Relax at work with social media!
By siliconindia   |   Tuesday, 26 October 2010, 00:12 IST   |    1 Comments
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Melbourne: It is a common practice in many companies to block access to the social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, Orkut and others. The reason cited for this step is low work productivity as employees whale away most of their work time in these sites. In the midst of these claims, little did anyone predict that these social media sites could actually help employees relax at work in more productive ways? And we have research backing our claim. According to a research done by Brent Coker, University of Melbourne, social media sites and music and online video sites like YouTube are the most productive ways employees can relax at work. The research findings add that employees who are confined to their desks for work are more likely to feel refreshed by playing online games, checking personal emails, reading news online, and other online activities. Even if research backs the relaxing ways that social media exudes, there is no denying that access to social media at work does hamper productivity. And there is research to back this aspect too. As per a report called "Social Networks vs. Management" by employment services firm Manpower, social networks are a liability for the business. Lost productivity, security problems, and reputation issues were cited as top reasons as to why companies ban social networks at work. However the best thing to do here would be to have specific policies regarding the use of social networks at work. The sad part is not many companies have such policies in place. In a study conducted by eMarketer, a market research company, only one-fifth of the companies surveyed had a formal policy for employee use of external social networking sites. American and Asia-Pacific firms were ahead in this front while majority of companies in other regions had no policy. Among the companies that did have a policy, 63 percent claimed it was effective in combating lost productivity. So having a policy works in a positive way and both employees and employers end up as happy lots.

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