10 FREE RESOURCES for your Journey with Social Media in the Enterprise and Employee Engagement

From PollyPearson.com:

My friend Allan Steinmetz of Inward Strategic Consulting and I just finished a Webcast featuring EMC's story on building an employment brand and engaging employees by leveraging web 2.0 and social media behaviors /tools.

I discussed how the body of work started, our strategic approach, how the brand was built out across multiple mediums and social properties, and how along the way organic brand ambassadors emerged and started making real magic happen.

This topic always draws a large audience and today was no exception.

For those who want to start the social media/Web 2.0 behavior and tool movement at your company, I thought I'd share a few resources which could help:

• 1st: This white paper, "A Journey in Social Media," by EMC VP and Marketing CTO Chuck Hollis. Chuck was instrumental in this movement at EMC and kindly dedicated his personal cycles to pulling some of our strategic inflection points, key learnings, and approaches together in this white paper. The white paper is marked "draft" and his promises likely typos within it -- no matter, this is GOLD for anyone about to start the journey. It is a superb documentation which should save you a ton of headaches and unnecessary consultant fees. It is also filled with the type of frankness you just don't seen enough in businesss. Like this, which addresses the likely request for a business case, an ROI justification, or another means to counter the concerns of your Chief-Bummer-Executive.

One of our most effective justification techniques tended to be slightly manipulative given our corporate culture. We frequently pointed out to people that -- due to the extremely competitive nature of EMC and our business -- we would not want to be in a situation where our competitors had a significant competitive advantage through social media proficiency that we did not have. People tended to understand that concept in a very visceral manner. ----> I love that explanation! It is very "real world."

• 2nd: The blog, "Web Strategy by Jeremiah Owyang." Jeremiah is the top rated analyst in the social media and the enterprise space. He has the top blog on the subject, has been named the top (and most trusted) analyst on Twitter ... and puts out non-stop gems via his Twitter feed and blog.
• 3rd: The blog, a Journey in Social Media. Chuck Hollis documented EMC's journey over the first year or so on this blog. He doesn't post any longer, but the content is awesome and could answer lots of questions for those companies of this FORTUNE 500-size.
• 4th: The blog, "Confessions of an eBiz Junkie." It is written by EMC's Web Master -- the guy behind those .com, and Knowledge Management Platforms of the '90s ... which are morphing into the social platforms of the 21st Century. Len has been the guy getting his hands dirty in this technical stuff from the beginning -- and today serves as our head Social Media Strategist as well. Check out his tag cloud on this blog -- that will give you a feel for what he writes about all the time. I think you'll enjoy following his work.
• 5th: The blog, "Social Media Musings." It is written by EMC's Jamie Pappas, Len's parter in social media strategy and the woman who was chief community manager and chief Road Show Pitch Person at every staff meeting at EMCin the early 2.0 days doing show & tell on how this social network thing worked. Jamie is in the top professional organizations and can give you the inside scoop on worthy and waste-of-time things to consider as you move forward.
• 6th: My blog, "Building and Branding Careers, Culture and Cool." Hardly a post goes by here where I don't reference the positive transformation evidence at play in cultures, careers, brands, and business strategy as a result of the behavior models and tools in our 2.0 world. This blog provides case studies and stories, along with strategy and reports on our latest thinking with regard to engaging people and building brands.

And for those individuals who are still on the journey of understanding how this all works and getting personally comfortable with the tools and the career benefits, I recommend these resources:

• 7th: The blog, "Community and Social Media," by Chris Brogan. Chris offers a ton of free eBooks, a free newsletter and a very friendly blogging style which taught me a lot. Now he's a top consultant, and author in this area as well.
• 8th: The "blog roll" of every one of the above blogs. This is generally a list, listed on the right or left rail of the blog, of the favorite blogs these authors read. Poke around in there. See who these people are following.
• 9th: Twitter. Sign up and then leverage Twitter Lists or Twitter Search and type in words like "Social Media." Follow the pre-populated lists of people who write about that subject. Save Twitter, or a more robust version like "Tweet Deck" on your desktop. Visit it a couple times a day -- like when you need a stretch from email. See what content the gurus in this space are attaching, forwarding, and talking about. You'll be up-to-the minute in no time!
• 10th: Google Reader. This is your new daily newspaper and on-line mentor for how this world works. You pop all these blogs onto this one space, set it as your home page, and experience the learning start to happen! If you have an internet-enabled mobile device, be sure to bookmark your Google reader so you can have your "newspaper" with you where ever you go!

Okay, that's 10 Free Resources that will get you smart in no time. I'm talking about 30-60 days if you dedicate just a little bit of time each day on your Google Reader (it will also suggest blogs to you as well, based on who and what you show an interest in!), and on your Tweet Deck. You'll learn even faster if you join the discussions, post a comment and -- horrors -- start a blog.

For those who have a decent Gen Y dynamic at play in your company, here's a bonus:

• #11: Personal Branding Blog. Get in the head of the 2.0 movement via this blog's 20-something leader, author, speaker, and career counselor, Dan Schawbel. Dan has been my reverse mentor and chief cheerleader in gaining a hands-on experience in this space. I encourage you to get a reverse mentor of your own (someone of any age or rank who gets excited about this subject and clearly seems to 'get it.') Until you get that person, subscribe to Dan's blog. It is loaded with fresh research and insights and shows you how this 2.0 world can put a brand, including a personal brand, on steroids.