Corporate Blogs
November 23, 2008
It is somewhat difficult to find actual corporate blogs that are used strictly for internal communication. These blogs are generally private. The use and veiwing of these blogs require identification as an employee. I was able to locate information on two corporations that have blogs available to employees as well as the general public.
McDonald’s Vice President Bob Langert posts information about corporate responsibility, specifically Ronald McDonald House Charities. http://www.crmcdonalds.com/publish/csr/home/_blog.10829.2284045.html
Todd Watson at IBM Corporate http://www-128.ibm.com/developerworks/blogs/page/Turbo blogs on a variety of topics. At first glance not all topics seem to be relevant to IBM, but it is possible these are topics that have arose at varies times within the IBM corporation.
Technorati http://www.technorati.com/blogging/state-of-the-blogosphere/ has a report for 2008 providing statistics for blogging. Technorati estimates close to one million posts every day. Technorati has also gathered demographic information about bloggers including age, gender, marital status, and level of education.
A blog site is quite easy to set up. It took me less than 15 minutes to set up this site. Maintenance is minimal and a blog site would allow not only the blogger, but readers of the blog to post comments. For general information or group projects a blog would be a beneficial tool.
As with all communication a blog is only effective if all participants are regularly viewing and contributing. An effective blog would require a corporate culture that encourages active participation.
