Adopting and implementing a new online enterprise community is never a completely smooth and linear process. Knowing what to expect, however, prepares you to deal with the problems so you can have a plan in place to react quickly.

1) Strategy.—Outline and rely on not only an implementation strategy but a business goal strategy before you even start looking at platform options:

1. how and for what purposes are you going to use the community,
2. who will use the community,
3. what tools do you need to both facilitate the communities functions and ease adoption for your users, and
4. how does using the community align with business needs and further enterprise goals?

2) Choosing a platform. —There are a lot of options out there, the sheer number and plethora of capabilities of which can overwhelm someone who is unfamiliar with the software. Choosing a knowledgeable and responsive partner to help research the possibilities and report back on which platform fits the best will save you time, headaches, and money in the long run.

3) Resistance to change. —The wariness and discomfort most people display when confronted with a new technology someone expects them to use presents a very real and pressing problem for adoption. Low-level employees struggle with the idea that this is just another program they have to learn, something they will need to transfer all of their work to, and they worry that if they don’t “get it” fast enough they’ll look bad. Managers and executives worry that community platforms will give employees too much power or enable them to shirk their work. Addressing and overcoming these anxieties and encouraging adoption despite them is one of the biggest aids to a smooth implementation process.

4) Technology hurdles. —This is not simply a matter of having computers with compatible platforms and the latest versions of software (thought that certainly helps), it’s a matter of encouraging adoption through technology. For example, make it easy to sign in to the community by creating a single sign-on program: users can sign in to their computer stations and that single portal will sign them on to the community, their email and IM clients, and other programs they use constantly as well. This will encourage adoption because it immediately impacts their efficiency with measurable improvement.

These are just the main hurdles that we have come up against in some of the communities we have implemented. What are some of the other hurdles that face enterprise 2.0?

Blog Written by Courtney Steen, Diagram Designed by David Lee.

Enterprise Collaboration Implementation Strategy – UX Diagram