Gulf employers don’t ‘like’ Facebook
Triska Hamid | November 1, 2012
Wasting valuable work time on Facebook and Twitter is becoming increasingly difficult as the majority of regional companies limit access to social media sites.
A survey from Gulf Business Machines (GBM) indicates that 35 per cent of workers in the Arabian Gulf are prohibited from accessing social media sites, and about 33 per cent face partial restrictions.
The remaining 32 per cent have no restrictions and are free to tweet, browse holiday pictures on Facebook or try to decipher the magic behind the Gangnam Style dance moves on YouTube.
“Although these findings do not come as a surprise, it is a clear indication of how seriously enterprises take the potential impact of social media on productivity,” said Hani Nofal, director of intelligent network solutions at GBM.
“The challenge that businesses face is in finding a middle ground which allows them to tap into the power of social media, while ensuring that it does not negatively impact productivity.”
With the bring-your-own-device trend widely accepted in the region, workers can still access social networks on their own smartphones, laptops or tablets, rendering such restrictions ineffective.
So it remains to be seen how companies will prevent employees from tweeting away their working days using such devices.
I personally think that prohibiting and banning the use of such social media( facebook and twitter ) during working hours is a very positive and rewarding move towards increasing the productivity and insuring the wanted progress of work in such companies in a way that would generally have a very big effect in the improvement of the revenue economy in the Gulf Countries which is a good thing.
But still there would be the bigger problem of having Employees who are very dependent on such social media sites in a way that continuously decreases their intentions to be serious in their working hours within their companies.. leading to direct consumption of working and research time in unwanted LAME commenting and vague commenting as it is known about these social media sites ESPECIALLY facebook and twitter….
Provided an employee does his work on time and to the required standard, does it matter if he spends time on social networking sites? The best employers focus on the their staff’s performance, not their web-browsing habits.
Well that not in UAE or Dubai.This is a biggest issue all-over the world.I think in office premises such well I think that restricting such social media( Facebook and twitter )in official hours is a very positive step as it will increase work productivity as well as fully concentration toward work.
Social media for Internet marketing professionals are okay to use as its their job responsibility.
Accessing social media has advantages and disadvantages. I think employers should look at how employees deliver results. Some employees are fast and efficient workers and complete their tasks on time and in order for them to stay in the office, they need to while their time accessing social media, LOL!