Deloitte: Social media engages employees and boosts productivity

Social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter are often given a bad rap in the office sphere, blamed as the source of decreased staff productivity.

However, the exact opposite may be the case, according to Deloitte.

The 'Rethinking social media: Building the social organisation through HR' report, which was conducted by Deloitte's Centre for the Edge in conjunction with the Australian Human Resources Institute (AHRI), found that social media usage is key to building an organisation's "social capital".

This referred to the way in which such media channels can help engage employees and ultimately increase levels of productivity.

"Social tools help organisations connect networks of people, promote idea sharing among their employees and drives innovation," Deloitte Chief Edge Officer Peter Williams said in an October 24 statement.

"Tapping into the collective wisdom of an employee base can help an organisation 'know what it knows' more quickly than relying on more traditional knowledge management systems."

The potential for any recruitment agency that can tap into the power of social media are therefore immense.

Through the collaboration capabilities offered by social media, staff can experience heightened levels of productivity. For example, you can complement your candidate searches on social media such as LinkedIn with FastTrack360 recruitment software to process candidates even more efficiently.

Deloitte also offered some key tips for any agency wishing to implement social media as part of their strategy.

One of these was the importance of setting realistic goals and milestones for measuring ROI, which can of course be streamlined through the use of ROI software.

Additionally, it is wise to identify where the "disruptive exceptions" lie in your agency and take steps to determine how social productivity software can help.

Alec Bashinsky, National People and Performance partner at Deloitte, offered some additional insight into the growing significance of social media in HR.

"Human Resource Directors and businesses leaders need to come on board and accept it is passionate and proactive employees who strive to improve performance and inspire innovation," he explained.

"These people are the ideal advocates for a business."