Last Sunday, Tom Friedman of the New York Times wrote a pretty good op ed on highlighting social as an acronym. Social as an acronym comes from Marc Benioff of SalesForce. The Social as an acronym goes something like this:

The Social Acronym

• S is for Speed which means that due to social media everything is happening very fast.
• O is is for Open which means with Facebook, Google, etc. all information is freely available and can be worked on.
• C is for Collaboration. People using social media can get together virtually and work on just about anything from energy problems to organizing protest
• I is for the Individual which is now empowered using social media and can link to anywhere in the world.
• A is for Alignment. Social allows organizations to ensure that everyone is moving in the right direction to the end goal.
• L is for Leadership. Social allows leaders to continually reach out and provide the vision of what they want their company or product to be.

Social as and acronym helps us understand just how powerful social media is not only as marketers but as people. We are now able to easily work on and produce products instead of meeting people you are working with. But, all facets of the social need to be met for this to work. You will always need to individuals with a clear purpose moving in the right direction and you will need to do it fast because you know there are other people already doing it.