March 28, 2010 in Business

Nearly half of U.S. businesses have become anti-social

Increasing popularity of social networking Web sites drives policies

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mollyq@spokesman.com
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Larry Soehren says his company, Kiemle & Hagood, recently faced the choice whether to block employee access to popular social networking sites such as Facebook.

According to one survey, slightly more than half of U.S. businesses now block office access to Facebook, which this month was anointed the most popular Web site in North America. It just surpassed Google for most visits per week, according to site analysis company Hitwise.

Companies block Facebook, MySpace and in some cases, YouTube, because they can affect productivity. Nucleus Research concluded earlier this year that U.S. companies would see a productivity gain of 1.5 percent if Facebook were blocked on work computers. In addition, many computer-network administrators block access to those sites because workers can introduce viruses via links or spam messages sent to them.

Soehren, chief operating officer for Kiemle & Hagood, said he and his colleagues understand that the typical workday, for many, includes checking Facebook, Twitter or YouTube several times.

But Kiemle & Hagood decided that providing office access to Facebook and Twitter made sense – if only to reward, or at least not irritate, the company’s most tech-savvy workers, he said.

“The tech-smart people we have are also the ones who have Blackberrys and are dealing with work e-mails in the evening when out of the office,” he said. “If we clamp down on them and block Facebook at the office,” they might be less likely to do company work in the evening hours.

The debate about Facebook is raging in offices wherever Facebook is available, which currently is in more than 50 countries, with 400 million registered users.

Soehren is on the side of managers who embrace the use of popular social networking sites. Some salespeople regularly use Facebook to make sales and build contacts with potential customers, he said.

Just as YouTube once was blocked by some companies, only to become a platform for online training sessions, he predicts Facebook likewise will increasingly become a business tool.

Websense, a San Diego company that provides Web security and filtering services, has found many companies that once blocked social sites have moved to allowing sites like Facebook inside their networks.

“Their productivity concerns are decreasing as more companies realize the business benefits of Facebook and other Web 2.0 properties,” said Websense spokesman Matt Mors.

Spokane County Information Systems Director Bill Fiedler said Facebook and a few other sites have been blocked for all but a few county departments since 2002. No change is anticipated, he said.

Twitter, a popular networking site that allows people to send short text messages, is not blocked, but Spokane County’s information systems team monitors it to track excessive use, Fiedler said.

The reason has less to do with policy and more to do with technology, though – the network filter used by the county lumps Facebook into the category of dating sites, but doesn’t regard Twitter as a dangerous site, Fiedler said.

Spokane Teachers Credit Union also blocks Facebook for most workers but allows Twitter access.

STCU workers doing communications or marketing jobs can use Facebook, provided they use the site to connect with customers or other business professionals.

Laura Wood, STCU”s director of human resources, said the mood inside the credit union is moving toward changing the current restrictions. “We have recently had more discussion about allowing more access,” she said. Some marketing team members are urging the credit union to set up its own Facebook page, she said.

Robert Half Technology, the consulting firm that found more than half of U.S. firms block Facebook, also noted that one in five U.S. companies allow Facebook for strictly business use. It said about one in six allow occasional or minimal social networking at work.

Soehren and other business leaders suggest the numbers will soon start shifting to much wider access.

One business group that will make that transition more slowly is the medical sector. Karina Jennings, vice president of regional communications for Providence Health & Services, said the organization is looking seriously at removing blocks, but will do so carefully.

Providence is regulated stringently to ensure that patient information and hospital data are not compromised or misused.

Any shift by Providence to allow employee access to social-networking sites such as Facebook or LinkedIn first would have to assure that those safeguards are addressed, she said.

Providence operates hospitals and medical facilities in Washington and Montana, include Spokane’s Sacred Heart Medical Center. In Washington the operation involves about 20,000 employees.

Only a few pockets within the Providence team have access, for now, to social media, Jennings said. But she and other managers have identified several reasons for opening up access.

One Providence foundation is using Facebook for fundraising, for example. And some Providence hospitals have Facebook pages as well, to connect with their communities.

One business consultant and management professor, Sheizaf Rafaeli, contends that companies need to consider productivity but also keep in mind the bigger, long-range role of social media in the workplace.

Rafaeli is a teacher and researcher at the Center for the Study of the Information Society at the University of Haifa, in Israel.

Over time, nearly every business with a direct relationship with customers will begin to use social networking tools, he said in an interview.

“Today’s workplace has more communication already built into it. Tomorrow’s workplace will have even more,” he said. Company managers will have to build some workplace norms for that new system.

“But prohibition will not work, only backfire,” he said.

Seven comments on this story so far. Add yours!

• 

  SugarShane on March 28 at 10:29 a.m.

  “But prohibition will not work, only backfire,” he said.

  Hmmm, where have I heard this before?

• 

  spokanada on March 28 at 12:38 p.m.

  Block the sites and realize 1.5% increase in productivity. Doesn’t seem worth it considering employees can access the sites through their cell phones.

• 

  eyecatch on March 29 at 9:15 a.m.

  Mobile access has forever changed the way people spread information. Information flow is key to business growth. Those most fluent in social media are valuable to promoting and spreading ideas. Even if a lot of what is spread seems useless, it’s still building relationships and networks.

  I have lived in two small towns before and during the beginning of the web, and observed first-hand the casual conversations that passed the most valuable news, because by the time it was in the weekly paper, it was old news. Social media is just an extension of person-to-person communication and is key to the way we are now relating in business and socially. Don’t stop the river. It’s going to flow. Learn better how to swim in it.

  Brian Solis, author of “Engage: The Complete Guide for Brands and Businesses to Build, Cultivate, and Measure Success in the New Web,” says “Social media is the democratization of information and the equalization of influence.” Now, that’s cool — come on — doesn’t that seem like a good thing in the end? Especially when so many of us are really fed up with corporate and political hype?

• 

  smarg on March 29 at 11:04 a.m.

  Employee + computer/internet access = cyber-slacking.

  Questions?

• 

  LisaValentine on April 11 at 5:53 p.m.

  If your company or workplace is going to block Facebook, Twitter and other social media apps on the network, you can share this helpful whitepaper on the subject with your IT dept first, it’s called “To Block or Not. Is that the question?”

  http://bit.ly/9f8WOT

  Could help your cause.

• 

  ithinkimcute on September 21 at 10:50 p.m.

  Want to block Facebook from work?

  This software program http://www.timedoctor.com/1 uses a better method than blocking Facebook as it only monitors Facebook during work hours. Team members can use Facebook during lunch breaks. Also some employees must use Facebook for their work so it’s silly to block it.

• 

  ladyontime on September 23 at 10:08 a.m.

  Ive been using http://bit.ly/bJwmma .
  It uses a better method than blocking social media sites because it only monitors sites like Facebook during production hours. People/Employees still have the option to use it for a breather or during breaks really . Sometimes they use it for work too in helping reach decisions.

  For me its really unnecessary to block Facebook.