Social business strategy can be quite interesting depending on a number of factors. One such factor is that it enters maturity at around half a decade. The question here is why does it take half a decade to reach maturity? Through this period a number of lessons are learnt. That is probably why it takes that long to establish itself. It is also within this period that the business undergoes test and if the strategy is truly solid the business will survive. If not the social business is bound to fail. The aspect of five years is also interesting in that it is not such a long period compared to a decade and it is not too short a period. It is just about the sufficient duration for social business strategy to be formulated, implemented and fine-tuned to perfection. If it is the right one then the projected results will be achieved (Chapter 15,pg 185).
Another interesting question is, what does it mean by the end of the beginning for social businesses? This can be viewed from two perspectives. The social business may have a solid strategy in place or by sheer luck make it through this early period discussed above and manage to establish itself. There is also the possibility of the business failing to make it through this early stage and thus signaling the end of the beginning for it. This period is pretty much an experimental phase where the social business tries to come up with ways of handling its operations but the outcome is never certain. The end of the beginning initiates a new stage of maturity. In this new phase the social business may opt to continue with its previous policies, improve on them or adopt a completely new strategy to achieve its desired objectives. Whichever way you look at it the end of the beginning marks a fascinating period which may involve failure, survival or transition. The good news for social business is that broader outlines for social business strategy keep emerging day after day; this increases their chances of survival past this early period. This creates a strong platform for sustainability of the social business past the end of the beginning (Chapter 15,pg 186).
It is interesting that the matrices for measuring success of social business include increased productivity, revenue creation, cost reduction and connected culture. Increased productivity may involve better investment decisions which are bound to increase output. Shorter customers support cycles will increase customer satisfactions leading to return sales, consequently leading to greater output. Revenue creation involves improved globally sales and increased customer satisfaction and retention. Cost reduction may be achieved by overcoming distance and time zone barriers to collaboration and improvement in self service support cycles. Connected culture entails more rapid new-hire ramp-up, improved connections between departments and internal personnel teams and quicker location of expertise. It is interesting in that all the above indicate a predetermined system which when implemented leads to the expected successful results for the social business (Chapter 15,pg 186).
Something interesting that we can ask is what are the best practices and effective fundamental techniques that have to be understood for the success of a social business? One of them involves competitive positioning. More successively innovation and higher productivity rate lead to better products that make an institution a better place to compete with its competitors. Modernization of the workplace creates a sound environment for workers in general and particularly millennial who are the largest group entering the job market. Information discovery makes it quicker for communication between employees, compared to the traditional means of conducting operations which also leads to greater productivity. High levels of transparency lead to a greater probability of good decision making, that is because there is greater access to information and it is pretty obvious that a well informed person will make informed decisions. Transparency will also reduce tensions in the social setup of the social business as all the individuals involved in it will not feel excluded or that there is something being hidden from them. All the above factors are related in that they create a good atmosphere for the social business setup which is good for productivity (Chapter 15, pg 186).
A combination of top-down and bottom-up drivers of social business transformation is interesting in that it produces a set of core-artifacts which authenticate, document and guide the social business. The best practices and social computing patterns should be designed in such a way as to include the needs of the business, infrastructure, social tools, achievable standards, an identity structure and security. The change and risk management on the other hand would involve a social business narrative and ad hoc opportunities for improvement. The bottom up strategy entails a sequence of viral adoption, cultural change and finally local problems solving. Social business narrative and ad hoc opportunities focus on extracting the most from situations set in social business design away from previous innovations (Chapter 16, pg 192).
It is interesting to note that not all social businesses apply the specified artifacts even when they are successful. This shows that there is still the possibility of achieving success even if a social business acts outside the norms of operation.Ofcourse this is highly risky and social businesses that run the risk of failing. However as earlier stated one may be lucky enough to succeed. It is however important to apply the artifacts previously mentioned as they are tried and tested and have proven successful for a large portion of the cases in which they were applied (Chapter 16,pg 192,193)
However, as indicated in the initial statement, these are artifacts are not a hundred percent guarantee of success for the social business. Success may come through sheer luck as strange as it sounds or from very technical wit of the ones operating the business. Some may use these artifacts but on establishing themselves, they may opt to adopt other policies. They may end up failing or thriving even more than was expected. One thing is certain, nothing is guaranteed in terms of the outcome for social businesses (Chapter 16,pg 193).
Reference
Hinchcliffe,D,& Kim,P. (2008). Social Businesses by Design: Transformative Social Media Strategies for the Connected Company
