More unconference loviness

 

  Well, we did it again!  CHRU-2 was just as successful as CHRU-1, and just as lovey (not just lovely) as HRevolution.

So I’ve been been thinking further about the success of these events.  And I still think the ‘getting the presentations out of the way’ that I referred to in my last post is a big part of what’s going on.

But I’ve also been thinking that there is something else important that I missed out in my earlier post – the events’ success is also (in fact is mainly) about the people who attended them.  And this is partly about a lot of the people knowing each other before the event (even if many have only connected virtually but never met IRL before – and there is always something special in that first face-to-face connection).

But I think it is also just about the type of people who are using social media, which we used to promote the event – and their understanding of the value of social learning. This is important firstly because this is the direction of HR evolution.  And secondly because it means these people are more open to the potential of connection.  So you get these people together and you’re almost bound to have a great time.

For other un- and conferences copying our success, or organisations wanting to create the same passion and love between their employees there are maybe a few lessons to learn as well.

I suppose the first of these has to be about getting more employees using social media as this often opens a window on a new way of behaving.

But I also think there’s more too it than this.  The people who attended both HRevolution and CHRU use social media because they’re social people (as in people who understand the benefit of relationships, not just of socialising - though there was plenty of that going on too), they’re not social people because they use social media.

So the secret isn’t really about getting people to use social media, but getting people to understand how to be more social (again, in its relationship sense) – or just recruiting those who are.

For example Liz Gottung talked about recruiting from GE and other ‘best practice’ HR organisations. I think she’d do better looking at the people who gathered at the Georgia Tech in Atlanta and more recently in the Spring.  These to me are the people who are going to be driving the future of (a more social) HR.

 

Technorati Tags: Love,passion,unconference,social,media,HR

 

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