Collaboration Platforms: Maximizing Benefits While Managing Risks
Increasing employee engagement in the digital age
Posted on 05-23-2019, Read Time: Min
Share:
For HR professionals, the emerging digital workplace offers opportunities to increase employee engagement, break through silos and reinforce your company’s culture. According to a recent study, digitally connected employees are more productive and motivated, enjoy better job satisfaction, and have a more positive view of work-life balance – all important goals from an HR perspective.
As part of the modern workplace, collaboration platforms such as Workplace by Facebook, Microsoft Teams, Yammer and Slack provide a more efficient way for a growing number of companies to communicate digitally – a trend that is expected to continue. For example, Nestle, the world’s largest food and beverage company, announced in January it would deploy Workplace by Facebook to more than 210,000 employees worldwide, as reported in the Wall Street Journal. And given Slack’s $10 billion valuations, investors foresee extensive growth for collaboration.
Enterprise collaboration technology offers clear benefits, but in order to maximize adoption organizations need to first address HR concerns such as:How do we know that employees will use these tools to communicate productively? How do we shield our employees against toxic behaviorin these platforms?
You should expect employees to chat about their interests and personal life on these platforms – that’s part of how employees develop relationships and find common ground. Most employees understand that there are appropriate channels to share this type of information, and that personal conversations shouldn’t be the primary use of the tool. It’s important to define adequate guardrails, so that employees understand how much personal conversation is acceptable.
And, as HR professionals know too well, every organization must address human behavior risk. In the same vein as personal conversations, most employees understand appropriate versus inappropriate content. However, there are sometimes a few bad apples who can ruin it for everyone. An employee who already behaves inappropriately in the workplace may bring these behaviors to the digital world— especially in private areas such as one-on-one chats or closed channels.
Your organization should implement a tool that quickly identifies bullying, harassment and discrimination, and develop a plan to address any unwanted behaviors before it creates a toxic environment. As an added benefit, monitoring tools offer an objective lens into situations that arise – reducing the need to sort through finger-pointing.
As part of the modern workplace, collaboration platforms such as Workplace by Facebook, Microsoft Teams, Yammer and Slack provide a more efficient way for a growing number of companies to communicate digitally – a trend that is expected to continue. For example, Nestle, the world’s largest food and beverage company, announced in January it would deploy Workplace by Facebook to more than 210,000 employees worldwide, as reported in the Wall Street Journal. And given Slack’s $10 billion valuations, investors foresee extensive growth for collaboration.
Enterprise collaboration technology offers clear benefits, but in order to maximize adoption organizations need to first address HR concerns such as:How do we know that employees will use these tools to communicate productively? How do we shield our employees against toxic behaviorin these platforms?
You should expect employees to chat about their interests and personal life on these platforms – that’s part of how employees develop relationships and find common ground. Most employees understand that there are appropriate channels to share this type of information, and that personal conversations shouldn’t be the primary use of the tool. It’s important to define adequate guardrails, so that employees understand how much personal conversation is acceptable.
And, as HR professionals know too well, every organization must address human behavior risk. In the same vein as personal conversations, most employees understand appropriate versus inappropriate content. However, there are sometimes a few bad apples who can ruin it for everyone. An employee who already behaves inappropriately in the workplace may bring these behaviors to the digital world— especially in private areas such as one-on-one chats or closed channels.
Your organization should implement a tool that quickly identifies bullying, harassment and discrimination, and develop a plan to address any unwanted behaviors before it creates a toxic environment. As an added benefit, monitoring tools offer an objective lens into situations that arise – reducing the need to sort through finger-pointing.
Managing Your Online Community
A community management planisso that employees know the collaboration platform provides a safe environment to work. An internal communications leader or another designated community manager should work closely with human resources and other stakeholders to develop this plan. As mentioned above, the plan should outlineappropriate behavior on the platform as well as how to respondwhen out-of-bounds behavior occurs.
Monitoring is a key element of this plan.Given the massive scope of digital interactions, it’s essential to have a well-configured monitoring tool to automate this task. Using artificial intelligence, the monitoring tool can scan public and private conversations for keywords, patterns and anomalies. Alerts enable the community manager to quickly address issues such as potential violations of HR policies, a security risk or other concern.
Keep in mind, you’ll want to create a monitoring strategy that matches your culture. For instance, many companies use of swear words is inappropriate. But in other companies some use of profanity is an accepted part of a productive discussion. An effective monitoring tool enables your company to set the standards for what is – and isn’t – appropriate.
The community management plan should also provide procedures for escalating issues that arise. The community manager needs guidelines and alignment regardingthe designated point-of-contact for incidents,as well as identifyingsituations in which content should be immediately removed.The plan should also provide clear standards on coaching the employee who posted inappropriate content – and how to support a victim of harassment or bullying.
With these three elements – a thorough plan, an effective community manager and the right monitoring tool – an organization can minimize risk and promote robust use of collaboration tools.
Monitoring is a key element of this plan.Given the massive scope of digital interactions, it’s essential to have a well-configured monitoring tool to automate this task. Using artificial intelligence, the monitoring tool can scan public and private conversations for keywords, patterns and anomalies. Alerts enable the community manager to quickly address issues such as potential violations of HR policies, a security risk or other concern.
Keep in mind, you’ll want to create a monitoring strategy that matches your culture. For instance, many companies use of swear words is inappropriate. But in other companies some use of profanity is an accepted part of a productive discussion. An effective monitoring tool enables your company to set the standards for what is – and isn’t – appropriate.
The community management plan should also provide procedures for escalating issues that arise. The community manager needs guidelines and alignment regardingthe designated point-of-contact for incidents,as well as identifyingsituations in which content should be immediately removed.The plan should also provide clear standards on coaching the employee who posted inappropriate content – and how to support a victim of harassment or bullying.
With these three elements – a thorough plan, an effective community manager and the right monitoring tool – an organization can minimize risk and promote robust use of collaboration tools.
Gauging Employee Sentiment
Digital collaboration platformsprovide a better way for your employees to work, and also generatea wealth of information about employee engagement. When viewed holistically, this data can provide insights to guide leadership decisions and change management.
What do employees think about the changes to the benefits package? What about the upcoming merger? The CEO’s latest speech?
While they will continue to share views at the water cooler or in the lunchroom, employees will also have frank discussions on the collaboration platform, particularly in private groups and messages. Insights derived from these interactions will be more honest and accurate than the typical culture or engagement surveys that are often skewed because employees are reluctant to share their true sentiments.
Knowing this information will also help internal communications leaders to coach executives or other influencers on how to respond and engage with the digital community in a way that creates a positive impact on the organization.
By ensuring employees are using collaboration tools appropriately, organizations canachieve the full benefit of collaboration tools. This includes streamlining communication – and drawing on data to make faster, better decisions.
What do employees think about the changes to the benefits package? What about the upcoming merger? The CEO’s latest speech?
While they will continue to share views at the water cooler or in the lunchroom, employees will also have frank discussions on the collaboration platform, particularly in private groups and messages. Insights derived from these interactions will be more honest and accurate than the typical culture or engagement surveys that are often skewed because employees are reluctant to share their true sentiments.
Knowing this information will also help internal communications leaders to coach executives or other influencers on how to respond and engage with the digital community in a way that creates a positive impact on the organization.
By ensuring employees are using collaboration tools appropriately, organizations canachieve the full benefit of collaboration tools. This includes streamlining communication – and drawing on data to make faster, better decisions.
Author Bio
| Matt Pasternack is Chief Product Officer at Aware. Connect Matt Pasternack |
Error: No such template "/CustomCode/topleader/category"!
