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Impacts of Social Media in The Workplace

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Impacts of Social Media in The Workplace

Introduction and Background

Social media has significantly changed the way people interact in the workplace since

social networking is becoming inevitable in daily routines. Private use of social networking

platforms at the workplace has recently become a controversial topic based on various legal

frameworks. Businesses are always on the lookout for technological opportunities that will give

them a competitive edge over their business rivals. Such technologies have reshaped the

workplace and such technologies will allow employees some private gains, such as checking

real-time sporting updates or making and receiving private calls, at their employer's expense.

Due to the positive and negative impacts of social media, proponents of its use in the workplace

argue that it promotes a company's marketing efforts while opponents argue that it reduces the

productivity of employees.

Effect Of Social Media On Productivity And Mindset Of Employees

Social media can be a major source of distraction for many employees that already use

social media privately. Whenever a familiar message tone is heard at the place of work, thoughts

are distracted by the new message or there is a desire to look immediately. Recent studies

indicate that there is a loss of productivity because of social media usage at the place of work

(Mustajab et al., 2020). Productivity is reduced because of the constant checking and reviewing

of social media platforms, which can lead to a loss of valuable time and loss of focus. Instead of

performing different tasks simultaneously, the brain will change the focus of attention and tasks

will take twice as long to complete. Constant checking on social media often involves unfilled

free time, addiction, and laziness. Increased stress levels and nervousness, and lack of

concentration (Mustajab et al., 2020). Popular social media such as Facebook, Whatsapp, email,
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Google, Instagram, YouTube, Twitter, and others take a lot of time for non-work-related

purposes during working hours, which lowers productivity.

Social media has slowly gained its place in the workplace, which has changed employees'

mentality about their jobs. Due to the conciseness of communication through messaging

applications and Twitter, some employees do not see the need for extended meetings or work

schedules that require long, overlapping hours. Some employees do not see the value of

communicating face-to-face if they have the option to communicate quickly through short

written messages over the internet (Han et al., 2020). As a result, more workers are less patient

and demand flexible arrangements that are granted as long as they can fulfil their goals.

Communication between team members is adversely affected because everyone in the workplace

is becoming wired to receive instant gratification from instantly available messages and social

media connections (Han et al., 2020). Although the effects of social media in the workplace are

glaring, some employees think that it is possible to separate personal and professional life, which

is not true and has adverse effects on their performance.

How Social Media Improves Employer Brand

Organizations are constantly trying to attract the best talent in the market by using social

media to improve their employer brand. The trend has been influenced by younger generations of

workers that use social media to research companies they are interested in working for. In turn,

organizations commit to an online presence to maintain visibility and online interaction to attract

top talent (Tanwar & Kumar, 2019). Organizations maintain visibility on social media because

people want to work for popular organizations and employers they can verify and trust.

Organizations try to earn the trust of prospective workers by defining organizational culture and

goals that can be differentiated from competitors and keep employees engaged. Companies can
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use tools that potential employees turn to when checking job opportunities such as Facebook,

LinkedIn, Twitter, Blogs, and career websites. According to Tanwar & Kumar (2019), the

messages in such platforms should have consistent messaging that connects with different

audience groups. Social media allows companies to show prospective employees what life is like

in their organizations through interviews, case studies, and videos. Through social media, a

company can interact with people who are interested in working for them and connect them with

the training team.

Security And Image Risks Involved With The Use Of Social Media

There are hackers and people with malicious intent that are actively using social media to

exploit security loopholes that can be used to steal information and disrupt business operations.

Businesses are constantly under attack for their data, trade secrets, and other sensitive business

information (Soomro & Hussain, 2019). Employee use of social media is exploited to hack into

secure systems, which makes the use of popular social media platforms risky for business

operations. Hackers use malicious applications, scams, social network issues, untrained

employees, and a lack of social media policies to gain unwanted access to sensitive information.

Most security breaches involve cases where employees do not know how to protect themselves

adequately against social media threats (Soomro & Hussain, 2019). Security breaches occur

because it is impossible to monitor the actions of every employee and some organizations have a

large workforce, which increases the risk of social media attacks.

Companies that allow their employees to use social media in the workplace are always at

risk of destroying their brand reputation. Security breaches from social media that result in the

loss of customer data will have negative consequences on a brand image because of loss of

consumer trust and loss of business. In the past, big companies have lost consumer data to
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hackers and were forced to pay fines and compensate some of their customers and suffered more

losses due to negative brand reputation (Soomro & Hussain, 2019). Customers want to be

associated with companies that can guarantee the security of their personal information. Social

media results in an increasing amount and complexity of data available and low control over the

social media environment (Soomro & Hussain, 2019. It is almost impossible for a brand to

manage its image on social media if people do not associate the brand with positive outcomes.

Alternatives For Social Media In Workplace Communications

Since social media has many loopholes that can be exploited by malicious agents,

companies can use alternatives such as collaboration and communication platforms and

videoconferencing for workplace communication. Collaboration and communication platforms

can be tailored according to organizational needs and ensure that all activities that require

collaboration are completed without risking information leakage (Buchal & Songsore, 2019).

Since the COVID-19 pandemic, some work processes can be done remotely without ever having

to show up physically in the office. As such, the collaboration and communication platforms

allow a workplace to include remote working and increased reliance on technology without the

risk of revealing sensitive information on social media. Such platforms can help employees

separate their professional and personal life and organizations can increase their security by

issuing company devices with pre-installed programs that can only be accessed with confidential

employee information. Video conferencing can also facilitate workplace communication,

especially when there is a need for employee collaboration in real-time (Buchal & Songsore,

2019). Such alternatives can reduce dependence on social media and reduce the risk of security

breaches.

Future Of Social Media In the Workforce

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Social media will become an important tool in the workplace as more people continue

using social networking platforms in their daily activities and the content will be more

personalized. There will be vast amounts of data available to everyone and data collected from

social media will be used for major business decisions. More job seekers will use social media

to look for job opportunities because more than half of people today trust information from a

personal connection in their social network (Muninger et al., 2019). The future of job recruitment

will be on social media as more organizations continue turning to social media for talent

recruitment. Some hiring decision-makers in major organizations are unlikely to hire job seekers

without a social media presence. Most work will be completed online as the number of remote

jobs and workers continues to increase. When newer generations that were raised on social

media begin flooding the job market, companies will need to meet them where they feel most

comfortable and build authentic talent with prospective employees.

Conclusion

There are negative and positive effects on the use of social media in the workplace that

either advocate or oppose its use in organizations. Social media is not an ideal tool for employees

because it reduces productivity and negatively impacts the mindset of employees. Companies

can use social media to promote organizational culture and goals and attract prospective

employees by guiding their employer brand through social media. Social media can lead to

security breaches that can negatively affect brand image if there is a loss of sensitive information

such as customer personal information. Organizations have the alternative of using collaboration

and communication platforms and video conferencing to reduce their reliance on social media

for workplace communication. Social media will be an integral part of any company that wants
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to attract employees in the future because the newer generations that were brought up on social

media will flood the job market in the near future.

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References

Buchal, R., & Songsore, E. (2019). Using Microsoft Teams to support collaborative knowledge

building in the context of sustainability assessment. Proceedings of the Canadian

Engineering Education Association (CEEA).

Han, R., Xu, J., Ge, Y., & Qin, Y. (2020). The impact of social media uses on job burnout: The

role of social comparison. Frontiers in public health, 8, 588097.

Muninger, M. I., Hammedi, W., & Mahr, D. (2019). The value of social media for innovation: A

capability perspective. Journal of Business Research, 95, 116-127.

Mustajab, D., Bauw, A., Rasyid, A., Irawan, A., Akbar, M. A., & Hamid, M. A. (2020). Working

from home phenomenon as an effort to prevent COVID-19 attacks and its impacts on

work productivity. TIJAB (The International Journal of Applied Business), 4(1), 13.

Security and image risks involved with the use of social media

Soomro, T. R., & Hussain, M. (2019). Social Media-Related Cybercrimes and Techniques for

Their Prevention. Appl. Comput. Syst., 24(1), 9-17.

Tanwar, K., & Kumar, A. (2019). Employer brand, person-organisation fit and employer of

choice: Investigating the moderating effect of social media. Personnel Review, 48(3),

799-823.