Dion Hitchcliffe asks the question: Is it time for a C-level social media executive? The summary includes the statement,” Does centralizing make sense, or should responsibility for it be spread across the business? I think this is the key question. He then goes through a number of options as to who should own social media. First there is IT but they have never been good at social media.
He then looks at the business side and points out that the scope of social media cover customers (CRM), workers HRM, and partners ERP. So you could make the case that the person in charge of each of these three functions has a legit shot at the job. But then you are missing out the other two
Dion concludes — “even though I think it will take a while for most companies to create it — I think a C-level social media role will be profoundly useful, particularly because it would be focused on business and not technology.” I agree completely.
I wrote about this a while back (see - Does a Senior Exec Need to be in Charge of Enterprise Collaboration?) based on an excellent post by Jacob Morgan, Do Organizations Need a Chief Collaboration Officer? I wrote at the time, whatever you decide to call this person, I think that there is a compelling argument that someone at a senior level needs to have his or her sole responsibility be to support collaboration across the enterprise.
McKinsey has well documented the financial benefits of the connected enterprise and Jacob offering some strong arguments to support this role. His best one was, “the need to look at “collaboration from a holistic big picture of how it impacts everyone.” I concluded, whether you call the person a CCO or some other title, the organizations that put someone in charge of collaboration and give this person the budget and staff to do their job will be the winners in our ever connected markets.
Here is another take on the topic I just saw from fast Company, Why Your Company Needs A Chief Collaboration Officer.
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