Comments on: Is it Safe to be Social At Work?

By: newraycom

newraycom — Thu, 08 Nov 2012 21:02:52 +0000

@JPJason Of course. As always the level of diligence depends on the particular business culture.

By: JPJason

JPJason — Thu, 08 Nov 2012 20:42:50 +0000

@newraycom Thanks Ray. I agree that it should be covered, and I must underline should. Many of our clients have to take the extra precaution though to monitor social media to be sure this does not occur due to disgruntled employees, improper training, overly eager employees, etc.

By: newraycom

newraycom — Thu, 08 Nov 2012 18:22:50 +0000

@JPJason Thanks for the feedback. Your industry is very sensitive to uncontrolled messages, but I would say that most of the issues you state are covered ion any employee policy under confidentiality and representation of the ocmpany clauses.
It is a bit of a mind field but there’s nothing stopping staff from posting on social media networks anyway. The genie’s out of the bottle.
Best hope is to adapt and manage it.
Not everyone can or should speak for the company. But those that mention the company in a post need to make it clear that their opinions are their own.

By: JPJason

JPJason — Thu, 08 Nov 2012 15:12:51 +0000

Thanks Ray for the insight. I came across this via LinkedIn and want to add this is especially true for the regulated industries. My area of focus is in the life sciences and compliance is a big area of concern for this marketplace – adverse event reporting, off-label usage and misinformation on Wikipedia pages, for example. If employees are contributing to this in any way, problems can occur.

By: newraycom

newraycom — Fri, 29 Jun 2012 11:43:44 +0000

@KlaudiaJurewicz It’s a bit of a minefield out there as companies try to deal with a new generation of employee that wants (has) access to their smartphones at work which makes prohibiting access to social media a matter of trying to stuff the toothpaste back into the tube.
Thanks for taking the time to leave a comment, Klaudia.

By: KlaudiaJurewicz

KlaudiaJurewicz — Fri, 29 Jun 2012 10:16:05 +0000

Interesting post!
“customized social media guideline that educates employees about sound and safe social media practices at work and at home.” – I believe that’s the future, companies need to create guidelines but like some employers try to ban using social media apps might do any good.
I think it’s all about collaboration and understanding.

By: newraycom

newraycom — Thu, 28 Jun 2012 12:27:19 +0000

@snouraini Opening your company to being social, especially if you’re in the financial services or other “security” dependant sector, requires a big culture change. Managing change is never easy which is why it has to be lead by upper management and championed throughout the organization.
We live in exciting times, Sherry!

By: snouraini

snouraini — Thu, 28 Jun 2012 06:12:57 +0000

Awesome post Ray! I think not citing privacy is a cop out! They’ll have to come around eventually, but they’ll be late to the party!

By: newraycom

newraycom — Wed, 27 Jun 2012 13:44:31 +0000

@FabriceCalando Thanks for your contribution.
It all comes down to management; as it does with any new technology that impacts on the way business is done.
While doing research for my presentation, I was surprised at how many Financial Advisor’s had blogs and used social media to reach out to clients while the corporations are still very conservative.

I think one problem is that companies look at social media as a threat to their “information security” and aren’t knowledgeable enough to see past the Facebook cliché to see its potential value to the bottom line.
I’ll check out Financialplanning.com, thanks. Another site that I found helpful is financialsocialmedia,com.
Again, thanks for your feedback, my friend.

By: FabriceCalando

FabriceCalando — Wed, 27 Jun 2012 13:22:02 +0000

Interesting post Ray. I work closely with the Financial industry and privacy is a HUGE issue. Policies are important, education is key. That being said, I think it’s important to take a step back.
1) Privacy is always an issue. Every company has secrets that should not be exposed. Granted, some industries, like the financial one are more regulated than others. It’s important to know the rules…and that’s where the policy can come in handy

2) Customers, financial or not, are people. And people use social media. A study on Financial-Planning.com shows that by 2014, social media will have fully taken over the financial industry. Customers will expect their advisor to know who they are and they expect to be able to research their advisor through sites like Facebook and LinkedIn. That’s just how it is.

3) I don’t think the role of financial planning will change, there will just be a strong social layer on top. Some sectors will have more success using social networks as a tool to recruit new clients, others will have more success with it as a retention tool.

All in all, the move to social is inevitable in the financial space. It’s happening.

That’s it for my rant. Thanks for the insightful post