“Social business collaboration” is the new buzzword that is going
around in the C-suite circles. The plethora of social networking sites and the
proliferation of advanced mobile and cloud computing technologies have
encouraged many progressive entrepreneurs to consider social business
collaboration as a method to facilitate improved and more effective
communication between employees, clients, business partners, suppliers, and
vendors scattered all over the world.
Social business collaboration means virtually dispersing and
sharing work-related information between the various stakeholders of a company
using social media tools. In a dynamic and inter-connected operational
environment, this process lets users communicate and/or respond as promptly and
effectively as they can when they use the social media for their personal
needs. It is evident that social business collaboration facilitates quicker
decision-making, eases access to critical information and that too, in real
time by doing away with the need to wait for mails or announcements, and thus
increases productivity of the employees.
Given the numerous
significant benefits of social business collaboration, it is imperative that
companies learn about the ways in which they can either improve their process
of enterprise collaboration or adopt it as part of their internal communication
strategy. If you are a decision-maker in your company, then consider the
following ways in which you can optimize social business collaboration process:
· Adopt the latest enterprise collaboration tools. It goes without saying that the success of
this virtual mode of collaboration depends largely on the tools being used. So,
you must keep abreast of the latest enterprise collaboration platforms, tools,
and technologies to achieve optimal results. For instance, there are social
collaboration software that let users search for and share relevant
organizational or task-related information using videos and screenshots. Some
of these platforms are also compatible with smartphones making it possible for
your employees to access and share knowledge and obtain real-time business
updates on the move.
· Adopt
social business collaboration tools customized for your business needs. There are sundry enterprise collaboration tools
out there and while browsing through their specs, you may be forgiven for
feeling lost. Choose one based on your immediate business goals, like
optimizing collaboration between immediate team members for a mission-critical
project or expanding the talent pool of your business for specific tasks and
assignments. This tip makes sense especially if your business is a newbie
on the social business collaboration bandwagon. Tread softly on the pedal so
that your employees and infrastructure can adapt to the changes without getting
overwhelmed, and then up the tempo.
· Improve employee acceptance and/or adoption of the enterprise
collaboration concept. Often the challenge of adopting new digital tools is not in
shelling out the costs involved or upgrading the existing communication
infrastructure but in getting employees to accept and adopt the new technology.
Many entrepreneurs report that employees either do not use these new
productivity tools or shun them after using for a few days or a month. So, you
have to ensure that you adopt enterprise collaboration tools that are easy to
learn and implement and also facilitate learning with regular training
sessions. Encourage your employees to embrace the new tools by educating them
on the benefits of using these.
The above-mentioned ways to reap the
productivity benefits of using social business collaboration are easy to
implement but you should make sure that you do not lose sight of your business
goals or ignore efforts to pump up employee motivation. And remember, social
business collaboration is an ongoing process; so you will need to keep yourself
updated always.
Sources
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