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My IBM
Some people fear that blogs only exist to attack brands and destroy careers.
Others exult that blogs will allow corporations to disintermediate the press, advertising, and other managed forms of communication, thereby allowing them to reach interested parties directly with their own version of the truth.
IBM's official, corporate position is: adherents of either view need to ‘chill’ a bit.
The fact is, blogs are a fact of life today and a leading source of information and entertainment for an increasing number of people - as well as an opportunity to collaborate and share ideas.
But blogs' popularity and usefulness are, in large part, due to their authentic, personal nature. That's why - contrary to what some headlines have said - IBM hasn't so much ‘embraced blogs’ as it is celebrating those IBMers who have. Because when they're successful, IBM can be successful.
"As a sales/marketing leader," writes Ed Brill, one of the IBMers who regularly updates his popular blog, "being able to have an intimate, one-to-one relationship with thousands of customers who buy/deploy/manage the product I sell is immensely rewarding. I've been able to win business, save business, and affect the market and competitive landscape through blogging."
In other words, blogging helps Brill and others do their job more effectively by engaging with the people and communities seeking that engagement - whether they're clients, software developers, policy makers, or other (or potential) employees.
To make it easier for their colleagues to explore this new environment more confidently, in spring of 2005, IBM bloggers created a wiki (an online, shared space for collaborating on documents and other content) to develop a set of
blogging guidelines
(US) for navigating the blogosphere. Written by the bloggers themselves, the guidelines were endorsed by the company's legal and communications departments and posted internally, and later shared with the wider world.
Today, many IBMers use their Internet blogs to open up their work and expertise to a wider audience, and to gain insight from customers, partners and even competitors. Internally, thousands of IBMers use an intranet-based blog tool to collaborate with colleagues in ways that were once locked inside e-mail inboxes and mailing lists.
And on October 11, IBM announced new productivity features in its most recent release of Lotus Notes and Domino that allow users to design, create and update blog entries. Even offline or while travelling, bloggers can update their blog using Lotus Notes and then transfer their updates the next time they connect to the network. Plus new support for Real Simple Syndication (RSS) technology allows companies to publish RSS feeds from any Lotus Notes application using an industry standard format for easy content viewing and updating.
A new
blog directory
, or ‘blogroll’, is also now available on ibm.com to help visitors find IBMers who are now using blogs in the normal course of their jobs. By voluntarily listing themselves here, these IBM employees have set their welcome mat out for anyone to stop by, ask a question, pose an idea, take issue with a position, and otherwise engage in a new level of collaboration and conversation for corporations - and the very real people who make them work.
http://www.edbrill.com
1. Three good reasons to blog about your work/job/career
Direct connection to my customers/partners, who are in 40,000 organisations across the world
Amplify the latest good news about my product for those customers/partners, in one focused place
Generate discussion about new concepts, ideas, opportunities, news, and competition
2. The worst reason to blog about your work/job/career
Bad news makes for a better story than good news. When we do things right, we rarely get recognition. When there's bad news, it amplifies fast throughout the blogosphere, with people looking to me for answers.
3. Three business buzzwords you could gladly live without
Web 2.0
Honestly can't think of two others right now - not playing buzzword bingo at the moment
4. Best non-IBMer blog you follow regularly
Peter O'Kelly from Burton Group - he tracks industry news better than anyone at
pbokelly.blogspot.com
5. What has been an unexpected benefit or experience you've had thanks to your blog?
I didn't expect my audience within IBM to grow to 10 percent of my overall readership - when I started blogging, it was definitely with an external audience in mind.
http://datageekgal.blogspot.com
1. Three good reasons to blog about your work/job/career
Blogging helps me keep aware of what's heppening in our industry. I read technical news as part of my research for blog topics, and I am more informed about current events in technology as a result. This makes me a better employee.
Blogging helped me keep my personal commitment to read through the Oracle 10g Concepts Guide. (A 500+ page must-read for every Oracle DBA) Making a public promise to research and blog about what I'd learned helped me not procrastinate. It's like having a workout buddy to keep you honest about going to the gym. :-)
In this ever-changing world, it's helpful to build a level of credibility tied to you as an individual. I've built professional connections world-wide that would not otherwise exist, as a result of my blog.
2. The worst reason to blog about your work/job/career
I don't care for blogs that are nothing more than ad copy for the individual's product or service. Give us something useful, help us see a new slant on a topic. Inform us, don't give us a ‘brochure in a blog.’
3. Three business buzzwords you could gladly live without
paradigm
right-size
4. Best non-IBMer blog you follow regularly
Tom Kyte's blog:
tkyte.blogspot.com
Jeff Hunter:
marist89.blogspot.com
Lewis Cunningham:
blogs.ittoolbox.com/oracle/guide/
5. What has been an unexpected benefit or experience you've had thanks to your blog?
Making friends with a blogger who works for my former employer, in a different country.
http://andypiper.wordpress.com
1. Three good reasons to blog about your work/job/career
I originally started blogging to keep technical notes and reminders about what I'd been doing with software from day-to-day. Keeping a blog helps me to remind myself how I solved particular problems.
Since I work on-site with our customers I don't always see other IBMers as often as I might like, so keeping a blog enables the rest of my team to keep up with my activities (and I can follow the blogs of my teammates).
Blogging has enabled me to make a large number of contacts I may never have made in person - exchanging comments on posts has led me into discussions with IBM executives, customers and industry analysts - not bad!
2. The worst reason to blog about your work/job/career
Some people might think I do nothing other than work - so I try to balance that by interspersing my technical / business blog entries with some stuff about photography.
3. Three business buzzwords you could gladly live without
synergy
leverage
conceptualise
4. Best non-IBMer blog you follow regularly
This one is really difficult! I follow so many. I travel in and out of London regularly and I live fairly close to the capital, so the diamond geezer blog (
diamondgeezer.blogspot.com
) is a great read. Fred Wilson's "A VC" blog (
avc.blogs.com
) is also great: a mixture of music, gig reviews, and discussion of venture capital topics.
5. What has been an unexpected benefit or experience you've had thanks to your blog?
Again, I've got a lot of choice with this one. Most recently, I met Jeff Barr, the Web Services evangelist from Amazon - I got to know a colleague through his internal blog, and he invited me over to his office during Jeff's recent visit to IBM Hursley. It was quite a chance encounter - without the networking I've achieved through blogging, I would never had made that personal connection.
http://www.elsua.net
1. Three good reasons to blog about your work/job/career
To share my expertise and passion in Knowledge Management with those interested both inside and outside of IBM. Having my own voice and weblogging style
To be able to connect with other experts in the area of Knowledge Management and be able to establish different connections and relationships with them that otherwise would not have been possible.
To show how weblogging (and emerging technologies - e.g., Social Software - in general) can be a very powerful Personal Knowledge Management tool that will help people share their knowledge, collaborate more with others and, above all, have an online presence that will spark some further innovation in the area of expertise of the weblogger. In my case Knowledge Management, Communities, Collaboration, Social Networking and Social Software
2. The worst reason to blog about your work/job/career
Within Knowledge Management there are hundreds and hundreds of different sub-disciplines and it is difficult, but desirable, to stick with one or a small range of topics to discuss. And the worst reason is the wide variety of topics to discuss, perhaps one of the main drawbacks from blogging, where everyone should stick to a topic, or a couple of them, and blog away.
3. Three business buzzwords you could gladly live without
ROI
Measurements
Funding
4. Best non-IBMer blog you follow regularly
There are plenty of great non-IBM blogs that I follow on a daily basis but here you have got five of my all time favourites that I check every day:
Anecdote -
www.anecdote.com.au
with Shawn Callahan, Andrew Rixon and Mark Schenk
Cognitive-Edge -
www.cognitive-edge.com
with Dave Snowden
Knowledge Jolt with Jack -
blog.jackvinson.com
with Jack Vinson
Knowledge-at-work -
denham.typepad.com
with Denham Grey
Portals and KM -
billives.typepad.com
with Bill Ives
5. What has been an unexpected benefit or experience you've had thanks to your blog?
The incredible amount of fascinating relationships and connections that I have been able to develop with multiple experts in the area where we have been able to follow up on each other virtually and whenever we get a chance we try to meet up face-to-face. Like what happened not long ago when I got the chance to meet in Cincinnati with Patrick Hindert and one of the leading KM thinkers out there today: Denham Grey. I actually shared some of those highlights in this weblog post.
http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/blogs/page/SusanVisser
(US)
1. Three good reasons to blog about your work/job/career
I'm passionate about my work and find it very easy to come up with material for the blog.
Hopefully at least one person reads my blog and benefits!
I can avoid answering the same question multiple times by writing about it in my blog and point people there for answers :)
2. The worst reason to blog about your work/job/career
I'm reluctant to reveal personal information about my life when writing my blog but know that the most popular blogs have a mixture of personal and work.
Sometimes finding the time is tough! Even if you're passionate about a topic it still takes time to write coherently and there are never enough hours in day to do everything you want!
Given that you're seen as the expert, readers could blame you if they don't like the message.
3. Three business buzzwords you could gladly live without
ecosystem
e-business
best-of-breed
4. Best non-IBMer blog you follow regularly
I'm not currently following any non-IBM blogs - too busy!
5. What has been an unexpected benefit or experience you've had thanks to your blog?
My blog has been mentioned in many newsletters and articles, which is very gratifying!
http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/blogs/page/rawn
(US)
1. Three good reasons to blog about your work/job/career
• When I find something that I think others may want to know about or learn.
• To comment on ideas I see elsewhere (on another blog, web site, etc.) that relates to what I do.
• Since I work with external users and audiences, it is a great way to get feedback on what my division does.
2. The worst reason to blog about your work/job/career
Because your manager or your higher up thinks or suggests that it is a good move or needs to be done.
3. Three business buzzwords you could gladly live without
YouTube - more a name than a buzzword but this site still seems to be completely bubble-mentality
leverage - I'm just as guilty on using this but it sounds Machiavellian nonetheless
synergy or synergise - the sympathy behind it always seems false to me
4. Best non-IBMer blog you follow regularly
Ron Moore's blog on Battlestar Galactica -
blog.scifi.com/battlestar/
I recently found this and really like Jakob Nielsen's blog/newsletter -
www.useit.com/alertbox/
5. What has been an unexpected benefit or experience you've had thanks to your blog?
Doing this Q&A :)
IBMers' blogs
A menu of expertise and insight from a passionate crowd
(US)
IBM's Blogging Guidelines
Created by the bloggers themselves
(US)
To blog or not to blog?
Lotus Notes software gives you the choice
(US)
Outside IBM
Technorati
Google Blogs
Blog Pulse
Stay on top of innovation that matters
More Ideas from IBM
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