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How to build a crappy workforce

I write about strategies to turn fans into customers and customers into fans. I also share ways to use real-time strategies to spread ideas, influence minds, and build business.

Social Media  |  Worst Practices  |  Research and Analysis

Shutterstock_studentIt's simple.

If you are eager to employ second-rate employees and cannot wait to build a team of D-players, just ban Facebook, Twitter, and other social networks at your workplace.

As I have heard many times from young people, social networking is their preferred method of communication. Banning these tools is a sure way to have the best candidates re-consider working for you.

Finally here is some proof

To demonstrate the role of the network in young people’s lives, Cisco commissioned an international workforce study of nearly 3000 college students and recently employed college graduates, many working in their first full-time jobs.

Here are the findings I find most interesting:

  • More than two of five would accept a lower-paying job that had more flexibility with regard to device choice, social media access, and mobility than a higher-paying job with less flexibility.
  • The study revealed that one in three college students and young professionals consider the Internet to be as important as air, water, food, and shelter.

For several years, whenever I speak with college students (like I did Wednesday at an entrepreneurial marketing class at Tufts University) I've told them that if a prospective employer bans social media, they’ve got to resist working there. I tell them to ask about social networking at the office. If it is banned or restricted, I tell them to stand up, thank the interviewer and leave because they will not be happy at that company.

Do you trust your employees?

Guess what? When companies ban social networking, the best employees leave. They sense they are not trusted. Those who reluctantly stay go into the restroom or outside the office with their iPhone or Android to get onto Facebook and Twitter.

Here is a video where I explain this idea to a group of Microsoft interns considering a first job. And I provide some advice.

Direct link to Advice to students about getting a great first marketing job

Image: Shutterstock / Monkey Business Images