Is Employee Social Engagement a Good or Bad Thing?

With electronic communication and social media, texting has made its way into the work place. Is this a good thing?

Many professionals feel both sides of this; texting work information to consumers and clients has strong pros, but also some cons to go along with it.

As a business owner, it’s a good idea to set some parameters and guidelines for your employees regarding texting so as not to have anyone regret anything or be caught in a difficult situation, but overall work texting is an important mode of communication and should be accessible.

Here’s a look at some pros and cons of work texting….

Pros:

• It’s an easy way to communicate. You can text individually or within a group and this way, information gets out quickly and to the right people. No sifting through emails or waiting for programs to load. Responses are easy and to the point.

• It’s accessible. With a phone call, you need to be in a space to talk and have the time for a conversation. With email, you often have to pull up your email account and it’s a bit more difficult to access past emails and read the whole conversation. Texting is easy – conversations are right in front of you, it just takes a minute and you can be doing something else during a text conversation.

• It’s non-invasive. As long as you’re not driving or attending to something else where you could be in a dangerous situation, or in a meeting with someone else, texting is pretty easy to do. You can text while working on something else or even while traveling. As the following article looks at, some may think, texting while flying? but it’s an easy way to stay connected even during travel time. In places where a phone conversation isn’t feasible, you can text.

• You and your employees can text out links of information – press releases, media, product launches, social media links, all of these are easy to disseminate through text. It’s a good marketing tool.

Cons:

• Texting isn’t always seen as professional. Some people still don’t like texting as a means of professional communication. They’d rather have an email or phone call. The best way to work around this is to make sure you and your employees know your clients, customers and colleagues.

• Texting is not secure. Texts are easy to pass around and can leak valuable, secure information. To work around this one, simply don’t text information that you’d like to remain private.

• It can be distracting. Because texting is so convenient, it can be distracting and take away from current tasks. You don’t want someone else texting while you’re talking to them or in the middle of an important meeting (unless it’s related and part of the meeting), so you and your employees shouldn’t do it, either.

Texting is the second most popular of work communication, email being the first.

It’s hard to stay away from texting regarding work, and it is an efficient and easy way for your employees to communicate.

The key is to be careful, but, then again, any communication should come with that warning.

Photo credit: Image courtesy of shutterstock.com

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