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Guidelines for social media in the workplace
Social media in the workplace is fast becoming a way of life for employers and many companies have embraced the use of social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter and Linkedin during working hours. However, while there are clear business benefits from using these communication tools, there are also reputational risks. To ensure these tools result in success rather than disaster, here are a few pointers:
1. It’s just another tool
With so much hype around it, it is easy to forget that social media is simply another vehicle that can be used for business purposes. Just like any other business tool or form of company communication, the objectives for its use should be clearly defined and employees should be given clear guidance on how to use it.
2. Define a clear policy
The most effective companies have a clear social media policy in place. This clearly defines what “social media” is and gives guidance on use eg what sort of sites are appropriate, how they can use social media for business benefit and some examples of best practice. What can also be helpful is including some examples of what is not acceptable, so don’t be afraid to share some bad practice examples that you want to avoid.
3. Share the policy
It may sound obvious, but if you have a policy in place, it is important that this is shared with all employees, both existing and new employees. Given how quickly social media is developing, it is worth considering reviewing the policy and sharing any updates at least every six months.
4. What’s in it for me?
As well as explaining how social media can help the company and how they can be part of that, make it clear how this business tool can benefit employees. For example, will it help them build relationships with customers, which in turn could lead to more sales commission for them?
5. The bigger picture
Any social media policy of this nature should be part and parcel of your overall HR policy. To ensure this is implemented appropriately, it is important to engage your HR and management teams in this.
6. Education, education, education
To make the most of the benefits of social media and to help avoid any disasters, it is helpful to offer social media training to all staff. Whilst it is likely that younger staff will be more familiar with social media, its reach is extending well beyond Generation Y. For example, currently the fastest growing age group on Facebook is women over 50.
7. Don’t forget to engage your senior team
Company directors may think that the world of social media is not relevant to them, but it is important that everyone in the business has at least a basic understanding of how social media works and how it can benefit the business.
8. Make sure you have the right person in charge
Whilst it may be tempting to leave the wonderfully new world of social media to a fresh graduate who eats, sleeps and breathes Facebook, unless you want to risk the entire reputation of your organisation, resist this! Social media is a key business tool which has potentially huge reputational risks. As a result, ultimate responsibility for this should rest with your most senior communications person. This individual and their team should be responsible for guiding appropriate use of social media and responding to any external issues in the same way they would with any other media channel.
9. Monitor references to your company in social media
As well as understanding what your employees are saying about your business, it is important to understand what is being said externally on social media like blogs and on channels like Twitter. With tools like Google alerts, this can be very easy, quick and cost effective.
10. Don’t lose the sense of fun
While there are some major potential pitfalls, social media can be great fun. A large proportion of employees are using social media to have fun every day in their personal lives, so imagine being able to harness the power of this for your business?
