By Chris Lee

Human Resources (HR) is an area of business profoundly affected by social media, both positively and negatively. On the plus side, social media channels can be used to improve internal communications and reduce recruitment overheads, while the downside is that hardly a week seems to go by without news of a sacking due to comments made by employees on social networks. While much may be touted about the impact of social media on HR, NMK decided to take a closer look for itself.

If you build it, they will come

Global public relations consultancy Edelman built its own internal social network using the Ning platform, which enables users to create social networks with the same functionality that can be found on the likes of Facebook: personal profiles, photo uploads, blogging, forums and more.

Jon Hargreaves, head of technology for Edelman in Europe, told NMK that employees were encouraged to post on the site and send the link around for colleagues to comment on.

“It works very well in that respect as emails are very ‘immediate’ whereas a hosted insight or discussion gives people more control over when they can get involved,” Hargreaves said. “This means we have discussions without the intrusion of emails spamming everyone’s inboxes.”

This has led to a notable reduction in email discussions and large inboxes full of unread messages, according to Hargreaves, at a relatively low cost to the business of $20 a month for the basic Ning package.

Social hiring

Firms which have struggled with high recruiter fees have benefitted from using social networks such as LinkedIn and Facebook to research and attract new talent. For example, Microsoft launched its own page to hire for its Xbox division to keep potential employees up to date with opportunities.

According to the social network; “Facebook offers a multitude of opportunities for employers to attract the right pool of potential hires, including developing interactive applications and Facebook Pages to keep people updated. Many employers also participate in job search Pages where they can interact directly with people on Facebook. Job hunters can take advantage of employers on Facebook by ensuring that they’ve developed a competitive and intelligent presence on the site as well.”

Ready to Jive

For organisations looking for more sophisticated internal communications systems options include tailor made social business offerings, such as those offered by Jive Software. Adam Mertz, the company’s senior product marketing manager, believes that traditional HR systems have helped standardise processes but have failed to progress HR’s key goals of enabling a more engaged, connected and knowledgeable workforce.

“The vice-president of HR at every major company today is standing at the precipice of a new way to work and has the opportunity revolutionise the way people connect, share and learn at work,” he warned.

For Mertz, best practice for bringing social to HR and internal communications is two-fold. Firstly, focus on implementing a holistic social business platform, one that enables executives an easy way to share via blogging, while tracking trending topics and views across the employee base. The feel should be similar to the apps that people are using outside of work, yet they have all the enterprise controls in place, Mertz advises.

“Mobile capabilities that give an intuitive experience across every major mobile platform are essential as every knowledge worker now works away from their desk at some point,” he added.

Secondly, leverage strategy and service consulting from outside the company to maximise success, Mertz says.

“Don't just buy a technology tool, rather select a vendor who you can partner with to ensure that the planning, implementation, roll-out, and on-going management of your social business platform is one that connects with stakeholder objectives and the overall goals throughout the company,” Mertz concluded. “Driving adoption and usage is key as what this amounts to is a new communications vehicle for you company, so the deeper the expertise the better.”