Lecture 8: Social Media Governance Flashcards
Why are organizations on Social Media?
- branding/reputation purposes
- Trend scanning (how do people talk about them + issues)
- Relatively easy to do (you are, mostly, in control)
What can organizations not control on social media?
- the dialogues are beyond the control of communication professionals
- organizational members/employee also use their personal accpunt
- Can impact reputations and relations
What are the benefits of employees’ social media use?
- Reputation management
- Intra-office communication
- Extra-office communication
- Communicating with existing customers/clients
- New customer/client outreach
- Participation in online work community
- Task-related
- Information Gathering
- Crowdsourcing
- Social media as technological solution
What can be harmful of employees’ social media use?
- Reputation damage
- Representing the organization poorly
- Plagiarism
- Diminishing personal reputation
- Creating offensive content
- Time wasting
- Time theft
- Multitasking
- Relationship damaging
- Disparaging others (bullying)
- Relationship refusal
- Establishing inappropriate relationships
What are the effects of social media and work performance?
- Effects on happiness and fatigue
Happiness -> Organizational citizenship behavior
Fatigue -> Counter-productive work behavior - Indirect effects
Indirect effect: Social media (all) -> Happiness -> OCB
Indirect effect: Social media (friends only) Fatigue CWB
What is governance?
Governance is the way rules, norms and actions are structured, sustained , regulated and held accountable.
What is the difference between management and governance?
- governance is more strategic, and related to how you create, structure etc. these rules.
- Carrying out and enforcing policy is management.
What does corporate governance refers to?
- The mechanisms and processes by which corporations are controlled and directed (Shailer, 2004)
- It involves balancing economic and social goals and being accountable for the use of power and behavior within the social environment (Aras and Crowther, 2012).
What is a code of conduct?
a set of rules outlining the norms, rules, and responsibilities or proper practices of an individual party or an organization
What did a study about ‘Social Media Governance’ found (van den Berg & Verhoeven, 2017) found?
- Nobody really ignored the risks, but some people were more aware of the opportunities…
What means prevention focus?
managers focus on harmful behaviors and have a prevention focus by (mostly) restricting social media use
What means promotion focus?
- trying to align corporate values onto employees (called employee identity) so that employees communicate these values to the outside world (ie stakeholders)
- sees employees as brand ambassadors
Manager who use two way communication is focused on… prevention or promotion?
Promotion
Manager who use one way communication is focused on… prevention or promotion?
prevention
What are social media guidelines?
policies that articulate organizational expectations, responsibilities, and consequences for employees and employers and define what comprises “(in)appropriate” communication.
What are the 6 dimension of social media management?
- Social media presence
- Employee encouragement
- Responsibility
- Work-private balance
- Branding policy
- Content
What are the three frames of social media policies (Stohl et al. 2017)?
- Reputation/business frame
- Risk frame
- Co-creation frame
What is the ‘reputation/business frame’?
Communication is conceived as a public relations instrument for achieving corporate advantage and mitigating harm
What is the ‘risk frame’?
Communication is viewed as a vehicle for disclosing or exposing information that may be harmful to the organization.
What is the ‘Co-creation frame’?
Communication is viewed as a mechanism for transparency, employee dialogue, and employer, employee, and community rights—a co-creation frame for social media.
Which 4 conclusion about communication did the research of social media policies (Stohl et al. 2017) found?
- Freedom of speech: right to address own opinion or in line with organization
- Engage stakeholders: promotion to actively engage with stakeholders.
- Collective sharing: share work on social media. (thus not in response to stakeholders).
- Transparancy: always be honest. (only positive, but they are not going to put in public guideline that it is better to lie).
Which conclusion about boundaries did the research of social media policies (Stohl et al. 2017) found?
- two-thirds (70.54 %) of companies attempt to expand their influence over employees beyond the corporate sphere by
explicitly blurring the boundaries between corporate, private, and public communication in their guidelines.
What are the three different types of boundaries?
- Spatial
- Temporal
- Material
What are spatial boundaries?
= outside workplace
What is temporal boundaries?
= physical boundaries (e.g. no personal phone use)
What is material boundaries?
= different media (e.g., linked only professional)
What are incentive guidelines?
Incentive is promotion: stimulate stakeholder engagement
What are restrictive guidelines?
Restrictive focus on what cannot be posted
What are the 4 branding behaviors of employees on social media?
- the act of praising rather than criticizing one’s employer on social media (i.e. employee word-of-mouth)
- responding to criticism about the employer and recommending its products or services on social media (i.e. employee endorsement)
- sharing and liking the employer’s social media content (i.e. employee sharing)
- respecting the employer’s values and culture in all social media activities (i.e. employee culture)
Do guidelines help? (Soens & Claeys, 2021)
- you want to make sure people remember it, so communicate unambiguous and clear
- At the same time, enabling guidelines motivate people to be active on social media more than restrictive ones.
- Which one makes employees manage their risks better? That Question remains unanswered!
What is the impact of incentive guideline?
- More online Brand Ambassadorship
- More Control Mutuality
What is the impact of restrictive guidelines?
- Better Guideline Recall
- restrictive guidelines demotivate people to talk online about their employer
