Brunel Business School and Social Media - Coursework Example

Challenges that Brunel Business School in adoption or use of social media Social media popularity has improved drastically in past years. Some of the common social medias are collaborative plans (I.e. Wikipedia), micro blogs (I.e. Twitter), content communities (i.e. YouTube), and other online social networking sites (i.e. Facebook). Rise in social networking adoption and smart tool evolution has transformed the information sharing arena for many organizations (Mergel, 2013 p., 188). In present time, social media sites offer to users of every age groups and have been an integral part of the cyber life. There are various issues that have been achievable through this platform to many schools. Today, rapid diffusion of social media use is ushering in new possibilities for organizations to communicate with and engage the general public. The ability for any organization such as Brunel Business School no matter how small – to adopt cutting-edge social media application presents substantial openings for a more level playing field. Thus, it potentially ‘changes the game’ about the kinds of resources and capacities the school requires and the strategies they might adopt in order to capitalize efficaciously on their social media presence (Peacock, 2011 p., 71).The growing popularity of social media is making its mark on many organizations as well as a general public. With more than 500 million individuals using Facebook, for instance, organizations have realized that it is necessary to be next to those they serve (Ryan, 2011 p., 153). The potential benefits of social media for schools like are several: in addition to customer contact, social media can be used Brunel Business School for facilitating students and parents as they are aiming to make the correct choice and at the same time provide knowledge work within the organization. In spite of the possibilities social media offers for the school, many times the school also associated problems and challenges with its adoption. These challenges in reality may arise from social media being more than just another information system implemented and a new tool or by the organization. Social media come with it a new way of reasoning about schools management. As a result, the school adopting social media has to surrender some of the absolute control they earlier had over their web presence. In some schools such as Brunel Business School, this kind of alteration from a closed to an open setting marks a significant step and change in the school culture. Brunel Business School often faces challenges with the adoption and use of information systems, and social media are no exception. Brunel Business School faces a lot of challenges and these can be broadly classified as external and internal challenges linked to the adoption and use of social media in the school to enable students and parents who are researching their site to make the correct choice. This paper’s findings show that internal challenges in Brunel Business School include resources, authorization, ownership, attitudes and economic issues, on the other hand external challenges are linked with Brunel Business School reputation, public/private network identity and legal matters (Kelsey, 2010 p., 86). The report add to the knowledge created by earlier research by introducing the problems and challenges related to authorization and ownership of social media services in Brunel Business School, which were found to be of high relevance to the school social media adoption. In order to minimize these obstacles, the report suggests that the school prepare guidelines and strategies for social media adoption and use. Following the increase in tuition fee, the only way Brunel Business School can make both parents and students make proper choices about their operations and issues of academics there is need to address the challenges. There is a need deliberate need for strategies to ensure the schools social media can be used more efficiently and efficiently to improve prospects, students body and alumni engagement and assistance. Literatures on adoption and uses of social media As with internal challenges problem, external challenges to given social media adoption, also share several traits with the issues faced by schools in other contexts, like as e-commerce adoption and use. For instance (Farhoomand et al., 2 000) classify external problems to electronic commerce into three sections: political concern (like limited access to the internet in specified parts of the world), legal issues (such as the acceptance of electronic signatures worldwide) and cultural issues (like resistance to online shopping in given regions). While the examples used are never directly applicable to the context of social media, the organization behind them still holds: little or restricted internet access still restricts the use of social media in many countries, for instance, and new legal concerns like privacy management and the application of social networking in benefiting the school. Strom et al. (2002) too categorized external challenges and problems to the adoption and use of social media as critical questions (like infrastructure), external impact and support (such as for instance industry influence and a lack of known standards) and legal issues. Again, as with Farhoomand et al. (2000), the case used does not operate in the specific context of social media, but the organization behind them are still logical. In practitioner literature, Li (2010) accepted that the main external risks linked to organizational adoption of social media and uses are linked to the lack of monitoring and guidelines in social media services. According to Li (2010), guidelines are essential in controversial circumstances, as they make it simple for school managers to recognize problems and turn to advice for possible next steps. Li (2010) also believes that organizations are require clarifying how deliberations on social media services are monitored or scrutinized, and that it is essential to reach a pact on how information and responsibilities should flow. From this literature review, conclusion can be made that many challenges and problems exist in the adoption and use of social media in schools such as Brunel Business School. These challenges can be divided into two wide categorizations: external and internal (Peacock, 2011 p., 111). External challenges, such as those related to Brunel Business school image, external relation brands, are also currently in the adoption and use of the social media in the school context. For instance, I have considered the most essential of these to be a perceived absence of control over content and subject in social media and its reflection on Brunel Business School brand image, coupled with apparent high security risks related to social media. Due to these aspects schools social media has been incapable of more effectively ways to improve prospects, students and alumni engagement and support (Gupta et al, 2011 p., 47).Similarly, the critical analysis of the social media adoption and use at Brunel Business School indicates that the external challenge related to reputation. The school has never been sure of our public views their operations and management as a whole. Furthermore, they feared how the general public would perceive their operation and content at the social site. Reputation of the school can be mentioned in 100% of the examine social media plans, with the key concern being those teachers and other workers status updates, blog posts or tweets might have an unwanted impact on the Brunel Business School reputation. For a fact, individual support staff, students and other users of the social media limit the control school has on information, and that malicious or misguided staff have the potential to damage a school brand. The review and analysis also gave the challenge of preexisting Web capabilities which might constitute resources that school can mobilize in pursuit of additional Web-based goals and social site generally in provision of the necessary facilities, academic provision, social life, etc. There is in fact growing evidence that Internet and Website capacities contain critical school capabilities for the effective strategic use of information technology Website reach is also an indirect pointer of ‘communication competency,’ which in contingency theory is hypothesized as a determinant of an school external trust-building efforts (Girard & Girard, 2011 p., 35). Chart showing summary of main barriers for organisations in embracing social media practices at Brunel Business School While there were several comments about the lack of knowledge or understanding as barriers to social media adoption in the school, these tended to be written by individuals with relatively lower levels of concern with social media. Individuals who had the highest levels of involvement with social media were more probable to make comments about the problems linked to creating a compelling business case. The school knows all these strength but it has never been so keen in full implementation of these benefits. My professional to Brunel Business School is they appoint a person within the organization to monitor the content on the social media. Another plan would be to re-explore the information needed by the school and provide into the exact target group (Farhoomand, 2005 p., 26). For example, if it is information to the parents it should be divided to that going to the workers. There is also need for the school to provide adequate information and at the same time provide a mechanism for direct feedback for those using the site. There is needed for the school immediately gets the public response and act on the content. For the social media provides exciting opportunities that Brunel Business School should use and ensure it is providing the exact content that its audiences want such as facilities, academic provision, social life. In the age of permitting and universal internet access, the social media have become a critical tool for online presence of users and organization such as Brunel Business School. Adoption of such social network podium is not free from issues and challenges. In this paper, I have highlighted main challenges that need attention before proper adopting social media for Brunel Business School. All pointing to balanced social media policy, workers and students awareness, and proper security control are few measures that can assist the school in dealing with stated challenges and allow them to obtain benefits of using social media for their school objectives especially know that tuition fee is hiked and all are keen in joining the school (Cross & Parker, 2004 p., 23). References CROSS, R. L., & PARKER, A. (2004). The hidden power of social networks: understanding how work really gets done in organizations. Boston, Harvard Business School Press. FARHOOMAND, A. F. (2005). Managing (e)business transformation: a global perspective. New York, Palgrave Macmillan GIRARD, J. P., & GIRARD, J. L. (2011). Social knowledge using social media to know what you know. Hershey, PA, Information Science Reference. http://site.ebrary.com/id/10448593. GUPTA, A., HATE, S., & SIEMER, A. (2011). ASP.NET 4 social networking a truly hands-on book for Microsoft ASP.NET 4 developers. Birmingham, UK, Packt. http://site.ebrary.com/id/10467642. KELSEY, T. (2010). Social networking spaces: from Facebook to Twitter and everything in between : a step-by-step introduction to social networks for beginners and everyone else. [New York], Apress. MERGEL, I. (2013). Social media in the public sector: a guide to participation, collaboration, and transparency in the networked world. San Francisco, Jossey-Bass. PEACOCK, M. (2011). Drupal 7 social networking: build a social or community website with friends lists, groups, custom user profiles, and much more. Birmingham, UK, Packt Publishing. RYAN, P. K. (2011). Social networking. New York, Rosen Central. http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&scope=site&db=nlebk&db=nlabk&AN=617390. KAPLAN, A.M. & HAENLEIN, M. 2010, "Users of the world, unite! The challenges and opportunities of Social Media", Business horizons, vol. 53, no. 1, pp. 59-68. LI, C. 2010, Open Leadership: How Social Technology Can Transform the Way You Lead, Jossey-Bass. MANDE, D.M. & WIGAND, R.T. 2010, "Taming the Social Network Jungle: From Web 2.0 to Social Media", AMCIS 2010 Proceedings, , pp. 416. PAPWORTH, L. (2009). Enterprise: List of 40 Social Media Staff Guidelines. http://laurelpapworth.com/enterprise-list-of-40-social-media-staff-guidelines/ created on April 4th, 2009. [3.6.2009] HENDERSON, J.C. & VENKATRAMAN, N. 1993, "Strategic alignment: Leveraging information technology for transforming organizations", IBM Systems Journal, vol. 32, no. 1, pp. 4-16. IBM (2010). IBM Social Media Computing Guidelines. http://www.ibm.com/blogs/zz/en/guidelines.html [7.12.2010] Read More