‒ I think that any social media may facilitate shaping the behavior of the users. I think, that's it, we are influenced by what we see and if we see a lot of positive messages, if we see positive things happening, and people talking about them you might as well feel happier in the workplace. On the other hand, you see things that you don't like or don't coincide with your values, you might start feeling more unhappy in the workplace
‒ I do think that the social media has a lot of power to change our emotions and how we feel and then in the second moment that ends up changing our behavior too
‒ Maybe with a wrong use of those internal social media the organization can also control some aspects of the employees daily private life if they use them to the power that shouldn't be used
‒ I believe that internal social media facilitates their organization to shape in place behavior in that way because they have a lot of information about each of their employees and that information can be related to work and also not related to work, related to private life
‒ I think this internal social media communication gives a lot of power for both sides:
for the employees and for the company itself.
‒ I think that it needs to be well controlled by the organization.
was not established by the interviewees. For example, Leonardi et al. (2013) argued that digital
communication can provide management with extra monitoring and controlling opportunities, which is not always positively perceived by employees. Ten (2017) research also indicated a perception of increased pressure from management afforded by additional means for surveillance and control. It referred to it as a part of the digitalization of social media. Indeed, an Accenture survey of C-suite executives reported in 2019 that 62% of their organizations were leveraging new tools to collect data on their employees, and only 30% of the C-suite executives who were polled reported themselves as confident that the data would always be used responsibly (Accenture, 2019).
However, this digital natives' perception may be a consequence of the particular organizational environment that the respondents are immersed in. They were sampled from the same company, which may not have applied uncovered surveillance techniques. One respondent appoints ethical
organizational culture as a factor for disbelief in corporate data mishandling. Once again, there might be an indication that digital natives will trust organizations unless there is any adverse event and that the technologies' optimism is again prevailing. Drawing a parallel with what was described on the
theoretical foundation, that digital natives individuals are expressing uneasiness and pessimism about the way private social media data is used, and extending this to the organizational context, the
neglection over the risk of misapplication of surveillance tools would be hazardous for the organizations, unless trustworthiness is established. In fact, they are expected to patronize and support companies that align with their values. They will not hesitate to lessen or end relationships when they disagree with companies' business practices, values, or political leanings.
Besides corporate surveillance itself, this set of questions also intended to address digital natives' likelihood of feeling an obligation to create and share content, eventually correlate to a
potential organizational requirement that may lead to (or reinforce) a compulsive behavior exaggerated need for sharing. In summary, the respondents believe in a participatory culture naturally created on
social systems that impose a high contribution level. Visibility and competition appear to be the reason behind this behavior, as they believe people who will use more social media are more likely to be valued by the organization. However, it is not clear if the pressure results from the company's culture or only a projection of the competition already present on the private social media.
Table 15
Corporate surveillance aspects – extractions
Monitoring ‒ It can have a lot of monitoring from the employees and also from the high management teams because there is a lot of information available.
‒ It kind of creates that environment of monitoring.
‒ Companies can monitor this collaboration by a lot of indicators available in these social medias.
Privacy ‒ I always say that I always imagined IT reading my chats, but I don't really feel monitored for what I am doing.
‒ I don't feel my privacy is being hurt for example, and I don't know if it's the company culture or the habits of the company.
‒ I do think that the social media inside our organization does bring that aspect of any social media that you feel like people are looking at you and they might be positive or might be negative depending on how you feel if you feel judged, or if you feel connected.
Obligation to
share ‒ Everyone is going to feel really pressured to share content there.
‒ They need, not they can, they need to post something always, they always need to be connected on the company social media.
‒ Sometimes people may see obliged to create and share content because they see that others are doing that and that raises a feeling of competition that's very natural to human beings.
‒ Most organizations value people that collaborate more.
‒ They are more important to the company because they are acting on the active way.
‒ I believe that this person can feel really pressured (by sharing details and information for anyone to access) and maybe that cannot be healthy.
‒ This competition feeling that may be generated within the company about content sharing and communication itself
‒ People who will use more social media are more likely to just to be valued and seeing and remembered because they are putting themselves out there. That's not easy because you have to be willing to take the risk to feel a monitored or judged by other people. So, I think that in some way is rewarded by other people.