Can Social Media Makes Employees More Productive?

Does Social Media Make Workers More Productive?  According to a study from McKinsey Global Institute (MGI), there is a great deal of potential value in using social media “to enhance communications, knowledge sharing, and collaboration within and across enterprises.”

In other words, if employees can access Facebook and Twitter at work, a small amount of time may be lost or wasted, but the overall effect on productivity provides more gains than losses. In fact, MGI estimates that by fully implementing social technologies, companies have an opportunity to raise the productivity of high-skill knowledge workers, including managers and professionals, by 20 to 25 percent. 

As we shared in the post, Why Enhance Knowledge Management with Social Media Strategies, traditional knowledge management is being expanded by social media strategies:

• To make innovative ideas visible and accessible
• To allow people to have conversations
• To build community
• To facilitate information exchange
• To enable knowledge sharing
• To assist with expert location
• To power collaboration on idea evolution
• To help people educate themselves
• To connect people to others who share their passion
• To surface the insights and strategy that people should be building ideas from

According to the MGI report, correctly using social media technologies could add between $900 billion and $1.3 trillion of value annually to the consumer packaged goods, consumer finance, professional services, and advanced manufacturing markets. A separate study from data analytics firm Evolv suggests that employees who use up to four social media networks are exceptionally productive and stay in their jobs longer than those who don’t have access to social media at work.   

Paring this with employee engagement, CSR, and business sustainability, the post 3 Ways Social Media Promotes CSR Communications articulates the use of social media collaboration technologies can help organizations break down silos and facilitate knowledge sharing across business units and corporate functions. Social media has an emerging role in knowledge management creating bridges between the corporate world and its stakeholders by closing the gap on knowledge management and business intelligence. Specifically so if sustainable communications and performance is valued by your stakeholders. 

A crucial key to social media success for productivity, knowledge sharing, and business sustainability is arming employees with what they need to know about sustainability at your company  and providing them with a social media policy that aids employee engagement in CSR communications.  

Sustainability and social media together offer a refreshing and innovative approach to business.  In fact, results have shown that socially engaged enterprises see 4x better returns.  For these and a number of positive business sustainability reasons, our professional consulting provides information and services to help your business discover the value of social media for sustainability.  Visit us to learn how you can drive the conversation.

This post originally appeared on the Taiga Copmany blog. Distributed with permission of the author.