By Jerry Brown, General Manager, Contra Costa Water District and AMWA Representative to the WaterXchange Board
The water/wastewater industry is headlong into transformational times: One Water, Utilities of the Future, holistic regional solutions, urgent response to climate change and much more. Keeping up with best practices, connecting with key stakeholders and leveraging industry innovations is challenging. There’s a lot of information out there, but it can be hard and time-consuming to easily find relevant materials and make the right industry connections. Public water, wastewater and stormwater utilities, associations and research organizations now have a digital collaboration tool unlike anything else in the industry – WaterXchange.org.
A recent Harvard Business Review study shows use of social tools soaring in the workplace. Seventy- two percent of over 4,000 companies reported using social tools and apps to facilitate employee communication. Employees who used a work related social media tool became 31 percent more likely to find coworkers with expertise relevant to meeting job goals. Those employees also became 88 percent more likely to accurately identify who could put them in contact with the right experts. They made these gains by observing what their coworkers talked about on the site and with whom. You can now realize these same gains at your organization.
WaterXchange.org was created by a group of water and wastewater professionals specifically to meet the needs of this industry. The tool works across desktop, tablet and smartphone platforms. You can exchange documents, write a blog, form groups within or outside of your organization. The capacity is endless and can support every employee in your organization. HR, IT, O&M, Finance, Public Affairs, Engineering – all can find useful ways to get more done faster with WaterXchange.
As a contributor to early WaterXchange site development, AMWA is able to offer its members a 90-day free trial period. Download a fact sheet on the trial program at www.amwa.net/WaterXchangeTrial.
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Visit the WaterXchange site at www.waterexchange.org for details and step-by-step signup instructions.