Monday, May 07, 2007

Web 2.0: Endless possibilities for the GRI network

A friend of mine gave me a book over the weekend called "Wikinomics: How mass collaboration changes everything" by D. Tapscott and A. Williams. It has dropped into my lap at the perfect moment as I am in the midst of drafting up GRI's five year strategic plan and the book has inspired all sorts of great ideas.

GRI is in essence a mass collaboration. Thousands of people contribute their knowledge, experience, and opinions into one big pot which gets simmered and stirred, and eventually the GRI Sustainability Reporting Framework pops out. We have been doing this for 10 years and have managed to grow the network to include an estimated 30,000 people. And we have done this all the old fashioned way of hopping on airplanes and organizing telephone based conference calls.

Tapscott and Williams outline dozens of examples of successful and thriving online communities - some with a business focus and some with a social good focus. Imagine what we could do if we had access to new tools where people could collaborate on topics directly and not have to go through the Amsterdam secretariat? We could engage so many more people on more topics in more meaningful ways. This also bodes well for cost and carbon savings with less travel and phone time.

Interestingly, Don Tapscott also wrote "The Naked Corporation" all about the importance of transparency in the modern era - with very strong value propositions for sustainability reporting and GRI based reporting. Wow, the world is more closely linked than we all thought!

2 comments:

Pavlusha34 said...

Love that you started a blog and I am a huge fan of GRI work. The issue of new interactive web tools is huge for this (and any) field. I just order Wikinomics, even if I am not sure the title captures what it's all about.

Thanks for adding a feed to your site. You are easier to follow now.

Alyson Slater said...

Enjoy "Wikinomics." I am a new fan of your Socializing blog!