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Serena Software Adopts Facebook as Intranet

Posted by: Heather Green on November 02, 2007

Serena Software in San Mateo, Calif. is wrapping Facebook in a big corporate bear hug. Today,the company is launching Facebook Fridays. The idea is to for Serena’s staff of 900 (average age, 41) to spend an hour each week on the popular social networking site—updating their profiles, collaborating with colleagues and clients, and recruiting for Serena.

The company is also setting up an employees-only group on Facebook as a kind of alternative corporate intranet.The portal will be used to exchange documents, update corporate information, and share marketing videos.

I met with René Bonvanie, an SVP at Serena who has been using Facebook for around 3 years (He apparently used his teenager’s credentials to set up a profile) He and CEO Jeremy Burton, came up with Facebook Friday and are backing it to the hilt, using their profiles as a template for what employees should know about what they should put on Facebook.

Bonvanie says some older staffers considered the idea frivolous when it was first proposed. But once they start using it, they begin to see why the company is making the switch he says. And he thinks that by using social networking seriously, he says, “we believe we can get people to communicate and collaborate more.”

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Reader Comments

Andy Church

November 2, 2007 03:39 PM

Great story - I was wondering when this was going to happen. We believe stakeholder networking will be the next major trend for large, established brands looking to align employees, partners and corporate communications people looking to leverage their collective geniuses.

Andy Church

wtanaka

November 2, 2007 10:11 PM

Seems like there are a lot of ways that could backfire.

Bob

November 3, 2007 02:30 AM

This has to be one of the stupidest ideas I've ever heard of. I suppose it goes hand in hand with Serena's abundance of Web 2.0 buzzword ideals.

Chris Jacobson

November 3, 2007 11:45 PM

This idea will backfire when one of their employees posts something that shouldn't have been posted... such as internal information made public.

Joanne

November 5, 2007 02:12 PM

Corporate life has long been invading our personal lives. It would be nice to see this allow employees personal lives be accepted in the workplace, but I think it's more likely that information that is TOO personal will end up being displayed to the employer. And ultimately it is a social networking site, not a corporate intranet, so the corporation has no authority to exercise control.

And will corporations suck the fun out of Facebook?

Reem

November 14, 2007 06:20 PM

Businessweek.com had a small excerpt about "Facebook Fridays" a couple of weeks ago. There are still so many companies that are concerned about allowing social networking at work. I blogged about this very topic a couple of days ago.

http://www.reemabeidoh.com/social-media/should-companies-allow-social-network-usage-at-work

Vishnu

April 14, 2008 01:16 AM

I agree with wtanaka
http://www.mindq.in/

Mike

January 14, 2009 11:17 AM

This is a great idea and more companies should do this. There's tremendous value in utilizing facebook in this manner and Serena is ahead of the game. Good for their senior management, hope more companies follow their lead.

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In Blogspotting Senior Writer Stephen Baker and Associate Editor Heather Green take a look at how cutting-edge technologies are changing business and society. Whether its blogs or wikis, data crunching or data targeting, technology’s advances are reshaping the world that we live in.

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