Banghart, S., Etter, M., & Stohl, C. (2018). Organizational boundary regulation through social media policies. Management Communication Quarterly, 32(3), 337–373. https://doi.org/10.1177/0893318918766405
Organizations need to create specific, comprehensible, realistic, and consistent social media policies to set clear expectations for employees’ behavior on the internet. In a world where social media allows any employee to act as the voice of the organization, and where remote work and communication technologies blur the lines between personal and professional spheres of life, it’s important for organizations to establish boundaries around when, where, and how employees should engage with and communicate through social media. These boundaries can be rigid, with social media policies applying strictly to work accounts, spaces, and hours. These boundaries can also be permeable, with policies applying any time, any place, and on any account, personal or professional. While more constraining social media policies can help organizations better control employee speech, they can prevent employees from sharing their voice positively, cause potential legal issues by infringing on employee rights, and cause employee angst by invading too much into their personal lives.
This article provided useful guidance that I can use when crafting social media policies in the future. It’s important that social media policies are unambiguous and to ensure that parts of the policy don’t contradict each other. Organizations should be careful not to be overly invasive and constraining and should have realistic expectations. Employee speech on social media can also be a powerful positive force for the organization, so social media policies that enable employees to use their voice should be strongly considered.
Learning Outcome 2: Demonstrate the ability to assess complex organizational environments and achieve communication goals.
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