Small World Labs

I received an advance copy of Charlene Li’s new book Open Leadership: How Social Technology Can Transform the Way You Lead while at the Social Media & Community 2.0 Strategies conference in Boston last week.  I read half of it on the airplane ride back from Boston and the second half yesterday after having fulfilled my inaugural Mother’s Day duties.

Given Charlene’s position and insight into the social media market, I thought this would be an important text to read and understand.  Why does this matter to the CEO of a social networking platform company?  Because at Small World Labs we firmly believe that to create a successful online community, you need:

1. A good technology platform
2. A good strategy for its use
3. A good community building plan
4. The appropriate resources to implement that plan

It’s not enough to just have good online community software.  That gets you only halfway there.  Open Leadership discusses strategies companies can use to better adopt and implement solutions like ours. 
 
Now, back to the book. After reading it, I looked online for more information and found only 4 reviews:

1. Josh Bernoff (Charlene’s co-author of Groundswell and about to become competing author)
2. Lee Odden (CEO of TopRank Online Marketing - his review has been republished a couple of times)
3. Brett Simmons (speaker and professor at the College of Business at University of Nevada – Reno)
4. Lindy Dryer (Chief Social Media Marketer at Social Fish)

 
However, I was interested in discussing and analyzing the book’s concepts further and in more detail.  So... I thought I'd create a review series on the book. A primer, if you will, that digs into the text’s core concepts in more detail, kind of like an old fashioned book report. 
I hope you enjoy the series.  It will come out over time. Please let me know what you think in the comments below.