Current Events - Social Media & the Workplace

Due to the explosion of social media in global culture, there are many questions that arise as it relates to the worker-employer dynamic:

·         How much information should people reveal about themselves on social media sites and what are their legal rights?

·         Do employers have the legal right to request login information from current and prospective employees? If granted access, can employers use this information to make judgment calls on the character of current and prospective employees?

·         At what lengths should employers go to make sure that private information is not illegally disseminated?

This issue is important from a legal standpoint because both sides should know their rights…there should be no “grey area”. The purpose of this blog is to investigate the questions posed above and more as it relates to the worker-employer dynamic, specifically within the United States.

From the employer standpoint, the primary issue is the illegal dissemination of proprietary information. Companies must make sure that controls are in place to safeguard against information leaking out through improper channels.  The risks are huge…knowledge of financial transactions unintended for the public could have negatively affect the market. Disgruntled employees could share data not meant for the outside world. Worker productivity is affected…time spent on Facebook and Twiiter is that much less time spent working. So far, the courts have sided with the employer on these matters. Electronic communications by the worker are considered voluntary. The employer expectation of legally protecting themselves takes precedence in the courts mind. That said, earlier this year, the state of Maryland passed legislation (effective October 1, 2012) that essentially states employers are not allowed to ask for login information to social media sites from current or prospective employees for purposes of hiring decisions. In that same legislation, it stated that employers can request login information for purposes of investigating unlawful activity. Similar laws are pending in ten states.

For workers, the way the law pans out remains to be seen. At the forefront for employees is whether criticizing an employer in blog posts is protected free speech. We have seen numerous cases of workers being fired for posting negative comments about an employer or the workplace on sites such as Facebook and blog sites.

In my opinion, it’s simple. If you are a worker, don’t post anything online that you wouldn’t want your boss to know. If you’re an employer, only investigate an employee if you have reason to believe that something improper has occurred.

Social Media, Employee Privacy and Concerted Activity: Brave New World or Big Brother? Jeffrey A. Melo – 2012

Social Media Accounts in the Workplace: Employers Need to Proceed Smartly in the Workplace in the Face of the New Law – Poerio & Johnson – 2012

Avoiding Social Media Catch 22s – T. McCollum - 2012

Use of Social Media by Companies To Reach Their Customers                

The author wrote this article to demonstrate the important role of social media in connecting the customers to the firm as sellers. He also uses this article to inform the readers what social media is. I think that this article is important as use of social media is getting more widespread. The world seems to be smaller with social networking activities. The major social networks are Facebook, Twitter and You Tube.  Currently, there are one billion Facebook users (Business Bloomberg, Oct 2012).People have been using social media as means to interact within the society.  The greatest advantage of social media is the free cost of the channel to the users. For example, Facebook does not charge any premium to the account holders while providing free and convenient social networking services. Facebook owner manages to list his firm in the Stock Exchange as a public company merely by collecting advertising revenues from companies advertising their products and services.

The author has conducted the study in India to find out how companies utilize social media to market their products. He found out that 83% of the companies agreed that they would not succeed in marketing their strategies without social network.  52% of the companies are able to win new customers through social media. Majority of big retailers use Facebook and Twitter to communicate with their customers for complaints and compliments. Customers are satisfied when they get feedback promptly whenever they have doubts and unhappiness about products and services.  He also found out that company will suffer losses if they do not respond to their customers’ grievance. One company name Parle Agro used Twitter to keep track their inventories and it turn out that it was successful to increase their sales. (Bhanot, 2012).  The author supports the above finding by stating that consumers make purchases base on their cyber friends’ recommendation. As the costs of using social network are minimal, small and medium firm could afford the budgets. Author also thinks that companies could enhance their product images with the use of social media while reaching out to more people. (Bhanot, 2012)

For implication, managers should know how to use social media effectively. Firms should be creative when designing their web pages. Advertisements should not contain too much information to the social media users as to avoid sense of overload data. Firm could update the advertisements frequently too. They should consider implementing their marketing strategies at the right timing and to the appropriate group age. Managers should also consider competitiveness of their rivalry. The products that they advertise should seem unique and different from their rivals.

Written by Sandeep Bhanot, Sies Journal of Management, March 2012, Vol.8 : Issue 1

Theory Testing (Quantitative) Article

Impact of Quality Programs on supply Chain Performance

The purpose of this article is about the implication of the different types of quality programs such as ISO 9000, TQM, and Six Sigma, on the supply chain performance.

Since supply chain plays a crucial role in most companies, it is therefore very important to see what can help it to become more efficient. Supply chain is the backbone of the business with the control over purchases and allocations of raw materials, and the distribution of the finished product to the different sale channels. Without an efficient supply chain, the business will not survive.

The author of this article wants to show us that quality programs play a very important role in the improvement of the efficiency of supply chains. So, he came up with a model of research, which will go through different structures of a business affected by supply chain in order to see how the different quality programs affect them. He tested 72 firms in total, and the firms covered a wide variety of industries in order to be more representative. As said before, the authors will measure the performance of the quality programs. To reach his goals, we will create a strategic process to perform his analyses.

According to Dr. A Rajagopal, the studies will involve “four major activities involved in any value chain” (Global Management Review/volume 4/Issue3/May2010), and the hypotheses are:

 “Adaptation of different quality programs does not have any impact on :1. Customer orientation practices  2. Distribution practices  3. Internal operations or  4. Supply practices” (Global Management Review/volume 4/Issue3/May2010).

After reviewing the results of the surveys, the “null hypothesis is rejected based on the available sample evidence”(Global Management Review/volume 4/Issue3/May2010).

All the evidences showed that the quality programs affect positively the supply chains. Also, Dr. A Rajagopal mentioned that the implementations of the quality programs are not affected by size of the firms and neither by the scale of their activities (Global Management Review/volume 4/Issue3/May2010).

Since there is no doubt that implementing the quality programs on supply chains will be beneficial for all types of firms, managers and executives should consider the use of those programs to ameliorate their respective supply chain performances. An efficient supply chain will in return give the executives and managers a greater control of the firm resources in order to make their firms successful. 

References:

Dr. A. Rajagopal. Global Management Review/volume 4/Issue3/May2010