I love this medium – I get to learn a heck of a lot but I’m the first to agree it’s far from perfect. Not in the technology but in the execution. So it was with some interest that I read JP Rangaswami’s On social software and consensus, referencing David Freedman’s What’s Next: The Idiocy of Crowds.
JP asserts that David is incorrect because:
- Deciding isn’t doing.
- Consensus comes in many forms.
- Social software aids consensus
I’m not convinced that was the full thrust of David’s argument. I read it differently:
The effectiveness of groups, teamwork, collaboration, and consensus is largely a myth. In many cases, individuals do much better on their own. Our bias toward groups is counterproductive. And the technology of ubiquitous connectedness is making the problem worse.
David points to much academic research in the area to support his theory. I can attest to the value of not working in groups – something I struggle with at the best of times. There are of course plenty of exceptions but David’s main concern seems to be:
Simply put, when you make it easy for everyone to put in his two cents, with little filtering or accountability, the scum tends to rise to the top. Look at it this way: How much time have you taken to post movie reviews, rate products, or help a group of strangers with a project? Not a lot, I’ll bet. But malicious adolescents, really grumpy people with a lot of time on their hands, and sleazy marketers just love plastering the Internet with their rants, gripes, and plugs. For all the excitement generated by social networking sites like Facebook, how many people are actually making valuable contacts on these sites, compared with the amount of time wasted browsing through the sea of goofy material.
This is where I think David is only partially right. Sure, there’s a ton of crap out there. Sure, there are digital groupies, desperate to get a link from one (or any) of the so-called A-listers. But we can filter crap by ignoring it. If we make that conscious decision. This was a point I made in respect of complaints over at AccountingWEB (sign-in req) about an individual who was upsetting a number of readers. We can demand that assertions are backed by fact rather than sweeping statements. We can apply the No Assholes Here rule (my personal favourite.)
At present, I’m engaged in a debate on a private group about how ‘we’ might define emergent technologies and their uses in business. The group as a whole doesn’t agree. We are certainly collaborating. The debate is robust and despite being part of the dissenting minority, I don’t feel any sense of inferiority. That’s because we work on the basis of shared trust. We may not reach a consensus but there could be both a majority and minority outcome. Both will be equally valid and useful, depending on the audience to which each viewpoint is addressed. That’s value in action.
I accept this is not much good in a business situation where decisions have to be taken, although the eventual output of the discussion will have value. Those decisions can but don’t have to arrive out of consensus. But as JP suggests, they need collaboration in order to start the process of reaching a decision and social software, blogs and wikis facilitate that in ways that email and instant messaging cannot.
Finally – I’ve made more valuable connections in the last year than at any time in my life. I’m looking forward to sharing time with at least a dozen of what I would term my closest colleagues when I attend Office 2.0. On a rough count, I reckon I’ll meet up with about 60 people I didn’t know a year ago but who have contributed to the many discussions that have appeared on this site. None of that would have been possible without social software. In that regard, David is presenting a distorted view that doesn’t stand up to scrutiny.
Technorati Tags: no assholes here, practice management, wisdom of crowds
