Monday April 11, 2005

Thanks and What I have learned

I'd like to add my thanks and congratulations to the BSC (blogs.sun.com) team who just won Sun's chairman's award for creating BSC. It got me thinking about all the benefits that for me have come from blogging. Since I started blogging last September I've learned a lot. Blogging at Sun has been an extraordinarily valuable experience. I've summarized some of my thoughts about blogging and its benefits in a lessons learned list.

• Blogging is a great communication opportunity. It is a great opportunity to start a conversation. Since I am doing Change acceptance for JDS and Solaris 10 within Sun, blogging has been a great opportunity to tell people inside and outside of Sun what we are doing and why we are doing it. Broadcast emails just don't do the trick. They often are too much marketing talk and they usually don't encourage feedback. But even if an all Sun email was written like a blog a blog still does a better job because of the conversational aspect and because people who read my blog have over time built up an understanding of who I am and how I operate so they don't hesitate to ask questions or even challenge what I say.

• Blogging builds community. I've probably met more Sun customers and Sun employees outside of my division in the 7 months I've been blogging than I did in the previous 7 years. And I've learned something from each of them. The community building aspects are amazing. From my perspective it is one of the best things about blogging.

• Blogging and reading blogs are a great learning tool. Presenting to customers has always been a fantastic learning opportunity for me, but blogs are even better. The give and take and the different blog perspectives have allowed me to learn a lot about Sun's strategy and products and I've become much more aware of what is going on in our industry. I think it works for me because it is like sitting in on a conversation with the people who are making the decisions and selling the products. The perspective is invaluable. And I've always believed that the best way to really learn something is to teach someone else about it.

• Writing a blog is not only a learning tool but it makes you a better communicator. You can't help but improve you ability to communicate about something if you are writing about it. And I believe that the regular discipline of writing a blog is bound to improve my written and verbal communication skills.

• Blogging has improved how I feel about Sun. Sun is a big company. One of the things I love about Sun is that most of the time I have worked here I have been able to feel that I was making a difference, that I what I do helps Sun to be successful. It is almost a small company feeling. As Sun has gotten bigger it has sometimes been hard to maintain that feeling. Blogging has made me feel more a part of the company and more aligned with our strategies. It has improved my morale.

• Strangely enough blogging has made me realize how many people don't read blogs. By writing a blog and receiving feedback I've communicated with a lot of people that I probably wouldn't have otherwise. But what is interesting is that seeing this has made me realize how many people we have not touched with our change acceptance and communications efforts. I need to remember that blog readers are just a segment of the community.

• You never know who is reading. One aspect of blogging that I am still grappling with is how much of my life to share on my blog. I know that the blogs I enjoy most are those where I get to know the writer. And I also believe that transparency is what builds trust and trust is important in blogging. But every time I write a blog entry I think about my audience, my family, my coworkers, my boss, Sun customers and my friends and I think about whether what I am saying is appropriate and whether leaving something out would be less than authentic.

• Blogging is intellectually challenging The mechanics of creating a blog have been a fun challenge. I've learned about CSS, Technorati, tags, RSS, etc, etc. The list is endless. And of course there is the challenge of the content. My mind is challenged whether I am reading about Building Solaris from Scratch or about traveling on the inland waterways of Britain

• Blogging is Fun! I don't have to analyze it to know that I am having great time! I'm hooked and I can't imagine ever stopping.