/2011/1753640-how-world-leaders-use-social-media-why-whitehouse-doesnt-follow-barackobama-and-other-idiosyncrasies-thumb.jpg
When
we talk about social media and work place, we are not talking only about a pacific
size company or enerprize. But workers
in any work place any size such as a small home office a medium size office or a big organization with channels all over
the world, they all have policies and
they all experience changes in the way work is conducted from past to present.
Most of the changes are here as a result of the emergence of new technology and
new social media.
In
my previous blogs I already talked about the use of social media and the
changes it has brought to organizations and what employers and employees should
consider when they use social media at work place. Here I want to think big and
talk about the importance of social medial in a much bigger and crucial
workplace which is the presidency and leadership or conducting a whole country
and working for the people of the whole country.
If
running an organization can benefit the use of social media, for sure running a
country also needs use of social media and can benefit from it in different
aspects and different ways.
Traditional media has lost its popularity and
use it once had in terms of campaigns and public relations. The new outlets of social media have
created a two way active connection between the two sides of
senders and receivers and it is no longer a one way media as it was
in past when people had TV or radio to listen to and to be connected to the
world. It is now a two way conversation tool. People get the chance to read and
comment and send their message and their voice to the other side.
Using social media is beneficial for any job
in any field. Leading a country is not an easy job and that is why I thought if
I am talking about organizations and CEOs and managers using social media at
work place, it is good to talk about the use of social media in presidential
elections
In
traditional campaigns TV, radio, newspapers, advertisement and mail had big
role in presidential elections. The presidents and leaders advertised their positions,
gave speeches, and went to different towns to talk to people and the reports
for all these were sent to people through the basic social media outlets that
we mentioned. But today things are very different. Today candidates are
expected to know the use of social media outlets such as face book, twitter,
blog, text messaging and many others to reach targeted audience and to be
connected to public and to increase the rate of participation among different
age groups from different distances. Use of social media for presidential
campaigns is a very effective and efficient way saving time and money for both
sides for voters and for the parties. Making advertisements and to pay for TV
or radio air time for broadcasting the campaigns have been very costly. However,
today even though these advertisements are still part of a campaign and
awareness programs. There are so many other types of social media that facilitates
the process and saves money.
People
of different age can take part in the elections and be updated about the news
anytime and anywhere they are.
TheNew York Times on its Media and Advertisement page published an article about the
power of social networks in presidential campaigns. I found the following
paragraph interesting to share here in my blog.
“Thomas
Jefferson used newspapers to win the presidency, F.D.R. used radio to change
the way he governed, J.F.K. was the first president to understand television,
and Howard Dean saw the value of the Web for raising money. But Barack Obama understood that
you could use the Web to lower the cost of building a political brand, create a
sense of connection and engagement, and dispense with the command and control
method of governing to allow people to self-organize to do the work.” (The New York
Times)
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Looking
at all these changes social media has brought to different aspects of work and
life, we can predict how things are going to be in future with the way social
media is growing.
According
to MATTHIAS LÜFKENS from the Atlantic “In the near future, no one will
be able to become a leader without digital followers, and no diplomat will be
well-positioned to represent his or her country if he or she does not
personally engage on social networks. And it is not the size of the
followership that matters, but the quality of the conversations. (MATTHIAS LÜFKENS, 2012)
Here is a you tube video from Good Day New
York talking about Social media's impact on the presidential election.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7iqsthA2Jbg
How
can social media help leaders of a country
· Build a personal brand
· Helps with presidency campaigns
· Create a sense of engagement and connection with public
· Get connected to public in different parts of the country in real time
· Lower the cost of campaigns
· An opportunity for citizen feedback and deliberation
· Gather a big pool of ideas on candidates and policies that would otherwise have been hard to get
· Efficiently and effectively gather ideas, get advice, convince and persuade people
http://cribsuite.com/news/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/Screen-Shot-2013-09-06-at-11.21.14-AM.png
Do presidents of
the different countries use social media?
As
I mentioned earlier, today the leaders and presidents of different countries
use social media not only for their presidential campaigns but also for
different other purposes on daily basis.
Here
are some interesting facts about a few presidents out of the many presidents that
use social media.
1 1- Barak Obama and social media- Based
on some data gathered from (twitaholic .com and twitter counter.com) “as of June 12, 2012, Obama's account had 16,505,044 followers, followed with 677,188 accounts and had posted 4,239 tweets. Well into 2011, it was
following the most people of any account on the network and was the third to
achieve ten million followers. It is one of only two accounts in the world to
be in the top ten in both followers and followees. As of June 12, 2012, the White House account is also among the
two-hundred most followed with nearly three million followers. (Wikipedia)
2- Latin
American presidents have taken to tweeting with gusto. Seven of the 25
most-followed world leaders hail from the region, according to Twiplomacy, a
website. Among the most active is Argentina’s Cristina Fernández. She
frequently tweets out verbose diatribes split across dozens of messages; she
once tweeted 34 times in 32 minutes. Although she has over 2m followers, she
herself follows only 54, with not a single non-Latin American leader among them”
(The
Economist, 2013) .
3- “Hugo Chávez was second only to Mr Obama as the
most-followed leader before his death earlier this year. He has been replaced
as the Twitteratus maximus of Latin America by the Argentine Pope Francis, who
has 4m followers of his Spanish- and Portuguese-language account”. (Follow the leader, 2013)
4- Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez used Twitter to
rally his 3.6 million followers and secure re-election on October 7, 2012.
5 5- “Twiplomacy study found that;
- E.U. President Herman van Rompuy (@euHvR) is the best-connected world leader, mutually following 11 peer
- Australia's prime minister (@JuliaGillard) is
the second-best-connected leader, with 10 mutual connections, followed by the
Korean presidency (@BlueHouseKorea), the U.K. government ( @Number10gov), and the Russian prime minister
(@MedvedevRussia), all of whom follow (and are followed by) nine other world
leaders”.
Bibliography
(n.d.). Retrieved from
http://www.economist.com/news/americas/21583263-how-presidents-tweet-follow-leader
(MATTHIAS LÜFKENS, 2012). Retrieved from
http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/10/tweet-me-to-your-leader-how-the-worlds-big-shots-use-social-media/263752/
(n.d.). Retrieved from Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barack_Obama_on_social_media
The New York Times. (n.d.). Retrieved from
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/10/business/media/10carr.html?_r=0
Twiplomacy study 2012. (2012). Retrieved from Twiplomacy:
http://twiplomacy.com/twiplomacy-study-2012/
Hi Leena.
ReplyDeleteThere are some great pieces of information in this blog, like the snippet on the most followed leaders and most social media active leaders. I was fascinated with the statistics you’ve presented, and impressed that President Obama is ‘up top’ at following other, in addition to having the highest number of followers in Twitter, in the political world.
Your bullet point list, of how social media can help make leaders a better cut from their predecessors, is very thought provoking; it had me thinking about the 80’s and 90’s when Princess Diana was touring those parts of the world where there was a great demand for relief from drought, starvation and sickness. If social media was prevalent back then, the effort to rally world leaders would result in more involved hands sooner, there would be more funds raised from every nook and corner of the world, and there would be a faster resolution to acute & dire situations. This, I see, would be the heightened benefit of social media to charitable and non-profit organizations (a workplace and a very different kind). The ‘Princess Diana’ brand is slowly being rebuilt with the new Royal Family, and everywhere they go, everything they do, and every cause they take up gets branded with their personal branding, thanks to them constantly building relations with governments and people worldwide directly and through social media. So who’s to say, but good things are likely forthcoming with the future Crown (http://www.royalcentral.co.uk/blogs/the-british-royals-embrace-social-media-9058).
Back on home soil, our Prime Minister’s Twitter activities are being questioned based on the tweets being government related versus party related, both coming from the same handle, and using PMO time for those of the latter (http://o.canada.com/news/national/how-stephen-harpers-use-of-social-media-blurs-the-lines-online/). The two tweets described in this article link tell me that I’m better off today that I was 10 years ago (TBD), and that the government is passing strong legislation against child offenders. Point to note is that message was received.
Thanks Leena.
Audrey