Social Media Strategies for HR Seminars - Thoughts and Observations

I enjoyed the past 2 days of The Conference Board sponsored event, Social Media Strategies for HR Seminars. If you weren't able to attend you were following the #tcbsm4hr hashtag to get a glimpse of what was occurring. It was rich in content, interaction, and thoughtful discussion.

For me, there were three key observations I'm taking away from this event. They are:

• We're walking or running, and no longer crawling. As I observed at another Human Resources event, practitioners are no longer rookies when it comes to social media. There are less questions along the lines of "What is (Twitter/LinkedIn/Facebook)?" and "Why should my company get involved on these platforms?" The primary question that participants wanted answered was, "How can we....?" For many it was about solving a business issue, and how social media could be used to help do that. We're moving forward and that's great to see. HR knows social; we even showed it on an actual quiz administered on Day 1.

Uh-oh, a quiz. #tcbsm4hr

— Victorio Milian (@Victorio_M) April 17, 2012

Finally got logged in. Administered SMQ quiz to kick things off. Highest scores ever: 3 in the 90s! Some #socialmedia experts at #tcbsm4hr

— Social Media in Orgs (@SMinOrgs) April 17, 2012

• Everyone's different. There is no one-size-fits-all approach when it comes to how organizations can leverage SoMe tools to support business objectives. There were a wide variety of examples being discussed on what worked and what didn't work for companies. For one company, creating short video blogs (vlogs) helped to raise the financial literacy of their sales team. For another, it was discovering that a branded employee portal discouraged participation. It needed to be reconfigured to allow for personalization by employees. Once this happened user adoption went up. The trick in finding out what does or does not work is...

• Discovering that 'A-HA!' moment. Like any other business initiative, implementing one that's SoMe focused required addressing issues of ROI (Return on Investment), as well as adoption (commonly referred to as What's in it for me? aka WIIFM), both on an individual and institutional level. While finding the right social media approach posed numerous challenges, it was inspiring to hear about instances where key stakeholders "got it." Maybe it was when a senior executive was shown that their (previously unknown to them) Youtube video--one in which they were discussing the organization--had several hundred views. Or how, when a particular organization decided to jump into Twitter, it was the organization's receptionist that spearheaded the adoption, adding a real "voice" to the account. Or my favorite, which is of a VP of HR at this very event going from, in the space of less than 24 hours, not knowing what Pinterest was to having an account and getting onto Twitter. This all just by having a conversation with a peer at the event who was able to articulate the pros and cons in a hands-on manner. An a-ha moment in real time!

@victorio_m I just created a #pinterest board for the conference and have speaker pics/ blog or twitter links #tcbsm4hr

— Trish McFarlane (@TrishMcFarlane) April 17, 2012

Once again, The Conference Board has delivered a quality event. I look forward to future ones. I thank all of the speakers for their information and insight into this topic, and I wish the participants the best of luck in their professional endeavors.