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IBM's del.icio.us: A big hit

Posted by: Stephen Baker on May 06

I was talking yesterday to Irene Greif, an IBM fellow who heads up IBM’s collaborative user research, and her colleague, Joan Dimicco. Some nuggets:

IBM’s internal social network, BeeHive, has grown from 300 to 29,000 users worldwide since its launch in September. Here’s more. One of the popular features, which entices people to share data, is a “top-five” list. People can list top-five of anything: dinners in Paris, R&B songs, favorite books, software projects at IBM. The open-ended aspect of it draws people in, which is what IBM wants. More participation = more connections and more data.

One popular inhouse feature is a Big Blue tagging initiative, similar to Del.icio.us. A few IBMers worked up a little button that fits right next to the Google search box on browsers. With that, employees doing a Web search can also see related documents and sites that their colleagues have tagged.

So, is everyone tagging at IBM? No, I learned. It’s only about 10% of participants. But an active minority creates enough value for the other 90%—the so-called lurkers.

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Reader Comments

Jack

May 6, 2008 12:50 PM

People love to make lists, as evidenced by MySpace. However, I blame the elementary, middle, and even high school teachers who made us fill out endless "about me" worksheets at the beginning of every school year, therefore forcing us to define ourselves increasingly by our favorite colors, favorite sesame st characters, and pet peeves. And what did anybody ever really put for hobbies?

Jon Garfunkel

May 11, 2008 09:03 PM

Interesting. Yes, inside the corporation, the question is, how do we get people to participate, and how do we get them to contribute things of value?

The "top five" list may just help break the ice enough.

Jon

Vandalous

May 22, 2008 04:00 PM

Don't forget the old "slam" books we used to do in elem and jr high. You know... the ones that you had to answer the questions on each page and then pass it to a friend. It was the pen and paper version of the Myspace bulletin meme's that are so popular now.

Questioning

May 26, 2008 06:14 PM

Unclear what value this has inside an enterprise. Can anybody explain what value does a social networking site such as Facebook -- or in this case Beehive -- have inside an enterprise ?

Ian Joseph

June 3, 2008 11:57 AM

IBM is such a large organization that it can be very challenging at times to find the right people and information to get the job done. IBMer's with experience have a large network of contacts that they can draw on to help them with their work. The better your network in IBM the better you are at your job. Beehive helps formalize and expand your network in IBM. The use of a formal tool to document and expand your network in IBM helps make one more effective and efficient with one's job.

Henry the PM

June 4, 2008 11:32 PM

to "Questioning"
As a certified Project Manager, I find the value of social networking software to be that of bringing synergy to virtual / distributed teams. I lead a global independent volunteer group of 900+ project managers called PMlessonsLearned.com and one of the topics of most interest is that of how to manage virtual teams. PMs want to know how to get the people on their teams connected when they are so far apart geographically and culturally. I feel that social software is the way of the future to build relationships on teams.

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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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