Steve Bendt and Gary Koelling are two of the more unusual change agents you're likely to come across. Laid-back hipsters with modest demeanors, they shatter the myth of typical change agents who are aggressive, decisive and demanding.

Yet somehow this duo managed to create something most established companies only dream of: real and informed employee engagement that cuts across boundaries, silos, departments and disciplines.

Bendt and Koelling are the creators of Blue Shirt Nation (BSN), a robust community of Best Buy employees who convene regularly to share knowledge, best practices, frustrations, aspirations and a few jokes. Community members include everyone from recent high school graduates to semi-retirees.

"BSN members form groups, make friends, stay in touch and prop each other up; they swap ideas and problem-solve together," explains Bendt. "It's really cool and it's also a total fluke."

Bendt and Koelling are two former advertising whiz kids hired by Best Buy a few years ago to work on various advertising campaigns. Marketing is a company's growth engine—from developing products and services to acquiring and keeping customers—and the stakes were high. The pair proceeded to come up with a "crazy idea to circumvent all the rules" and build an online community to tap into customer insight. Their source for the insight: The Best Buy employee.

"When we set it up two years ago, we weren't turning on a social network," explains Koelling. "We were turning on a research tool. Boy, did we have it wrong."

"We found out real fast that employees didn't want to play that game," says Bendt. "Instead, they gave us new rules and told us what they wanted on the site and at the company. We shut up pretty quickly and realized we needed to just listen."

Both Bendt and Koelling agree that the project quickly became more interesting than the original problem they were trying to solve. The site launched in June 2006 and within a year, 20,000 (of Best Buy's 150,000) employees had signed up.

Business, Innovation