“How would you re-invent our digital presence for greater relevance to the IET stakeholders?”

short answer:-

commodify the means, specialise the ends

The IET Home Page:

This report:

 

Starting Point

 

 

 

Agreed – a professional community is defined by, and develops around, its body of knowledge. Traditionally this has been through the medium of publishing with the added spin-off that it became a source of income generation from the institutions to subsidise the fees paid by the membership.

We can think of a basic model of the professional organisation comprising the link between the source of knowledge and the consumers of knowledge. Within this knowledge chain linking the creators of knowledge and the consumers of knowledge there are industries which represent intermediaries [such as the publishers or purchasing consortia], newly emerging channels which by-pass elements of the chain [such as self publishing] and new entrants who work with metadata [data about the fundamental knowledge] changing the dynamics of the relationships and value in the chain [an example of which is Google with Search and Scholar].

Together we are engaged in a game of technological ‘cat and mouse’ in which established locus of interest and source of income are becoming disrupted and new alternatives are developing as a direct substitute. For all membership organisations it is a threat and an opportunity.

The Challenge: Means and Ends

Ends: what is our community thinking?

Figure 1 – NCVO Future Focus 8

Means: how are our core assets performing?

Knowledge is at the heart of the claim that professional bodies make for their legitimacy.

Yet, traditional ways of association and social interaction are increasingly facing competition from Internet-based social computing.

The formal structures and hierarchies provided by professional bodies are being challenged by alternatives that are more informal, spontaneous and for this reason perhaps more attractive to a younger generation.

Increasingly, people are finding that much of their networking and informational needs can be met without the cost of membership or barriers to entry that a membership of a professional body has historically entailed.

This trend has been reinforced by the blurring of the boundaries between workplace and home which has destabilized or disrupted established ways of working and interacting with information.

Professional bodies are under pressure to adapt, innovate and diversify.

Piers Cain – CMI

 

Themes: how do our capabilities work together?

In a world of rapid technological, professional and political change the most effective strategies are more emergent than deliberate: characterised by being strong on ends, light on means, managed through feedback and delivered through agility.

 

Steps & Stages

Digital Learning

Under the convergence that follows from the digital economy we can recognise the IET challenges manifest in other organisations and other sectors. This has two great advantages

• We can learn from others
• We can compare with others

Not only does this comparison help to develop our own thinking it helps recognise the opportunities for partnerships and alliances which amplify collective value and provides the foundation for partnerships [The IET will therefore investigate opportunities to form partnerships with other Institutions, including around education activities, policy and professional registration].

My comparison is based on my own experience and comes from those institutions I have used regularly over the last few years. Whilst the summary is very basic it does illustrate the range of digitally derived ideas.

 

Knowing the Goal

Using this set of organisations there are a number of valuable comparisons that can be used to help shape and determine actions and activities. Appropriate ‘best of class’ institutions should form the core of our ‘roadmap’ and the benchmark for our progress. Internally we have to copy from the best, externally we have to differentiate our membership proposition.

Our road-map will be signposted by our choice of best in class, we need to navigate by the digital compass:-

Numbers Count

We should become obsessed by numbers, leaders in the digital world have a passion for measurement. Google is ‘super-numerate’ using data to validate changes and determine progress.

As an example on digital positioning the RSA has produced a big spike in interest based on their initiative in attracting interesting ‘named’ speakers as part of their thought leadership.

 

For The IET the big change has come from the introduction of the game Cogitate but, seemingly, core assets such as the video speaker library attracts little interest through the search engines [Google accounts for 44% of inbound traffic from google.co.uk and 27% from google.co.uk].

 

Other data can be usefully be used and interpreted to explore and define strategies

 

Data without communication and understanding is worthless. Heatmaps should be used to visualise and communicate our progress and the relationship of resources and response.

The Secrets of Our Success

Re-Thinking: Technology

There are a number of profound factors driving technology in the Internet age

• The hegemony of the internal IT department is past, the ubiquity of Internet Services such as the Cloud galvanise standards and transform economics.
• The Internet is re-defining quality expectations around ease of use, integration and serviceability.
• There is a proliferation of form factors, channels and devices to consume content. No single channel is dominant, all are important.
• In the world of copyright usability is not an effective barrier to abuse, indeed bad usability simply encourages a quality defection.
• The Internet is re-using learning, usability is familiarity as consumer experiences are shared and re-used.
• The Internet is transforming the economics of production, of product bundling and of payment. Technology is entwined with economics.

Re-Thinking: Focus

Re-Thinking: People

There is a schism in age. Anyone who has seen technology emerge continues to see the technology long after it matures, those who grow up with it do not recognise capability as technology.

So – what we may see as word processing or email is not recognised by the under 30s who just communicate and do stuff. It has a big impact on what we build and how we build. It requires novel approaches, clear communication and new participants.

Institutionally we need to blend enthusiasm & experience, naivety & judgement, technology & content. The variety of channels and communities requires simply much more effort and openness from the institution and its suppliers.

Key Points

• Digital Changes Everything: the means of production, the possibilities of delivery and the practicalities of partnerships
• Membership is at the core: retaining the focus on members and the profession anchors a uniqueness and purpose and keeps ownership of the origin and endpoint of the value chain.
• Common problems & common strategies: we have more to gain and less to lose from the commoditisation of the means of production but delivered uniquely.
• Partnerships are essential in the digital age: usability is delivered by other peoples technology, usability is driving new expectation [Facebook like, YouTube like]
• Fundamental architectures enable success: agility of content, focus of action, commitment of resources, visibility of activity, communication of progress.

Key Sources

www.alexa.com – for the web statistics

www.worlde.net – for the word maps

The challenge to professional knowledge: How CMI is adapting to prosper in the digital age. Piers Cain, CMI. Business Information Review, 27(3) 152–158, 2010

Future Focus 8: What will membership be like in 5 years’ time? National Council for Voluntary Organisations, Third Sector Foresight. ISBN: 978-0-7199-1796-7. © NCVO 2010

Business Model Generation: A Handbook for Visionaries, Game Changers, and Challengers. Alexander Osterwalder, Yves Pigneur. John Wiley & Sons (2010) ISBN-10: 0470876417

The IET Annual Report 2009 http://www.theiet.org/about/governance/annual-reports/annual-report-2009.cfm