2.0topia?

Andrew McAfee is one of my favorite bloggers and is always worth reading. However, his latest post seems a bit on the utopian end of the spectrum. Below is the comment I submitted:

Andrew,

I think you're right as far as you go. And, I basically agree with your suggestions. However, they do have a bit of a utopian whiff.

The Web/Enterprise 2.0 hype reminds me a bit of the "information for free" buzz that surrounded books like Kauffman's "Origins of Order" in the mid-90's. It's a nice dream, but I think less likely than we might wish.

Enterprises have goals that require individuals to act in a coherent fashion. To achieve those goals, they must Execute certain activities in a reliable fashion (e.g., core processes). At the same time, they need to Explore new opportunities that emerge from a shifting technological, memetic, economic, etc. landscape. Exploration work incrementally improves Execution capabilities and potentially modifies the organizations goals by uncovering disruptive opportunities.

Web/Enterprise 2.0 holds the promise of a quantum leap forward in an organization's capability to Explore/Innovate. The key is to integrate Exploration with Execution in a way that increases agility & adaptability without sacrificing the coherence required to maintain the organization's health (e.g., profitability). As others have mentioned, the primary challenge is probably at the DNA level of the organization (identity, values, narrative fragments, mental models, etc.) I suspect that much of the DNA-level change will be largely an emergent phenomena, and Web/Enterprise 2.0 has a key role to play in catalyzing that change.

Note: Others (e.g., Tushman, Christensen, Hagel & Seely Brown) have drawn contrasts similar to what I've characterized as Execution-Exploration. After stumbling across the basic contrast about 1.5 years ago while analyzing technological change vs. organization change I found these writers (among others) had already discussed it. The fact that this contrast continues to appear in various flavors is perhaps one indicator that it is important.