The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines confluence as a coming or flowing together, or the flowing together of two or more streams, or the combined stream formed by conjunction. This is what I think happened at the Disney Institute during our visit.
Confluence - A Flowing Together
Human Resources and Social Media
I have already described what we did at the Disney Institute in my two previous installments of this trilogy, Consulting and Consultants. In part one, I said that this experience had provided me with a unique consulting opportunity and that I was considering other ways in which the experience might be applicable. What I am suggesting is that this event provided an opportunity to consider ways in which social media tools could be used for practical purposes in the workplace by HR professionals beyond recruiting and web site outreach.
I believe that what we saw at Disney was an example of what can happen when the confluence of strong Human resources knowledge and social media skills flow together. I believe our group at Dsney was part of a confluence of two skill sets that are flowing together organically in a way that offers potential new ways for managing information and transformation inside business organizations. One of the first ways that I thought where this might work was organizational change management, especially in a merger and acquisition scenario. I was going to write more expansively on this thought in this final post, but that has changed.
Why?
Because in discussing the relevance of the idea with others, the suggestion was made that it might be possible to take the general idea further. Hopefully, Mark Stelzner and I will be continuing this dialogue across our blog spaces in the near future. More to come on that, probably after Labor Day.
What do you think?
In the meantime, I am curious about your thoughts.
What other areas do you see where social media tools could be applied inside HR to improve a process?
Feel free to display your creativity in the comments!
Related articles by Zemanta
- Betting on the Future of Employment and Career Blogging (punkrockhr.com)
- More Meta-Marvel (snarkmarket.com)
- Looking for a job? Get busy on Twitter and LinkedIn but skip the job ads (thisisherd.com)
No related posts.
Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.
{ 1 comment… read it below or add one }
Twitter: karla_porter
September 2, 2009 at 8:54 am
Via a combination of public and proprietary social networks, social media can be deployed to broadcast information in a “community” package and lend itself to wiki type organizational knowledge bases. If relegated to HR rather than Marketing it can get be an organ for the employer brand. Finally, it can put a friendly and approachable face to HR. Wouldn’t you rather hear about open enrollment, training, health fairs, employee recognition, etc., via SM than a dry email?