Digital Engagement

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Comment by Charlotte Britton on July 6, 2012 at 7:21

Really great to see so much energy in the DE group.  Some really great ideas which I hope the new council can take forward with the DE group.

@Ted love the idea of a communications plan for each document for the fellows.

Also agree with your comments about the digital strategy.  From the work Matthew has done as have a better idea of online assets the RSA has.  I guess what we need to do next is work out how the fellows want to engage through these channels.

One of my main gripes is that the Nings are so fragmented.  If you talk to Don Pinchbeck he'll tell you the original vision was to have 1 platform where the fellows networked and connected online.  Instead we have a very fractured and splintered approach with many Nings being not used.

How do you suggest we move forward on this - as I see this as a fundamental issue to overcome before we can move forward?

Comment by Ted Waters on July 5, 2012 at 22:53

Further to Charlotte Britton’s July 4th comment should a start be made in producing a summary of the RSA’s current communications In order to inform our discussions about an RSA Communications Strategy?  This could include for each ‘publication’ its:

Report title - unique name that identifies the report

Report area - for example on strategy, achievements, medium term plans, financial, operational performance, issues, project progress, statutory requirement etc

Recipients - intended audience including Fellows, internal staff, external organisations, media etc

Purpose / objective - for information, input to a meeting, action / decision

Content - a detailed description of the document’s contents and the source of any input information needed

Frequency

Priority - high, medium or low

Author(s)

Medium - paper, word document, email, blog, web page, twitter, SMS etc

Comment by John Oakley on July 5, 2012 at 21:22

What Ted said! I have a similar background and agree (almost) totally with him. I agree then Sharepoint wins over Ning and LinkedIn but for real world deployment it is EXPENSIVE as it really does need professional administration apart from the cost of licenses.

However, that it way down the road. The first step is to document needs... which I think was my very first post on the RSA blogs just a few months ago.

None of this is rocket science and we have some of the best expertise in the industry as Fellows - if you will excuse my immodesty. Lets use it to follow Ted's plan.

Comment by Ted Waters on July 5, 2012 at 19:24

David Wilcox is absolutely correct in saying that our Digital Strategy can’t be defined until we understand the RSA’s strategy.  Before my retirement I had over 20 years’ experience of helping FTSE 100 companies define their IT strategies, and believe me it’s impossible to do properly without a good understanding of the organisations strategy that the IT strategy has to support. 

A starting point therefore to define our Digital Strategy is to document what the RSA needs to do well if it is to achieve our mission, and then map the key processes  currently used to it.  These processes can then be assessed as to their ‘fitness for purpose’ on a scale of ‘World Class’ to ‘non-existent’ at the other end of the spectrum.  Mapping ‘what needs to be done well’ against how much individual processes need to be improved highlights those processes that are in greatest need of improvement.  This process was well described in a 1989 Harvard Business Review.

So what is the RSA’s Mission and Strategy? 

21^st Century enlightenment was not too helpful in understanding the RSA’s strategy and I personally prefer something on the lines of ‘helping to create the society that we’d like our grandchildren to inherit’.  I never envisaged the RSA should be primarily an organisation for career networkers.

What is certain is that any change will only be achieved through project based activities; so any investment in providing a project support based environment could be money well spent.  If project management software is excluded (since there are several well-known solutions) the need is for an environment that includes discussion and document storage / retrieval functionality.  Having used Ning, LinkedIn and SharePoint for this in the past I’m strongly of the view that SharePoint beats the others ease of use and functionality hands down.

Interestingly I came across this diagram that shows how complicated the whole internet social, media and marketing environment has become http://www.businessinsider.com/social-media-marketing-landscape-com... .  This has Ning included in Community Platforms and LinkedIn in Social Platforms which mirrors my views.

So to summarise, once the RSA’s strategy is understood there are proven processes that will identify the areas where IT solutions would be most effective. 

All it needs now, as John Oakley has just said, is for someone to take ownership of this.

Comment by Andy Williamson on July 5, 2012 at 17:51

> Someone has to own this problem...

Thanks John, you managed to sum up succinctly where I was trying to get!

Comment by David Wilcox on July 5, 2012 at 17:47

Phew, thanks John. Wise words

Comment by John Oakley on July 5, 2012 at 17:42

David,

I would not characterize your previous post as a rant but a succinct restatement of the issues that we face. And as we have discussed on several occasions, there is a real need for a face-to-face "engagement" be it a workshop, a conference, a seminar or a debate. Maybe a multi-thread conference for Fellows is the way forward from this recurring theme in the manner of commercial conferences i.e. plenary, parallel threads, common debate, rinse and repeat...

We have to do something because this repetitive online discussion does not seem to be moving us anywhere, just gathering a (mainly) new set of players on each iteration. 

Someone has to own this problem...

Maybe the first face-to-face should be representatives of the Trustees, the Fellowship and the Staff to agree who does OWN this.   

Comment by David Wilcox on July 5, 2012 at 17:22

Thanks Andy ... I was ranting a bit there:-)  A face to face discussion is a seriously good idea. Maybe we could pitch that to the election candidates as something to do before their first meeting, if possible.

Comment by Andy Williamson on July 5, 2012 at 17:11

I suspect some face to face 'engagmeent' is needed to take this forward :-)

Comment by David Wilcox on July 5, 2012 at 17:03

OK - I agree RSA can and will be different things to different people etc. 

However, when someone says "should I join the RSA ... or rejoin" we need something we can say about the value it offers, and the bundle of values that hold it together, without having to give them a questionnaire about their interests :-)

At the moment we have "diverse mix of really interesting people (but difficult to meet them)" and "enormous potential (but not sure how to realise it)" and "you may make some business contacts (but the bylaws say don't use FRSA for business purposes)" and "lovely House (but you can only meet in the bar)"

That means an enormous amount of spread-about discussion here and in Linkedin about the nature of the RSA ... rather than what we can actually do. 

Back to my original point: the comms systems for a university, business forum, think tank, innovation hub or whatever are all different. How can we possibly have a technology strategy without knowing what we are, and what we are trying to, and what roles we each have? 

I think those issues should be top of the agenda for the Fellowship council.

At the same time I can understand an election forum is maybe an innappropriate place for a member of staff. Many, many thanks Matthew for venturing in here.

So - how and where do we create a good, safe space to talk about this ... ideally with input from staff who are currently developing personas, value analysis systems, frameworks etc for Fellowship, without us?

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