Social Pressure: The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

Periodically, I like to put on my "outsider glasses" and search through social media sites to find out the latest buzz regarding my organization. I do this to learn what the current perception is of the organization and how aligned our mission and goals are with our actions and results. In the era of networked social media, our customers have the ability to instantly communicate what they like about what we are doing and what they would like to see done differently. Make no mistake about this: they will tweet, post, and blog about it. Prior to the explosion in social media outlets, customers had to be fairly upset with your organization to take the time for letter writing (or even a phone call). Now, it's as simple as pressing the submit or send button. David Kirkpatrick writes in Social Power, an article for the September 26th edition of Forbes, "Both your customers and your employees have started marching in this burgeoning social media multitude, and you'd better get out of their way - or learn to embrace them". 

Okay, so we know that social media is here and must be reckoned with if your business is to succeed. How can you make all those quick bites of feedback work for your organization's benefit? Kirkpatrick states that "customers and employee activists can become the source of creativity, innovation and new ideas to take your company forward". Positive feedback is great to get, it lets you know you are on the right track, but negative feedback is what is going to make your business - that is, if you are open to it and act on it.

Acting on negative feedback means recognizing an opportunity for improving a service, product, or even a process (here's the tie-in to human resources!). It may even mean soliciting suggestions from your customers. Customers and employees appreciate "authenticity, fairness, transparency, and good faith" Kirkpatrick further states.

Take a look at the article and think about how your organization is utilizing social media (or ignoring its existence) and how that reaction is affecting your business.