ja_mageia

We have entered the era of “Wikinomics”, as stated by Don Tapscott and Anthony D. Williams in their book of the same name. In this era Web 2.0 tools such as virtual worlds, virtual meeting spaces, blogs, virtual innovation hubs, mass collaboration, mash-ups, peer-to-peer networking, podcasts, RSS, social networking, wikis, web services, etc are becoming more and more critical for organisations to leverage from.

The Net Generation will provide the major part of the workforce within the next decade and organisations have to understand their language and preferred methods of operation. There is a great deal of hype and data on the current and predicted talent shortage and it is only those organisations that harness the potential of the Net Generation that will truly survive into the future. Currently the Net Generation consists of more than 2 billion people worldwide.

There are also other very good reasons to use Web 2.0 tools. Just a few could include:

• Using virtual meeting spaces to hold meetings or run projects inviting participants from all over the world without having to physically fly them into one point. This saves a great deal of money and travelling time as well as contributing to a reduction in your carbon footprint. Furthermore, these events never have to close as one can hold them more regularly
• Using virtual worlds such as Second Life to test your product, obtain customer feedback, train and develop your employees, create innovation hubs, internal and external collaboration, employee opinion surveys, virtual meetings, external branding, internal branding, social networking, etc
• Establishing virtual innovation hubs that enable your employees as well as invited external experts to work collaboratively on designing and testing potential products and services for you. It is only those organisations that can innovate rapidly to meet their current and future operating landscape that will truly survive
• Setting up virtual recruitment centres to attract and assess potential candidates
• Setting up virtual offices for certain employees who are not required to be at a physical office all of the time
• Using blogs to open up communication, innovation and collaboration within your organisation
• Establishing mass and/or targeted collaboration capability that not only rapidly harnesses the thoughts, beliefs and creative juices of your employees but can also harness the same from subject matter experts, customers and other interested people who do not work for you. This will enable you to find solutions to your challenges from a far greater pool of expertise, at a faster pace and at a cheaper rate
• Introducing wikis, peer-to-peer networking and social networks into your workplace which will open up communication as well as create a great employer brand for the organisation
• Using a combination of these tools to create meaningful and far-reaching learning content that is always-on and always-available.