Social networking

The NCVO ICT Foresight report which prompted development of this site is due out at the end of March, as Megan Griffith reports here. Megan writes:  read more »

For many VCOs, online ‘social’ networks have the potential to be disruptive; that is, they have the power to change the model of organising upon which many VCOs, and particularly membership bodies, are based. The connections that ICT facilitates suggest that some organisations may increasingly be bypassed and that power may shift away from top-down hierarchical organisations and towards more fluid and participative networks where there is less need for a centralised ‘bricks and mortar’ coordinating organisation.

The second think-piece from Ross Ferguson is now on the ICT Foresight blog. Again, we would really like your thoughts and comments.

Megan

Several of the ICT Foresight panel are contributing short think pieces to our next report on social networking. I have posted Eleanor's piece to the ICT Foresight blog for comments.

The rest should be coming in soon...

Megan

It's a particular crusade of mine to encourage not-for-profits to identify an internal champion (or recruit a virtual volunteer) to take on this role. Call it what you will, and David Wilcox and Beth Kanter, have both had a go at (re)inventing job labels.  read more »

Just wanted to say a quick 'hello': I sadly couldn't make the meeting last week but have been following this blog, and several of the contributors', with interest.

I suppose my main claim to involvement in this area, beyond personal interest, is that I work for a company called Delib and we're working on a couple of 'social web' projects for charity clients at the moment -- I know some of you have already seen and commented on the very-nearly-finished www.vcscollaborate.org.  read more »

The following is just a snippet from a long ramble I published here today.

We can all agree, I think, that the web has empowered individuals and invited more scrutiny into the work of organisations. Charities are not immune from this evolution but they do have a secret weapon: compelling stories.  read more »

Thanks to everybody who came along yesterday - I thought it was a fantastic day.

I have written up the comments you left on my flip chart quotes here

Take a look

Megan

PS Can someone tell me how to add a link properly?

Cross posted at my blog here: http://ideapolicy.blogspot.com/2006/10/networking-and-volunteering.html

 attended a roundtable yesterday at the National Council for Voluntary Organisations on the Community and Voluntary Sectors and ICT supported social networking. Whew...that's a bit of a mouthful. Basically, it's about how IT can help charities get more from their existing relationships between supporters, staff and recipients or create new relationships.

It was great to meet other people - like David Wilcox, whose blog I was familiar with already. And I met other bloggers too, like Nick Booth and Steve Bridger and Molly Webb from Demos. We were all there because we're committed to using new communications tools - like blogs and wikis to support greater interaction, communication and collaboration. Very few of us are really all that technical (I'm certainly not), but we all see these tools as a big opportunity to work in a more open, social and accountable way. And there were a lot of other people there all doing some really interesting work. David Wilcox has started a community site for us to share some of our thoughts in this area at www.mediablends.net

It's part of a project called ICT Foresight and there's alreading some interesting findings - including a publication called campaign and consultation: in the age of participatory media. Although about the voluntary sector, there are some interesting statistics about how much new media tools are used already. There are some case studies which highlight how organisations can engage with users - not just for consultation but for education campaigns and maybe even decision-making. We're not there yet, but these are the signs of participative democracy and co-production online.

online volunteering
As part of the day we also attend and Economic and Social Research Council sponsored seminar on 'ICT, Social Capital and Voluntary Action'. Jayne Craven gave a really interesting presentation on online volunteering (and has some great resources online, too). It really opened my eyes to the way that we need to promote online social networking between public sector professionals. We need to treat online collaboration the same way that we treat participation in benchmarking, speaking at conferences, etc - the things we're aready doing to share information with either altruistic goals in mind or as some kind of way of improving our own professional karma.

In essence, that's what community of practices (like that for Partnerships and Performance Management - PM Partner) are supposed to do. They're a way to share learning with a wider community. But they don't yet have the cache of speaking at a conference. I'm sure that my online activities have helped to share more information about performance management than my conference speaking has - but I'm not sure how much recognition there is for that.

_____

BTW- here's David Wilcox's take on yesterday's events on his mediablends blog and Molly Webb's, too.

Kivi Leroux organises a series of blog carnivals where you can find best posts submitted by bloggers.
This carnival is a collection of the best advice and resources that consultants and other support organizations are offering to nonprofits through their blogs each week.Nonprofit Communications » Carnival of Nonprofit Consultants  read more »

Beth Kanter, in Zen and the Art of Technology Blog offers links a blog offering a set of posts on key technologies for nonprofits.

It used to be that you joined associations because it was a way of meeting like-minded people and getting help, facilities, information and other things difficult or costly to organise for yourself. These days it is much easier to find people and resources online, and to mix and match these assets into project teams, communities of practice, and informal networks.

That means social networking is going to impact on nonprofit membership. More at Designing for Civil Society: Why bother with "membership" in future?
 read more »

Nancy White - well-known for her work facilitating email and forum-based communities - has developed an analysis of blog communities, and the roles within them.

Designing for Civil Society: Blog communities: Nancy White explains being in many places at once<!-- technorati tags end -->

The BBC is supporting 20 blogger in Manchater in an experiment to develop and aggregate local content.
Designing for Civil Society: BBC helps start local blog communities
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John Smith and Bev Trayner have analysed what it takes to combine online collaboration and face-to-face events. They look at three main phases - online ramp-up (preparation phase online), face-to-face meeting, and online follow-on (post-meeting online phase) - and detailed issues likely to arise.

Designing for Civil Society: Article analyses the online/offline mix around events  read more »

 The Network Weaving site gives 14 characteristics of successful networkers. "Network Weavers are individuals who take responsibility for creating healthy networks, what we call Smart Networks".  read more »

The Overseas Development Institute reviews research into networks and suggests that there are six main functions: Filter, Amplify, Invest/provide, Convene, Build communities, Facilitate.  Aee also Dave Pollard's eight functions.

Dave Pollard has developed a mind map expanding on eight key functions of social networking. He suggests that these are  read more »

1. Finding people (discovering, rediscovering, or locating them)
2. Building directories, network maps and social networks
3. Inviting people to join your networks
4. Managing access to your networks ("permissioning")
5. Connecting with people in your networks (using various media)
6. Managing relationships across media (e.g. making the jarring transition from e-mail or weblog-based relationships to voice-to-voice or face-to-face)
7. Collaborating with people in your networks, and
8. Content sharing with people in your networks (and other learning, knowledge-finding and knowledge-sharing functionalities that are arguably the domain of Knowledge Management rather than Social Networking)

See also six things that networks do

George Siemens in Groups vs. Networks quotes Stephen Downes to offer an insight into the difference between groups and networks, and I think by extension the difference between place-based online communities (forums) and the blog communities that Nancy White has been exploring. George writes:

Like it or not, the move by the Tories into the field of blogging and social networking is going to make this type of engagement an essential part of politics and e-democracy. More about webcameron at Designing for Civil Society: Tories launch social networking - from the kitche  read more »