Management Communication

This article discusses the impact of social media on organizations and the need for effective communication policies. It explores the benefits and challenges of using social media in the workplace and provides recommendations for organizations to regulate employee behavior on social media platforms.

Running head: MANAGEMENT COMMUNICATION
MANAGEMENT COMMUNICATION
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

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To: Paul Morgan
CC: Alice Jones
From: Jane Wilson
Subject: Management communication
Respected Sir,
Social media is a form of communication technology where information and feelings are
exchanged on the interest through various technological mediums like computer, laptops and
mobile phones. The wide use of internet among people has encouraged companies to adopt
and encourage the use of social media in the workplace for efficiency and the development of
the organization by connecting directly with their target that enhances the operation of an
organization. Social media has become a phenomenon and the use of social media in the
workplace has benefited organizations and has helped them to gain a competitive advantage
in the market.
Organizations across the globe are using social media for different operations in the
workplace like marketing, providing customer service and getting the required and necessary
feedback that helps an organization to make effective changes to cater to the needs of the
customers in seconds (Cardon and Marshall 2015). However, the misuse of the medium or
platform may be detrimental and bring many challenges for an organization that may
negatively impact an organization (van Osch et al 2015). It has been seen that impact of an
organization due to social media has been hard on the company and it is difficult to recover
because of the wide use of the social media by so many people. Information travels fast and
this becomes a blessing and curse at the same time. Curse is when the wrong information that
can damage the reputation of an organization travels and becomes the current topic of
discussion (Hornik et al 2015). Managing the challenges that are caused by social media is

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tough and hard to recover The management of the challenges and the effective decision
making process becomes more difficult in this case as information is shared to a wide area of
people and it becomes difficult to control the backlash and the negativity that comes from
social media (Upchurch and Grassman 2016).. On the contrary no matter how fast paced
social media is traditional mode of communication does not have these problems. Issues
within an organization are peacefully settled in an organization without any negative
feedback and reputation.
An employee represents the organization and it is expected that the ethics and morals of an
employee is aligned with the organization’s ethics and morals as well. (Signori and Flint
2016). An employee’s behavior on social media can highly affect the reputation of an
organization (Cao et al 2016). The post by an employee of Sunshine 100 had made the
company face backlash from the customers and people online as the employee had posted
about the nutritional food that the company produced for kids as a junk. This picture had
went viral and made people question the ethics and moral of the company. Many think that
the internet was a medium for the company for green washing. This image had a negative
impact on the company and made people boycott the products and felt that the company just
wanted to do business and did not have any social responsibility as they show and market to
their audience their product as nutritional food whereas an employee of the company calls the
food junk which is unhealthy for children. This shows the impact of the behavior and
activities of employees on social media when they post anything about their organization.
This results in low sales of the company that results in loss and also harms the reputation of
the company where people resist themselves from buying their products. This affects the
outlook of the unintended audience as well who do not want to associate themselves by
purchasing products from a company.

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Social media can be a blessing and a curse in disguise. There are many positive uses of the
social media however one mistake can change the entire table and damage a company’s
reputation and sales in the market. After this case it is necessary for companies to come up
with effective social media policies that will monitor and regulate the activities of the
employees to see whether there are no mishaps that can be detrimental for the organization
(O’Connor et al 2016). The organization needs to take measurable steps to ensure the balance
between an employee’s work life and personal life. In an organization an employee should
mostly use social media for work purpose to bring positive outcome however a person in
their personal accounts they should do what they feel like but not post anything that can cause
damage to the organization they are working for. The company should make sure that the
social media in an organization is used to the utmost only for the benefits of the company.
The employees should produce and post content that brings the company in positive light and
make sure the products of the companies are marketed properly to attract the customers.
Social media was introduced in the workplace for the development thus positive measures
like these a social media policy should cover.
Organizations need to communicate to the employees the social media policies that will help
in ensuring positive outcomes.
 The first step of the organization is to gather the employees and communicate the
vision of the company to make them understand what the company believes in what
made the company start their business.
 The organization needs to tell and communicate effectively the mission of the
organization. The employees need to understand the target audience of the company
so that they understand how and whom to attract to sell their products online
effectively.

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 Organizations should tell the organizations what the company stands for and the
morals and the ethics the company follows in order to make sure that employees
follow this and do not post anything that does not align with morals of the
organization nor anything unethical that may hurt the sentiments and beliefs of the
audience.
 The employees need to comprehend the goals of the organization and post or market
in a way that the goals of the organizations are met.
 New strategies and policies should be introduced to the employees and make them
have a clear understanding as to why the policies are being implemented and what are
the consequences that a company may face because of the violation of the policies
like the employees need to focus on the target audience and make sure the
advertisements on the marketing techniques attract the audience in a positive way in
order to enhance the sales of the company. Correct and authentic piece of information
should be provided. Transparency is the key that will help target audience to feel
secure and resonate with the company.
 The last step is to make sure there are no violations of the policies and employees
violating any policies that may damage the company’s reputation must be penalized.
Social media is an important part and aspect as to communicate directly with the audience
and promote the products and services to the organization. There is no denying that in
recent times it has been one of the most effective ways of communication and companies
across the globe have been using it for their benefits. However, miscommunication and
the misusage of the social media can harm a company to an extent where people and
government have the power that can impact an organization negatively. The
implementation of social media policies will make sure that the employees use the tool
efficiently that will help an organization to market their products, enhance customer

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service and help in getting positive feedbacks that will an organization grow and develop
not damage and pave way for a negative reputation of the organization in the market.

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Reference
Cao, X., Guo, X., Vogel, D. and Zhang, X., 2016. Exploring the influence of social media on
employee work performance. Internet Research, 26(2), pp.529-545.
Cardon, P.W. and Marshall, B., 2015. The hype and reality of social media use for work
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Hornik, J., Satchi, R.S., Cesareo, L. and Pastore, A., 2015. Information dissemination via
electronic word-of-mouth: Good news travels fast, bad news travels faster!. Computers in
Human Behavior, 45, pp.273-280.
O’Connor, K.W., Schmidt, G.B. and Drouin, M., 2016. Helping workers understand and
follow social media policies. Business Horizons, 59(2), pp.205-211.
Signori, P. and Flint, D.J., 2016. Digital Marketing Innovations and their role in service
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Upchurch, M. and Grassman, R., 2016. Striking with social media: The contested (online)
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van Osch, W., Steinfield, C.W. and Balogh, B.A., 2015, January. Enterprise social media:
Challenges and opportunities for organizational communication and collaboration. In 2015
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