Disqus - Latest Comments for Paula Thornton

Re: Forrester Research Gets It Wrong By Saying Corporate Blogs Aren’t Trusted

Paula Thornton — Sun, 28 Dec 2008 05:49:02 -0000

Classic problem of dirty data in surveys. A sign of a badly designed survey. But don't fear...it's nearly impossible to design a good one. That's pretty much why surveys are a bad mechanism for anything other that stirring up random thoughts -- but clearly NOT for measuring anything.

Re: Social Media's Defining Moment

Paula Thornton — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 15:46:51 -0000

The same is obviously true for companies, not quite prepared for new transparency via the flow: http://twitter.com/rotkapchen/statuses/911071921

Re: NBC's Lost Opporunity

Paula Thornton — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 23:13:43 -0000

Exactalactally! NBC is still stuck in the IP-centric mindset -- as opposed to 'follow the energy'. Tap it on it's own turf. Um, I'm pretty sure the energy companies know that you can't demand that the oil show up where you want to drill the wells :)

Re: IA Summit 2008 Opening Keynote: “Journey to the Center of Design” by Jared Spool

Paula Thornton — Sat, 12 Apr 2008 14:59:51 -0000

Great recap. Adds lots of missing context from tweetstream! There has to be an 'early adopter' angle to this thinking. I've been screaming same for years...and immediate colleagues think I'm insane. But then most of them are still reeling from pride over their CUA Certification. I refused to drink their Kool-Aid.

Re: There is No ROI from Social Media!

Paula Thornton — Sat, 02 Aug 2008 20:15:35 -0000

I'm not going to suggest you've gone too far to the 'other' side, but there are some distinctions needed. Social, relationships: related. But look at all of the equations and variables. How I relate with family/friends, different than industry colleagues, different than immediate team members, different than companies I do business with.

Capitalizing on and optimizing all of these distinctions IS the opportunity that stands before us.

Re: Do You Have to Get Involved in Social Media?

Paula Thornton — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 20:21:01 -0000

One word: Differentiation.

Re: Who needs analyst firms anyways?

Paula Thornton — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 19:04:08 -0000

All very interesting. Is somewhat related to the true opportunity I saw at FASTforward08. Looking at what major financial content providers could do (e.g. Dow Jones, Thomson Reuters) by simply bypassing IT services by delivering 'finished' content/services, made me realize just how easily the entire consulting/service model could be disintermediated.

Re: Don’t confuse Enterprise 2.0 with social computing concepts

Paula Thornton — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 21:27:36 -0000

I am a bit confused/conflicted. The right column is outward-facing (market-facing) -- that's Web 2.0. Enterprise 2.0 is focused on the business of optimizing 'doing' business, yes, facilitated by all the things on the left, but the output is not the list on the right...it can support some of the activities on the right, but you've got a lot of mixed fruit in the right column.

Re: Don’t confuse Enterprise 2.0 with social computing concepts

Paula Thornton — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 22:11:43 -0000

Leave it to John to bring up the K-word again :P *sigh*

Re: Enterprise 2.0 culture barriers: Brick wall or Hurdles?

Paula Thornton — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 00:12:35 -0000

I've been ruminating over this in trying to answer similar questions elsewhere.

I agree totally with you that one of the greatest potentials of 2.0 is to leapfrog bad cultures (that I've found are often reinforced for totally unknown, anti-success reasons -- that is, they exist based on baseless 'lore' that so many are so willing to defend to the death, even if it takes the business down with them).

But the implementation of 2.0 (I'm not specifically talking technologies, but the whole of it all -- a transition), is only successful by considering certain dimensions of 'culture'. Some of that culture are 'behaviors' specific to a certain industry; others are preferences and tendencies common in one company vs. another.

The culture is the 'context' in which 2.0 has to survive and flourish. Not knowing what the critical success factors for adoption might be, is a huge risk to take on (not suggesting that many have succeeded without it -- their cultures likely were good 'fits' for what was done).

A cultural failure: http://twurl.nl/lsnt8c The footnote to this is, Tom and I graduated from High School together and worked together -- He the Student Body President, I the Chief Justice of the Student Government/Court. At a very young age he was CIO at Nordstrom. I kept trying to get to work with him and he never understood how what I did was related to IT. His unwillingness to understand the impact of the 'culture' on success was a symptom of this.

2.0 does not require the full depth of 'change management' as a discipline -- but there are good practices from this discipline, related to culture that can be leveraged. In design, they're called 'constraints'; in economics, heuristics.

Re: Enterprise 2.0 culture barriers: Brick wall or Hurdles?

Paula Thornton — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 00:19:16 -0000

Just as a postscript, I absolutely agree with what Venkatesh is pointing out. He's trying to point out reasons to not 'blame' culture for bad choices/design. I'm kindof saying the same thing from a different perspective -- you have to embrace/consider the existing cultures to optimize success -- to optimize design.

And you can put some 'infrastructures' in place to let sub-surface healthy cultures break through and replace stagnant ones.

Re: Twitter-to-FriendFeed

Paula Thornton — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 02:23:15 -0000

No idea what the issue might be. Any available "subscribe" button results in "...limit exceeded".

Re: “NOW knowledge management is possible” - Whaddya Kidding me?

Paula Thornton — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 17:04:26 -0000

KM has been DOA for years: http://www.fastforwardblog.com/2007/06/15/km-ne...

Re: 10 Most Common Misconceptions About User Experience Design

Paula Thornton — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 13:32:30 -0000

Great piece. I've already recommended it to someone. It's in my delicious collection. Per Shaun's comment, it's clearly one of those 'immersion' things: you don't realize what you don't have until you can experience it!

Odd Catch 22 to be in :)

Re: Are We Designing for Community Completely Wrong?

Paula Thornton — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 15:34:55 -0000

For some of us it's always been about the conversation. I've always hated not only having the comments buried below the text but often another click away -- as opposed to columnar right.

Re: Watching Twitter Become the World’s First Ubiquitous Computing Brand

Paula Thornton — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 02:00:42 -0000

Actually Michael, you may have missed the fairly significant switch of roles today between Twitter and CNN: http://twitter.com/rotkapchen/statuses/1025274447

Re: Is Code the New Global Currency?

Paula Thornton — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 10:27:43 -0000

Fairly certain that I've seen coders as the industrial machines of past for over a decade : )

They're the upscale version of the sweatshops of old. That's why it made so much sense to send it offshore. The analogies are ... well, analogous : )

Re: Should Hotels Have Social Networks

Paula Thornton — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 21:05:07 -0000

Kinda reminds me of the Walmart failure noted by Jeremy Owyang: http://www.web-strategist.com/blog/2007/08/24/w...

Channels/connectedness already in place. Admittedly the Hotel could facilitate in some way.

Re: Should Hotels Have Social Networks

Paula Thornton — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 21:17:20 -0000

Sorry Chris...I can be a bit obtuse at times. Walmart tried to reinvent a channel that already existed elsewhere. You mentioned LinkedIn. Leveraging existing energy has to be their focus.

It's a matter of the laws of physics (and sports). Don't try the 'standing jump', leverage the 'pole vault'.

Re: Should Hotels Have Social Networks

Paula Thornton — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 21:38:19 -0000

It's a matter of 'the network'. What, where? The best way I can illustrate my point would simply be to suggest that it would have to be something that might tap Twitter via API.

They should not 'create' the network, but should leverage a 'view' of it. The moment in time (the length of stay) is a network snapshot to facilitate the experience.

All said, I'm just playing along here. I'm still looking for the compelling evidence that supports 'uptake'. There are way too many evidences that this wouldn't have traction:
1) Two primary hotel stays: personal, business. P: I'm 'getting away', likely not trying to 'connect'. B: More likely, but just for not eating alone.

Wait a minute...isn't that the primary purpose of the hotel bar? You have to look at the existing models for social exchange and determine what value they already provide and what they don't.

Another option leveraging an existing network -- the hotel channel network. Again, leveraging 'known' social models, individuals could post anonymous 'personals'. That, however, might put the hotel at risk -- something they'd not want to flirt with.

There are a whole-lotta more dimensions to this that suggest the hotel might want to be as disconnected from this as possible, but simply act as a facilitator (ala. the bellman -- informal 'connections').

Again, look at all the existing social 'transactions' that already go on and see how they could be facilitated in other ways.

Re: Should Hotels Have Social Networks

Paula Thornton — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 21:55:57 -0000

3rd party network...that's again, creating something 'new'. That's not leveraging existing energy. This is not a scenario that has a lot of kinetic energy as it is -- not enough to overcome the barriers to entry, so you have to piggy-back off of another train in motion.

Re: Should Hotels Have Social Networks

Paula Thornton — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 22:27:15 -0000

Way to think Jonathan "proximity (neighborhood, town), not property-specific". That immediately adds to the value of the service (but only in densely populated environments -- which sortof goes hand-in-hand with "hotel" vs. "motel").

It goes back to what are the specific goals/scenarios that would be capitalized: finding someone to go out to dinner with, getting recommendations from others as to what to eat/do and where, etc. etc. -- some of which is already covered by the social aspects of the travel sites...but fractioned. A 'value' might be to synthesize some of those channels/voices.

Re: Should Hotels Have Social Networks

Paula Thornton — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 11:50:17 -0000

Lots of great ideas. Particularly liked comments from Warren Sukernek (including the expansion of all things related -- esp. photos). Edward Wiest's comments immediately brought to mind the need to focus on the role of 'cruise director' as an analogy.

Again, architecturally this would be more of an effort to 'thread together' a view to accommodate the various scenarios and technologies (e.g. leverage Flickr, Britekite -- any number of 'capabilities' -- behind the scenes, but have a 'branded' front that abstracts everything together that makes it look like it's a hotel experience).

Pete Simon's concept of "profile-as-XML" fits this, as well.

Bender was on the right path with the idea of "temporary social networks" -- in this case they're both temporary and virtual, but the elements have value beyond the moment because they're still available elsewhere (e.g. in Flickr). This concept of the diminished value of 'separated' is key to Enterprise 2.0 efforts. I keep insisting, other than for corporate content, there is no value to me creating a collection of links (research) that are part of a corporate-only model, because I lose it all when I leave the company. Same efficiency issues are critical here.

Re: When Your Blog is a Grand Stage

Paula Thornton — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 12:06:43 -0000

As always, a matter of 'both'. Agree with your points, but there's also the "don't care, don't need to" model that goes with a true artist.

You've introduced the science, then there's the art. It's a balance of both. The middle: design -- optimized connundrum of science and art.

Re: Growing New Crops

Paula Thornton — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 01:21:45 -0000

Do newspapers know they're being marginalized? Most do. They're just not sure what to do about it. Aritifact: San Diego Union Tribune sent a staffer to FASTforward '07 in San Diego to learn more about Enterprise 2.0. Had great deep conversations with that individual.

It's kinda like the issue I saw at MCI. The entire engine of MCI cashflow was held up by the telemarketing centers. It was a finely tuned engine. But it was losing speed (incentives based on 'sign-ups' soon turned into revolving doors of returning customers). Changing the model, however was so precarious that the wheels would start falling off and the business couldn't survive that much change.

That's the beauty of 2.0. It's about doing lots of small stuff, but you have to start. NOW!

Re: Happy Birthday Laura!

Paula Thornton — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 23:58:07 -0000

You're so smart to avoid Facebook :)

Birthday now...and a wedding soon? Go big...

Re: Creative Thinking or Lateral Thinking?

Paula Thornton — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 19:20:11 -0000

Blew right over the most significant: Design Thinking -- leveraging deductive, inductive, abductive.

I recently identified a related distinction, paring interpretation (connecting the dots) with interpolation (crossing the chasms -- finding the unlikely associations).

<abbr>Rotkapchen’s last blog post..How Social Networking Helps Service Orientation</abbr>

Re: Creative Thinking or Lateral Thinking?

Paula Thornton — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 09:31:55 -0000

As a general point of reference, I keep all of my online references for Design Thinking here: http://delicious.com/iknovate/DesignThinking

You'll also see some Visual Thinking references sprinkled in. This is a key mechanism for creating critical artifacts of agreements in the process, e.g. a 'map' of what 'we' all currently agree to -- which is in constant flux. It serves as an 'explicit' placeholder so all can consider and comment.

<abbr>Rotkapchen’s last blog post..What will happen when your local TV Station & Newspaper are Gone?</abbr>

Re: Northwest Airlines – It’s Not An Emotional Thing

Paula Thornton — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 22:03:02 -0000

Indeed. What great timing for Southwest. I hope they leverage the heck out of this opportunity.

NWA, like other companies live in a culture of 'denial' to the point of not allowing employees to do the 'right' thing (because all the 'loopholes' have been managed out of the system to minimize waste).

It's a new world. A world in which Southwest Airlines (or anyone like them) will dominate the market. Thank goodness for us.

Re: Personal Branding Under The Microscope

Paula Thornton — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 11:48:10 -0000

1. David was able to do what others cannot in many situations: BE who they are. CM is obviously a culture that allows for individuals to grow to their full potential. The fact that David could do what he did in their culture speaks volumes -- only a positive reflection on them.

2. As is the case with Jerimiah Owyang, due to the nature of his 'role' David has been limited to the 'customer' side of design. As far as I'm concerned there is far more potential and far more need for the sake of the GDP to have great design resources on the Enterprise side (with a focus on employees and their ability to do their work better).
3) Because of 1) I'm sure CM is aware of David's need to stretch his legs a bit more and capitalize on 2).

Re: Is Design Thinking bullshit?

Paula Thornton — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 11:22:46 -0000

Matt: Great insights, particularly considering your 'early' career. A lot of clues in your ability to 'see' this clearly to be found in your education path (love that you shared those details).

Actually, the 'best' upcoming book on Design Thinking is Roger Martin's http://twurl.nl/zq43ge, due out in November "The Design of Business..." http://press.harvardbusiness.org/the-design-of-...

My 'alternate' Wikipedia entry may be of interest http://twurl.nl/lvlrry

Find other Design Thinkers on our LinkedIn group http://twurl.nl/y5px4o

Re: Twitter: The Value of Good Conversation

Paula Thornton — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 23:23:36 -0000

The concept takes on a whole new meaning when you introduce it internally as a MicroBlog and set it up for keeping minutes/discussion from a meeting. [Similarly how I got hooked by doing same from conferences -- there's a strength in that scenario in the right context :) ]