The World Wide Web is a drastically different digital landscape
to that present at its inception, with the Web 2.0 revolution ushering in a new
age of utility and co-development that has seen the creation of rich,
ever-evolving content, largely superseding the rigid, stagnant, single author
webpage of yesteryear (O’Reilly 2005). Evolutions in Internet architecture have
allowed users to add and/or modify website content in new participatory forms
(Howard 2008, pp.490-491), with Hypertext Markup Language Standard, or HTML,
now incorporating a host of previously unimaginable features in its fifth
version (W3C 2014). Howard (2008) conceptualises contemporary practices as inherently
hybrid on what he describes as the ‘vernacular web’, with non-institutional
participatory expressions thriving in a technological space largely produced,
funded and maintained by institutions.
It is in this uneasy balance between the institutional and
the contrary that I believe many employers have difficulty, with what was once simply
a vast resource through which one could collate information becoming
increasingly participatory and ubiquitous. As demonstrated by a Bank’s recent
mishandling of issues related to social media (Hannan 2011), businesses are
struggling to adequately comprehend the diversity of new media, instead
attempting to locate employee practices within existing legal frameworks in
ways that are detrimental to both parties. Similarly, the choice to dismiss Barminco
miners due to breaches of Occupational Health & Safety laws whilst
participating in the ‘Harlem Shake’ viral video meme in an effort to boost
workplace morale is but one case of an institution’s missed opportunity for
free, positive publicity, instead producing an antithetic achievement.
Having spent close to two years under the employ of an
institution with an open social media policy, similar to that of Cisco
(Earnhardt 2010), I have come to the conclusion that an employee’s workplace
motivation is largely unchanged by their choices in media consumption. During
my employ, projects were assigned with a deadline and as long as that deadline
was met, workplace practices were largely unregulated. Employees used social
media or other online material as a mental break, returning to their work
refreshed and motivated. Speaking to others in the industry in restrictive
workplaces, I found that they too took similar breaks but due to workplace regulation,
they simply did so on their own mobile devices.
I believe this is a beneficial strategy for all businesses;
choosing to find a balance that results in productivity and only punishing
those who abuse it. The idiom of motivation through the carrot and not the
stick comes to mind here, with employers offered the opportunity to seemingly
reward staff rather than punishing them for accessing content that is
realistically a part of everyday life in this digital world.
References:
Note: the Barminco ‘Harlem Shake’ video cannot be properly
referenced as the original was taken down during legal proceedings. A number of
versions are still available online, and can be found here: <https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=barminco+harlem+shake>
Earnhardt, J 2010, ‘Cisco Social Media Guidelines, Policies
and FAQ’, Cisco, 15 June, viewed 5 May 2014, <https://blogs.cisco.com/news/cisco_social_media_guidelines_policies_and_faq/>
Hannan, E 2011, ‘Bank’s Facebook Sacking Threat’, The Australian, 5 February, viewed 5 May 2014, Factiva database
Howard, R G 2008, ‘The Vernacular Web of Participatory
Media’, Critical Studies in Media
Communication, vol.25, no.5, pp.490-513
O’Reilly, T 2005, ‘What is Web 2.0: Design patterns and
business models for the next generation of software’, 9 September, viewed 5 May 2014, <http://www.oreillynet.com/lpt/a/6228>
W3C 2014, ‘HTML5’, W3C,
29 April, viewed 5 May 2014, <http://www.w3.org/TR/html5/>
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