Social Media Influence on Employee Performance

Dr. Tarik Mohamed Elaujali (PhD.)¹

Benghazi University, Libya

Email: loujli@hotmail.com

HNSJ, 2023, 4(2); https://doi.org/10.53796/hnsj4219

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Published at 01/02/2023 Accepted at 05/12/2022

Abstract

Purpose: This study investigates the influence of social media platforms such as: Facebook, Linked and Twitter on employee performance.

Approach: To show the function and format of working of key variables, an illustrative paradigm was introduced in this study. Paradigm showed that social media affects the knowledge, productivity , and motivational level of employees of Majorel company, Wipro international company and Telus international company.

Related data gathered from the selected companies employees in the Dublin office so that real scenarios can be introduced.

Findings: The study shows that social media affects the working situation of Majorel company, Wipro international company and Telus international company employees. For exploring key issues, previous studies were thoroughly reviewed and introduced in this study. Primary gathered data was subjected to correlation and regression analysis.

Practical implications: Illustrated that using social media by employees affects their skills, knowledge, productivity and motivational level.

Originality: The current study determines the social media needs of employees and its usage for optimising their performance. It provides an effective and solid foundation for organisations to use in their upcoming training/coaching program.

Key Words: Social Media, Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, Productivity, Knowledge and motivational level of Majorel company, Wipro international company and Telus international company employees.

1. introduction:

Social media use is becoming pervasive and is rapidly spreading into the workplace. Some of this use is quite positive, as it can help employees build their professional networks and obtain work-related information and feedback (Carlson, Zivnuska, Carlson, Harris, & Harris, 2016).

Moreover, organisations are using social media for their benefits via creating and enhancing customer relationships and integration. It is not surprising then that social media has been broadly characterised as fundamentally changing the way we communicate, collaborate, consume, and create information within the workplace. It is needless to say that employees in any organisation are social media users (Aral et, al., 2013). Therefore, social media is no longer a luxury, on the contrary it becomes a necessity that needs to be adopted and applied in each business strategy in complying with these new variables of the surrounding context.

In other aspects, social media can cause risk and lead to several negative results as it can “communicate information of an organisation instantly in real time which organisation may never want to share with people outside their entity” (A. Naheed, 2014). In fact, sharing such information can negatively affect the organisation’s productivity.

Based on the above discussion, it can be said that social media has a strong influence on employees’ performance through affecting skills, productivity, knowledge and motivation.

The current study is conducted in Majorel company, Wipro international company and Telus international company (Dublin office) to find out to what extent the company is using social media to boost knowledge, skills, productivity and motivation of their employees.

1.1 Purpose of Study

The purpose of the current study is to find out whether social media have influence on employee performance variables like knowledge, skills, productivity and motivational level. The study population included the technology sector in Ireland to evaluate how social media influences employee performance. This study inspects that technology companies use social media to interact with their employees by boosting their motivational level. Technology companies use social media to share updates with their employees simultaneously for increasing productivity and knowledge of employees.

Moreover, the current study examines the phenomenon that either technology companies use social media as a training medium to boost their employees skills.

1.2 Hypothesis

1. There is a positive relation between use of social media and employee’s performance (knowledge, skills, productivity and motivation).

2. There is no relation between use of social media and employee’s performance (knowledge, skills, productivity and motivation).

1. Literature Review:

Previous related literature were reviewed on performance management of employees, its variables, social media and its influences on employee’s performance.

1. Dantas, R., et al. (2022). The study explored the mediating effect of extra-role behaviours on work-related social media usage and social-related social media usage work performance relationship. One of the crucial key findings of their study was that social media usage for both work and social purposes positively and significantly affects employees’ work performance. In other words, social media usage increases the work performance of employees
2. Men, L., et al, (2020) explained that the more employees use internal social media, the more they feel engaged. The study indicated how social media has become ubiquitous in business therefore companies should benefit from using internal social media. The study results also showed that regardless of employees’ level of satisfaction with their relationships with the organisation, the more employees read the company’s and co-workers’ posts, interact with the content by liking, sharing, and commenting on the posts, and engage in one-on-one conversations or group discussions on internal social media, the more they feel absorbed, attentive, dedicated, connected, and involved in the organisation.
3. Bo Yang, Lulu Wang, Bayan Omar Mohamed (2019) confirmed that online social media, social trust and social goals have a positive and important impact on employee motivation. Furthermore, obtained results have revealed that organisational knowledge sharing is significantly influenced by employee motivation and organisational commitments.
4. X, Cao., et al. (2016) found in their empirical results that social media can promote the formation of employees’ social capital indicated by network ties, shared vision and trust, which, in turn, can facilitate knowledge transfer. They emphasised that shared vision and knowledge transfer positively influence work performance.

1. Elena Alberghini, Livio Cricelli and Michele Griadin (2014) emphasises on the importance of using social media in companies as a key performance indicator (KPIs’) to monitoring the collaboration and knowledge sharing activities among employees.
2. Ioannis Leftheriotis and Michail N. Giannakos (2014) indicated that social media are not simply a waste of time for employees, but they also significantly and positively impact the employees’ performance. They believe in the potential role of social media as a medium for improving collaboration and knowledge sharing, thereby increasing productivity among employees.
3. Naheed Ashraf (2014) believes in the vital role of social media for organisations in affecting their employees motivational level, productivity, knowledge and skills.
4. Assa Gakui Munene and Ycliffe Misuko Nyaribo (2013) found in their study that advantages arising from the use of social media among employees such as, personal participation, corporate significance and information sharing, however they highlighted the thin line between personal and workplace usage of social media which shouldn’t be mixed by employees.
5. Sien Avabs (2011) divides the employees in any organisation in five different categories based on their habits of response on social media and manage their performance productivity by designing programs for them:

1- Creators: (those employees who give ideas on their status update).

2- Critics: (those who assess and criticise others’ ideas to make perfect implication of ideas).

3- Collectors: (people who collect information by scanning the environment).

4- Spectators: (these are silent readers who can follow ideas and strategies of other workers).

5- Inactive: ( these are the kind of people who never do anything themselves, just follow instructions blindly).

2.1 Personal Observation

The employees of Majorel company, Wipro international company and Telus international company added other employees from the same company to make social contacts, chat with each other, discuss working environment and daily job experience, share information and get knowledge about new policies and updates. Additionally, new employees use social media to learn from senior employees about how to deal with difficult situations and hard managers. This way can improve their working skills and work productivity. Employees also get motivated when an announcement is made by the management through one of the channels of social media (which they are using within the company as an inner tool of communication) stating the employee of the month, also employees learn that improving work performance leads him/her to a quick promotion. On multiple occasions employees from these companies learnt about a colleague getting promoted due to their work performance, this motivates them to do extra efforts such as, policy self study, pay more attention to detail, conduct effective communication cross functional departments etc, which will increase their knowledge, position subsequently brings financial benefits too.

Some managers use these social media channels as a KPI’s tool to evaluate the abilities of their employees in producing the best work outcome through monitoring and analysing their engagement with their colleagues on these channels. For instance, managers find out some employees are creators, some are critics, collector’s spectators and others not active. Manager assigns tasks to employees according to their natures and temperaments which give working satisfaction to employees that generates best working results. That being said, the use of social media during work hours can affect performance negatively though. Employees may spend hours on social media in their workplace for socialising with their colleagues, discussing irrelevant topics to their work, exchanging funny images, videos and jokes to pass time which will affect their productivity. Based on that, social media has a strong influence on employees skills, motivational level, productivity and knowledge.

2.2 Model of Influence of Social Media on Employee Performance Factor

The above model illustrates that social media has become an essential element in any employee’s daily work life. Companies avail social media clear effectiveness to influence their employees skills, productivity, knowledge and motivational level.

3. Methodology:

3.1 Questionnaire Samples

To examine the relationship between social media and employee’s performance a research survey was designed by the researcher in order to serve the purpose of this study was distributed to respondents of “Majorel company, Wipro international company and Telus international company”. Out of 70 distributed questionnaires 50 completed ones were received.

A purposive sampling was taken to distribute questionnaires to respondents representing the information technology sector in Ireland. Personal contacts were used for data collection as well as for explaining the purpose of study to respondents.

3.2 Study method

Questionnaires were the instrument used in data collection for the current issue. The questionnaire contained close-ended questions to enhance validity of response. It consisted of six sections as follows: First section deals with the socio-demographic profile of respondent. Second section contains questions about social media using habits of employees. The third section of questionnaires were about skills extracted from using social media. Fourth section, questions covered knowledge obtained from social media. Fifth section questions examine the influence of social media (in terms of increase and decrease) due to the usage of social media. Sixth section, explores whether motivation level increases or decreases as a result of using social media.

SPSS 16.0 was undertaken in this study to ascertain the degree of relationship between the variables. Significance of questionnaire was examined, Reliability of the scale was counted and Correlation and Regression analysis were employed for drawing results.

4. Findings:

4.1 Correlation Analysis of Data

The current study measures the correlation of social media with employee’s skills, knowledge, productivity and motivation. Table 1 illustrates positive correlation between social media and four factors of employee’s performance (skills, knowledge, productivity and motivation). The correlation was positive and significant at the level of 0.01 to 0.05 between social media and skills, productivity, knowledge and motivation. For instance, correlation between social media and employee’s skills 0.639 (p=0.000); the correlation between social media and employee’s knowledge was 0.0480 (p=0.000); the correlation between social media and employee’s productivity was 0.348 (p=0.006); the correlation between social media and motivation was 0.0646 (p=0.000).

Table 1. Correlation of Social Media with Skills, Knowledge, Productivity, Motivation.

rr	Dimensions		With social media	Results
1	Skills	Personal Correlation	. 639**	Accept
					Significance Level	.000
		2	Knowledge		Personal Correlation	. 480**	Accept
Significance Level	.000
3	Productivity			Personal Correlation	.384**	Accept
		Significance Level	.006
		4	Motivation	Personal Correlation	.646**
Significance Level	.000**

** Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2-tailed).

As shown in Table 1, a strong positive correlation between dependent and independent variables was approved. Employee’s skills, knowledge, productivity and motivation highly correlate with the use of social media. Social media has an impact on skills (63%) knowledge (48%), productivity (38%) and motivation level of employees (64%). So this correlation can be improved more with little efforts of the management of the technology companies. The result supports the first hypothesis that there is a positive relation between use of social media and employee’s performance variables (skills, knowledge, productivity and motivation).

4.1 Regression Analysis of Data

Regression model was employed to predict the factors affected by using social media. In regression analysis, four dimensions are undertaken as dependent variables in terms of employee’s skills, knowledge, productivity and motivation. Table 2 shows the coefficient between dependent variable (X1= Employee Skills) and independent variable using social media, the regression R was 0.639. It represents the association of using social media and employee skills 63.9%. High value of beta and level of significance shows the strength of association. From Table 2 dependent variable (X2= Employee Knowledge) and independent variable (Social Media), the regression R was 0.480. So it shows the association between social media and employee productivity was 48%.

Highly beta and strongly significant these variables were. By Table 2 the dependent variable was 0.384. Association between using social media and productivity was dependent variable (X4= Employee Motivation Level) and independent variable association here became 64.6%. Here again highly significant and having high beta.

Table 2. Regression Analysis of Factors Affected by Using Social media

Dimensions	R	R Square	Adjusted R Square	Std. Error of the Estimate	Unstandardised Coefficients Beta	Standardised Coefficients Beta	Significance
Skills	.639	.408	.396	.60296	.754	.639	.000
Knowledge	.480	.230	.241	.61773	1.292	.480	.000
Productivity	.384	.148	.130	.87005	1.364	.384	.006
Motivation	.646	.418	.406	1.73988	-2.443	.646	.000

The results ‘in Table 2 indicate that the use of social media contributes to employee’s

skills learning, gaining knowledge and becoming more productive for organisation and increase in motivation level. Results showed that the dimension of skills learning was 63.9%, gaining knowledge was 48%, productivity was 38.4% and motivational level increase was 64.6%. It means that there can be other contributing factors too. There can still be margin for improvement too.

Results reject the second hypothesis and support the first hypothesis strongly. It shows that these four dimensions get affected by using social media. This impact contributes to employee performance positively.

This four dimension model developed to measure the impact of using social media on the employees of the technology companies performance positively. In Ireland, the technology sector can use this model to enhance the performance of its employees. Technology companies can enhance their employee skills/multi-tasking, boost their knowledge, increase motivational level and bring more productivity in work.

5. Conclusion:

Examining the current topic has a great influence on the technology companies in Ireland and for the HR departments’ who have concerns for the employee’s performance. Thus, technology companies should first concentrate on employee’s behaviour when using social media. Technology companies can design their training program based on their employees’ habits when using social media. For instance, companies can create a Facebook page and use it for training purposes.

HR departments can update their policies, launch new training programs, meeting schedules, training tools, inspirational quotes in facebook training page.

Secondly, technology companies may use facebook or any other social media profiles of employees to screen out required skills for newly launched/planned projects. Technology companies can use these social media platforms to enhance skills, knowledge, productivity and motivational level of employees. It is a matter of fact that employees reflect their company’s image and reputation, therefore any negative activities on social media while using the company’s own computer will definitely cause great damage. Technology companies can draw the right path of the usage of social media by their employees. It is the technology companies responsibility to improve their employees’ use of social media in the workplace. They should approach social media as an effective tool for upskilling and optimising employees’ performance.

Needless to say, there can be some other variables which may influence employees performance when using social media such as: misunderstanding while reading updates, employees’ individual characteristics, etc. these variables can be a food for thought when conducting further investigation. The current study assists technology companies to create more appealing and engaging training programs.

References:

Dantas, R., et al. (2022). Empirical Investigation of Work-Related Social Media Usage and Social-Related Social Media Usage on Employees’ Work Performance. Behavioral Sciences. 12(297), 1-17

Men, L., et al. (2020). Examining the Effects of Internal Social Media Usage on Employee Engagement. Public Relations Review. 46(2), 1-12.

Yang, B., et al. (2019). Improving the organisational knowledge sharing through online social networks: The mediating role of employee motivation. Role of Employee Motivation. (online) Available: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Bayan-Mohammed/

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Carlson, J. R., et al. (2016). Social Media Use in the Workplace: A Study of Dual Effects. Journal of Organisational and End User Computing (JOEUC), 28(1), 15-31.

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Naheed, A., (2014). Impact of Social Networking on Employee Performance. Business Management and Strategy. 5(2), 139-150.

Aral, S., et al. (2013). Introduction to the Special Issue-Social Media and Business Transformation: A Framework for Research. Information System Research. 24(1), 3-13.

Munene, A. G. and Nyaribo Y. M. (2013). Effect of Social Media Pertication in the Workplace on Employee Productivity. International Journal of Advances in Management and Economics. 2(2), 141-150.