1) The document describes an experiment conducted with 17 employees from Shell International BV located across 3 continents where they used the Yammer enterprise microblogging service to regularly post updates about their work using an agreed hashtag. 2) Employees posted status updates daily or a few times a week on average for about 20 minutes each week, and read others' updates for around 25 minutes weekly. 3) While most employees posted publicly, some chose to post privately depending on whether the information would be useful just to their team or more broadly. The experiment found that narrating work in this way increased insight, connection, and awareness while preventing duplication.

1. Narrating Your Work
Experiment
Dr Anoush Margaryan
Senior Lecturer, Caledonian Academy, Glasgow
Caledonian University, UK
Twitter: @anoush
WWW: http://www.gcu.ac.uk/academy/people/anoush-margaryan/

2. Context
• Shell International BV
• Distributed team: 17 members
on 3 continents
• Yammer enterprise
microblogging service

3. Experiment
• Regular status updates
• Issues, resources, events, ideas
• Using agreed hashtag #nyw
• Options: daily flow, daily
recap, weekly recap
• Public or private

4. Methodology
• Mixed-method: quan->qual->
analysis of NYW updates
• Criteria: practicality and value
–practicality=time, ease of use
–value=increased insight,
connectedness, awareness; tangible;
avoids duplication of work

5. Data collection & analysis
• Survey (n=17, 100% response)
• Interview (n=11, 65% response)
• NYW updates (n=642)

6. Frequency
9
8
8
7
7
6
6
5
5
Posting frequency
4
3
Reading frequency
3
2
2
2
1
1
0
Once a day or more Couple of times per
week
Once a week
Less than once a
week

7. Time investment
• Writing NYW updates:
21 min/week on average
• Reading others’ updates:
25 min/week on average

8. Public vs private (1)
2/17
3/17
Private
Public
Both
12/17

9. Public vs private (2)
“…Sometimes the postings are about the pulse of
the team, things that need to be discussed within
the group only. There are other things that we have
done that are beneficial to all of Shell, way beyond
our team, that we have the option of posting
outside the group for others to read and to respond.
We all agreed to use this question to decide when
we are posting something if it is beneficial to more
than our learning group then let’s post it globally
and if it is something where the rest of Shell might
not be interested in, then we keep it within our
team” (P1).

10. Yammer was easy to use
8
7
7
6
5
5
4
3
3
2
2
1
0
0
Strongly agree
Agree
Neutral
Disagree
Strongly
disagree

11. My understanding of Yammer was
a limiting factor in how often I
posted
8
7
7
6
6
5
4
3
3
2
1
1
0
0
Strongly agree
Agree
Neutral
Disagree
Strongly disagree

12. NYW has given me better insight
into my peers’ work
12
11
10
8
6
4
3
3
2
0
0
Disagree
Strongly
disagree
0
Strongly agree
Agree
Neutral

13. NYW made me feel more
connected to my team
10
9
9
8
7
6
5
4
4
3
2
2
2
1
0
0
Strongly agree
Agree
Neutral
Disagree
Strongly disagree

14. NYW prevented duplication of
work
9
8
8
7
7
6
5
4
3
2
2
1
0
0
0
Strongly agree
Agree
Neutral
Disagree
Strongly disagree

15. Content of NYW updates is useful
12
11
10
8
6
4
3
2
2
1
0
0
Strongly agree
Agree
Neutral
Disagree
Strongly
disagree

16. Self-reflection
“Within a corporate world
where everybody is running
all the time and we never stop
and reflect, NYW was a good
moment of reflection” (P2).

17. Awareness of expertise in team
“There is an expert on a subject matter on a particular
software across the pond and they are working actively
with their vendors and I needed to create an interface for
that project. So I utilised that person when I found out
that the Business Analysts across the pond, they helped
me get into contact with vendors to get the work done.
There are synergies that could be made, the connections
are not being made and should be made because people
do not understand exactly what people are working on.
With NYW you could actually say hey, that person is
working on that and that is applicable to my job, maybe
I should connect with that person” (P3).

18. Connecting with other teams
“I started going out of my work team and
started joining some of the other teams and it
helped me to learn some things that were
going on in the company. There is a group out
there for the Business Analysts, for all the BAs
in Shell. I really stay connected with them
because it learns [sic] me a lot of techniques
and things I could prevent from happening on
my own projects” (P1).

19. Enablers
Barriers
•Champion • Lack of
interactivity
•Early
adopters • Lack of
cohesiveness

20. http://tinyurl.com/7z3rzro