I just did a presentation to a Concours Group teleconference called the CLO Staff Meeting, with a number of large companies in the US and Europe participating. I talked about wikis, blogs, and other new technologies and how they both are new elements in the external environment – using blogs to address customers and suppliers, for instance – and very powerful tools for internal knowledge sharing and communication.

I was very encouraged by the lively discussion and good commentary – several of the companies, both in the US and Europe, were using wikis internally, and were considering blogs. They were wrestling with such issues as to what extent the wikis or blogs should be public or not, as well as how people’s concept of ownership of information was being challenged.

One reflection I made after the call was that blogs, in addition to the increasing use as communication tools with end consumers, will be great tools for shared services organizations to communicate with their internal customers – the relationship between an internal IT provider and their customers is more collaborative, there is less of a "leak" issue, and a blog might just be the tool to move the relationship from a transactional, user-provider relationship to a partnership where provider and customer are exploring new opportunities together.

If they are used honestly and creatively, of course.

Anyway – great fun!

PS: Here is a link to my paper Using Wikis in a corporate context, which discusses some of these issues.