Messaging News - June 2008 - (Page 24)

CHANGING LOCUS value, and some may have added follow-on comments. All of these reactions are taken into consideration when the search result set is returned. It is not merely a machine algorithm that is used to highlight appropriate content; it is the social reactions and value assertions as well. Many of the newer “Enterprise 2.0” products, services and platforms are introducing new capabilities to support implicit collaboration. start exploring related content that aligns with their frame of reference, as well as other people’s frame of reference. New ideas are discovered, and new contacts are made. What’s the Benefit? Having defined this new locus and examined what it does, let’s consider the benefits an organization may accrue from embracing tools to support implicit collaboration. First, it makes for a more intel- Understanding Explicit Collaboration vs. Implicit Collaboration If we think about collaboration within the context of the five phases of the content lifecycle—creation, publication, leverage (business use), archival and deletion—traditional team collaboration happens within the creation phase. Many of the new collaboration tools target the second and third phases. Collaborating during the creation phase of the content lifecycle means working together to create great content. It is an explicit activity. Collaborating in the latter parts of the content lifecycle, on the other hand, is largely implicit. It means that the normal, everyday actions of people in relation to published content are taken into consideration to the benefit of others in the future when they come to browse and access published content. Think about it in terms of searching for a specific keyword within a document management system. Today, when the search is undertaken, the user receives a list of documents that include the term that has been ranked using certain algorithms related to the content itself. Thus, machine algorithms meet the search needs of end-users. As an alternative, a user does the same search and this time the results come back with additional contextual information based upon the use of social algorithms. The user can see how many people have already read each of the documents that have been listed. Also available is an accumulated rating score for each of the documents, derived from what earlier readers thought about each one. The user sees how the document has been classified by other people, and can quickly click to see a collection of other documents that share the same classification. The document with the highest density of words that matches the original query under the machine algorithm may actually be the worst document for answering the question being asked. Because the actions of colleagues have been captured and synthesized into something meaningful—the social algorithm— the user can see which documents get the highest social rating. This is a form of explicit collaborating, the emerging new locus of collaboration tools. MS/TMP There is a change underway in the world of collaboration within organizations, and it opens a whole new arena of collaborative possibilities. Although the underlying user actions are happening and have been happening for years, these newer tools capture, track and use the implicit cues to help shape the social algorithm. For example: • Content rating (an explicit response to “How good is this?” or an implicit count of people that read the document or forwarded it by email to others) • Content tagging (classification of content by end-users based on what the information means to them, rather than being forced to see it only through the official taxonomy) • Semantic matching of like content (“What else is like this and might be helpful in my work?”) • Expertise surfacing (“Who wrote or contributed to this document, and how can we engage with them further?) The tagging idea is particularly interesting, because it provides a way for people to describe what a certain piece of information means to them. But the real power for implicit collaboration comes when the tag contributions of multiple people are aggregated. Individuals can then see how other people think about the information they are looking at, and they ligent organization. Being able to not only capture the value that other people assign business content and ideas, but also being able to access those value judgments in the future, helps others within the organization by allowing the best ideas to rise to the surface. Second, implicit collaboration provides tremendous opportunities for explicit collaboration. Once a person discovers other people in their organization that have great ideas and complementary (or even opposing) viewpoints, they can be invited to participate in future explicit collaborative work projects. Ultimately, that is what collaboration is all about: making the organization more productive and effective by connecting the right people, with the right information, at the right time. MS/TMP FOR YOUR REFERENCE Messaging News writer Michael Sampson helps organizations improve the capability of teams that can’t be together, to work together. He writes at: www.michaelsampson.net 24 MESSAGING NEWS JUNE 2008 http://www.michaelsampson.net

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Messaging News - June 2008

Messaging News - June 2008 Editor’s Note Short Takes Classification & Retention Spam: Bigger, Faster, and More Dangerous Bad Behavior and Today’s Reputation Analysis The Changing Locus of Collaboration Serving Up Managed and Hosted Messaging Solutions “On Message” with Ben Gross SCAP Standard Benefits Both Government and Commercial Space Making the Case Learn More

Messaging News - June 2008

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