ascribed to the brand and yet no value is ascribed to relationships (cart before the horse thinking by accountants and economists).
An excellent debate.