Most business leaders have a decent level of fear around anything that they can't control. And social media is no exception. But according to Social Recruiting Strategist Steve Ward, the benefits of social media far outweigh the risk to the business. In fact, it's actually an opportunity – allowing us as leaders and employees to be tuned in to our customer audiences, have a positive impact on the business, and make us more accessible in both social media channels and offline. Ahead of Steve's session at HR Tech Fest 2016 “Helping HR People Fight the Fear of the Rising Personal Brandâ€', he explains how we can help our people, and more importantly our leaders, to realise the benefits of social media and overcome the “shut it downâ€' mentality that exists in a lot of organisations today.

The ability for any employee, whatever their supposed rank in the company's hierarchy, to be able to post real time opinion on their existence at work is a huge fear factor for businesses – particularly those with shareholders to consider. Vodafone, Nestle and HMV have all suffered from “social media gaffsâ€' which had a direct impact, albeit briefly, on their share price and just as importantly, brand reputation.  When the growth of social media hit the business zone eight or nine years ago, the first requests to marketing/PR agencies predominantly wasn't “How can we use this to our benefit?â€', it was “How can you protect us from this?â€'. Here we are nine years on, asking the same questions.

The reality is that social media has made us all much more visible online. Not just our professional activities and achievements, but also our trips to the pub and what we get up to at the weekends. This makes our leaders uneasy and the common narrative is that to ask everyone to “shut it downâ€' – in the hope of protecting our company brand. While this may allay our leaders' fears, is this really enforceable and is it a realistic solution to managing social media? In a word, no.

In any aspect of business, risk analysis is essential. Recognising the pitfalls of social media and being prepared for the outcome is just common sense. Yes, the fear of negative impact is tangible but the key to managing it successfully is having a structure that *does* protect you for the 1% of times you experience a negative reaction on social media whilst getting the 99% of benefits from the opportunity it brings.

The most progressive minded of businesses understand that the actions and voice of key people in the organisation have a positive impact on the company brand. It all starts with encouraging a culture that empowers employees to be effective advocates of their business – whilst developing their own gravitas within key market channels. People in the modern age hate to be stifled and restricted in their actions, and being told what they can and can't do is unacceptable. By encouraging modern day professionals to act with modern day methods of communication, we provide an environment of opportunity and in-built responsibility in those people. People with effective personal brands are not careless about what they post. In fact, they seek positive opportunities for amplification at a moment's notice. Encouraging and training our digital natives to be expressive brands online is a positive action for modern day businesses.

So how can we empower our people to use social media in a responsible and powerful way that benefits both the business and our personal brands?

• Start by understanding and evaluating the dangers they are concerned about. With the support of a digitally focused task group agree on the opportunities, address the concerns, and propose the appropriate parameters to manage these risks. Encourage your leadership to not close door on social media and miss opportunities for positive branding and employee satisfaction. It needs reminding, that social media wins business, builds recommendation channels, attracts key talent, builds employer brand, and allows the company to tell its story to target audiences, from the ground up. That seems like an opportunity not to miss.
• Start from the top. The leaders of the organisation need to be showcased and active in the program. In my program of social media strategic integration, the layer with greatest gravitas is that of the leaders/directors in the organisation. People buy into companies often because of believing in and understanding the leaders.
• Develop a user-generated approach to social media and branding. As we have said, being ‘told' to do stuff on behalf of the business, for the benefit of the business brand, doesn't drive employee motivation. The people who best represent our customers, are often the people who best understand what the best content looks like. Include key employees/groups within the organisation, to come up with ideas for social media integration. Authentic and enthusiastic branding through our employees, requires the employees to be engaged with it from the outset.
• Offer a program to provide support and learning to aspiring and active digital natives within the organisation to ensure they understand the difference between the expression of thought online, and the responsibility of your employed role. Make sure to outline how they can ensure their personal branding efforts positively impacts company brand as well. The first people on this course should probably be the leaders themselves.
• Trust your people – the biggest part for most businesses is understanding that when we hired adults in the first place to take on significant roles, we need to trust that they have the ability to act like adults on any given business situation. Believe in your key people, don't over police them like children. This approach, not surprisingly, attracts top talent.

Although at times unpredictable, social media is not something to be feared. By embracing and encouraging our people to promote a vibrant professional personal brand through their social channels, organisations will reap the many benefits presented by social media.

You can hear more about how to use social media to drive HR transformation at HR Tech Fest, 27-29 November 2016 in Melbourne. Steve will be presenting on “Helping HR People Fight the Fear of the Rising Personal Brandâ€'. Secure your place here.

Steve Ward is an award-winning social recruiting strategist and digital recruiter. His passion and purpose is to help people and companies integrate social media into recruitment, branding and talent attraction. With 22 years' recruitment experience, he is credited as being one of the first (in 2009) to undertake what people would now call social recruiting. He also writes the well-known therecruitmentmisfit blog.