Let’s Talk Strategy

Once a sponsor is on board and you’ve sold the merits of setting up a Social Networking (media) and Collaboration site, your next step is defining the company strategy. There are two key components to developing a good strategy. The first is knowing what you want to do with your implementation. The second step is determining where to start, how this application supports the overall company strategy, and how this start will take you to your destination.  These two steps will help you develop you elevator pitch and build support slides to socialize your plan with key stakeholders.

It is important to define risk and risk mitigation for your strategy. This will help you define some critical components that must be included on the technical side as well as key steps that must take place on the business side. In addition, it will help you prepare for the discussions with stakeholders and enable you to gather information to support your position. Socialization of your stake holders will be a threefold discussion that contains education, cost benefits, and a call for support. The outcome of this meeting should be an appreciation for social media and collaboration tools and the benefits they can bring your organization as well as a general enthusiasm to support the plan in their respective areas. Socialization must continue beyond this team but this is a key first step. Once over this hurdle you will have confirmed their participation and support to engage either directly or to make available key resources that you will need for your next steps.

Join me next time as we talk about more about developing your strategy and launching your implementation.