Digital Skills, Social Media, and Professional Online Presence

Desklib provides past papers and solved assignments for students. This report explores digital skills and social media's impact on the workplace.

Digital Skills and Research Methods

TABLE OF CONTENTS
Introduction................................................................................................................................1
Importance of digital skills at workplace...............................................................................2
Social media at workplace......................................................................................................3
Social networking sites...........................................................................................................4
Facebook............................................................................................................................4
Instagram............................................................................................................................5
Twitter................................................................................................................................5
LinkedIn.............................................................................................................................5
Security and safety of the social media..................................................................................5
Conclusion..................................................................................................................................8
Bibliography...............................................................................................................................9

LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 1: The downside of the employees using social media...................................................3
Figure 2: Improved communication and collaboration through social technologies.................4

Introduction
Microsoft has predicted that within the next two years, there will be a high demand of the
employees those knowing the digital technology and tools. The inclination of the business for
digital technology and skills is supporting them for high performance and quality within
minimal efforts and cost (Digital skills, 2018). The report has a purpose of discussing the
importance of the digital skills and social media in the workplace. It will also discuss several
social media websites with their capabilities to support marketing practices. Safety and
security with social media also will be discussed with a concentration on the user
information. The report will discuss the process and approaches for the effective professional
online presence.
1

Importance of digital skills at the workplace
According to key findings of Lloyds UK Consumer Digital Index 2018, around 4.3 million
people in the United Kingdom are still not aware of the digital technologies. They have zero
digital skills related to document upload on Google drive or mail someone (Lloyd consumer
digital index, 2018). Besides to it, the organisations also have to manage the right digital
skills for the desired profitability.
Digital skills are required to increase business productivity and develop a competitive edge.
The organisations can avail right training and support to work with digital document and
systems so that high performance and confidentiality can be achieved in data access, storage
and sharing. The organisations are also moving toward the digital technology for marketing,
customer relations and sales so that the employees need required digital skills (Steve, 2018).
Therefore, the use of digital systems and technology can workplace can optimise productivity
along with high performance, reliability and cost-effectiveness and can lead the business with
competitive benefits.
It is also significant to provide a new way of working and increase revenue. The
organisations can make use of technological advancements to reduce the efforts on routine
operations and improve the employee satisfaction and motivation through digital platforms
for collaboration and data sharing. New tools and techniques for communication and
operations can support effective contribution in performance whereas online presence can
improve the effective reach to the customers and increases the business revenue (Anthony,
2017). More specific and directed marketing and sales can be conducted through digital skills
under online business presence to achieve high revenue.
Digital skills are significant to build and manage customer relationship which is essential for
business growth and a virtual network of interconnected sales. The organisations are adopting
online systems and tools for customer relationship management so that interaction with
customers can be simplified to achieve their satisfaction with product or services. The
changing expectations for product use and experience and demands for new features can be
integrated into business production decisions through customer relations.
2

Social media at workplace
Employee engagement and communication are essential at the workplace to achieve
performance and quality and for that; social media is playing a vital role. According to a
survey, 82% of the employees believe that social media can improve work relationship
whereas 60% thinks that it can also help in decisions making (McKinsey Global Institution,
2012). However, social media has several downsides at the workplace. For example, the
employees are more intended to find a job or work connections in other organizations, and it
can impact the performance and quality adversely. Also, employee retention rate might be
lower with the adoption of social media. Besides the downsides, it has several benefits for
employees.
Figure 1: The downside of the employees using social media
(Source: Lorenzo, 2012)
It helps the employees to take a mental break from work and resuming working can improve
their quality and performance. It also enables the workers to create professional connections
and engage with them to support professional activities. It can establish their knowledge for
work and helps to develop multiple skills toward the dynamic team. Social media allows a
more flexible and informal approach to questioning and answering. Therefore, an employee
can get support from various professionals to resolve the issue (Lorenzo, 2012). It also
empowers the professional relationship with co-workers as employees can share their ideas
and concepts with more freedom and flexibility which is somehow constraint informal
communication.
3

Therefore, social media can enhance the information delivery and discovery and support
informal groups at workplace those can be used to bound the team and improve the
performance. Overall employee work recognition and role retention can be enhanced as
social media can empower the strengths and satisfaction for business operations. Therefore,
about 72% of the organisations are adopting and using social media as a significant tool for
communication and marketing (McKinsey Global Institution, 2012).
Figure 2: Improved communication and collaboration through social technologies
(Source: McKinsey Global Institution, 2012)
Social networking sites
There are several social network sites are in existence, but the giants are discussed for their
support in networking with customers for effective marketing operations.
Facebook
Since the origin year, the website has gained the user attention for entertainment, advertising
and marketing. Today, Facebook is one of the largest advertising and marketing channels for
businesses. The organisations can use Facebook Advertising, page and Insight features to
reach the target customers and improve the awareness and sales related to products. It
provides features of the mobile application with easy photo and textual content uploading and
sharing with others along with the formation of groups and pages for business and personal
purposes. It has 2.23 billion logins every month (FB, 2018).
4

Instagram
It is another platform from Facebook. The website has monthly 800 million active users, and
it simply means that the organisation has large opportunity to reach customers globally. It has
features of hash-tags those can be selected or used to boost the awareness for business or
products — insights on stories, views, likes, creditability and comments on post help to
understand the user intentions for product or services. With in-person interaction with
location tags and sharing of user-generated content provides an opportunity to advertise
among the more highly-targeted audience (Nia, 2018).
Twitter
It is the simple messaging like application which provides interaction and broadcasting with
followers. The strengths of the Twitter can be analysed with the fact that there are almost
7,000 tweets in a second on the website and each tweet is enough shorter to engage the
viewers as it is four times smaller than the Facebook post (Neil, 2018). Therefore, the
features of tags and customised tweets enable the organisations to reach a large customer
base. It also allows easy announcements and marketing among the followers.
LinkedIn
It is well-known for the professional communities and network. Most of the users are linked
for the business profile, and they have direct communication and following with other
professionals. The website has effective features to provide secure and reliable
communication. It also has several features including business accounts and advertising those
can be used use marketing tools for business operations.
Security and safety of the social media
Social media such as Facebook and Twitter have passed the issues of user data compromising
and security. Individual also may get impacted with stolen account control and details and
misuse of the information they have provided or shared with other users on the platform.
Therefore, security and safety of the social media are essential for individual and businesses
to manage the identity and authenticity of the information during their communication, data
sharing and marketing practices.
There is always a concept of privacy and security settings on the website. The user has to
understand the terms and conditions for the privacy and security they get or can manage with
the system. The effective configuration of the setting and privacy can lead to security (Stay
5

Safe Online, 2018). Also, it helps the individual to manage the online identity and reputation
among the friends.
It is required that personal information is personal and not shared with other users as it can
lead security breaches on accounts or may impact the social image and reputation. The users
have to understand that once the content is posted on the website, it is accessible to the
defined set of the users. Therefore, the content quality and appropriateness are required to
consider as it can impact individual job profile, role and social reputation.
There are several options to protect and manage social accounts. If there is anonymous
activity on the account, the user has to report to the organisation to protect the account and
social reputation. Also, the friends and followers on the social accounts are required to
manage as the unknown people and accounts might access critical personal information from
the users. However, it is difficult to identify the actual user accounts on the Facebook and
Twitter when some of the information is hidden from others and in such cases; the users have
not to share the personal information with them (Shillair et al., 2015). If the user is not
comfortable with a platform or other users then reporting to the management or developer
team can help to achieve the security and safety.
Therefore, safety and security are essential to consider and monitor during the use of social
media usage. A proper configuration and control on the account can ensure high security and
safety of the personal information and social reputation.
Creating own professional online presence
The professional online presence can be managed to achieve interaction with other
professionals and develop the knowledge and skills. It also can help to achieve the
professional growth and opportunities in career. However, creating a professional online
presence in a tedious task as nothing is deleted from the social media. For example, unwanted
post and tagging on social media such as Facebook and Twitter can lead damage to social
reputation, and it can impact professional life also.
Therefore, the individual has to manage social accounts such as Instagram, Facebook and
Twitter for post and security. Later, it is recommended to create and manage a professional
account and network at LinkedIn as it can provide a vast community of professionals those
6

can support for professional activities and careers. Following are some of the major
instructions and stages during the creation of a LinkedIn account:
Define why to use LinkedIn
LinkedIn can be used by job seekers and businesses. It is essential for the user to understand
what the main objectives with the professional account are. It further might be to interact
with professionals, hire resources or market the skills or business values.
Sign-up
The user has to create or register the account on the LinkedIn website. The sign-up process
has requirement of the several details including profile photo, email address, phone number
and professional qualification and skills detail. The sign-up process is simple and fast, but it
is essential to provide all the required information on the profile to improve the efficiency of
the website for the desired objectives (Alison, 2018).
Professional photo
Trust or not but a professional photo represent the user among others. LinkedIn is a
professional network so that user can get desired responses through impressions and details.
A professional photo helps others to understand that the user is linked to a particular role or
have skills. It represents the characteristics required for the professional environment.
Write a Good Profile Summary
For job seekers, a good profile summary helps others to understand the capabilities and skills
required for a job specification. The profile summary should be accurate and brief enough to
impress the professionals. It is recommended to use accurate details with justifications to
prove that user has required skills, document or capabilities (Van Dijck, 2013).
Improvement and tweaks
The user can improve the profile with all the required details for education, qualification,
experience and skill set. Recommendations from LinkedIn also can help to achieve an
effective profile. LinkedIn endorsements are useful to represent profile to other users with
high similarity in expertise.
7

Conclusion
Digital technologies are being an integral part of the business operations, and therefore,
digital skills are being important and useful for the employees. Digital skills can help the
business to achieve competitive benefits whereas it can help employees to ensure high quality
and performance. Social media has some concern of the security and reputation, but proper
configuration and setting can help the organisation and individual to market their services
and products. LinkedIn is an excellent professional network which can be used by an
individual to present online presence with high influence.
8

Bibliography
 Alison Doyle, 2018. How to Use LinkedIn Effectively [Online] [Accessed Through]
<https://www.thebalancecareers.com/how-to-use-linkedin-2062597> [Accessed On 7
January 2019]
 Anthony Jeanetta, 2017. 7 Reasons Social Media in the Workplace can Help
Employees [Online] [Accessed Through] <https://theolsongroup.com/5-reasons-
social-media-workplace-can-help-employees/> [Accessed On 7 January 2019]
 Digital skills, 2018. Get a digital refresh [Online] [Accessed Through]
<https://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/athome/digitalskills/improve/> [Accessed On 7
January 2019]
 FB, 2018. Facebook, Inc. (FB) Second Quarter 2018 Results Conference Call [PDF]
[Accessed Through]
<https://s21.q4cdn.com/399680738/files/doc_financials/2018/Q2/Q218-earnings-call-
transcript.pdf> [Accessed On 7 January 2019]
 Lloyd consumer digital index, 2018. Lloyds Bank UK Consumer Digital Index 2018
[Online] [Accessed Through] <https://www.lloydsbank.com/banking-with-us/whats-
happening/consumer-digital-index.asp> [Accessed On 7 January 2019]
 Lorenzo Bizzi, 2012. Employees Who Use Social Media for Work Are More Engaged
— but Also More Likely to Leave Their Jobs [Online] [Accessed Through]
<https://hbr.org/2018/05/employees-who-use-social-media-for-work-are-more-
engaged-but-also-more-likely-to-leave-their-jobs> [Accessed On 7 January 2019]
 McKinsey Global Institution, 2012. The social economy: Unlocking value and
productivity through social technologies [Online] [Accessed Through]
<https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/high-tech/our-insights/the-social-economy>
[Accessed On 7 January 2019]
 Neil Patel, 2018. 12 Powerful Twitter Marketing Tips (That Actually Work) [Online]
[Accessed Through] <https://neilpatel.com/blog/twitter-marketing-tips/> [Accessed
On 7 January 2019]
 Nia Gyant, 2018. How to Use Instagram as a Marketing Tool [PDF] [Accessed
Through] <https://thrivehive.com/how-to-use-instagram-marketing-tool/> [Accessed
On 7 January 2019]
9