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The Wiki Workplace: An exclusive interview with Don Tapscott

June 2008

The keynote speaker at the recently concluded Cognos Forum 2008, Don Tapscott is an internationally sought authority, consultant and speaker on business strategy and organizational transformation. He served as founder and chairman of the international think tank New Paradigm before its acquisition by nGenera, co-wrote 2007's highly praised Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything, and currently works as an Adjunct Professor of Management at the University of Toronto's Joseph L. Rotman School of Management.

Here, he joins Cognos Senior Writer Kelsey Howarth to discuss Wikinomics, raw self-organization, and the new role for IT.

Seven new business models and a "perfect storm"

KH: You have written that a "perfect storm" of change is brewing under global business, driven by four broad forces: Web 2.0; the coming of age of the Net Generation; a social revolution in which mass collaboration is superseding information as the focus of the web; and an economic revolution.

How should companies be reinventing themselves to take advantage of the opportunities this is bringing?

DT: "In Wikinomics, we talk about seven new business models that are shaking the windows and rattling the walls of every industry. The challenge facing every company is to figure out how they can harness these powerful new forces, new tools, and a combination of these seven business models to innovate and compete better.

"The simplest example of one of these models is something I call the Wiki Workplace. Companies today have all these really primitive technologies for collaboration like email and the telephone.

"I was interviewing a youngster recently and I asked her if she uses email. She said, 'Only for sending a thank you letter to one of my friend's parents.'

"So, if email is yesterday's technology, how do we get to the next generation? This is where blogs, JAMS, social networks, collaborative filtering, RSS feeds, tags, teleprint, digital brainstorms, and more are providing spectacular improvements in performance and innovation.

"I recommend that companies do a Wiki Workplace Workshop. At the beginning of the day you examine all of these tools and then you start to probe the opportunities to apply them at your company.

"After careful focus, companies can begin to look at which technologies make sense for them, what impediments might arise, and really formulate a game plan to get going.

"I love watching this. Every time I've been involved it's been really quite extraordinary how energized people get."

Learning to love self-organization

KH: In Wikinomics you mentioned that companies like Google, Mozilla, and IBM really encouraged and orchestrated raw self-organization to create competitive advantage. How have they done this, and what lessons can other companies learn from their approach?

DT: "A lot of companies fear self-organization. They fear customers having power, or being able to scrutinize them.

"Companies want to protect all of their IP and not place it in the commons.

"I understand the concern. If you place things out in the open, doesn't that undermine the legitimate right of companies to make a profit? Didn't Linux hurt Microsoft? Didn't MP3 hurt the record labels? Didn't Wikipedia hurt Britannica?

"We have found in our research that the answer is actually no. If you embrace self-organization, it can help you compete, grow, and innovate.

"IBM is a great example of a company that could have fought Linux, but instead embraced it. They gave away hundreds of millions of dollars in software and placed it in the commons.

"In doing so they created a platform - Linux - on which they built a multi-billion dollar business. They also saved themselves close to a billion dollars a year in developing and maintaining their own proprietary operating system."

Making Wikinomics happen

KH: You have a new edition of Wikinomics coming out this spring. How does it differ from the original?

DT: "The core of the book is still incredibly relevant, but we wanted to include more practical advice on how readers can make Wikinomics happen in their own company. We have also modified the introduction to explain more about how Wikinomics is changing the world."

Find the right IT strategy

KH: I was recently reading an article you wrote cautioning companies against making IT cost cutting part of their strategy. Why?

DT: "There may be opportunities to reduce the cost of IT. There are people who argue that you should cut your IT budget by 50 percent because IT 'doesn't matter.'

"I fundamentally disagree with that approach. Our research shows that it's illusory at best and often dangerous. Sure, in a recession companies need to trim the fat, but don't go yanking out parts of your nervous system to save money.

"Instead, organizations need to set a strategy that clearly defines the role of IT in reaching goals. They need a clear path to migrate from legacy systems to the new collaboration systems they need.

"In doing so, they can look for opportunities to exploit new publicly available technologies with virtualization capabilities, open architectures, web services and more. Then they can begin to move away from the traditional, more expensive, and costly proprietary IT infrastructure."