Issue link: https://www.e-digitaleditions.com/i/161013
Resolving Employee Conflicts with Social Media Alexan de r Ki rch /G low I mag es Though it may seem that online social media sites have been around forever, companies are still struggling to determine how to best use social networks such as Facebook and Twitter to boost productivity and innovation. To discover the pitfalls and payoffs of social media, three researchers followed a global security company—which they call "GloSecure"—as it rolled out a digital social media strategy with its employees. The researchers include Hope Koch and Dorothy Leidner, both professors of information systems at Baylor University's Hankamer School of Business in Waco, Texas; and Ester Gonzalez, at the time a doctoral student at Hankamer. The researchers chose this company because of the challenges it faced in adopting a digital social media strategy. It had a history of hiring freezes and merger and acquisitions activity. Its major client was the U.S. government, so it had been the target of government cutbacks. Finally, it had previously restricted employees' Internet usage. These factors had created a culture dominated by information hoarding and managerial control. Hope Koch Encouraging its teams to collaborate on social media sites (SMS) via discussion boards, blogs, and wikis represented a major shift in culture—from "need-toknow" to "need-to-share." The pair spent two weeks reviewing the company's website, annual reports, and other documents, and then they interviewed employees. One of the SMS Dorothy designers noted that previously "employLeidner ees in the aeronautics division and employees in the space division could be working on the same project without either group knowing." After the SMS system was in place, employees who were too informal in their social media activity initially were admonished and reminded that the SMS was "for work only." Others viewed it as too much like Facebook and deemed it a "distraction" and "time waster." To resolve the conflict between SMS and the entrenched culture, GloSecure took a "leadershipbased" approach by involving executives in the imple- mentation process. It took a "policy-based" approach by having managers write information sharing into its employees' work objectives and by decreasing hierarchy—for example, placing engineers' workspaces on the shop floor with other workers. It also took a "socialization-based" approach, hiring Millennials who were comfortable with interacting on social networks, allowing workers to telecommute, and planning social events for employees. As they adopt social media strategies in the workplace, managers need to be aware that many employees may perceive social media as frivolous, distracting, and even a threat to their status, the authors emphasize. "Organizational adoption of these technologies will only accelerate," they write. "Managers embarking on digitally-enabled social network implementations should … address both employee misperceptions and organizational culture." "Digitally-Enabling Social Networks: Resolving IT-Culture Conflict" appeared online June 13 in the Information Systems Journal and is published in its September issue. BizEd September/October 2013 55