The great social media consulting debate, to date, has social media consulting divided into strategic consulting, training, and/or setting up social media Centers of Excellence.
The good side of the debate for Centers of Excellence fosters a doing approach to social media adoption, while the not-so-good side has flared up further debate about why these consulting practices will fail if left to existing marketing/advertising agencies.
The whole argument of agencies leading strategic consulting for social media apparently falls apart if they cannot boast of an internal management consulting experience and if they rely on ‘specialists’ with little or no front-of-the-line social engagement experience. In fact, if any of these are even true in some form or another, the argument isn’t even worth having.
The Center of Excellence Talk
Centers of Excellence usually aim to bring about, through best practices and advice, excellence through various developmental or hand-holding means. These centers are usually run by small corporate or worldwide groups of experts who have been there.
The Center of Excellence Execution
By enabling other groups through excellence, these centers cater to the ever changing requirements of business scenarios, in which existing boundaries are extended, the usual experiences doesn’t count for much, and where careers are either smashed or raised up to higher pedestals.
Enterprise wide adoption of excellence initiatives tends to be the one major thing that creates a success of any strategy, and if that center itself cannot devise a strategy, then all hell breaks loose, and failure is inevitable.
Centers of Excellence, and those who are supposedly influenced by these centers, tend to rely on a default status of excellence. Stakeholders involved and those who look upto these centers will rely on presumptions of expertise and skills, irrespective of whether these centers or the individuals involved within have actually demonstrated any excellence n the past.
Perceptions shaped by such factors are dangerous, as they tend to impart the vague impression that all it takes for excellence is past or existing critical skills.
This argument by itself creates a rift in expectations not only within centers but also within the enterprise. The recursive factors instead should practically aim to include excellence execution through driving adoption, strategic workings, and center positioning through smart team development.
A series of continuing articles in this regard will help in devising such an objective and hopefully clear out any misconceptions associated with this particular domain.
