Social Media Skills Matrix, In Development

I recently began working with a group of social media-oriented professionals on an interesting new project sponsored by EDC (the Education Development Center), which is "a global nonprofit organization that designs, delivers and evaluates innovative programs to address some of the world’s most urgent challenges in education, health, and economic opportunity." 

The project, funded by a grant from the NSF (National Science Foundation), is part of a larger program to help define the skills, education and experience required for various 21st century careers. The objective is to provide guidance and structure to students just emerging out of two or four year programs. In this case, the focus was on the concept of a "Social Technology Enabled Professional," that is, a professional who makes active use of social technology, specifically one who "builds, maintains, manages and leverages online social networks to engage with customers, business partners, employees and key influencers with the goal of building organizational success."

Facilitator Joe Ippolito skillfully leading the workshop through the development process...

The first workshop was held on a recent weekend on the campus of the Springfield Technical Community College (STCC), in a lovely re-conditioned mill building, reminiscent of so many other refurbished buildings that house high-tech companies I've seen. Involved in the group were about a dozen professional with diverse experience in social media, ranging from an active blogger to a Communications and Social Media Strategist for IBM Global Services, and many interesting and very capable people in between.

It's too early to report on the output, which is still very much a work in progress. What was of particular interest however was the methodology and structure for creating what I would call a skills matrix for the "social technology enabled professional." The occupational analysis began with brainstorming the kinds of activities undertaken when making use of social media for a variety of business areas. Subsequently grouping of these activities into themes and, ultimately, six discrete categories - or "Duties" - within which the tasks fell. 

Duties included high-level items such as "Create A Social Networking Strategy," and "Develop Content To Engage Community."

Tasks within the six defined duties included things like, "Defines success metrics  aligned to organizational objectives" or "Syndicates content across social platforms and existing markets."

The preliminary result was a 6 by 12 matrix of tasks, that represent a pretty comprehensive guide for people looking to not only develop experience but also in designing and executing social media strategies for their business. I'll follow up here when the rubric becomes available for public viewing.