In Malcolm Gladwell’s New Yorker article “Small Change” from October 4, 2010, he lays out what I think is a pretty convincing article around the theme that what counts as activism within social networks in today’s world really doesn’t compare to real-life activism from history such as the 1960s civil rights movement in the US, the tearing down of the Berlin Wall, etc.  He speaks of the differences in structure between what I’ll call ‘social media activism’ and ‘true activism,’ explaining networks vs. hierarchies.  It really takes a hierarchy to get any movement past a certain point – there must be strong leaders rather than a bunch of people disagreeing who carry equal weight. He also says that social media activists are involved in low-risk ways…the causes usually don’t demand great personal risk or sacrifice or courage like it would have taken to be a young black student and sit down to order at a whites-only counter in Greensboro, NC in 1960.  Gladwell is making a statement that “social media can’t provide what social change has always required,” and my interpretation is that he means social change has always needed people who are committed 100% to move the cause forward, no matter the personal risk or sacrifice required of them.  But social media activism doesn’t at all demand this same level of commitment, so it’s easier to commit.

In today’s world, it is so easy to jump on the bandwagon for a cause on the social network of your choice, or to say things that you might not say to someone’s face. For example, if you were a young black student in the South in 1960 at a whites only lunch counter, you’d think twice about what you’d say directly to the angry white crowd behind you.  But if you were in your living room on your laptop, and the angry crowd is just in cyberspace, I’d bet you may let loose with a few choice words.

My thought here is less about the activism angle, and more about what people say and do online. The two are closely linked, and that’s what has gotten me thinking today.  It would have been hard to miss the hoopla leading up to the Thanksgiving holiday in the US around the new TSA security procedures in airports – new electronic body scanners and intense, extreme physical pat-downs.  Kunar Patel provides some insights and observations from AdAge’s recent Me* Conference, and he references a panel where Mark Ghuneim, CEO of Wiredset, discussed this very topic.  Ghuneim talked about all the chatter on Twitter and other social networks prior to Thanksgiving, including threats of boycotts and protests to hold security lines up on the very busy travel days.  He said that 1 in 10 tweets prior to Thanksgiving contained #TSA or mentioned the pat-downs, yet no protests actually surfaced in US airports on those busiest travel days of the year, and security measures were carried out without interruption.  “It was a really good example of talking the talk, but not walking the walk,” Ghuneim said.

Talking the talk but not walking the walk – I can think of other recent examples of this from within my own network.  For instance, how is it exactly that by changing my Facebook profile picture to a cartoon character this weekend am I helping in the campaign to stop violence against children?  Right…I don’t know either.  Yet many of my Facebook friends have taken this step. I’m not faulting them for doing so – of course we’d all like to stop violence against children.  But if that is truly a cause they care about, will they volunteer at a local center that counsels child victims of violence? Will they donate money to the efforts? Will they walk door-to-door informing citizens and neighbors of the problem that exists in their area in an attempt to gain awareness and action to prevent it?  I’m guessing none of my own friends will do any of those things, but it sure was easy to feel good for a few days by changing the profile pic.

Not walking the walk…let’s get to me. I don’t exonerate myself in this area – I’ve certainly taken similar steps like changing my profile pic for varying causes, and might even do it again in the future.  And what about what I’ve said in tweets or status updates? Last week I had to take my car in to get my week-old brakes fixed since they weren’t working properly. Nobody wants brakes that don’t work. I talk to the same guy I’d worked with the week prior, explained that the car wasn’t stopping exactly on demand, asked that they drive it, see for themselves, and fix it as quickly as possible.  I’d been sitting in the waiting area for about an hour when my cell phone rings, and it’s my husband telling me that the brakes guy has called him, and the two of them have decided that they’ll be installing new brake pads today.  I was so irked! This guy had called my husband to discuss the issues rather than walking out front and talking to me face to face.  I immediately took to Facebook, and posted “Sitting here waiting to hear about fixing my brakes. My phone rings and it’s the husband b/c the car service guy has called him rather than walking thru the door and talking to me. I’m sitting right here! Geez.”  A few friends immediately validated my indignation as they added their comments and tales of similar experiences to the status thread.  And yet, when said service guy appears again, I’m pretty nice, and I just ask how soon my car will be ready.  I worry about making him mad so that he takes even longer with my car – I am really ready to get my car, go home, and be done with that place.  I was somewhat sassy on Facebook, yet perfectly meek when a face-to-face encounter came into play.

So are we bolder online? From my recent observations and personal experiences, I say yes, I think we are.  Do you think so too?  Will we the people of social media today make changes to this type of behavior just because we recognize that it’s happening? Hmmm.

I really enjoyed the livestream of the event, which I was supposed to co-host with Stowe. The other speakers were funny, informative and engaging – even the other victims of travel problems who provided videos.

The focus of my talk was the idea that hanging shiny social media baubles on the cold, hard external walls of a corporate organisation runs the risk of creating a false brand promise unless this work has strong internal underpinnings in the form of social business structures that can do something about the noise, insights and feedback that outbound communications generate.

Key to achieving this is building bridges between the inside and outside worlds, and recognising that we are all (corporate, as well as human beings) products of our networks, ecosystems and connections. I touched on Christakis’ work on contagion and the influence of social networks and emphasised what an opportunity this embodies for brands with a strong value proposition, such as the poster child of modern customer service Zappos, and how this also creates a building-block, API-style opportunity for others to build on your products or services to create even more value.

Social business strategy and infrastructure have a key role to play in this process, and can help shift the balance towards people over process. It is also time, I think, to put into practice all the wonderful learning we have gathered over recent years about how people work, what motivates and influences them, rather than continue with the huge waste of talent and energy caused by existing hierarchical bureaucracies. Finally, I offered some thoughts on necessary precursors for social business design work in organisations, and shared my colleague Caroline Dangson’s recent observations on what to look for in an internal champion.

This post originally appeared on the Headshift blog.

Two weeks ago, Kate Niederhoffer spoke on the “Social Psychological Principles of Change” at our Social Business Summit here in Austin. Mainly, bringing about change by promoting positive behaviors, rather than punishing negative ones.

In her presentation, Kate said to start focusing on changing behaviors rather than changing attitudes. As humans, we have an inherent need to belong. We want to be in agreement with the people around us so that they’ll like us and we’ll fit in. As a result, we will agree to ideas that we don’t fully accept. More and more, social psychologists find that people will generally say they support the stated goal in a group setting, i.e., “Let’s do social!” but then actually behave in the opposite way when no one is looking. So, their attitudes end up saying, “YES!” while their behaviors say “no.”

How can you change individual behaviors and, in turn, company culture? Realize that it’s easy to “talk the talk,” but you have to get people to “walk the walk” too.

1. Start by exposing people to their anti-social behaviors and show them how to develop new behaviors, possibly through a pilot program.
2. Don’t make a list of “no no’s.” I have personally seen companies make this mistake often, most obviously in their social media policies. A list of what not to do exacerbates anxiety and seems to more firmly root people in their old behaviors. If you want engagement, you can begin to encourage interaction by telling people what they can do, rather than what they can’t.
3. Introduce a new behavior set, not just new tools. Pair newbies up with those who have been playing in social spaces for a while. I think training is key to success. Once people know what they can do, help them understand how to do it. Fear of the unknown can be a major roadblock.

In reality, this concept is one we’ve been exposed to all our lives. Your mom tells you not to touch the hot stove, and all you can think about is touching the hot stove. Now, as an adult, you tell your employees not to email and all they can think about is emailing. It’s difficult to stop old behaviors and develop new ones, but your business can never be truly social without first addressing culture change.

What are you doing today to facilitate the culture change that a social business demands? If you’ve got the buy-in for “social,” attitudes are already in line. Now it’s time to start addressing the behaviors that feed your corporate culture. Don’t let your social strategy stall because you fail to encourage the right behaviors.

Kate Niederhoffer will be presenting at the Dachis Group Social Business Summit 2010 on the topic of how to use some principles of social psychology in your organization to help manage and understand how people react to change.

You’re going to talk about some principles of social psychology that can be extremely useful in the enterprise. Why don’t we learn this in business school?

Academia faces the same problems that businesses do: cross-departmental communication is not that good. It’s a pretty closed ecosystem. This is changing though, thanks to the popularity of books by Malcolm Gladwell (e.g. Tipping Point, Outliers, Blink) and the Heath brothers (Made to Stick, Switch) that make it to the Business Best Sellers Lists. Those are all filled with social psychology and written in, arguably, more compelling ways than academics write journal articles.

Tell us about your favorite research study that you won’t have time to include in your talk, and why it’s so fascinating?

Social psychologists have derived some really creative experimental paradigms! I’ve always loved Dutton and Aron’s (1974) Misattribution of Arousal. The experiment took place at Capilano Canyon in Vancouver where there’s a suspension bridge made of swaying planks, several hundred meters high. They were allegedly studying “scenic attractions on creativity” and used a very attractive female experimenter. The experimenter intercepted men after crossing the bridge– either immediately after, or on a park bench a few blocks away– and asked them to fill out a well-known psychological questionnaire where participants had to respond to some ambiguous images (Thematic Apperception Task). When they were done, as is typically done, the experimenter explained she would be available for questions about the experiment and provided her phone number. Turns out, this was one of the outcome measures! Men intercepted immediately after crossing the bridge had more sexual imagery in their responses AND were more likely to call the experimenter and ask her out than those who had a chance to catch their breath after the exhilarating walk! What happened was, the men misattributed their aroused physiology (fast heartrate and breathing) to the experimenter. The results speak to our shocking inability to understand why we feel a certain way, but powerful need to ascribe ambiguous feelings to something/ someone– usually whatever is staring us in the face. I think this actually has some implications for social businesses. There’s an opportunity to harness the ambiguous arousal of participating in social technologies– giving employees, for example, something to which they can attribute the positive sentiment that might result from being a part of a more open conversation.

When we’re talking about change in the enterprise, is it best to apply change quickly like ripping off a band-aid or is slow change better?

Unfortunately you don’t really have much of a choice. For enduring change, it’s going to take a while. Bringing behaviors and attitudes in line with each other is challenging – it takes commitment, mindfulness… and change. Culture is not a superficial construct, so be wary of measures that show a lot of fluctuation after a short amount of time. They’re likely not breaching the surface.

How would you measure the success of any type of culture change?

Use objective, naturalistic, and multiple measures. With all the data we produce on a daily basis, it’s relatively easy to tap into attitudes, behaviors, and beliefs unobtrusively and glean a deep understanding of a culture. As I said above, culture is not superficial. You need to tap into the mechanism of change (how effective is the motivation to change), people’s probability to change (attitudes, beliefs, perceptions), and the change per se (desired outcome).

It’s great to open things up and give people freedom, but specificity– that is, some focus or structure- is what really unleashes talent. Specificity comes in many forms of social systems. As Tom Malone et al. point out, the “genome” of collective intelligence can be broken down into Who (staffing), What (goal), Why (incentives), and How (process). Each of these “genes” demand specificity.

Take the Netflix Challenge, for one: its success as a crowdsourced effort was attributed to connecting the right people only after some jockeying happened. It was not a result of all participants being connected, helter-skelter. Often throwing too many people into the mix leads to hasty and irrational outcomes due to groupthink or lazy free-loading, as a result of social loafing — not to mention pluralistic ignorance where we incorrectly assume acceptance of a given norm.

A less oft-cited method of making a social system work has less to do with who is connected and more to do with what you ask of those connections. This is a critical focus as researchers migrate from surveys as our mainstay methodology. Good questions are the currency of social systems that flow between the focused connections discussed above.

The other day I noticed Rypple made an important change in this direction with its “Power of One” initiative. Rypple, as you might know, lets you give and receive feedback online (anonymously), to and from select others. All humans lack an inherent sense of psychometrics, so it’s hard to know precisely what to ask, especially when the stakes are high. That is, you’re asking *specific* trusted others for self-related feedback. The inclination is to ask open-ended questions. Logic being similar to the above: connect everyone // ask people to tell you anything and any number of things. Turns out, lack of specificity leads to confusion, and in most cases non-response. Rypple is alleviating this problem by encouraging users to ask “what’s *one thing* I can do to improve.”

It’s usually one question that makes or breaks a given finding. Gallup’s one question, “Do you have a best friend at work” is the biggest predictor of workplace engagement. Other research shows that one question self-assessments of health are better predictors of mortality than an extensive battery of objective health data. Reicheld told us six years ago that your Net Promoter score is “The One Number you Need to Grow.”

My point is not about measurement error and response bias, it’s about specificity. Being direct in order to make social systems effective. Finding the signal amidst the noise.

We can’t go on idly talking about “social” initiatives. We must be focused in order to make social systems effective. This pertains to who is in your ecosystem, how they are connected, why they are connected, and how you measure those connections.

Being social is not necessarily complex. If you apply a lens of specificity, you can systematically simplify the situation.