The man who invented "Enterprise 2.0"

Andrew McAfee

I found a 40 minute online video today of an interview with Prof. Andrew McAfee, the Harvard Professor that coined the term Enterprise 2.0

See the post here on Traction's website Blog. The video is embedded below.



Good stuff,

• great definitions of what Web 2.0 and Enterprise 2.0 are along with
• references to Prof. McAfee's blog and Japan Enterprise 2.0 Summit
• it also refers back to his previous presentation at the Fast Forward conference

Impact on my Research

Security Issues

A key point the professor makes is that the most asked question from management about Enterprise 2.0 is about ROI, but the second most is about security of personnel and customer data.

His answer to that is that: he has seen NO EVIDENCE that Enterprise 2.0 technologies introduce NEW RISKS to the enterprise, (see 18m:40s in the video).

Cultural Issues

He also talks about the types of cultures required for collaborative social technologies
1. Soft incentives are offered for participation
2. Management

• Blesses Web 2.0's use
• Uses them themselves - CEO writing a blog

3. The need to know what is happening around the organisation to

• Grow faster
• Be more flexible to complex requirements and solutions

4. Employees are trusted to do the right thing. What is the assumption?
5. Younger workforces are more suitable
6. Large pull for information around the organisation, especially about

• knowing who to ask
• frustration with the current processes

7. A push from the bottom up to make process changes with the blessing of the board and management (uses the US Intelligence community).

Success Metrics

The key for the professor is "Tie Strength"
Normally work gets done in enterprises through high tie-strength relationships.
The power of Enterprise 2.0 technologies is that they allow for information flows that are topic related so network collaboration can occur regardless of tie strength.

Andrew McAfee references

Enterprise 2.0: The Dawn of Emergent Collaboration
MIT Sloan Management Review, Spring 2006
What's Most Important for Success with Enterprise 2.0?
FASTForward 08 Keynote topic
Andrew McAfee HBS Blog, Feb 22, 2008
The 9X Email Problem
Andrew McAfee HBS Blog, Sep 29, 2006
Enterprise 2.0, version 2.0
Andrew McAfee HBS Blog, May 27, 2006
The Slippery Nature of 'Strategic' IT - Discusses VRIN test with examples
Andrew McAfee HBS Blog, April 10, 2006
To download a Japanese language translation of these references prepared for the conference, click here (.pdf 116KB).