… or not

In the analogy, think of how the high gravity that exists closer to the sun and how it affects movement. The closer to the center the more rigid and formal everything is. By the same token, the further from the center, the more loose and disconnected things are.

• Rigid: portals managed centrally, typically by the communications department. Although too rigid for collaboration, they make for a good top down (tightly managed) communication channel where central control is important.
• Formal: departmental sites, managed in accordance to corporate structures. At this level, collaborations is structured and based on pre-defined groups. Mostly used to share managed documents at the departmental level. Regulated by the department and policies.
• Right Balance: not too structured not too loose. Governed by an evolving culture and guidelines. Although flexible to allow for non-anticipated types of collaboration and innovation (open collaboration), it is still connected enough to the enterprise goals and existing processes to produce tangible business value. This balance varies for each enterprise or organization.
• Loose: collaboration groups or initiatives that are still forming (emergent) and may flow towards mainstream by finding the “right balance” or drift towards the disconnected oblivion.
• Disconnected: so loose that it becomes disconnected. This includes the sprawl of collaboration sites that are disconnected from each other and at times from the organization as well. Although benign in small scales when it grows it aggravates problems such as data duplication, data quality and collaboration silos. Typically no policy, no guidelines and no visibility.

Related posts: Content Management Formality Spectrum & Social Network – The Intersection Diagram