Notes from the Online Community Unconference East 2010

By Matthew Lees

This week’s snow storm in New York City only marginally hampered this week’s Online Community Unconference East 2010 (OCUE10), a one-day event run by Forum One Communications. With a nod to local commuters, the program ended an hour early, although quite a few attendees were stuck in New York for the night due to rail and air cancellations. The snow kept some people at home, particularly those coming from more distant locations — it was disappointing, though understandable and, in hindsight, wise — that the Impact Interactions team didn’t venture north — but attendance overall was good. Not quite the 200 online community strategists, practitioners, vendors, and consultants that were originally expected that, but not too far off that number.

It was a good event, though not as strong as previous ones, despite the improved facilitation. Unconferences follow an Open Space-like methodology more frequently used, it seems, on the West coast than on the East. Attendees run the sessions themselves, selecting topics based something of interest, whether they’re expert in that subject or just want to talk about it and think others will, too. It’s a bit of organized chaos in which one of the underlying philosophical tenets is that you’re responsible for your own experience.

The Unconference’s theme was “Moving Forward, Together.” That’s a worthy and appropriate objective. Forum One did set the stage for us to think about our personal and professional goals, the direction of the industry, and ways of taking action and moving things forward, well, together. This is easier said than done, though, even for a group of inherently collaborative-minded souls. While I admittedly sucked the air out of a planning session intent on industry-wide adoption of social business metrics, the efforts are well intentioned. Making things happen will be a challenge, but with some sustained work and outreach to other concerned organizations, such initiatives could potentially gain some traction.

But my main frustration was that the sessions, which sometimes stay on topic and sometimes don’t, largely didn’t. Perhaps that’s part of the point of the format, to go wherever the discussions take you. But if I attend a session on, say, B2B revenue streams, I’d like to really dig into that topic. Tangents can be the norm, however. It also can take a while, sometimes 20 to 30 minutes of a one-hour session, for people to get on the same page regarding terminology. It’s not that the digressions are irrelevant or that the conversations are uninteresting; they’re usually not. It’s just that, more often than not, we didn’t get into the real substance I’m really looking for.

That said, it’s always good to see old friends, make new ones, and discuss things we’re all passionate about. Here are some observations:

• Job Changes and Hiring. In recent months I’ve seen more than a few community and social media professionals change jobs, sometimes due to layoffs, sometimes due to taking advantage of a new opportunity. At the OCUE 2010 I learned of even more. And a few people mentioned that their organizations were hiring. This is good news for the industry (although perhaps small solace for the many who are still looking for jobs).

• Business Value. It’s pretty clear that the exploratory phase is over for online communities. More and more organizations are all but requiring bottom line results, or at least a solid plan to get there. If you’re a vendor, agency, or consulting group that can speak to helping an organization achieve quantifiable, attributable ROI success, you’ll have a leg (or two) up the competition.

• Community Strategy: Beyond Your Site. Bill Johnston, Forum One’s Chief Community Officer and the Unconference’s host, summed this up nicely, saying “Most companies are trying to pull together a more holistic strategy.” A lot of attendees talked to this point, and how they’re trying to consolidate and streamline their community and social media strategies. If your organization is running one or more online communities, that’s one or more customer-facing touchpoints. But you’re likely involved with Twitter, LinkedIn, other social sites, and perhaps some independent communities as well. Fractured strategy translates into a poor customer experience, diminished brand identity, and limited business results.

• Organizational Issues. This one will be with us for a long time. Organizational dynamics play a major role in the success (or not) of community and social initiatives. They’re also a contributor to the many tales of woe that attendees talked about. People were looking for ways of breaking down silos, clarifying ownership, ending turf wars, undoing inappropriate and/or ineffective structure, and getting more buy-in from colleagues and the executive suite. (One of my favorite quotes was from a Microsoft community manager who said, referencing collaboration among his company’s business units, “Any coordination between these groups happens accidentally.” That’s too bad, but, sad to say, not uncommon.)

Look for the next Forum One Unconference in Mountain View, CA on June 9, 2010. It’s doubtful they’ll have to worry about snow…

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6 Responses to “Notes from the Online Community Unconference East 2010”

Bill Chamberlin says:

February 15, 2010 at 4:02 pm

Matthew…. I could not make this conference so I was happy when my colleague Pauline Ores told me to check out your summary. I think I am even happier now as it seems the conference was not as productive as it could have been. I do second your thought that 2010 is a year that we need to show some type of ROI/business value results from communities. While we all know that business value is created, we need to do the due diligence to track and report how much value. Anyway…thanks for your summary here.

MatthewLees says:

February 16, 2010 at 9:13 am

Thanks for stopping by, Bill. Pauline is aces.

With 3-4 dozen sessions at a typical Unconference, one person can only join so many discussions, so my experience may certainly be different from those of many others. A friend of mine told me that someone on her team who she sent in her stead said she learned a lot and thought it was fabulous. So experiences vary.

And do let us all know if you share your musings (or direct experience) on ROI/business value of online communities…even if it’s on another site or blog.

Bill Johnston says:

February 16, 2010 at 1:07 pm

Hi Matthew – thanks for coming, and for the thorough report back.

I agree that we were hampered by the weather, with about 40 folks having to drop our or come late because of the snow.

To your main point of frustration: the session formats. This really comes down to the people in the room. If the convener doesn’t keep the conversation on topic, and if the folks in the room don’t agree on session objectives at the beginning, you can certainly get topic creep. I think we both experienced this in the B2B communities session. I still got value out of that session because of the deep discussion of subscription business models, although I could see that you may have gotten less because of your position as an analyst.

One idea from this could be that we give better guidance on how to hold a productive session at our future Unconferences. I would also welcome any ideas or suggestions you may have.

Overall, I thought this was a strong event, albeit one hampered by weather-related attendance and timing issues.

One thing we can agree on, and as you have both noted, Pauline Ores rocks! Pauline actually mentioned (I’m paraphrasing) in the closing circle that she was pleased that the conversation at the Unconferences has moved over the last three years, and that sessions were at a higher level of sophistication than in years past. Matthew – I think you missed this as you were out of the room for the closing session.

Again – I welcome any feedback on how to make the Unconferences more valuable for attendees in the future.

MRowland says:

February 16, 2010 at 1:37 pm

I’m sure the event would have benefited from our being there too! (Ah the weather…)

Bill, I like the idea of providing just a little bit of guidance on using the time for the topic at hand prior to the sign ups. Encourage the attendees to stay on topic during the session, but that if it runs its course and ends early to engage with a related topic.

In most of your unconferences that I’ve attended, there has always been a little time after each session to introduce a slightly different yet related topic to the group at the session. The only exception seems to be the metrics/ROI sessions…In fact, that’s how I’ve been able to grow my network and learn quite a lot at your events.

MatthewLees says:

February 16, 2010 at 5:43 pm

Yes, I was sorry that a client call kept me from joining the wrap up at the end of the day. I missed that closure, as well as, apparently, Pauline’s reflection on how things are indeed moving forward. That’s great to know. (And, Bill, I definitely missed what was no doubt one of your usual delightful and insightful summations.)

There are indeed more variables at play at Unconferences than at more traditional scripted, presentation-oriented conferences. That’s one of the reasons why they’re important to attend, too. The frustration I described above was specific to one aspect of my own individual experience at this particular event, and shouldn’t be taken as an indictment of either the methodology (which is tried and true) or the management organization (i.e., Forum One, which is tops).

Could guidelines and direction help keep things on track? Sure. But it would also be important to (1) keep a low barrier to entry (so people don’t shy away from running sessions), and (2) ensure that some degree of spontaneity remains.

In any case, I do expect to be at next year’s OCUE, if they’ll let me…

Online Community Unconference East 2010 – A Report Back | Online Community Report says:

August 19, 2010 at 4:29 pm

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