Communication Technology

ACAS has printed a probe paper on the implications of internet two.0 technologies (e.g. Facebook, LinkedIn, blogging, etc.) for employment relations.

The paper is named Workplaces and Social Networking: The Implications for Employment Relations.

It is written by Andrea Broughton, Tom Higgins, mountain Hicks and Annette Cox of the Institute for Employment Studies.

The aim of the paper is to answer the subsequent questions:

● however intensive is that the use of social media in kingdom workplaces?

● What challenges and opportunities do social media gift for management of employment relations?

● What will smart observe during this space look like?
Click here to access the paper.

HR Zone have just released a new report about the uses for social networking tools in the workplace.

The report has been done in conjunction with Skillsoft.

To get a copy of the report click HERE.

It appears that LabourStart has re-launched it's trade unionist social networking site.

The social networking site is called UnionBook.

Updated tools include:

- post your photos, videos and music

- join existing groups and create new ones

- add comments to other people's content

- add events to our online labour calendar

- post entries to your blog

- update your status

- make friends

- use the online chat to talk with other trade unionists online

- invite friends and fellow union members to sign up too

- send us your questions, comments, and suggestions - use the special group called "UnionBook Help and Support Network" to do so.

I've just come across a research report that looks at whether HR professionals have grasped opportunities afforded by Web 2.0 technologies, such as social networking forums.

For more details see Conversations at your fingertips by CHA.

According to the BBC News website over the weekend:

US troops are to be allowed to use social networking websites such as Twitter and Facebook following a review of internet use and security.

Defence department officials say the benefits of using social media now outweigh the risks to security.

The ruling means that a number of sites blocked by the Pentagon in 2007 - including YouTube - will be unblocked.

However, commanders will be able to temporarily block access to safeguard missions or save bandwidth.

Correspondents say social media and the internet are becoming increasingly important for the US military.

The web is used for recruitment, public relations and for communications between troops and their families, among other things.

US Defence Secretary Robert Gates has said that social networking can help the Pentagon interact with US military employees, many of whom are in their early 20s and regular users of online services.

For more details see Twitter and Facebook access for US troops.

Last week a story emerged that involved people using Facebook to organize a protest about increasing petrol prices.

The story is not related to work, but it seems reasonable to assume that what works in on respect will probably work in another.

More specifically the article from The Times concerns Facebook users organizing a 'no fuel day', or as it was put the writer of the article - Rhys Blakely:

In a digital rerun of the fuel protests of 2000, members of Facebook, the social network website, are planning a massive boycott of petrol stations next week.

I have no ideas of whether the protest worked in any shape or fashion, yet to me, the case in question marks an increasingly creative application of Web 2.0 communication technology for ends that it probably wasn't initially designed for.

I believe such creative initiatives also indicate what appear to be an increasingly common social phenomenon, that of polyphonic organization.

The question for someone with similar interests to myself is whether organizing many Internet-based voices around a grievance is a worthwhile strategy.

The only clear example I can think of where it did work was in the case of Liverpool Dockers in the late 1990s - and Web 2.0 hadn't even got off the ground at that time!

I expect we will not hear the last of such campaigns whether they work well or not.

I'd say there is plenty of research mileage in this subject.

See Facebook's fuel protesters target BP for more details of the case in question.