Sun Microsystems new CEO, Jonathan Schwartz, is one of a small number of big company CEO's who blog. This fact made the news recently because, as USA Today says, his blog makes Sun the largest company with a CEO blog.
This is worthy of our notice.
Schwartz has been blogging for a while (longer than he's been CEO) and he's good at it. His posts are personable, they seem genuine and they are relevant to his role as the leader of his company. Though he only blogs about once a week, he's fairly consistent about it.
In other words, he comes across as a real blogger.
Too many big company executives have no idea how to blog. Most of their public communication is so filtered and sterile that no self-respecting blogging software would publish it. So, producing a well-written genuine sounding blog is still a big stretch for them.
But, to be fair, most of them probably don't care to become bloggers. They're too busy running their companies. And, I suspect a lot of them don't understand the medium enough to accurately judge its value to their companies. Of course, a lot of PR and marcom types still don't understand this new social media either, so we can't judge their bosses too harshly.
Is Jonathan Schwartz leading the way as a shining example for more CEO's to follow?
Yes and no.
Yes, because (long term) any company that ignores the power of our new media/social media is going to suffer. As AOL learned last week, the power of social media is an awesome thing. And no company or group can control it. You either participate and use it or you get clobbered by it.
No, because Jonathan Schwartz is not typical of big company CEO's.
First, he's been in IT his whole career.
Second, he has a degree in mathematics.
Third, he has a pony-tail.
In other words, Jonathan Schwartz is predisposed to using something like a blog. He's hip. He's cool. He's dialed in to what's happening in the fast-changing world of technology. For him blogging is as natural as golfing is for most big company CEO's.
So, I wouldn't expect a stampede of big company CEO's to start overwhelming the blogosphere any time soon. But, I think Schwartz's blog is a good example for other CEO's to follow. For them, it legitimizes the concept of blogging at the CEO level.
And I think others will follow. Slowly at first, but they will follow.
Who knows, maybe we'll start to see more pony-tails in the CEO's offices in the future...
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