Enterprise Social Computing with Microsoft SharePoint 2010

Smart companies are gleaning benefits from enterprise social computing and the results are measurable. Enterprise 2.0 is big, getting bigger, and is no place for laggards; not in today's global business arena where knowledge is power and the water cooler might be 1,000 miles away. Microsoft SharePoint provides companies with rich features for social computing and a solid foundation for Enterprise 2.0.

SharePoint, already a successful and well-recognized platform for collaboration, portals, enterprise search, enterprise content management, business processes and forms, and business intelligence, is getting better. The latest version, SharePoint 2010, is a business collaboration platform for the enterprise and the Web.

SharePoint 2010 provides rich features for enterprise social computing from social networking tools like personalized My Sites to social content technologies such as blogs, wikis, discussion forums, RSS, and more. What's more it solidifies Microsoft's vision for social computing, which is to enable the full range of spontaneous, collaborative conversations around ideas, data, documents, and projects while maintaining the necessary framework of business management and IT governance.

While enterprise social computing isn't new, companies are moving from experimentation to adoption as part of broader business practices. And it's easy to understand why.

McKinsey & Company tracked the rising adoption of Web 2.0 technologies, such as the use of RSS or microblogs, wikis, blogs, and podcasts, for the past three years. The firm’s latest research, from June 2009, reveals that more than two-thirds of executives surveyed worldwide report that their companies have gained measurable business benefits including more innovative products and services, more effective marketing, better access to knowledge, lower costs of doing business, and higher revenues.

According to McKinsey, the survey results indicate that a different type of company may be emerging — one that makes extensive use of interactive technologies. Such networked organizations are characterized both by the internal integration of Web tools among employees and use of the technologies to strengthen company ties with external stakeholders, namely customers and business partners.

Enterprise spending on Web 2.0 technologies is expected to reach $4.6 billion globally by 2013, according to Forrester Research, with social networking, mashups, and RSS capturing the greatest share. Furthermore, what is now an inherently disruptive technology is expected to blend into the fabric of the enterprise.

"Enterprise social computing is about making connections within the enterprise as pathways to knowledge; creating avenues for conversations to happen that may not have happened before that will result in some benefit," says Shannon Ryan, president and CEO of Non-Linear Creations, a Toronto-based Microsoft Gold Certified Partner.

Non-Linear is a SharePoint specialist that consults and delivers social computing solutions leveraging SharePoint that provide customers with the ultimate in flexibility.

There are several business drivers for social computing behind the firewall using SharePoint, according to Microsoft:

• Maximize and Share Knowledge. The No. 1 asset of any organization is its people. The smarter the better. A lot of knowledge remains locked up in employees’ heads until they're given the infrastructure and tools to capture and share that knowledge with others in the organization. When skilled workers depart, their learning and expertise can remain to serve the goals of the organization as blogs, podcasts, and wikis. Social networking also creates highways of easy access to discover experts when you need them.
• Bring People Together. Social computing tools inside organizations transform how people work together to create community-of-interest projects, add value, and spark innovation.
• Attract and Retain Talent. The truth of the matter is that many up-and-coming employees come from a digital generation that grew up with access and are faithful participants in social networks. These valuable individuals will look to optimize those talents professionally at 2.0 enterprises. Social computing can also help new or transferred employees get up speed and connect with colleagues and communities more quickly.

Working with Microsoft channel partners like Non-Linear Creations or Newsgator Technologies, a Gold Certified Partner based in Denver, businesses can bring home the benefits of advanced social computing to their organizations.

According to J.B. Holston, president and CEO of Newsgator, companies in the financial, pharmaceutical and biotech, high tech, professional services, and media industries, as well as government, are embracing enterprise social computing using SharePoint. The CME Federal Credit Union, based in Columbus, Ohio, serves about 26,000 members and manages about $158 million in assets. It implemented a corporate-wide portal that leverages a combined Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 and the NewsGator Social Sites solution to enhance customer service and improve employee productivity.

The robust SharePoint corporate intranet provides all employees with collaboration tools such as wikis and blogs, a document management system, automated workflows, and centralized access to internal business application data. Integrated with SharePoint, Social Sites make it easy for bank employees to access and discover critical business information and become more informed and productive.

"SharePoint 2010 is more good news for enterprise social computing and great news as customers recognize SharePoint as a logical platform for social computing," says Holston.

The more advanced social computing features in SharePoint 2010 enable Microsoft partners to focus on more value-add for customers.

NewsGator's Social Sites, for example, offers advanced social software features for SharePoint 2010 such as communities of practice, microblogging, ideas, mobile support, expert discovery, and on-boarding. Other critical enhancements to SharePoint 2010's out-of-the-box social features include activity streams, advanced RSS, and tagging and rating.