THE DANGER OF NOT BEING ON SOCIAL MEDIA

Not being on social media is by now far more detrimental than hiding away in the corner office, writes David Dubois assistant professor of marketing at INSEAD.

He says that traditionally, leaders’ ability to influence has been based on the extent to which they harness their power and strength. Authority and the ability to guide others through hardship have historically been central to the growth of leaders.

“But in today’s digital age a new kind of “democratic leadership” has emerged, a process by which engagement is much more bi-directional: from top to bottom and bottom to top.

“The advent of social media has driven this change in social dynamics and new research shows that the most influential CEOs today are social leaders, open to listening, engaging in dialogue with stakeholders and responsive to their followers.”

Dubois [who worked on a study looking at the most influential people on Twitter] says people increasingly want to see their leaders on social media, which is where 80 percent of chief executives from the world’s biggest companies now do much of their bidding.

“CEO ‘sociability’ is critical to building trust and loyalty. Research shows that 82 percent of consumers are more likely to trust a company whose CEO engages on social media. Meanwhile, 78 percent of professionals prefer working for a company whose leadership is active on social channels.

“As reflected by the Twitter Influence Index (TII), not being on social media is by now far more detrimental than hiding away in the corner office. Engaging and telling the company’s story is becoming essential for CEOs, especially as the millennial generation demands and expects its leaders to be digitally savvy.

“As John Legere, CEO of T-Mobile (ranked #12 on the TII) said last year; ‘Who’s on Twitter? My customers, my employees, my competitor’s customers. And I hear every minute of every day how we’re doing and what we need to do differently.’”

This is republished courtesy of INSEAD Knowledge (http://knowledge.insead.edu) Copyright INSEAD 2016.

“There’s also value to the executives as users, Twitter is fantastic for keeping in touch with people, the issues and the media in their industry.”

So why aren’t our CEOs on board? Packman says some CEOs have a perception that it opens them to unnecessary risk and workload, “or that they may not receive anything of value. I think these concerns are relatively unfounded but can see their perspective”.

Digital producer and social media consultant ( and a former editor of Management magazine) Fiona Powell believes it may be security issues and concerns about social media back-firing on them that is holding some CEOs back. But she finds it odd, in this day and age, that CEOs are not wanting to be more accessible.

Socialites Packman believes it is a great idea for CEO’s to be on social media “especially if there’s already an established group of peers and companies from their industry on Twitter. There’s also an opportunity to keep an eye on the competition and the media too, and have conversations back and forth with people in those areas they probably already know”.

Powell agrees it is a missed opportunity – it’s a way for CEOs to be accessible and build more of profile both for themselves and for their company.

She points to serial entrepreneur Melissa Clarke Reynolds as an interesting voice and Vaughan Rowsell from Vend as another active company leader.

Powell also highlighted Sarah Robb O’Hagan (https://twitter.com/extremesro) an ex-pat New Zealander and president of Equinox, a fitness lifestyle company, based in New York who is also former global president of Gatorade. In 2014 she told Management that she extensively uses social media with her team. “I have over 12,000 employees and I believe that great ideas can come from every corner of the company so I really encourage everyone to participate and communicate with me and each other across Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn and Facebook.”

Michael Carney of online training provider, Netmarketing Courses believes CEOS should only be using social media if they are a thought-leader in the industry or an advocate for new thinking along the lines of Apple or Xero’s Rod Drury.

Carney says it come down to the philosophy of the CEO. “Not every CEO is right for ‘prime time’ – you do have to have a story to tell, not just about your organisation, but about your industry.”

It comes down to what they are trying to achieve. If they want to be the voice of their industry, if they want to show thought-leadership in the industry then LinkedIn or Twitter is the place to be, he says.

CEOs might want to see their companies considered as a thought leader but might be more comfortable with a media release and their own website, without realising they could spread the message further through social media.

“If you have a story to tell or a cause to champion – social media will allow you to do that.”

But it has to be done competently and it has to be inspiring. “You have to sell the sizzle. But if you are not that kind of CEO, perhaps better to stay off social media.”

Deborah Pead of Pead PR also points to Vaughan Rowsell of Vend with around 7,000 followers on Twitter and Kym Niblok of Lightbox, a client of hers.

As to why not more CEOs are using social media Pead says it can become very time consuming and perhaps a lot of CEOs don’t have time to monitor another platform “and it has to be an authentic voice of the person, a CEO can’t get their PA to do it for them”.

She says Cecilia Robinson of My Food Bag, a client, is terrific and is one CEO who manages to cross over between the personal and the business. She is quite clever in conveying the My Food Bag values through social media and talking to women who are central to MFB’s success.

Pead sees social media as an essential tool for brands to use to get their message out and to promote discussion in areas that are relevant. It’s also a way for her clients to be able release information without it being filtered or skewed.

She thinks New Zealand CEOs could be more active and that they need to be part of the conversation. “It’s a good way to a break a news story and put their voice and opinion-leadership out there, but finding time to work effectively with another platform might be the issue, it is not something a CEO can outsource.”