Is this a scenario you recognize?

You deliver a free seminar for about an hour to a group of managers that you believe could really do with using social media (Enterprise 2.0, Social Business, call it what you will) to sustain and grow their business(es).  You show them the benefits of the various platforms.  You explain what is available (the ones they know such as LinkedIn, Facebook, as well as another fifty or so they’ve never heard of.  You outline the potential risks of choosing the wrong platform or of failing to put in place the appropriate policies and controls.  When you finish, your audience claps, cheers, congratulates you on a very enlightening presentation and for your command of the subject.

So what’s the problem with all that?

What happens next is that these newly enlightened managers rush back to their offices and look around for a young member of staff who is on Facebook and say “I’ve just learnt all about social media for business.  We need to do that.  You’re on Facebook, so you’ll know all about it.  I’m assigning you to set up what we need.”

When, after six months, they have not seen any of the promised benefits, they shelve the project and decide it was a bad idea and that they should never have listened to you!!

(David Demetrius @demeto)