Viewpoint
Block MySpace?
Here’s a news flash: There are still
challenges facing widespread use of social
networking sites within an office setting.
That’s the gist of a recent survey by
Steelcase on the use of social networking,
but the tone of the press release announcing
the survey results suggests companies should
be more willing to let their employees visit
MySpace and Facebook during the workday, as
a way of somehow improving collaboration and
fostering business connections.
We’re not talking here about an
organization’s intranet. This is about
employees using their bosses’ computers to
go to outside Web sites, such as YouTube,
that are unrelated to work. What is
surprising is not that 50 percent of the
companies surveyed discourage or block
access to such sites; what is surprising is
that 100 percent do not block these sites.
Why
do employees need to go to MySpace during
the workday? According to the Steelcase
survey, the majority of respondents sign
onto social networking sites to reconnect
with family or friends (82 percent). The
most popular social networking sites among
these workers include: MySpace (66 percent),
Facebook (46 percent) and LinkedIn (22
percent).
Social networking within the workplace is
a long-standing tradition (think the water
cooler before everyone stocked cases of
bottled water in their offices). Sure,
mingling with employees just to chat can
hurt productivity a bit, but it is also a
valuable team-building and morale-building
activity. Can the same be said for visiting
family and friends on Facebook, or MySpace
friends you’ve never actually met?
Intranets also can be problematic as they
relate to productivity issues, but greater
control over their use can be maintained by
employers. Intranets also are work related,
not a diversion to watch a funny video or
chat with strangers across the country.
Steelcase suggests that companies need
"to think out of the box and ask themselves
if rather than blocking these sites, what
their takeaways can be. The workplace is as
much virtual as it is physical and
organizations that embrace this new reality
will reap its rewards."
Perhaps, but IT directors worry about
their networks being compromised from a
security standpoint, or about the bandwidth
issues related to downloading YouTube
videos. Business unit managers worry about
productivity. These are real concerns, and
the best way to address them is to block
such sites.
kanderberg@comnews.com