Welcome, John.

I used to run a lot of social media workshops within organisations. Internal 'digital literacy' stuff, really. I don't do this anymore and concentrate 100% on this Community. The increasingly broadcast-y nature of - to name one - Twitter - actually made me reflect on the very real and much deeper connections which emerge from a rather 'old school' discussion forum. Anyway, to get back to your question... when I gave these workshops, participants would often agree that as individuals we often have more affinity with people working in other organisations compared with - for example - the corporate, branded Twitter account belonging to that organisation. This will be especially so if you often network and meet your industry peers at events. People connect with other people. Businesses need to understand this is a vital part of their brand.

One manifestation of this is the company logo. I liked to use the example of the visual identity of the MIT Media Lab in the US. It is inspired by 'community' and collaboration. The basic idea is that the logo has three intersecting spotlights that can be organised in any of 40,000 shapes and 12 colour combinations using a custom algorithm. That’s enough to supply each and every new card-carrying Media Labber with his or her very own logo for 25 years.

I immediately thought of it when I read your post - and it could be argued this might be a perfect marriage of HR and marketing!! 

Each of the three shapes stands for one individual’s contribution, the resulting shape represents the outcome of this process: A constant redefinition of what media and technology means today. The logo is based on a visual system, an algorithm that produces a unique logo for each person, for faculty, staff and students. A custom web interface was developed to allow each person at the Media Lab to choose and claim an own individual logo for his/her business card.