A room of her own: Philips Electronics North America and Wisegate

The point, she says is that when you're not sure, you can use the power of a group of experts to brainstorm, get new insights and make decisions – especially when a new regulation comes up.

She went looking for a solution that would allow her to perform these tasks most effectively. It was clear to her that making the business case for collaboration would enable better connectivity and more efficient engagement resulting in increased productivity.

"Targeted collaboration among senior privacy people is an enormous help to productivity," she says. "It saves a lot of time with quality results. Also, collaboration lets me better solve problems and get very practical insights from others that frankly I can't get anywhere else today."

"Like many, I've used numerous solutions for collaboration with colleagues, such as email, trade shows, conferences, LinkedIn groups and other online forums, Knight says.

But, these options were proving insufficient. There was too much data to sort through with little of it relevant to her focus.

"I looked at Wisegate because it is a different approach – a private sharing forum that makes it easy to connect and share with other senior privacy officers like me, anytime."

Wisegate is an invitation-only community where senior privacy and IT professionals meet to solve problems with peers, says Sara Gates (left), founder and CEO of Wisegate. "By enforcing strict membership guidelines, which require a senior-level position and excludes vendors from joining, Wisegate is able to provide members with unmatched direct access to senior-level colleagues in similar jobs and high value content."

Wisegate's mission, she says, is to make members' jobs less stressful and more productive – and even more fun – by providing a place where professionals can meet and solve problems within a closed community of highly qualified peers. 

It is far easier to connect with colleagues on Wisegate than it is using email, Philips' Knight says, adding that unlike trade shows and conferences, she can connect anytime – and with the added benefit of not having to travel.

"Online forums and LinkedIn groups are way too noisy and have too many vendors," she says. "It can be difficult for me to find the people or information I need there. Wisegate instead is a private community. They only allow senior-level professionals and do not allow vendors. That makes it much easier to connect directly with other senior-level privacy professionals to share insights and get the practical input I need – and, to share my own experiences."

Wisegate is like a dial-tone, she says, always on. And, having that ability to reach others like herself and to pose questions and share experiences helps save a huge amount of time. She points particularly to her ability when on the site to take a pulse of what others are doing to mitigate risk. "Plus, it is a great value," she adds.

Wisegate is different for a few reasons, Gates says. "First, if you sell anything to our members, you are not allowed to join. There is no selling on Wisegate. This means that the noise level is very low and the help level is very high."

It also is different because users have to qualify to join, and qualifying means one is at a senior level and their work environment is big and complex.

Also, Wisegate is specifically structured to help its members in their day-to-day jobs and decisions, Gates says. "So, it is not a free-for-all forum environment, but a specifically structured site with a goal to help get information to our members quickly."

She says the forum's match-making service allows members to match questions with experts and bring together people who are in similar jobs. "Everyone's boss is always asking them, 'What are others in our industry doing about (fill in issue du jour here)?' We make it easy for members to answer that question by simply taking 30 seconds to pose it," she says.

Another key difference, she explains, is that the site is serving senior technologists who are always busy, so member concierge services are available to make it easy for them to contribute and get answers.

"With this service, they talk and we take care of posting for them, and members can email questions and answers and we take care of getting them answered and back to the member," Gates says.

The targeted collaboration Wisegate provides gives Philips' Knight more exposure to the approach that others are taking to the ever-changing regulatory environment.

"For example, as the FTC moves ahead with requirements around mobile devices and geolocation, etc., I will look to the Wisegate community for brainstorming around various approaches," she says. 

The “anti-social, social network,” is an ideal, time-saving and appropriate response to the trend in social media and the increase in privacy professionals, says Knight. "I love the ease of access to information and the always-on nature of the community."

And, the offering is regularly updated with new features and fixes, without the need for end-users to make any changes to their settings or environment, adds Gates.