Ton hits the nail on the head when he states that possible barriers to company blogs revolve around fear.  In a post where he links to 10 points why companies won't blog, he says :

"These 10 objections sound like very likely to be brought up when introducing blogs in a company. But the reasoning behind these objections has nothing to do with blogging as such, but everything to do with such a company having missed the cluetrain.

The list exudes the fear of talking to people. And also of fear of letting your people talk. That's fear of self-reflection.

........Blogs as a way of communicating of course are only useful in some situations, and as an answer to some business needs or problems. But usefulness is not inversely proportional to fear. Business should not be conducted on the basis of fear, as it so often is. It should be conducted on the basis of vision and self-belief, as it so often is not."

As an aside, and as Independence Day draws near on the 15th of August, i thought i'd share a poem we were taught in school, written in a different era, and context - it is simple yet exquisite.  It was written as a plea for political independence that India was striving for at the time. 

Where the mind is without fear

Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high;
Where knowledge is free;
Where the world has not been broken up into fragments by narrow domestic walls;
Where words come out from the depth of truth;
Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection;
Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way into the dreary desert sand of dead habit;
Where the mind is led forward by thee into ever-widening thought and action--
Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.

      -- Rabindranath Tagore

I think it is relevant today too - as a prayer for freedom from dead habit and fears that paralyse change. Not that companies will buy this.  (The tragedy is very few humans do too - but thats off-topic).

We need to find the elevator pitch that leads companies to blogging :

from attraction - to interest - to conversation - to unblocking fears - to conversion

The attraction and interest may be there and are more easily generated, the conversations have started, yet fear builds a wall.  And this is the hugest hurdle in the adoption cycle.  

9:30:34 PM    comment []  trackback []

Experimenting and having fun with tools and utilities.  Just added this guestmap to my blog.  Should be interesting to see a geographic spread of readers :).

Welcome to my GuestMap!  Would love it if you mark your location and leave a message. The link's on the right panel.

6:39:54 PM    comment []  trackback []