{"id":1920,"date":"2016-05-23T14:50:26","date_gmt":"2016-05-23T14:50:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.binfire.com\/blog\/?p=1920"},"modified":"2016-05-23T14:50:26","modified_gmt":"2016-05-23T14:50:26","slug":"social-media-new-corporate-welfare","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.binfire.com\/blog\/social-media-new-corporate-welfare\/","title":{"rendered":"Believe it or not: Social Media is the new corporate welfare"},"content":{"rendered":"

How today\u2019s workers are subsidizing their employers without even trying<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

If you believe the doomsayers, social media is destroying employee productivity. The average worker has 5 social media accounts and is spending between one and two hours a day cyberloafing.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 This wasted time is costing corporations billions of dollars a year and is destroying shareholder value.<\/span><\/p>\n

The problem with this theory is that it\u2019s not actually based on fact. Sure, there is plenty of data showing that most social media postings happen during the workday and not after-hours or on weekends.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The theory unravels when you look at the actual research that relates to employee productivity such as the US Bureau of Labor Statistics<\/a>.\u00a0\u00a0 At least in the US, there is actually an improvement in output per hour which means that in aggregate, employees are working harder and getting better results.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

How do we reconcile these seemingly contradictory trends? By recognizing that the \u201cbad behavior\u201d of social media consumption during the official workday becomes \u201cgood behavior\u201d after-hours.\u00a0\u00a0 All the problems we associate with social media (its addictive nature, the need for instant gratification and around-the-clock communication) are actually a gift in disguise.<\/span><\/p>\n

Let\u2019s take an example we can all relate to.\u00a0\u00a0 You are a Project Manager with a remote team in the US, Sweden, and India.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Your developers in Bangalore are thirteen and half hours ahead of your product marketing team in Seattle which means that there is never a scenario where your team has an overlap in official work hours.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Adding Stockholm to the mix, conference calls are inconvenient for one or more groups.\u00a0 The use of asynchronous desktop email builds significant time delays which could slow down individual workstreams.<\/span><\/p>\n

Now let\u2019s look at the same team that is using a Project Management software with online collaboration functionality<\/a> that is mobile enabled.\u00a0\u00a0 At 10:30 AM on Monday morning a developer in India posts a question to the extended team that requires a yes or no answer. \u00a0\u00a0For the team member in Seattle, it is 9:00 PM on Sunday night and she is out having dinner with friends when her smartphone buzzes.\u00a0 She sees the questions and within seconds has responded.\u00a0 Instant gratification.<\/span><\/p>\n

Harvard Business Review<\/a> has suggested that over-collaboration will lead to employee burnout, but in my opinion, we are witnessing the opposite phenomena.\u00a0\u00a0 At the time I argued<\/a> that HBS had mislabeled collaboration but now I am wondering if their underlying premise is correct.<\/span><\/p>\n

The same organizations that grudgingly accept that their employees are Liking their friends\u2019 Facebook posts during work hours are benefiting when the same employees that are collaborating with their team members during off-hours.\u00a0\u00a0 The basic question is whether employees are overworked by the extension of the workday into their personal time. Some suggest that the chemical dopamine<\/a> (the \u201clove bug\u201d) is activated by social media so it is not clear that anyone is paying a price.<\/span><\/p>\n

As a practitioner of Collaborative Project Management<\/a>, I view social media as a frenemy.\u00a0\u00a0 There are cases of actual addiction to social media but I these seem to be isolated and not verified by conclusive research.\u00a0 I agree that the organization does not gain by employees spending an inordinate amount of time on Facebook and Twitter.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 But let\u2019s not throw out the baby with the bathwater (please excuse the clich\u00e9):\u00a0\u00a0 the application of social media to Project Management enables the organization to tap into the best traits of its ambitious and conscientious team members.<\/span><\/p>\n

Rather than the unrealistic goal of eliminating social media from the workforce, we should figure out how this phenomenon can actually accelerate project and business performance.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

How today\u2019s workers are subsidizing their employers without even trying If you believe the doomsayers, social media is destroying employee productivity. 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