What are the risks for using tools linking people online?

After a recent webinar I helped present about social media and digital communities, several people quizzed me afterwards about the risks involved with using social media as a catalyst for building such communities. 

When you're not in the conversation, you're not part of the community

I told one inquisitor - I'll call him Alan - that I was at a conference of the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) a few years ago and this question was raised several times. I recall that one DCI said his officers had to be responsible for their actions online - "after all they are grownups" - and he warned that if the police were not part of the online conversation, they would not be part of the community and the community would then act without them. A prescient point given that the London riots happened a few months later, fuelled largely off the back of online networks. These days most police forces have comprehensive social media strategies as a result.

I guess the point is that you need to be taking part and that involvement helps you to mitigate risk. If there’s no involvement then you will not be able to:

• a, have a dialogue with your community,
• b, be able to work proactively within your community, and
• c, importantly, you won’t have the established networks or presence to be able to defend yourself and protect your online reputation if you community turns against you for some reason.

Social media networks want your data

The other side of that debate is about big data and how information is used when people get involved with social networks and freely divulge information about themselves online. It should not be forgotten that Google, Facebook and Twitter are private enterprises that want data about you to make money. This often seems to be forgotten when you’re encouraged to go onto Facebook or Twitter by the BBC or ITV.  Also, how is data used by local government, the police, NHS etc? These are debates happening at the moment, ie what about the activities at GCHQ? 

But getting back to the question: there have to be corporate rules around using social media for every organisation, ie what is the name of the Twitter account, who runs it, what is the thrust of the messaging and the conversations etc? Nevertheless, too many corporate constraints will stymie the good work you want to do regarding community building.

How to kill a tweet

I’ve often heard people in local government say that the comms team has to meet and agree on every Tweet before posting them. That level of central control - let alone tedious time wasting - will not allow you to build a network of like-minded souls nor help you to engage in a dialogue with people who live in the streets near your office.

Social workers would, of course, never divulge intimate details of the people they help, nor would doctors of their patients. It’s all about striking the right balance and agreeing this beforehand, but not stifling free debate. It’s a balancing act. But not to act is far more of a risk than to take part.

(Anyone interested in the webinar I co presented with OLM please see the slideshare post below)

Slideshow on how to build a digital community and make it sustainable

Social care & health goes digital - top tips for online success from Adam Ratliff

Digital communities - how we make them work

Today's blog is about digital communities of interest. How people, particularly vulnerable people, can improve their lives by using digital networks, downloadable apps and tools such as Twitter, Facebook, YouTube etc.

Videos, podcasts and apps

It's actually worth exploring all these functions in some detail.

Recently I've been working on a website featuring online tools for teaching English as a foreign language. Incredibly, most of the video and podcast tools and apps used by the teachers and students are free, easily downloaded onto laptops, tablets and smart phones. The apps are tools to help people hampered by language barriers to communicate more easily. And it occurred to me that it's only a small step taking these apps and tools from education and applying them to communties. I'll start to explore some of these apps in more details in later blogs, but suffice to say they help create and sustain communities, and these communities are the heart of the matter.

Communities of interest

So what does communities of interest mean? When using this term I refer specifically to people who live in a local community or neighbourhood. People with mental health issues, disabilities of some sort, older people who can't get out, or community activists who seek a better life for all. The in-term among local government employees is co-production. Nevertheless, all digital communities have the similar aspirations of collective problem solving and collaboration and you can just as easily be talking about English language students, businesses or charities. The template suits all.

In England and Wales, the reforms in health and social care have put unbearable pressure on professionals - and the people they serve - to deliver services to local people efficiently and more cheaply. More for less, is the term used. Of course, it's nonsense, but the reality is that people will need to start fending for themselves as local services are cut and professionals' workloads become overstretched and harder to deliver.

Working together

As a result, there is a new emphasis on community and collaboration. Working together. But as this community is at the heart of the evolving social landscape, how can it deliver what’s needed in the future?

The idea is that digital social networks will create vital connections that help people develop relationships within their communities. For health and social care (think doctors, nurses, meals on wheels, home visits to the elderly etc), this needs to be organised and managed.

Digital story telling - let the people talk

Using social media for community, consultation and service development has huge advantages, so long as we engage in more egalitarian forms of conversations with the people around us - and let the people talk about themselves and what they want. A problem shared is a problem solved, and most people in their own communities are the best ones to solve those problems.
 

Blogs, Facebook, Twitter

The overwhelming means of communications  on these digital networks is through the written word, texting, blogging, then come images, videos and audio podcasts. Blogs, Facebook posts, Twitter updates, Pinterest pins. They are all forms of content through digital story telling and conversations.

People and their communities have stories to tell and the best way to engage is to listen and act on what they have to say. Their dialogue is now through social networks and increasingly on mobile phones.

Technology – and social media in particular – is changing the way everyone communicates. That's large and small organisations with their employees, partners, stakeholders and customers.

The test for us all is how we use the new digital tools and how we manage and teach communities to use them in a sustainable way. A way that will build digital communities of interest, while solving the painful issues of government cuts in funding and closures of local services vital for people to live relatively enjoyable lives.

Helping professionals to help themselves and the people who they live among; it's an attractive proposition - and we can make it work. In the next post I'll try to answer this last conundrum, while in future posts I'll examine some of the apps that are suitable for using in your professional and personal life.

And, of course, I'll post a few blogs to promote clarity in writing for bloggers.

Bye for now

Andrew