SOCIAL NETWORKING IN WORKPLACES AND THE IMPACT ON EMPLOYEE PRODUCTIVITY

1.1 Introduction

Social networking is a means for other people to come together and develop a forum to help construct social networks or social connections. It offers users the ability to exchange thoughts, memories, and interests. Organization’s productivity and profits base on its employee’s performance, and its employees are strongly connecting to social networks. In other aspects Social networks are creating risks, opportunities, threats, weaknesses, and strengths for organizations. Social networking is making dramatic growth in dynamic environment of now a day. People use social networks for catharsis of their human emotions. Motives of social networking can be different for person to person. Motive of using social networks can be change but the ultimate logic of connecting is building social contacts and sharing (Ehrlich, 2011).

As a prelude to other parts of this study, this chapter will discuss the background upon which this study was initiated, the statement of problems that led to this study, the Aim and Objectives of the study. Others are Significance of the study, Scope of work, Research hypothesis and questions, Limitations of the Study and Definition of technical terms.

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1.2 Background of Study

Social networking is creating a dramatic changes or dynamic in the environment but it’s obvious it is creating changes. Social networking an online medium of interaction which let people build relations, share ideas, communicate information and bounding society in sentimental stream. Social networking is making dramatic growth in dynamic environment of now a day. People use social networks for catharsis of their human emotions. Motives of social networking can be different for person to person like; people connect to LinkedIn for professional purpose, Facebook and MySpace for personal motive, Twitter for social networking, Personalized Blogs for personal thoughts and view point. Motive of using social networks can be change but the ultimate logic of connecting is building social contacts and sharing (Ehrlich, 2011).

Social networking is not only targeting young generation. It’s tempting and hitting all age groups and generations. The way to use and respond social networks is not a good thing, nor a bad thing; it’s just a different thing. Using and connecting to social networks is part and parcel now a day of everyone’s life. Now people never ask for mail addresses or mobile numbers instead of that people ask each other for their social network IDs for carrying on long term contacts (Avalos, S. 2011),

Every organization is using social network sites for their professional benefits like creating customer relationship. So it becomes the need and it’s the time for organizations to design workforce according to changing environments. Organization’s productivity and profits base on its employee’s performance, and its employees are strongly connecting to social networks. In other aspects Social networks are creating risks, opportunities, threats, weaknesses, and strengths for organizations. Risk in a way that social networks are real time communication mediums, It can communicate and disseminate information of organization instantly in real timing which organization may never want to share with people outside the organization. Opportunity in the context that competitor’s employee shared information about upcoming strategy at social medium which can be used for organization’s benefit. Threat can be faced by organizations when its employees discuss internal information of organization at social networks which can be used by its competitors. Social networking can be weakness of organization when it affects its productivity negatively. Same social networking become strength for organizations when it’s used to build good relationship with employees, to direct them is right way, to collect information about employee behavior and to train them (Flynn, 2011),

Social networking affect all sectors of the economy as it affects employee’s skills, productivity, qualification/knowledge and motivational level. Organizations practice social networking for building employer-employee relationship by increasing employee’s skills, productivity, motivational level and knowledge. Organizations evaluate their employees and manage their contributions to keep organization’s image high through social networking. Some organizations direct their employees for ethical behavior in using social networks while they are representative of the organization. For doing all this organizations are formulating some sort of policies regarding using of social networking (Flynn, 2011), however, it can be said that social networking has strong impact on employees’ performance in terms of affecting the skills, productivity, knowledge and motivation.

Therefore, in Nigeria where the research was carried out, the activities that was conducted is to know the Social Networking in Workplaces and the Impact on Employee Productivity.

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1.3 Statement of Problems

Investigation revealed that the use of social networking sites reduces productivity in the workplace looked only at the time wasted as a result of social networking site use in the workplace and ignored the possible indirect benefits such as enhanced job satisfaction, higher organizational commitment, lower absenteeism, higher retention rates, higher innovative behavior, and increased productivity.

As for studies that argue that the use of social networking sites in the workplace is adding value to organizations, they did not empirically measure the positive effects of social networking site use in the workplace on work-related outcomes.

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1.4 Aim and Objectives of Study

The aim of the study is to examine the Social Networking in Workplaces and the Impact on Employee Productivity. In achieving this aim, the following specific objectives were laid out as follows:

1. To find out the impact of social networking site on employee performance.
2. To evaluate the potential benefits of social networking site for business in an organization.
3. To examine the effect of social networking site on the privacy and security of an organization’s information.

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1.5 Research Questions

The study came up with research questions so as to be able to ascertain the above stated objectives. The specific research questions for the study are stated below as follows:

• What is the impact of social networking site on employee performance?
• What are the potential benefits of social networking site for business in an organization?
• What is the effect of social networking site on the privacy and security of an organization’s information?

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1.6 Research Hypothesis

In order to pursue the objective of this study, the following generalized statements have been designed to guide and aids in obtaining the result for the experiment to be conducted. For this work, the null hypothesis will be represented with H0 while the alternative hypothesis will be represented with hypothesis H1.

Hypothesis One

• H0: There is no significant relationship between social networking site and employee productivity in Workplaces
• H1: There is a significant relationship between social networking site and employee productivity in Workplaces

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1.7 Significance of Study

The study will benefit human resource departments from understanding the associations elicited by this study. Understanding relationships between social networking site use in the workplace and employee performance and productivity, job satisfaction, organizational commitment, absenteeism, turnover intention, innovative behavior, and job performance can help reveal the underlying rationale for organizations to either allow or disallow the use of social networking sites in the workplace.

Organizations are searching for available means to increase workplace productivity. If the use of social networking sites turns out to be one of these means, organizations will be able to add the use of social networking sites in the workplace to their arsenal of practices to enhance job satisfaction, organizational commitment, absenteeism, turnover intention, innovative behavior, and ultimately job performance.

Second, this study contributes to social networking, employee performance, job satisfaction, organizational commitment, absenteeism, turnover intention, innovative behavior, and job performance literature.

The findings of this study will reveal whether the belief that happy workers work harder holds in the context of social networking site use in the workplace.

This study will also be of immense benefit to other researchers who intend to know more on this study and can also be used by non-researchers to build more on their research work. This study contributes to knowledge and could serve as a guide for other study.

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1.8 Scope of Study

The scope of the research is focused on the Social Networking in Workplaces and the Impact on Employee Productivity.

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1.9 Limitations of the Study

During the course of this study, many things militated against its completion, some of which are:

1. Time Constraint: The time frame given to accomplish this project was very short due to school academic calendar and it was carried out under pressure which made the researcher not to implement some necessary features.
2. Research material: availability of research material is a major setback to the scope of the study.
3. Frequent power failure: This made the researcher append more money on fuel to ensure sustainable power.
4. Financial Constraint: Insufficient fund tends to impede the efficiency of the researcher in sourcing for the relevant materials, literature or information and in the process of data collection (internet, questionnaire and interview).

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1.10 Definition of Terms

Social Networking: Social networking is an online medium of interaction which let people build relations, share ideas, communicate information and bounding society in sentimental stream.