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If the hype and potential growth of a market can be measured by the number of conversations that are happening on and off-line, then Enterprise 2.0 in all its forms and declinations is definitely set to be a megatrend in business for the near future.

Millions of tweets are exchanged on this topic, thousands of online communities discuss about it, magazines and newspaper are reporting daily how large corporations are leveraging this new business model to get closer to their customers and employees.

Despite this exponentially growing amount of conversations, the most frequent question I hear from customers and prospects I meet is: "How do I implement this?" Or even "How can I change my company's culture to adapt?". A lot of skeptics do ask: "Is there really a proven ROI?"
And the list goes on. There seems to be a lot of uncertainty about what this brave new world will bring.

Unfortunately a lot of these conversations are still happening only among subject matter experts, Enterprise 2.0 vendors, analysts, gurus and so on. A very small community compared to the millions of users out there.

This is not the rule, but it is very often so.

How do we bring managers and entrepreneur closer to this topic and allow them to voice their concerns without being submerged immediately by a thousands of vendors (I include analysts in this category) trying to sell their solutions/services?
I am not saying that this should not happen (it is my job after all to sell), but I am an advocate for communities and events lead by managers for managers where we (vendors, analysts etc) share our knowledge without fear of disclosing or without the (immediate) intention of selling.

I do not say I have the solution to this, but I firmly think that there is still too little interactivity at most events which are the perfect chance for sellers to bring buyers closer to them.
Most of the time there is a uni-directional pattern where experts are on the stage with very little interaction with users.
Agendas are mostly created by the organizers without much gathering of information from the audience.

Since Enterprise 2.0 is all about people connecting and generating content, why are Events still mostly 1.0?
Users do not really connect before, during and after the event.
They do not really influence what will be discussed. User surveys are good, but definitely not enough, especially if done after the event to plan for something which will happen a year later...

And presentation material? The most simple thing any 1.0 site can do and yet most of the time customers leave with their notes and not much more.

I have yet to come across an Enterprise 2.0 (major) event where the user is at the center and where the user drives the agenda.

Next week, on the 9th and 10th of June, I will be attending the International Forum on Enterprise 2.0  

The agenda will boldly address:

* Setting up the strategy and building the business case
* New organization schemes and leadership model
* Nurturing adoption and cultural change
* ROIs, metrics and business drivers
* Frameworks to manage communities and to engage customers and users
* The impact of Social Media on business processes: BPM 2.0, CRM 2.0, PLM 2.0
* Best practices and lessons learned through national and international case studies
* From marketing to Social CRM
* Social software and collaborative platforms

I trust that users will be given the chance to interact, voice their issues, exchange opinions and specially get in the driving seat to form the agenda of the future event with continuous conversations with other users, vendors and analysts.

The conversation has already started as a thread on the Enterprise 2.0 Community  (ask for permission to join...)

and can be followed on Twitter  .

These are all very good attempts to transform an (event) industry which is still very 1.0.

If users want to get more value they have to join the conversation, share their experience and make sure they are in the driving seat.

Consumers have been doing huge steps forward in influencing the corporate agenda. Enterprise customers should do the same!

Quoting the Cluetrain Manifesto:

"Business is actually about people and conversations"

I will be reporting my impressions during and after the event.

That's all for now!