Blog Post 9/28/2009

Last week I had the opportunity to speak to a few groups of people about social media. What I found however was that I talked a lot more about community than I did specifically about social media.

I like that because I see social media as just one other way to develop, build and grow community; and, I look to community as the producer of innovation.

Community produces innovation

When I consider a healthy community I think of a diverse group of people bound together by one (or many) commonalities. In regards to the work I do at the State of Ohio the commonality is related to IT procurement, at least within the group I am working with.

Many of the staff have commonalities beyond just that but it is the work around IT procurement that pulls them together. When the group sits down as equals, as a community, they manage to brainstorm really innovative ideas to the problems facing the State in this current economy. Being a part of this, even just witnessing it, is really spectacular.

This week I witnessed many innovative ideas bubble to the top thanks to this very process. (I would tell you more but you’ll have to wait until the ideas are farther along and can be released into the wild.)

Why then do we so often choose to build frameworks that remove this equality, this community?

When an organization chooses to strictly hold a command and control hierarchy they have effectively chosen to forgo innovation.

Innovation is free

The funny thing about innovation is that it rarely happens in a vacuum. The most useful innovation comes when groups of people who share a common experience and mission are empowered to solve their own problems and determine their own mission. Simply by empowering groups you invite innovation to find you freely, you just have to be brave enough to let it happen.

So I want to ask you:

Is your organization brave enough to invite innovation? Are you brave enough to be an equal member of an innovative community?