Far too many companies still have problems with employees who are continually ‘distracted’ by social communication during the working day, the employment law specialist Bibby Consulting & Support has warned.
While the debate continues on just how much it costs companies when employees use social media sites – a firm with 100 staff could lose over 16 working hours every day if each person checked texts and Facebook posts for just 10 minutes – Bibby Consulting & Support said this was only part of the problem.
In fact, the company believes the main issue is that through the growth of social media applications, employees are constantly aware of personal issues as a result of status updates and Tweets – so they are more distracted from their jobs than ever before.
But, says Bibby Consulting & Support’s Managing Director Michael Slade, businesses have an extremely simple solution to hand – they can create and implement a social media and IT policy.
This includes telling staff that they are not allowed to use their mobiles during office hours and can only turn them on at agreed breaks. They certainly should not use their mobiles while at their desks and could face disciplinary action if they do.
Also, employers should make it clear to staff that all online activity must be work-related and that it will be monitored.
Slade is surprised that many prospects he talks to still don’t have any sort of IT/social media policy and a recent survey showed this to be the case in 52 per cent of companies. At the same time, analysis has revealed that the peak time for social media traffic is during working hours.
“There is a serious problem here,” says Slade. “These aren’t just marketing statistics used by software companies to help sell their content filtering products, these are very real issues for businesses who are fed up with employees downing tools and simply messing around on the web.”
He concludes, “Companies need to get tough and implement a strict policy. Having a comprehensive set of rules will help staff remain focused and so will drive up productivity. The good news here is that this can be achieved incredibly quickly and at zero cost to businesses.”
I’m currently researching the use of social media for driving business change. The advice in this article would be a backwards step for many organisations who are realising business value through the use of social media, both externally to engage with customers and internally to engage with employees.
Those organisations doing this stuff well are seeing increasing employee engagement, which we know links to client/customer satisfaction and profit, and also greater collaboration among employees, leading to better client/customer service and innovation.
Companies seeing this value are doing it not through restricting use of social media but by trusting employees and valuing social contributions that may not see an immediate tangible benefit but connects often geographically or functionally disparate groups.
As one interviewee in my research put it ‘you only read policy in order to break policy’!
Twitter: @AlanaInness
Maybe you should first ask yourself *why* they are doing this before you start making them resent you.
Sometimes personal events or interests attract your attention during “business hours”. Sometimes work requirements or thoughts attract your attention during “personal time”. Swings and roundabouts, give and take… all that matters is that the employee gets their job done and does it well. And this is more likely to happen if the working environment is supportive, not driven by petty rules! Oh, and shoot me – I’m typing this during work hours!
Interesting. There’s nothing like a Canute approach to holding back the tide to guarantee getting wet.
Technology enables the flexibility critical to this new way of working, but for it to thrive, technology must coexist with a corporate culture based on trust and individual accountability, which measures performance by impact rather than by activity
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-17064032
I’ll start again, there’s nothing like a Canute approach to holding back the tide to guarantee getting wet. If you believe policies that drive ‘presenteeism’, restrictions on social media and use of systems will lead to greater productivity then I have news. You can lead a horse to water but you cannot make it drink. Happy, productive, professional employees flourish best in an environment of trust and autonomy. Don’t manage to your lowest common denominator, measure the performance of your employees by their impact not their activity. But hey, don’t just take my word for it:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-17064032
I cannot see how social network sites can give value to any commercial enterprise.
and whilst we are at it, we should chain our staff to our desks and allow only one toilet break a day. We all know that interweb thing will never last, its just a fad and so last year. Social media, huh, they will be telling us next that there are nearly one billion people on Facebook – oh wait….
there is….
Michael Slade, get real, i believe your approach is all wrong. Social Media is part of the everyday fabric of life and importantly of the working life. It is here to stay and it will grow. The challenge for companies is how to channel what social media can do for them, which platforms would suit their market and how you can monetise it and improve the service you give your customers. Having a restrictive practice on its use will discourage creativity, exploration and will impact your ability to recruit and retain your people. By all means deal with people who spend an unreasonable amount of time on their personal social media vice. So yes, have social media guidelines, not a policy. What i would be more interested in exploring is why any forward looking company would feel the need for such restrictive practices as it surely wouldn’t be needed with an engaged and motivated workforce.
Anyone not sure about the social media future, watch this video, a bit cheesy and even a little out of date, but nevertheless powerful. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0eUeL3n7fDs
I am aware that by contributing to this discussion, I am myself using social media during company time…..
I work as an HR manager within a highly competitive private sector organisation; as such I’m aware of the need to ensure everyone spends as much of their working time in activities where they are delivering their real value. With a clear social media policy, its possible for employees at most levels to allocate an amount of time engaging with their peers, experts and of course potential customers.
Genuine, positive and persuasive discussion adds value to the perception of an organisation and will attract both new business and talent.
Throwing company money into advertising has become less and less effective. But embrace and manage the use of social media within your organisation and the rewards are clear.
Social Media guidelines are useful (and necessary), but should also be aligned with other policies such as IT and bullying and harassment etc.
Most companies already have poor performance policies, the reason for the poor performance is immaterial. If someone is not doing their job (for whatever reason) deal with it as a performance issue.
Business owners who are serious about their business flourishing for future generations will know the value of social media. Apart from the range of benefits of using social media set out by others above, if you don’t embrace social media, how are you going to future-proof your organisation by attracting younger people into your organisation?
It really worries me that distrust and risk averse thinking is holding organisation back from ‘the future’. This is the reality – http://www.slideshare.net/jbrenman/the-future-of-work-2361479
You need to trust your employees and promote an adult to adult working environment, the measures described in this article come across as old fashioned and counter productive…
although I loved the irony of the article’s last sentence…
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Trust is key, remember when we were worried that employees might use the office phone for personal use, then came e-mail and now social media. I agree that we need policies but these should be used more to safeguard the business (and our employees), to educate employees (both in and out of work) about “appropriate” use of social media. We engage in social media but expect our employees to work whist at work, we have set up PCs in rest areas for staff to use during breaks and believe that in the future social media will be so enshrined in business that it is better to embrace it, encourage staff to engage in social media and more than anything trust them.