Really interesting point. I think with social tools, which tend to be easy to use, it's more the behavioral approach that makes the difference vs. technical competency. It's about the best practices that help you use the tools to get the results you need. That type of expertise you can only get from doing. Of course, there needs to be a forum for sharing and developing best practices, but most will come from doing. Thanks for your comment!

That can be very frustrating. I wrote a follow-up post to this one, and in that post one of my recommendation is to help your management see things from the outside. See if you can bring in someone whom they respect to talk about what your industry is doing with regards to social. I hate to say it, but sometimes it takes the desire to not be left out -- if all your competitors are doing it, can you afford not to? Also, if your customers are looking for you there, asking for your help, can you not be there? Of course, you need to show that this is in fact true. Do they feel this way about internal social networking to? There are serious benefits to sharing information across your organization, as we see from our customers all the time. Whatever social tools you are using, culture is really key, and many feel paralyzed by fear of losing some control. What's important to realize, though, is that by not participating you are actually losing more control than if you jumped in and got involved.

Hi Joitske! Thanks for sharing your post! That's a really interesting question, and I bet there are as many answers as there are people :) I think that it goes both ways, and culture and social can actually strengthen each other simultaneously. It can be a sort of a symbiotic relationship that way. I think there needs to be at least some appreciation for wanting to be more open and collaborative, even if it's not a fully bought-in organization. So they dip their toe in the water, and start to realize some of the benefits of being more open. Then the organization wants to do more social stuff, and then they get better at it because people start to believe in it more. The better the culture gets, the stronger the social execution, the better results, the better the culture. I think it absolutely goes both ways. I also like your point about doing social from so many different angles. When the company's approach to social matures, it actually will become a cross-sectional discipline vs. a bunch of disjointed efforts. Different angles are absolutely necessary, and social leadership must understand what these angles are.

Hi Florian, Great question: we update once an hour for the "Last 24 Hour" leaderboards. We update once a day for all other leaderboards. What kind of contest are you doing? Do let us know how it goes! Maria Ogneva, head of community at Yammer

That's a really key point; hoarding of information is replaced by sharing. A true digital leader is adept at managing many informational sources, and directing key conversations to public (or private when necessary) spaces where others can benefit.

Great! Do let us know how it goes!

Thank you, Jack! Glad you enjoyed it!

Thanks for stopping by and contributing, Ian! Loving the quote, and can't agree more -- how are we helping our customers? Helping them do their jobs, live their lives, prosper, etc.

Tim -- yes, we have a version of the beta desktop app available for download https://www.yammer.com/about/applications

Maciej, absolutely! Social media is not only a place to get leads. You have to nurture your community and ensure that you have the right process in place to support them. Thanks for your comment!

Thank you!

Great question! Actually, we have an open API - documentation is here http://developer.yammer.com/api. We are lucky in that our developer community has developed awesome apps and plugins for the Yammer platform https://www.yammer.com/about/applications, and we are definitely investing in our developer relations, and of course are always open to feedback from the community on what they want to see built. Thanks for your comment!

May I also suggest our desktop apps? https://www.yammer.com/about/applications Assuming that you can install them, they can be pretty fast, and an alternative to the web version