My own increased use of social networking is evidence that Face Book, LinkedIn are mainstreaming. What remains a puzzle to me--how are large enterprises internalizing social networks? Will there be a social networking capability within an organization that furthers the mission of the enterprise? Because for that to happen, IT will be the group in the organization that gets the assignment to make it work.

The logical next question is what should those of us in IT be doing to prepare for the eventuality of social networks in our organizations? Should we be thinking about licensing a social network like LinkedIn for proprietary use inside our organization? Will the enterprise social network be like an employee gazette, an interactive directory or a high school annual run by the HR department? Or should we simply go with the flow and let the affinity groups in the many social networking sites develop around our employees. Right now, I would vote for the latter, because I doubt that large enterprise will be interested in supporting social networks that gives outsiders access to their internal human resources.

How we implement social networking begs the larger question--How open will an enterprise culture be in supporting social networking applications? Enterprise culture plays a huge role in the way applications get adopted, or not. I strongly believe that an application that is based on "touchy feely" data runs counter to the enterprise proposition of “one for all and all for one.” Social networking celebrates individuality and openness. Enterprise mores celebrate group accomplishments and objectives that further the competitive advantage of the enterprise. In corporate America, enterprise identity counts for more than individual uniqueness.

Seriouly, how much do we want our colleagues to know about who we are when we are not at work? It is easy to see how an individual’s right to privacy could collide with peer pressure to put out for the social networking norm. The worst part about an enterprise social network--who becomes the arbiter of content? I don’t know many in IT that would welcome that assignment. You know non-technical business management will leave it us to figure out the fine print. We were the heavies on inappropriate content on email, too. Remember?

The best IT defense against the perils of enterprise owned social networking is a good offense. Hope that wikis and enterprise mashups are the hallmarks of the social networking communities that form inside your organization. Brush up the collaborative capabilities of your systems and data and hope that someone else drives the social networking bus. Be the plumber or the electrician. Just for once, don’t try and be the architect.