Joe McKendrick’s been surfacing a lot of points which go both to the new data that are coming out around Enterprise 2.0 and to the continuing energy around the adoption discussion.

In an earlier post I previewed some datapoints from a new study currently being finalized by the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) and FAST. The forthcoming report will offer a view on Enterprise 2.0 that is not as dark as the picture painted by the 250 IT professionals that Information Week surveyed. It also provides a perspective on business benefits that I believe helps avoid some of the chicken and egg discussions around getting Enterprise 2.0 experiments off the ground.

One of the most striking bits of data from the EIU’s work (surveying over 400 executives, over 40% C-level) is that over 80% of respondents reported that they view the 2.0 technologies as “an opportunity to increase my company’s revenues and/or margins.” Fewer than one person in 20 view the 2.0 technologies as a threat, and fewer than one in 5 expect it to have no significant impact on their businesses.

The EIU survey also indicates that these executives have formed quite strong opinions about where 2.0 will impact most strongly. Over 75% of them report that the greatest impact from 2.0 will come in “the way my company interacts with customers.” Approximately 40% report that they see strong impacts coming in the way their company is viewed by customers and in the way employees interact with each other and the enterprise. And 40% also report that they see 2.0 impacting their business models.

All of these survey results point to a strong sense of connection between 2.0 and future business benefits - particularly in offering the customer web-centric channels for interacting with the firm.

The interview research carried out by EIU in conjunction with the survey work brings out some similarly positive executive narratives from firms as diverse as Global Crossing, General Motors, Citigroup, J. Walter Thompson, Procter & Gamble, and more. For example, in describing some of the changes in expectations her customers are going through relative to interacting with her agency, JWT chief experience officer Colleen DeCourcy noted “The value is not in the delivery of knowledge but in the alchemy of knowledge, in the ability to connect thoughts that weren’t previously connected…. That’s why we need things like tagging, to connect previously unconnected ideas.”

On the issue of IT “preparedness” for 2.0 (less than 15% of the survey respondents were in IT roles), the EIU results indicate a generally high regard for IT senior management’s understanding of the technical and business issues. The largest areas of question are around whether or not IT has adequate resources and skills to follow through.

Look for the EIU final report on fastsearch.com within the week.