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The great thing about being a social media consultant is that you get to have some vigorous discussions with some very large and complex companies about social mandates across the organization. Recently, I was talking to a large financial services and insurance brand that was trying to wrap their arms around the rapid (rampant?) growth of social media across the company. The discussion about social media governance consumed almost the entire afternoon, and at the end of the day someone mentioned to me - 'That was a great session, you should really write a paper on this'. Well I don't have time for that right now as I'm waiting to catch my next flight but here's what's top of mind.

For those of you who are new to the concept of a social media organizational governance, it's really just a centralized body that helps provide standards (guardrails) and enablement to the rest of the organization so they can confidently and safely engage on social media. One thing that kept coming up in the discussion is that that words matter! What happens when you mention the word 'governance' to someone in the office? Exactly, they give you a look like they just bit into a lemon. Governance is a tricky word, it often carries negative connotations because it inherently implies more controls, process, procedures and oversight. When you're getting ready to create a governance body choose the names and terms associated with it very carefully. We brainstormed names like 'Social Media Business Enablement Center' or 'Corporate Social Business Excellence'.

#1) What's the mandate?

I believe there are three broad mandates for a Social Media Business Enablement function.

1) Harmonization of social media strategy. By this I mean each BU shares their social media business plan and activities so that the company has an opportunity to not only align on strategy but also on big initiatives. For example, Social Marketing is getting ready to help market a new product launch. Great! How can the other teams support them? Can Social Customer Service create complimentary support content with the same tone and feel and coordinate across the content calendar? Can Voice of the Customer provide an extra layer of reporting to provide real-time feedback? Should the company set up a Social Command Centre for the launch?

2) Organizational Enablement of Social Media: This refers to all the guardrails (policies, processes, training / certification, best practices) that need to exist in order to help teams understand how to safely begin participating in social media. You may balk when I say this but the Social Advisory Council (not "Social Governance Board") may need to approve every new twitter handle and every new Facebook page that a department wants to create. Some organizations actually have that particular department come to an advisory council meeting to present their case for a dedicated Twitter handle or Facebook page. What is the business rationale for a new Twitter handle? Who will be posting and how frequently? Why can't they use the corporate handle? How do they know they will have enough of a following to warrant the time investment to post content and engage? It's very possible that a department or region will need a new brand social presence but making the case and ensuring the council has awareness is a good thing. Too many times have I seen a large company with many, many dead handles, YouTube pages or Instgram

3) Technology Standards: This is always a sticky point with groups I talk to. "My business is different and we need different tools to be effective". Maybe you do. All I ask is that you have the discussion with the advisory council to make sure you aren't shooting yourself in the foot. Too many times have I seen different departments who need to pass work back and forth using completely different tools and workflow suffers. Then they have to result to email to manage the work and it's a… #fail. Sometimes a little compromise is necessary for the overall organization to succeed. To my IT readers, social media is a different beast and it's evolving literally every 60 days. If you want to be included on this roller-coaster ride then you need to be much more flexible with supporting the teams who are just trying to keep up with the competition. Make sure you hire staff that know the social space and the tools and build a strong communication bridge with Social Marketing and Social Support.

#2) Who's on the Social Advisory Council?

In my humble opinion, any BU or LoB that participates in social media even if they are just in a reporting position should have representation at council meetings. Send the person in the BU that owns social media for that function. Typical departments in attendance for roll-call would be Social Marketing / MARCOM, Social Customer Service, HR, PR and Voice of the Customer / Customer Experience. By default we tend to see IT and Legal there too as they play a supporting role to social business standards.

#3) What area should the Social Media Enablement sit under?

Such a loaded question. And it's an easy answer but possibly a hard thing to do. Ideally the Social Enablement function should report directly to the CEO. Why? To avoid politics and perceived hidden agendas from whoever might own the function. Typically, the Marketing department will own the initiative to start as they are normally the most socially mature in an organization. This can actually work brilliantly if politics are left at the door and the Social Marketing VP plays the role of social media steward.

Social Media Governance is really beginning to take root in large enterprises. Adopt the mindset that we want to safely enable these teams to engage with fans and prospects over social media instead of "we're going to clamp down and make it difficult for them to do so". Discuss your mandate openly as a group, share your business plans and if necessary hire dedicated staff to help socially enable the rest of the organization. Governance doesn't have to slow things down, use it to enable with guardrails!