One of the industry key players within the communication space at the Lagos Digital PR Summit says it takes about eight hours for a company’s reputation to be damaged on social media, thereby advocating for the need to start documenting Social Media Policy.
Workplace Social Media Policies are gaining traction as the number of people commenting, sharing, liking and tweeting every aspect of their life continues to grow. This surge in the same vein wreaks havoc on the image of any company if not being properly managed.
Chido Nwakanma, Director General of Blueflower Limited, a strategic communications management firm says once a questionable post that is capable of denting the image of the company hits the social media, its gets shared and go viral with grave consequences.
The communications expert who was at the summit believes that a growing concern for employers is how to manage their employees’ social media use and its potential impact on their brand.
“There is an urgent need for organizations especially the media to start developing Social Media Policy in the newsroom just as some media organization like the New York Times in the US.”
He argued that with such policy in place many employees would save themselves the hassle of reputational damage as this could amount to a devastating loss to the company.
While developing this Social Media Policy, it is important to take cognizance of individual rights.
“We need some of the things that are contrary to social media best practice, but they are not documented, no organization will stand the risk of reputational damage that is why we need strong collaboration in this regard by different stakeholders.”
Speaking also, at the summit, Chukwuemeka Fred Agbata, Founder of CFAtech narrated an incidence of reputational damage where an icon in diaspora whose Facebook account was hacked saw a video clip of porn on his wall.
“He needed to organize a press conference to let the world know that he wasn’t the one who posted porn on his Facebook that he was hacked. The deed has already been done although I believe that there was no reason for him to do that. These are the things that need to be avoided.
Agbata who delivered a lecture titled “Understanding Cyber Security for Communication Effectiveness” at the summit emphasized on the need for PR practitioners to start developing a high level of cybersecurity consciousness.
While concurring to the fact that Social Media Policy should be enacted, he argued that some of the violations emanate as a result of not taking extra pains to ensure security.
“This is not an issue of saying that PR practitioners are not involved in the fight of cyber-attacks because it’s a fight that involves everybody, it is not limited to any profession.”
He lamented that virtually all the stakeholders are not cybersecurity conscious enough, charging all to start developing interest on issues that relate to cybersecurity because more attacks are likely to occur in future.
He admonished all the PR practitioners to careful while on social media as well the internet, adding that using a password manager is critical to managing passwords.