Camaraderie in the Digital Realm
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Subject: [PD 4840] Re: digital citizenship and privacy setting on facebook and other social networking websites
From: Jesse McCall
Date: Thu Jul 15 09:04:33 EDT 2010
Greetings Everyone,
I've been lurking here for a while and finally decided to chime in as I've done some research into the blending of personal and professional lives. I'm a project manager at the Institute for Healthcare Improvement (http://www.ihi.org) and a majority of my job is to design and facilitate distance learning courses for health professionals.
Traditionally IHI's business was in face-to-face meetings and like so many others affected by the economic climate we were forced to think of new ways to engage people. We did quite a bit of research in to the difference between face-to-face meetings and virtual meetings and one of the main components that is lost in a virtual meeting is the camaraderie that goes along with travel time. When co-workers and colleagues spend time away from their daily work environment they are forced to get to know each other on a deeper level, usually leading to increased teamwork and performance.
In the virtual realm it is increasingly important to facilitate this kind of interaction, whether it's through getting to know someone a la Facebook, or asking people to include a short personal biography in their first posts to a discussion group. There are many ways to get to know the people you are working with virtually and as we continue to move more and more meetings and interactions into the digital realm we must not lose the human component.
Thoughts?
Jesse McCall
Project Manager
The Institute for Healthcare Improvement
