Business Communication Use of Social Media in a Crisis Situation

Question: Discuss about theBusiness Communicationfor Use of Social Media in a Crisis Situation. Answer: Introduction Crises have a potential to bring down the reputation of a business organization. An individual response to crisis directly correlates with the organizational response towards them. It is the role of the crisis manager to put together the team many business organizations are dependent on social media as a tool for providing various services to the customers. In case of crises or an emergency social media is used as a powerful tool for a business organization. A crisis can include a simple website outrage or a negative publicity. Individual responsibility is increasing with a growth in the social media tool (Mangold and Faulds, 2009). It takes fraction of second to spread a rumor through a tweet or a Facebook post. Under such a situation it has become evident for business organization to restrict the usage of social media at workplace. It is considered as one of the major reason behind the disruption (Gilbert and Karahalios, 2009). The usage of social media has become an important tool for an individual or an organization. The crisis manager has to develop a road map in order to make organization free from crises. The crises management falls under the role of public relation practioner in order to manage crises. The public relation practioner has a responsibility to deal with the image of the organization. The practioner need to find new way to communicate using the social media. It will help them in deriving the effective technique that will help in evaluating effective measures. Social media and internet is the new research and people are using it enthusiastically. Social media is one of the user generated media that allows interactivity between the users. It engages people in public conversation online. Large sized multinational companies are using social media as an important tool to manage day-today affairs. They are developing efficiencies by learning new technique for incorporating changes (Dutta, 2010). The social media do have a positive and a negative impact. The social media users use it as a tool to discuss their experiences. The users can use social media to discuss their personal experiences. This often creates a negative environment if the individual has large following. Social media provides users to get into a two way communication. Companies can participate in the online debates taking place on the social media. Social media provides companies to have a long term relationship (Papacharissi, 2010). The role of social media in crisis communication is often ignored. The role and the impact of social media on the crises are still uncertain. In todays global business scenario crises may occur at any point of time. Social media not only help the organization to manage crises but also help the organization to control the particular situation. It is necessary to find out the effectiveness of social media in order to fight against crisis. It has become important for the business organization to respond efficiently in order to manage the crisis Flew, 2007). Social Media can be an effective tool in managing the crisis. It provides organization with an important tool to communicate their thoughts with public. Fishman has suggested five common characteristics of crisis communication where he has focused on unpredictable event, where important values of an organization are threatened, where the intention of an organization is not clear, it can occur due to sometime sensitive e issue and las tly crises have occurred due to multi-dimensional set of relationship due to changing environment (Safko, 2010). The public perception in an organization depends upon how an organization deals with the crisis. The crises in an organization can occur in multiple stages. There is a necessity to handle the problem efficiently in order to avoid the amount of damage caused by the crisis. Organizations need to develop efficient workplace management so that the crisis can be dealt efficiently. Organizations that are willing to identify probable future crisis are able to combat against them by planning efficiently (Shepherd, 2011). A crisis management is not only help in developing preparedness but also helps in evolving efficient methods in order to deal with wide scope. The range of crises differs from organization to organization and social media. This procedure requires efficient planning and development by efficient management of resources. Planning allows organizations to develop a crises management team whose role is to effective planning. This helps in recognizing potential problems in order to manage crises in a steady manner. The organization will efficiently give effective measures to control the situation by developing efficient planning mechanism. The risk related to crises is more likely to increase without a proper planning (Qualman, 2010). Organizations need to develop effective plan in order to manage crises by reducing the interference of outsiders. Decisions and plans related to crises create a dirty impression in the mind of the people. An organization that identifies potential crises is likely to affect the organization. Crises manage inefficiently are more likely to create problems for an organization. A roadmap is required for an organization to cover dangerous routes (Blossom, 2011). The most important task for an organization is to manage the risk in an efficient manner so as to protect the stakeholders from any type of damage. In such a scenario a company requires an effective framework that is necessary to reduce the level of risk. Research has shown th at the organization response to the crises is necessary in order to attain effective result. The negative word-of-mouth has affected the organization in managing variety of crises. It is evident that the organization needs to develop activities that help in managing the organization by giving effective results. The planned responses help in attaining desired targets. An organization need to develop effective social media strategies in order to gain market strength (Brzozowski, Sandholm and Hogg, 2009). The information related to social media need to be wisely used so as to manage market efficiencies. Emergence of blog has changed the overall process of communication. The social media has a potential to influence the public relation practioner in dealing with the majority of issues growing in surrounding. Social media has instantly become one of the important tools to create awareness in masses. Social media is gaining importance in the organizations and has helped every individual i n dealing with the issues. Social media has quickly become one of the important medium if used efficiently. . Social media is one of the user generated media that allows interactivity between the users. It engages people in public conversation online. Social media security allows public relation practitioner to communicate efficiently. This helps in strengthening public relation in a proper manner. The users can use social media to discuss their personal experiences. This often creates a negative environment if the individual has large following. The social media as a tool has a power to influence large size of people. Social media provides customers to deal with the customers in an effective manner. This provides them with an opportunity to deal with different techniques in order to manage issues occurring at the different level in an organization. The public relation manger has a duty to look onto the important task to manage relationship with the stakeholders (Blanchard, 2011). I n such a situation it is important that recognizing potential problems in order to manage crises in a steady manner. The organization will efficiently give effective measures to control the situation by developing efficient planning mechanism (Bozarth, 2010). The internet has become relevant in the current scenario by looking onto the growing concern. There is a growing concern related to the social media on developing public relation. Internet allows organizations to develop efficiently by ensuring a regular growth. Public relation practioner are therefore taking efficient measures by looking onto growing concern of the function in the public domain. It is the responsibility of the manager to take-in-charge of the situation that is affecting the organization. Social media has both the positive and negative impact on the organization. In current scenario it has become evident to implement strategies in a manner that it helps in developing efficient regulation (Fuchs, 2013). The issues related to negative publicity in an organization can be managed in a manner it causes lesser harm to the organization. The manager needs to keep vigilance over the activities taking place in the organization. In the recent time it has become important the ma nager has to develop the activities that are necessary for measuring the public relation. . It is considered as one of the major reason behind the disruption. The usage of social media has become an important tool for an individual or an organization (Cook, 2008). The organization need to develop effective strategies that are necessary for managing the organizational strength. This is necessary for an organization to effectively implement strategies that are necessary for utilizing social media in an efficient manner. This is important from the point of view of the organization to develop activities that help in developing activities in such a manner that help in managing the organization in an effective manner. Large sized business organization is working in an efficient manner. The social media has a potential to influence the public relation practioner in dealing with the majority of issues growing in surrounding (Hinchcliffe and Kim, 2012). The social media is sometimes used by the people in the positive and negative manner that needs to be developed efficiently. It is highly necessary for an individual to develop activities that does not affects the organization in a negative manner the manager has a duty to train the employees in such a manner that they are aware about their duties. There is a need to teach about the negatives of using social media at workplace. Many multinational organizations are restricting the use of social media to stop negative publicity. This has become important for an organization to train employees in such a manner that they dont cause harm to the image of the organization. The image of the organization is vulnerable in todays scenario and it is important to find out one of the effective way through which the manager can restrict the organization from using social media tools at work place. In the given situation the manager is responsible to train the employees about the restriction of usin g social media at workplace. Large business organization are facing problems where the employees are misusing the liberty given to the, in such a situation it is necessary to effectively find the measures to restrict usage. The information shared on the social media has a long term impact on the image of the company. The information shared on the social media stays in the mind of the people for a longer time period. Majority of international brands has lost their market standing due to negative publicity. It is evident that the organization need to develop activities that need to used in order to implement efficient results. This is necessary as per the recent changes that need to be implemented in the todays global business scenario (Social Media: What are the advantages and disadvantages of social networking sites? What should we include in a policy, 2012? ). To conclude it is necessary that the social media is required in todays global business scenario but misusing it at a similar time will affect the business to a large extent. In the given situation the misuse of social media by the intern has created chaos. This can negatively affect the image of the organization. The most important task for an organization is to manage the risk in an efficient manner so as to protect the stakeholders from any type of damage. In such a scenario a company requires an effective framework that is necessary to reduce the level of risk. The image of the organization these days are highly dependent on the social media. In such a scenario it is important to evaluate important activities to keep a check in a way it positively affects the organization. Crises in the organization are inevitable but it is the role of the manager to develop activities in such a way that it help in improving the status of the organization References Mangold, W.G. and Faulds, D.J., 2009. Social media: The new hybrid element of the promotion mix.Business horizons,52(4), pp.357-365. Dutta, S., 2010. Whats your personal social media strategy.Harvard business review,88(11), pp.127-130. Papacharissi, Z. ed., 2010.A networked self: Identity, community, and culture on social network sites. Routledge. Flew, T., 2007.New media: An introduction. Oxford University Press. Safko, L., 2010.The social media bible: tactics, tools, and strategies for business success. John Wiley Sons. Shepherd, C., 2011. 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Available at : https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtools/tools-and-samples/hr-qa/pages/socialnetworkingsitespolicy.aspx Accessed on: 0 April 2017 Gilbert, E. and Karahalios, K., 2009, April. Predicting tie strength with social media. InProceedings of the SIGCHI conference on human factors in computing systems(pp. 211-220). ACM. Brzozowski, M.J., Sandholm, T. and Hogg, T., 2009, May. Effects of feedback and peer pressure on contributions to enterprise social media. InProceedings of the ACM 2009 international conference on Supporting group work(pp. 61-70). ACM. Cook, N., 2008.Enterprise 2.0: how social software will change the future of work. Gower Publishing, Ltd..