I had been invited to speak this week to the National Information Officers Association training conference in Clearwater, FL, but unfortunately was unable to make the trip. This is an annual conference which serves as a training event for emergency services Public Information Officers from throughout the United States and International agencies. The group is primarily comprised of fire departments, municipal services, government and law enforcement, but health care systems are becoming increasingly involved.
I was able to share some information about the Mayo Clinic Center for Social Media with Tammy Chatman, a Public Information Officer from Flight for Life based in Waukesha, WI, which she will be including as part of her presentation on Wednesday.
My colleague Glenn Lyden, who is an NIOA member, will be joining Tammy for the presentation. After any presentation it’s good to have a time for Q&A, and so Glenn decided to ask me some of those questions in advance. And once he had done that, it seemed reasonable to share some of the video here. Here’s our first Q&A:
Choosing low-risk initial applications is one key. You will note some language in my answers about “free advertising” and “telling your side of the story” which may strike social media purists as a vestige of old school, one-way broadcast communications.
But remember what your goal is: to help your audience (in this case your organization’s leaders) get comfortable with social media. To do that, you need to put the benefits in terms that are meaningful to them.
For any organization, and most of all for well-established ones, the ability to easily and quickly publish in-depth information to the Web via social media tools can be presented as a strong benefit. Disseminating information and perspective that are completely in context is appealing, because one thing that’s difficult for mainstream journalists to present is context. At least the fuller context your leadership would like to see.
Those of us who have been engaged in social media know the opportunity for feedback and interaction is extremely beneficial, and that it really is essential to the nature of social media. I believe that for most organizations, however, the emphasis in “selling” social media to leadership should be on using the tools to meet the goals you already have. Use the social tools to more effectively accomplish the work they hired you to do. Then you’ll be able to build on that success to realize the fuller potential of social media.
What do you think? What approaches or arguments have you found helpful in getting your organization involved in social media?
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The Mayo Clinic has been in the vanguard of the social media movement and continues to serve as a great model for how to leverage new digital technologies to meet organizational objectives. Kudos!
I have founded a community called Social Media in Organizations (SMinOrgs), whose mission is to be the premier resource for information and guidance about the intra-organizational implications of social media. Through the SMinOrgs S.M.A.R.T. Blog, I have been developing a Social Media Primer. This primer is targeted to organizational leaders to help them wrap their brains around Digital Era realities so they can provide the strategic leadership their organizations need to leverage these technologies to increase their success. In Part 1 of the Primer, I lay down a conceptual foundation and put social media in historical perspective, so folks can understand that the technologies are “new tools for doing old things.” Part 2 helps them understand that the potential applications of social media technologies extend far beyond the external applications (marketing, sales, PR, customer service) that dominates most of the discussions. Part 3 addresses the mental shifts they have to make (e.g., changes in the balance of power, loss of control) they need to make to move forward, and Part 5 discusses the leader’s role in advancing a social media agenda.
I could go on, but hopefully you get the idea. For me the key is to educate leaders at a level appropriate for their position and in ways that help them move forward strategically rather than tactically. Folks can access the primer in both blog and SlideShare versions via http://www.sminorgs.net/social-media-primer.html.
Thanks.
Lee congratulations to you, and to Mayo for taking the leap into social media! Historically the landscape of healthcare has been shrouded in hierarchy and convention, which is pretty much the opposite of what social media represents. I think this article hits the nail on the head. As with any new tool or instrument, healthcare leadership must understand how social media can be utilized to effectively address current challenges before they can open up to it. Good luck! It will be an exciting ride!
Our organization has started a Facebook page. However, we are not currently allowing employees access to view it from work. I am looking for a strong argument for why we should allow access via NRMC computers…can you help?
THANK YOU!!!