Coast Guard Commandant: Jump Into Web 2.0

In case you missed this story by Anne Laurent at Tech Insider, it’s worth posting an excerpt here to spark your interest:

“The message couldn’t be clearer: Coasties need to start social networking, right now! Yesterday on YouTube, in his firm, ramrod straight-arrow style, Coast Guard Commandant Thad Allen ordered his entire service, and especially its leaders, to get into Web 2.0, double time.”

Here’s the Commandant’s YouTube video (which I’ll post to the new video feature as well!):

For more articles and information related to the impact of four generations and Web 2.0 on the Federal workforce, please visit the Generation Shift blog.

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Scott Hielen

Definitely admire Adm. Allen’s intent with the message. It’s going to be a challenge to change the mindset of senior leadership across all of the services. It’s easy to “order” people to start using a tool, but the organization has to understand what behaviors and activities those (web 2.0) technologies are trying to enable. A majority of our military have grown up in a very hierarchical organization that filters information as it transits up and down the chains of command. We’ve done a lot to break down barriers across organizations, but it doesn’t seem like the benefits of the social network and “crowdsourcing” will be optimized in a pyramidal organization.