Using social media in the workplace to communicate

Using social media in the workplace to communicate

In the current times, more and more lives are chronicled online. This trend will only become so prevalent in the future since Social media continues to infiltrate every facet of our daily lives. In a number of ways, we are just beginning to understand the effect of our continued connection and the effects that social media will have on the manner in which we communicate with our world. In the business world, social media is often regarded as both a valuable asset and a perpetual interference. Despite this fact, companies that make an effort to embrace the new technology and learn with it are better off in preparation to take advantage of its potential as a tool for building relationships. At first, it may sound odd to encourage your employees to be active on social media. However, social media is not as taboo in the workplace as it was initially. In fact, around 90% of companies use social media for business purposes, according to a global survey conducted in 2014. Hire our assignment writing services if your assignment is devastating you.

Using social media as the starting point, this report analyses how social media can be used in workplace communication, the benefits of using media to communicate in the Business, and how social media communication can lead to distraction in the Business. This discussion will be backed up by practical examples in the organizational context.

How Social Media Can Be Used in the Workplace to Communicate

Social media continues to evolve as an efficient tool for corporate communications. Employers who are efficient with benefits communications have a complete knowledge of how to deliver their messages in a manner by which employees will absorb and retain them. Ranging from Yammer to LinkedIn to Facebook and many more, companies are doing much more with social media internally than they used to in the last years(Leonardi, 2017.p.48). On the same note, the companies continue to communicate the same message on multiple social media platforms, aiming to gain traction. In the next parts, we will discuss some ways social media can be used for employee communication.

Facebook is the most popular way of communicating with employees in the workplace in the modern world of Business. There are many managers who post organizational communications in the workplace in Facebook pages. From the perspective that they are connected with their employees, they use Facebook to communicate information about meetings, incoming enrolment deadlines, among others (Wang et al., 2016. p. 6). Additionally, they also use this platform to advocate for employees to spread the word. In such a way, employees are never afraid to call to action such communications. In so doing, important Communication in the Organization is communicated in an effective manner and, thus, retention.

Further, Businesses are using the chat service of the enterprise, Yammer, as an internal communication module. Yammer allows the sharing of information in the social dimension through anything from the board of the company to localized team members of the board or even individualized groups of projects. This online platform is easy to use, has a mobile application and it is a good way to communicate to employees in real time. Also, it is beneficial as it cuts down the daily overflow of emails found in the contemporary workplace.

Twitter is another social media platform common in the modern workplace. Arguably, Twitter is another powerful tool for internal communications in many companies. With the option to tweet publicly or privately, employers are in the position to share short torrents of statistics with the networks of their employees or even wider onlookers. Big companies like Google and Starbucks have taken advantage of Twitter as an internal communication tool to engage and motivate their employees, alongside providing an idea of what it feels like to work at these companies(van Osch, 2015. p.770). Also, other employers, such as MIT, use the Twitter handle to promote its work-life content and professional growth events, among others. In this way, it is worth saying that Twitter is a powerful tool for internal communications in the workplace.

The scope of ways in which social media is used in the workplace to communicate is so large that it cannot be fully exploited in this discussion. However, it is important to give an overview of how other social media sites, such as LinkedIn, YouTube, and company blogs, are used to communicate in the Organization. Firstly, with LinkedIn groups, the owners of the Business create their own intranet on a linked podium, which allows them to manage a group of employees and, in such a way, share lots of information regarding their organizations.

Company blogs, on the other hand, are used by HR to post important information. Through such blogs, employees can gain access to this information and also encourage Communication (Razmerita, Kirchner &Nielsen, 2016.p.45). Lastly, YouTube is a magnificent way to archive broadcast training for use in the future. A private business YouTube channel allows the Business to archive any video for training they have produced while making it available to third parties. Employees could use these videos for learning.

Benefits of Social Media Communication in the Workplace.

In this era of globalization and industrialization, social media has become an internal tool of Communication in the Organization. There are a number of benefits of using social media in the workplace to communicate, particularly an engaged audience when it comes to mobile. In this part, I will discuss the advantages if using social media to communicate with employees in an organization.

Improved Communication Within the company.

Social media has replaced the newsletters which were used by employers to keep employees informed. Private Facebook pages and events keep people posted as far as important information in an organization is concerned. To a much further extent, social media can be used as an avenue for the creation of a sense of community and confirmation between employees and other stakeholders (Wang et al., 2016. p. 6). In a more concise way, social media aims at keeping people connected even if they are physically segregated. Specifically, a report by David Mayfield confirmed that social media resulted in better relationships in the workplace. In this way of keeping employees posted and connected, social media usage has resulted in improved Communication.

Social Media Improves Employee Productivity and Engagement.

Social media, as an internal communication channel, is particularly for sales team members who are in different locations and time zones. Working in different places and time zones could be seen as a challenge, but more importantly, people work well together in addition to communicating effectively through the power of social media (Leonardo, 2014.p.284). In addition to Communication, social media keeps employees happy and engaged, where they spend more time than with their families working, sharing, and mingling with people who are part of the ever-changing Organization. It has also been found that remote workers tend to be more engaged than their site counterparts. This is because they log more hours of work and are more productive, with the main spur to their work-related communications being emails, social media, and virtual meetings.

Knowing more about each other’s personal lives.

Once scrolling through the News feed of Facebook, you may find a peculiar phenomenon., even the most quiet and reserved individuals who don’t talk much about their personal lives share them on social media. Outside the office settings, people live completely different lives. On this note, a proliferation of social media platforms helps the members of an organization to learn about the lives of their co-workers (Leonardo & Vaast, 2017.p.160). It may be seen as a bad thing, but it is not. This is because there exists a potential that the life of a co-worker, while not in the line of duty, could be the foundation of a conflict. However, in many cases, it could lead to a conversation about shared interests, outline other skills, and achievements or in extreme cases, help to offer a deeper insight into the source of motivation to a colleague while at work. This is good for the Organization since through sharing personal life experiences, other benefits could occur.

Promotion of the company Brand.

In the past, it used to be enough to have a website. However, to reach the right the most people and the right audience, Social media becomes critical. For instance, Twitter has a population of 303 active users, while Facebook has around 2 billion active users. Indisputably, this is a big market(Leonardi, 2017.p.48). If the employers are tweeting and retweeting the news, posting photos on Instagram, and inviting other people to like, they are not only communicating with their employees but also acting as social media marketers. Also, the news and information posted by Sales team members could be used to promote the products and services to a wider audience. Practically, information posted on social media pages not only keeps the employees posted but also reaches other users of social media. In such a way, the important information about the company is disseminated to a wider audience.

The power of social media in workplace communication is so large. However, it is also important to mention other benefits of using social media in the workplace to communicate. These include better customer service, engagement, and innovation through crowdsourcing, reaching a wider audience, and recruiting talent, among others(Cardon & Marshall, 2015.p. 275). It is also important to know that social media is an important tool for external Communication in the Organization, maybe to stakeholders and the customers. Social media has a long-lasting and appealing effect on customers, and hence, an organization using social media as a communication channel should be precise with the information posted; otherwise, the public image of the Business will be tarnished.

Social media as a distraction.

Definitely, the use of social media in the workplace to communicate is beneficial. However, the usage of social media in the Organization could lead to problems. This is based on the conventional wisdom that anything advantageous is disadvantageous, too. In this part, we address the problems that arise from using social media and propose some ways of overcoming such problems.

Social media usage in organizational Communication could lead to problems such as uncontrolled use, which leads to leaking of confidential information, lead to a generation dilemma, and could break relationships among employees as well as bullying and harassment. For instance, some employees could use social media to express negative views about the employer, which finally destroys his/her reputation. Social media is also very addictive, and its use in the Organization for Communication makes it difficult for employees to switch off from it during working hours. Finally, social media usage allows room for the poaching of employees by competitors, which finally affects the Organization adversely.

In the realm of such challenges, it is important to have an organizational social media policy. A social media policy could regulate the employee’s social media usage while in the line of duty. Therefore, the social media policy should be well drafted to regulate employee behavior (Holland, Cooper& Hecker, 2016 . p. 2622).

Conclusion

In conclusion, social media usage in the Organization is critical. Social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter, company logs, and Yammer, among others, can be used to communicate in the Organization. There are a number of benefits that an organization accrues as a result of using social media to communicate, such as improved communication, increased innovation and creativity, and knowing each other’s personal lives, among others. Apart from these benefits, there are problems that result from the use of social media, such as difficulty in controlling the employee’s social media activity and the creation of a generation dilemma, among many others. It is, therefore, important for managers to ensure that there is an organization’s social media policy. And in so doing, the problems will be overcome.

References

Leonardi, P.M., 2017. The social media revolution: Sharing and learning in the age of leaky knowledge. Information and Organization, 27(1), pp.47-59.

Leonardi, P.M. and Vaast, E., 2017. Social media and their affordances for organizing: A review and agenda for research. Academy of Management Annals, 11(1), pp.150-188.

Methot, J.R., Lepine, J.A., Podsakoff, N.P. and Christian, J.S., 2016. Are workplace friendships a mixed blessing? Exploring tradeoffs of multiplex relationships and their associations with job performance. Personnel Psychology, 69(2), pp.311-355.

Cardon, P.W. and Marshall, B., 2015. The hype and reality of social media use for work collaboration and team communication. International Journal of Business Communication, 52(3), pp.273-293.

Panagiotopoulos, P. and Barnett, J., 2015. Social Media in Union Communications: An International Study with UNI Global Union Affiliates. British Journal of Industrial Relations, 53(3), pp.508-532.

Razmerita, L., Kirchner, K. and Nielsen, P., 2016. What factors influence knowledge sharing in organizations? A social dilemma perspective of social media Communication. Journal of Knowledge Management, 20(6), pp.1225-1246.

Wang, W.Y., Pauleen, D.J. and Zhang, T., 2016. How social media applications affect B2B communication and improve business performance in SMEs. Industrial Marketing Management, 54, pp.4-14.

Van Osch, W., Steinfield, C.W. and Balogh, B.A., 2015, January. Enterprise social media: Challenges and opportunities for organizational Communication and collaboration. In System Sciences (HICSS), 2015 48th Hawaii International Conference on (pp. 763- 772). IEEE.

Leonardi, P.M., 2014. Social media, knowledge sharing, and innovation: Toward a theory of communication visibility. Information systems research, 25(4), pp.796-816.

Holland, P., Cooper, B.K. and Hecker, R., 2016. Use of social media at work: a new form of Employee voice? The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 27(21), pp.2621-2634.

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Using social media in the workplace to communicate

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