The world in which we live
thrives on hierarchy. Anything that is
organized whether it be a company, association, family, social club, classroom
and sports team functions on hierarchy.
It provides us with a sense of organization; the feeling of comfort
knowing who is ultimately accountable for what.
What if we did not have hierarchy in organization? Perhaps you would have chaos, lack of productivity,
inefficiencies, ineffectiveness and so forth.
Or perhaps not, but all I have ever known growing up and working in the
Western world is exactly this.
Let’s take this one step further!
We all know that there is
much MUCH more to organization than hierarchy.
How about culture, values, interpersonal relationships among peers,
politicking, the rapid meshing of work/life, religion, gossip and communication
styles? The list goes on. Organization is probably the most complex thing
that I have ever encountered in life.
It’s a jungle out there to thrive, or survive. It’s fierce and the competition is only
getting stronger.
As human beings we work (well
most of us do anyway) so we can earn an income so that we can live, enjoy life
and provide for our families with food, shelter and basic necessities of life. We progress through life as members of
various organizations with many objectives.
In the organization of work I would argue that the fierce
competitiveness has triggered natural responses, actions and behaviors in
people that mirror that of an elitist.
Yes, I said ELITIST!
I typically don’t like
getting into definitions but the word elitist refers to those people that
gravitate or associate themselves with an elite. By virtue of position, status, education and
the like, elite’s exercise power or influence over others.
As I mentioned we live in a
highly competitive world, and within organization it’s a natural human response
to both want to do well and do things that would allow and enable us to do
well. In hierarchical structures we look
upward to those who possess more power than us.
What we do in the eyes of those with more power than us could have a
huge impact on how successful we become within an organization. Of course there are always extremes but for
the most part we behave and gravitate toward elite’s.
Throw in social media…
It’s taken me awhile to get
to this point where I am talking about social media. In fact it has been a common theme lately
with me blogging about various topics—just bear with me! JJ What has
happened with the emergence of social media is the complete, or close to
complete, shattering of everything I said above. Elitism does exist on social media but has
been drastically minimized and marginalized; its power, influence and impact. What I mean by this is any one person can
start building relationships with people across the globe curating awesome
content, ideas and thoughts while slowly building their influence within the
social space. A core value has emerged
within social media, which is audiences placing huge value on quality content
and thought. People gravitate towards
others who a) show a genuine interest in them, and b) contribute awesome
content by way of a simple tweet, blog post, Facebook conversation, active
LinkedIn group participation and so forth.
Who cares if an awesome tweet came from Richard Branson or some guy off
the street? If the content was awesome
it’s rewarded, simple.
How about the example of
Charlie Sheen? He’s a celebrity, also
elite according to our Western cultural standards (i.e. placing celebrities in
an elite class of their own). But within
the social media space, his celebrity status matters very little, in my
opinion. I don’t follow him on Twitter,
nor do I want to follow him. I simply
don’t want his poor quality tweets clogging up my Twitter stream.
The moral of my “kind of story”!
In my bold opinion, No longer
does status or elitism matter within the social media world. What really matters are things that should
matter; authenticity, real relationships, quality content, idea sharing and
curating, pushing your own boundaries from a learning perspective and so
on.
I may be out to lunch… BUT…
I am really interested to see
the reactions and comments to what I talked about in this blog post. I feel pretty strongly that with social media
being so unbelievably fantastic at bringing communities together who share
common interests and standards, the traditional power usually possesses by
elitists is being challenged. And… I
love it!
About the Author:
Jeff Waldman is Founder SocialHRCamp, COO SocialHR
Jeff is an entrepreneur, ideator, social HR strategist and HR practitioner who has worked with a variety of organizations from start-ups to large multi-national corporations. He currently works with organizations and their HR teams to strategically leverage social media to create and drive unparalleled business value.
Jeff recently founded SocialHRCamp, the first-ever global HR UnConference, which provides HR practitioners around the world with an incredible experiential learning platform to kick into high gear their social HR journeys. He is an avid blogger, speaker and advisor on topics relating to diversity, social HR, career management, personal branding and leadership.
