Creating Enterprise 2.0 @ SAP

Recently I was interviewed by our Corporate Strategy Team regarding taking SAP's Enterprise 2.0 strategy and execution plans to the next level.  It was an excellent interview with great give and take... some novel ideas and some typical SAP deliverables - heavy on the quantification, heavy on the analysis, Board level recommendations, but a little light on the execution, discovery and experimental paths.  The typical organizational reaction to enterprise 2.0 is to try to control it rather than let it blossom in its own right.  I think this is where SAP faces the most internal change management challenges. We know we need to get there, we have islands of great innovation happening currently... I think of Dennis Moore's Emerging Solutions team... but how do we NOT over engineer the controls and let it continue to grow... the company needs more of Dennis' ilk.  This post from the FASTForward blog sums up my personal view on how we can accelerate.. but I'd add to this is that we need some degree of organizational empowerment to seed innovation islands (or continents) in SAP. Its what will work in our environment.

Our colleague Euan Semple just posted what are perhaps the ultimate and most direct-to-the-point manifesto on how organizations can promote Enterprise 2.0:

1. Do nothing - your Web 2.0-aware employees will do it for you, but in an uncontrolled fashion
2. Get out of the way - don’t tamper with the innovation and energy of a very tech-aware incoming generation
3. Keep the energy levels up - perhaps this is best done by keeping the organization out of the way.

Euan’s message is that Enterprise 2.0 is a grassroots phenomenon that is inevitably sprouting across enterprises large and small. The knee-jerk organizational reaction to such trends is to attempt to control and overmanage the technology.

Comments

[Larry Eiss]

Steve,
Great post. I agree with this list. Too many companies stifle progress by being fixated on established processes. I've faced it, and the rising generation faces it even more because they haven't been around long enough to establish the credibility long experience can bring.

BTW, I did a short post on AbleBrians over at my place (http://www.LarryEiss.com) and put a link in the Blogroll as well.
--Larry

[Steve]

Thanx for the link love Larry.. happy to reciprocate