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Saturday, August 25, 2007

KPMG misses an opportunity

KPMG isn’t the first big services firm to recognize the value social media brings to business, but when a company of KPMG’s stature steps up and says, “This is important,” it’s a big deal. Everyone who beats their heads against corporate walls trying to convince stubborn and uninitiated leaders to embrace social media now have something substantial to point to. “KPMG says it’s important? Well, hell, they’ve been our auditors for years. Maybe I should pay more attention.”

There’s nothing eye-opening in KPMG’s downloadable white paper, “Enterprise 2.0 is Not a Fad,” written by KPMG partner Gary Matuszak, who chairs the company’s Information Communications & Entertainment practice. But the booklet does a decent job of covering the most important elements of the social media space and shines the light on big, reputable companies that are using it well. The booklet includes a lot of charts, one of which offers a nice, though hardly complete, overview of the different uses to which social media can be put in the enterprise. There’s a glossary and a page on the challenges of “enterprise 2.0.” It’s a nice piece to hand a resistant 60-year-old CEO.

But KPMG missed a real opportunity to walk the talk by expanding the document beyond its traditional PDF/booklet format. I was initially impressed that the company had produced a three-part podcast to go along with the white paper, but the 7-minute first episode is strictly voice talent reading a script that’s as dull and corporate as they come. Why not a discussion between Matuszak and a couple other KPMGers? Why not Matuszak interviewing people responsible for enterprise 2.0 applications in the companies featured as case studies in the white paper?

KPMG does not appear to be blogging at all, although I don’t know what kinds of resources are being used internally. Still, to issue a white paper that says, “we get new media” but not embrace those media seems a bit disingenuous. At least, it reduces KPMG’s social media credibility. A company looking for a social media consultant should look at the company’s own efforts in the space more than its slick brochures.

George Dearing also wrote about this over at the FastForward blog. His take: The big global companies are jumping on the bandwagon just so they won’t be left behind. Good point.