Summary: The Influence Of Communication

The arrival of communication in the form of social media has connected individuals throughout the world together. Social media can be defined as where people communicate, utilizing online platforms while they are connected to the Internet (Cox and Rethman, 2011). With social media, people interact not only with a single person, but they can choose to connect with many other individuals to speak concurrently, though they are at various locations. In addition, people may engage in a variety of activities; for instance, they can download photographs, upload videos, and electronically transfer information. Social media diminishes the problem of communication with others over long distances, and expedites the ability for people to communicate at

Twitter is a unique form of communication because of its brevity on the postings: the limit is 140 characters, and the users have no need to be acquaintances with each other by 2009, Twitter had 41 million users (Kwak et al. 2010). Conversely, LinkedIn is more business oriented and has 85 million members (Wang and Kobsa, 2009). Users post their professional image to the public, showing their skills, contacting other professionals in the field, and even searching for prospective candidates for their industries (Cox and Rethman, 2011). Facebook, which is the most social in nature, stated they had over 400 million active users in 2009 (Warnakula and Minicab, 2010). Two years later, on November 4, 2011, Facebook stated they had more than 800 million active users, and more than 350 million of these people were utilizing their mobile devices Moreover, Facebook contends that more than 50% of their active users log on to Facebook in any given day. Further, Facebook states the average user has 130 friends with whom they interact. (Facebook Statistics, 2011). In the past, before the advent of Facebook, other social media sites were also popular: IM, Classmates, and Myspace (Skeels and Grudin,

Like increased cyber security this means that Hackers can commit fraud, launch spam, or even launch companywide viruses through a social media platform. “It’s important to protect your network with the same level of security that applies to proprietary business information” (Skeel and Grounding, 2009). When launching an employee engagement program recently for a government contractor with a global footprint, E Group worked with their IT team to ensure that social ware was not part of their platform. Given their top secret security work globally, the alleviation of any risk was the right call. And also usage guideline in this case Employers must develop clear policies and monitor social media to prevent employees that choose to use the platform to vent about clients and the organization, post confidential information, or even to post potentially offensive material. It is crucial for employers to provide clear guidelines on what is appropriate use so employees can have clarity and reference as