Have you ever considered how some words (and technologies) are so important, yet in the fullness of time completely disappear?  Buggy whips, Barrel makers (“coopers”), and Telex machines  are but a few examples.  Not fifteen years ago, the term “ebusiness” was popular, until people figured out that there was no such thing as ebusiness – just “business”. Today, we may be at a very similar turning point.  Consider the terms Social Media and Social Networking:  what do they mean from a business perspective?   Communication, engagement, community-building, research source, advertising venue, sales channel, support mechanism are but a few examples.  These same terms are the basic marketing building blocks of any successful business; it’s reasonable to expect that the requirement for a completely separate “Social” strategy will seem silly.  From an IT perspective, it is very much the same: at one point there were Word processing strategies and Laptop strategies.  No longer. The movement of a technology (or a marketing channel) from a special place to commonplace is not binary – it happens one step at a time.  And it happens as leaders begin to understand the importance of a complete social media integration with their organization: not a tack-on delegated to marketing or HR. This week’s action plan:  Look for one way to integrate Social Media into your day-to-day responsibilities. Contrived tasks or generic surfing don’t count: using the social web to achieve your annual objectives does. This week’s (flip-side) action plan:  On the flip side of complete social integration, is how quickly you retire some of the “old” processes and technologies.  Still have fax machines or fax numbers on business cards – or have you replaced these with Twitter handles and Skype addresses? This week, look for a few examples of “old” that you can replace with the new. Note: The Make It Happen Tipsheet is also available by email. Go to www.RandallCraig.com to register. Randall “Barrel maker and fax sender no more” Craig @RandallCraig (follow me) www.RandallCraig.com www.108ideaspace.com www.ProfessionallySpeakingTV.com