Social Media Impact on Employees Performance in Selected Information Technology Companies in Nigeria

Social Media Impact on Employees Performance in Selected Information Technology Companies in Nigeria

Frank Miyebi Pukon¹, Ehijiele Ekienabor^2*

¹Business Administration Department, Igbinedion University, Okada, Nigeria

²Department of Business Administration, Igbinedion University, Okada, Nigeria

*Corresponding Author

DOI: https://doi.org/10.51244/IJRSI.2024.1101020

Received: 24 October 2023; Accepted: 01 November 2023; Published: 06 February 2024

ABSTRACT

The purpose of this study is to examine the social media impact on employee commitment; to investigate the impact of social media on employees’ productivity. 200 respondents were sampled and the sample population was conveniently selected from two information technology companies. Spearman’s rho correlation coefficient was used to test the formulated hypotheses. From the result of the analyses, the research found that social media has a significant positive impact on employee commitment with a positive coefficient value of 0.917 at 0.01 significant level; and social media has a significant positive impact on employee productivity with a coefficient value of 0.909 at 0.01 significant level. Based on the findings of this study, it is recommended among others that management need to find ways at integrating social media into almost all sphere of the work carried out by the employees to increase employee job satisfaction. In addition, there is need for the management to do more through sensitising, orientating and managing social media usage if high and efficient productivity is to be upheld.  The study concluded that social media has a positive impact on employee performance in the workplace.

Keywords: social media, employee productivity, employee performance, employee commitment

INTRODUCTION

Today’s business world has been faced with momentous challenges on a global scale ranging from financial crisis, ever increasing competition, dwindling and unpredictable flow of natural resources such as oil, rising cost and reduced profits (Assa & Nyaribo, 2013). Revitalizing and possibly reinventing the culture of organizations and the way they do business is key to achieving increased levels of employees’ performance in terms of workplace productivity and employee job satisfaction (Pitt & Bennett, 2008). Recently, social media platforms have been used increasingly in the workplace to facilitate communications among employees (Jafar et al., 2019).

Social media is among information and communication technologies that have diffused widely throughout the workplace (Moqbel, Nevo, & Kock, 2013; van Zoonen, Verhoeven & Vliegenthart, 2016), changing and reshaping the nature of the workplace and work itself (Bucher, Fieseler & Suphan, 2013). In today’s internet era, there is a major constraint which affects this work-life balance. It is found that most of the internet users spend their time in social media in the form of websites or applications (Kumar & Priyadarshini, 2018). Social media is an online platform that allows people to build virtual relationship with other people including strangers who share similar professional or career interests, activities, backgrounds or real-life connections (Kumar & Priyadarshini, 2018).

Social media has become one of the most significant business developments of the 21st century as they have added another facet to the way people communicate all over the world. In particular, Nigeria has witnessed an exponential growth of social media over the past few years, with profound consequences for both employers and employees (Agrippah, Mpanwa & Jagero, 2014). Consequently, Nigerians are now among the world’s most prolific social media users.

Social media are used by individuals as well as businesses and are becoming highly essential and indispensable. Over the last two decades (Michael, 2015) digital technologies have invaded the globe and the Internet has reached almost every corner of the world where they are used by individuals, companies, journalists, and governments etc. Social media has been largely described as an effective mechanism that contributes to the firms’ marketing aims and strategy; especially in the aspects related to customers’ involvement, customer relationship management and communication (Filo et al., 2015; Saxena & Khanna, 2013).

Bennett (2013) reported that most business firms worldwide have adopted and engaged such innovative platforms and tools in their process to communicate and serve their customers. The social media has indeed gained entry and popularity into the workplace where it has not only affected employee skills, abilities, knowledge, qualification and motivation levels but also productivity and job performance (Munene, 2016; Tilahun & Yeshambel, 2016).

Social media are perhaps the most influential communication tools in the world today. In Africa, the extensive use of social media indicates that the internet has the potential to become the most dominant platform through which every segment of the society can communicate. All kinds of firms- ranging from start-ups and small and medium enterprises (SMEs) to large firms (Lee et al., 2008; Bell & Loane, 2010) – regardless of their size and activities have recognized the significance of adopting social media (Nah & Saxton, 2012). Accordingly, based on its importance; firms are progressively investing in social media (Williamson, 2011).

With this rise in social media, it appears that corporate communication has been democratized. The power has been taken from those in marketing and public relations by the individuals and communities that create, share, and consume blogs, tweets, Facebook entries, movies, pictures, and so forth. Communication about brands happens, with or without permission of the firms in question. It is now up to firms to decide if they want to get serious about social media and participate in this communication, or continue to ignore it. Both have a tremendous impact (Kietzmann, Hermkens, McCarthy & Silvestre, 2011).

However, Social media requires a social network in order to disburse content to those that wish to consume and interact with it. Social networking in social media is done by allowing its users to create and share content or to participate in the same (Kumar & Priyadarshini, 2018). Social networking is an online medium of interaction which let people build relations, share ideas, communicate information and bounding society in sentimental stream (Ashraf & Javed, 2014). Social networking is a way in which many individuals come together and form many sized groups. These groups may be big, small, formal, informal, intentional or unintentional. When organized, groups are formed, help is acquired, information is conveyed, and actions are taken to achieve certain outcomes (Aguenza & Ahmad, 2012). A company may use social networking to demonstrate its customer service level and enrich its relationships with consumers (Ahmad, Bakar & Ahmad, 2018). Marketers use social networking for increasing brand recognition and encouraging brand loyalty (Rialp-Criado & Rialp-Criado, 2018).

Certainly, the integration of social media in the workplace is a global phenomenon, and this practice is not limited to any specific country. In the context of Nigeria, several companies have recognized the potential benefits of allowing employees to use social media during work hours, while also considering the associated challenges.

In Nigeria and elsewhere, the practice of allowing social media in the workplace is continually evolving, driven by factors such as technological advancements, changing work cultures, and the need to adapt to the preferences of the younger workforce. As such, it’s essential for organizations to strike a balance between harnessing the advantages of social media and mitigating potential drawbacks.

The incorporation of social media in the workplace is a dynamic topic that requires a careful balance between harnessing its benefits and addressing potential drawbacks. Consequent upon the varied result of prior researches on whether there is a negative or positive relationship or no relationship of social media and employees’ performance, this study looks to fill the empirical gap by investigating the link between social media and employees’ performance in selected information technology companies in Nigeria.

This study is aimed at the following specific objectives:

1. to examine the relationship between social media and employee commitment.
2. to ascertain the relationship between social media and employee productivity.

LITERATURE REVIEW

This section looks at the concepts and definition of social network and employee performance.

Social media

Internet has changed how people interact with each other on a daily basis. Prior to the internet, staying connected with families and friends was difficult and costly. In today’s world, staying connected is easy and accessible (O’Dell 2011). The way we communicate changed when the first email was sent in 1971. In 1978, the bulletin board system (BBS) was invented to allow users to exchange messages, data, news and software thus the beginning of the internet. In 1979, two individuals created Use net, a worldwide discussion system that allowed users to post public messages.

The year 1995 marked the era for the corporate web page and e-commerce. Thus, it is no surprise that current trends towards social media have transformed the World Wide Web from websites that provided static information to a website that serves as information exchange platform between users. The social media dates back to 1998 when Bruce and Berson founded the open diary, an ancient social network site that brought together online diary writers into a community. Since then, MySpace was developed in 2003 followed by the development of Facebook in 2004 which are fundamentally different and more powerful.

YouTube was then developed in 2005 and a microblogging site Twitter developed in 2006 (Borges 2012). According to the research that was conducted by AT & T (2008), one out of every nine people in the world use Facebook, with an estimation of 700 billion minutes spent each month on Facebook site. Additionally, over 2.5 million organizations have a Facebook accounts apart from their corporate websites. In estimation, 250 million people access social media platforms using their mobile phones.

The social network platforms have transformed the daily lives of people beyond the “tweets” on twitter and the “likes” on Facebook. Consequently, organizations are feeling the need to be present on a number of social media sites. However, this has posed a challenge to ensure that they are accessible and listening to all customers at all times. In the light of current usage of ICT, the attractiveness of social media networks cannot be denied or ignored. Whether employers want to acknowledge this or not, people are logging in and spend daily an average of 20 minutes on Facebook and other social media (Vickers, 2007).

In the U.S.A, 71% of online American adults use Face book; a proportion which has remained unchanged since 2013. Usage among seniors continues to increase, some 56% of internet users age 65 and older now use Face book. Women are also likely to use Face book compared with men. 23% of online users’ uses twitter a significant increase compared to 18% in 2013.Twitter is popular among those under 50 years and college-educated. Also, 28% of online users are LinkedIn users. LinkedIn is popular among college students, those in high-income households and the employed (Pew Research Centre, 2014).

In Germany, social media is expanding and becoming more diverse and dispersed. There are 22million facebook users in Germany and 635 million visits. Social media like facebook has gained popularity in Germany because it enables users to socialize internationally and due to its multiple language features. Twitter has got only 10% of online users in Germany. Some of the reason for this small number is that people find it confusing with all the little text snippets that seem somewhat disconnected. However, LinkedIn is mostly used by companies to build their brand reputation, stay competitive and operate in the international market (Coyle & Vaughn, 2012). In India, social media has contributed immensely as a tool for communication and collaboration leading to real-time, innovative methods to reach a large number of employees with similar or dissimilar interests. The majority of leading organizations in India are venturing into new pastures for employee communication, engagement, collaboration and other areas of human resource (Wipro, 2012).

Face book statistics from AT & T (2008) listed South Africa as the sixth worldwide with more active Facebook users implying that social networking is a much a timely issue. In Zimbabwe, use of social media has helped to develop workforce’s knowledge of social media and be part of a wider digital engagement with the customer. It also fosters the collaboration of colleagues, marketing the company’s products and its visibility in the crowded world of online commerce (Bullock, 2010). In Nigeria, social media sites have been used to offering adequate information, Communication, dissemination, discussing and mobilizing vast information (Omekwu, 2014).

In Kenya, almost all business that deal with communicating with the consumers have social media as an integral part of marketing, branding, public relation, customer service, recruitment or any other function of a business that require you to reach out, social media plays a vital role (Munene & Nyaribo, 2013). Most organizations that use social media spend more than 6 hours a week. Further, utilization of social media has enhanced distribution of value-added content and more effective communication processes. A higher level of socialization leads to increased organizational performance and collaboration across departments (Novak & Hoffinan, 2011).

Filo et al. (2015) posit that social media technologies facilitating interactivity and co-creation that allow for the development and sharing of user-generated content among and between organisations (e.g. teams, government agencies and media groups) and individuals (e.g. customers, athletes and journalists). Ouirdi et al, (2014) define social media as mobile and web-based platforms that allow users to share and add geographical information to user-generated content for purposes of collaboration and building networks and communities.

Employee Job Performance

Employee performance is defined as how an employee fulfils their job duties and executes their required tasks. It refers to the effectiveness, quality, and efficiency of their output. Performance also contributes to our assessment of how valuable an employee is to the organization (Pradhan & Jena, 2017). Job performance is a very critical factor in every organization. It is the basis of the success of an organization which, in all aspects, is dependent on individual employee performance. In other words, if an individual performs according to the expected standards, then organization performance will be enhanced and improved (Chegini, 2010). It is, therefore, logical that job performance is an extremely important criterion that relates to organizational outcomes and success.

Employee performance is the outcome or contribution of employees to make them attain goals (Herbert, John & Lee 2000). Employee performance is normally looked at in terms of outcomes. However, it can also be looked at in terms of behavior (Armstrong 2000). Employee performance is originally what an employee does or does not do. Performance of employees could include: quantity of output, quality of output, timeliness of output, presence at work, cooperativeness (Güngör, 2011). Employees performance is the degree which an employees in organization achieves it goals, the degree an organization acquires the needed resources, the degree an organization maintains internal harmony, and the degree an organization satisfies it stakeholders, (Nwanzu, 2013). Employee performance is normally looked at in terms of outcomes. However, it can also be looked at in terms of behavior (Armstrong 2000).

Employee’s performances lead an organization and have greater opportunities for employees than those who have low performance (Vans cotter, 2000). Afshan, Sobia, kamran and Nasir (2012) define employees’ performance as the achievement of specific tasks measured against predetermined or identified standards of accuracy, completeness, cost and speed. Employee performance can be manifested in improvement in production, easiness in using the new technology, highly motivated workers. The performance of employees in the organization refers to those attitudes’ of employees that have been assessed or measured as to their contribution to organizational goals (Cook & Hunsaker, 2001).

Employee performance is very essential in the success of any organization. Success depends on employees’ creativity, commitment and innovation. Vroom (1964) elucidates that employee performance is based on individual. In a research carried out by Survey (2013) on the impact of employee engagement on employee performance, the study found that employee engagement drives performance by improving relationship, productivity, safety and profitability. Further employees’ work contribute positively to the success of the organizations and they care about their organization.

THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK

The study is anchored on the Distraction–Conflict Theory and Connectivism theories.

Distraction–Conflict Theory

Distraction–Conflict Theory (DCT) (Baron, 1986; Groff, Baron, & Moore, 1983; Sanders & Baron, 1975) provides a theoretical lens for understanding the effect that distractions and interruptions have on performance. The distraction–conflict model can be broken down into three causal steps (Baron, 1986): (1) others are distracting, (2) distraction can lead to attentional conflict, and (3) attentional conflict elevates drive. This elevated drive leads to impaired performance and motor behavior on complex tasks. DCT provides insight into evaluating social media as a technological ‘‘other’’ that distracts individuals from their primary tasks. When a decision maker is exposed to an interruption or distraction, they may forget some of the information needed for processing the primary task and, therefore, some cues are lost or never enter working memory (Speier, Valacich, & Vessey, 1999).

As the decision maker completes the interruption task and returns to the primary task, a recovery period is needed to reprocess information that was forgotten while attending to the interruption or lost from working memory due to capacity (incoming cues being greater than a decision maker can process) and structural interferences (decision maker has to attend to two inputs with the same physiological mechanisms) (Kahneman, 1973). Consequences of interruptions include mental attention and effort difficulties (Baeker, Grudin, Buxton, & Greenberg, 1995), resource rationing (Baron, 1986), and impaired task processing (Cellier & Eyrolle, 1992; Schuh, 1978).

Concerning social media, its ubiquity and ease of access make it a potentially powerful distraction mechanism. With the example of the social networking site Facebook, distractions can be initialized by sound (when a user receives a chat message) and by sight (when the web browser blinks colors or changes page titles for receiving a new chat message or relevant posting). Even simply knowing that one’s friends and family may be available through the social media at any given moment can be a distractor. Given the multitude of negative effects that a distraction can pose, it is of relevance to determine if the distraction posed by social media will have negative impacts as well. To gain a more robust view, investigating both external and internal impacts on a user is of primary importance. Concerning potential external effects, efficiency is of importance to any user in the classroom or workplace. Being able to complete a primary task efficiently can be the difference between passing a class/keeping a job and failing at either. (Brooks, 2015)

Connectivism Theory

Connectivism is a learning theory that explains how internet technologies have created new opportunities for people to learn and share information across the World Wide Web and among themselves. The theory was propounded by George Siemens and Stephen Downes that explains how internet technologies have created new opportunities for people to learn and share information across the World Wide Web and among themselves. These technologies include Web browsers, email, wikis, online discussion forums, social networks, YouTube, and any other tool, which enables the users to learn and share information with other people. (Ortiz, n.d.)

A key feature of connectivism is that much learning can happen across peer networks that take place online. In connectivist learning, a teacher (manager) will guide students (general workforce) to information and answer key questions as needed, in order to support students learning and sharing on their own. Students are also encouraged to seek out information on their own online and express what they find. A connected community around this shared information often results. (Siemens, 2005; Downes, 2010)

The massive open online course (MOOC) phenomenon comes from connectivist theory. In a connectivist MOOC (cMOOC), it is open to anyone who wants to enroll, it uses open software and systems across the Web to facilitate learning and sharing and it takes place primarily online, and it happens according to a specified curriculum for a designated period. While facilitators guide the c MOOC, its participants are largely responsible for what they learn and what and how they share it; this connected behaviour largely helps create the course content. (Siemens, 2005; Downes, 2010).

EMPIRICAL REVIEW

Ayyash (2022) posited that social media has become a familiar reality in many institutions and organizations, as they are considered one of the most important means of personal and organizational communication. Despite this, there are many challenges that organizations face when using social media among employees, for example: disrupting their productivity. Ayyash (2022) study aimed to identify the types of social media that are used by employees during their work and to know the extent of their impact on their productivity. A systematic literature review approach was followed. By reviewing and analyzing 37 articles and studies, the study concluded that social media, which can be categorized into social network, messages, email, forums, blogs, Wikis and many more, has become a common communication method for employees to exchange knowledge and collaborate among colleagues in the organization. By presenting and analyzing the previous literature related to the subject of the study, most of the primary studies demonstrated that the use of social media is beneficial to organizational and personal productivity.

Jong, Chen, Ruangkanjanases and Chang (2021) examined the impact of social media usage on work efficiency: the perspectives of media synchronicity and gratifications. The data of 322 valid questionnaires from respondents was analyzed by Smart PLS. The results indicated that the features of social media including availability and symbol variety had the significant influences on their work efficiency through work-oriented usage of social media. Publicness and symbol variety had impact on work efficiency via social-oriented usage of social media. In addition, both social media for work-oriented and social-oriented usage influenced employees’ work efficiency.

Alkhateeb and Abdalla (2020) examined innovations in human resources management: impact of social media use on employees’ performance. survey tool was used to gather the data from the employees of three leading organizations in the Tulkarm district. Two hundred eighty-two valid questionnaires were analyzed using IBM SPSS. The findings revealed that the impact of using social media for work purposes on job performance is fully mediated by job satisfaction, while social media use for personal purposes does not influence job performance directly or indirectly.

Lee and Lee (2020) investigated Social Media Use and Job Performance in the Workplace: The Effects of Facebook and Kakao Talk Use on Job Performance in South Korea. 283 office workers who use Facebook or Kakao Talk in South Korea participated in the survey. Results demonstrated that both Facebook and Kakao Talk had linearly positive effects on individual job performance. Moreover, task equivocality had a positive moderating effect on the relationship between Kakao Talk use and job performance.

Ibekwe, Agbaeze, Nwakoby, Abner, Kelvin-Iloafu and Akpan (2019) carried out an investigation on social media adoption and performance of telecommunication firms in Nigeria: from innovation diffussion theory to technology acceptance model. The findings unraveled an encouraging link between social media and service quality.

Song, Wanga, Chena, Benitezb and Hu (2019) collecting data of two matched-sample groups within a large financial service firm in China, examined the Impact of the usage of social media in the workplace on team and employee performance. They found that work-oriented social media (Ding Talk) and socialization-oriented social media (We Chat) are complementary resources that generate synergies to improve team and employee performance.

Shujaat, Rashid, and Muzaffar, (2019) investigated the effects of the use of social networking sites by organizational employees on job satisfaction, organizational commitment and employee job performance. A survey was conducted to empirically test the proposed research model consisting of latent constructs: social networking site use, organizational commitment, job satisfaction, and employee job performance. Data of this confirmatory study was collected from 279 employees of various organizations operating in Pakistan. The model was analyzed employing variance-based structure equation modelling. Statistical software was used to assess both measurement and structural models. Results indicate that social networking sites use is not directly associated with employee job performance but with the mediating effects of job satisfaction that is also nested with the mediating effect of organizational commitment.

Radhakrishnan, Basit and Hassan (2018) examined the impact of social media usage on employee and organization performance. The research takes on an explanatory approach and the sample consisting of 206 employees working in call centre departments was recruited. The data was analyzed using SPSS 21 and AMOS 22 software. The results showed that only decision making has a positive and significant impact on employee high performance and organizational performance. Further findings suggest no significant impact of the other two dimensions of social media usage (knowledge sharing and communication) on employee high performance and organizational performance.

Murat, Zwingina, and Opusunju (2018) examined the effect of social media on employees’ performance among SMEs in North Central Nigeria. The study adopted survey research design. The population of the study includes all the SMEs registered in North Central Zone which is made of six states and Abuja making it a total of seven states. The sample size of this study was 384. The questionnaire was administered by determining the proportion of the sample size by the population of the study. The study used regression and correlation as well as mean in analysing the data with the aid of SPSS, 25.00. The study also used reliability test to ascertain that the instrument used are reliable. The study found that there is a positive association between employees commitment among SMEs in North Central Nigeria and Facebook. Also, there is a positive association between employees’ commitment among SMEs in North Central Nigeria and YouTube and there is positive association between employees commitment among SMEs in North Central Nigeria and twitter. The study also found that Facebook is significant in enhancing employees performance in terms of employees commitment in North Central Zone, Nigeria while YouTube and twitter are insignificant in enhancing employees commitment in SMEs, North Central Nigeria. The study also concluded that there is insignificant relationship between social media and employees performance among SMEs in North Central Nigeria.

Daniel, Isaac and Janet (2017) examined the effect of Facebook usage on the productivity of employees of University of Cape Coast. A questionnaire purposely designed for the study was used to gather the data from a sample of 100 respondents purposively selected from the staff of the University of Cape Coast, after a pilot study. The time spent and the number of times people visit Facebook has both positive and negative effects on the output of workers. It also emerged that Facebook has become an important part of people’s lives. The study showed that the use of Facebook during productive hours has a significant influence on staff productivity. Face booking by employees affect their skills/ability, knowledge/qualification, and productivity/outcomes.

Moqbel and Nah (2017) using social capital theory and the broaden-and-build theory of positive emotions as theoretical framework, examined Enterprise Social Media Use and Impact on Performance: The Role of Workplace Integration and Positive Emotions. By collecting data from employees working for a large information technology firm in the Midwestern United States, data were analyzed using a structural equation modeling approach. The results suggest that enterprise social media use can increase workplace integration, which further enhances performance directly and indirectly through positive emotions. Enterprise social media use also has a direct relationship with performance.

Mohamed, Sidek and Izharrudin (2017) posited that social media has become a common sight in many organisations. Thus, their study conducted a literature review to identify the types of social media used by employees at the workplace and its impact on the employees’ productivity at the workplace. Using a systematic approach to analyse the literature, 37 Articles or studies were selected for the review. It was found that the social media has become a common medium of communication for employees to collaborate, integrating and sharing knowledge among colleagues in organization. Further, it is categorized into social network (Facebook, Twitter, Myspace, LinkedIn, YouTube, etc.) email, blog, messaging, forums, Wikis and many others. The use of social media has brought benefits and challenges to the organizations. Further, the positive and negative impacts of social media usage were presented as well. Most of the studies selected indicated that social media usage is beneficial to the personal and organization productivity. It was found that most of the studies provided their finding based on cross-sectional data, in which they are unable to provide actual causality of the usage factor that really impacts the productivity of the employees at the workplace. This review is expected to contribute knowledge and practices for future study in identifying the causality of social media usage on employee productivity. This is important as the causality of the usage factor that contribute to harmful effects to the organization productivity can be tackled and intervened by using the intervention model of internet addiction.

Abubaker, John and Preet (2016) explored the relationship between internal social media usage and employee engagement within the North American operations of a multinational organization. The relationship between the level and purpose of internal social media usage and company-wide self-reported competencies was also explored. Data was collected from 1694 employees and the study revealed variations in both internal social media usage and employee engagement by business division and career bands. Tasks being addressed by internal social media were also identified. The results showed that the greater the self-reported usage of internal social media, the greater the levels of self-reported employee engagement. The results provide preliminary evidence that internal social media usage is associated with the level of employee engagement. Also, internal social media usage is associated with the level of self-reported competencies of entrepreneurship, communication, and readiness for change.

Xiongfei, Xitong, Douglas and Xi. (2016) investigate the influence of social media on employees ’work performance, as well as the underlying mechanism for how they create value at work. Based on media synchronicity and social capital theories, the authors propose that social media can foster employees’ social capital and subsequently facilitate knowledge transfer. Both social capital and knowledge transfer help promote work performance. Specifically, the authors adopt shared vision, network ties and trust to represent, respectively, the cognitive, structural and relational dimensions of social capital. The research model is tested using data collected from 379 Chinese working professionals. The empirical results reveal that social media can promote the formation of employees’ social capital indicated by network ties, shared vision and trust, which, in turn, can facilitate knowledge transfer. Shared vision and knowledge transfer positively influence work performance. Although network ties and trust do not have a direct impact on work performance, the influence is partially mediated by knowledge transfer.

Brooks (2015) in a study “Does personal social media usage affect efficiency and well-being?”, two surveys were created to measure self-reported information on the constructs of interest. The sample consists of undergraduate students enrolled in an information systems course in a large Western US university. Findings of the study revealed that higher amounts of personal social media usage led to lower performance on the task, as well as higher levels of techno stress and lower happiness.

Murphy (2013) investigates how an employee’s level of organizational commitment and job involvement influence their use of social media. Correlational analyses showed that an employee’s level of organizational commitment and job involvement are positively related to whether they use Facebook to talk about work. The organizational climate of rule bending was positively related to work-related Facebook use. An employee’s perceptions of appropriateness of using Facebook to talk about work did not significantly moderate the expected relationships except for organizational commitment predicting work-related Facebook postings, in which the interaction is significant only at high levels of organizational commitment. Finally, the main hypothesis, that organizational commitment and job involvement would interact in their prediction of Facebook use was not supported but had significant simple slopes at low, medium, and high levels of job involvement.

Assa and Nyaribo (2013) examined the extent of social media participation by employees and its effect on their productivity. Analysis of variance (ANOVA) test and Pearson’s correlation was undertaken to ascertain the degree of relationship between the variables. The research found both negative and positive relationship between social media participation and employee productivity. The negative relationship was however found to be stronger as employees spend most of their time on social media enhancing personal networks. Positive relationship exists in employee use of social media for seeking and viewing general information. The study concluded that employees participate in social media in the workplace for both work and non-work related activity.

METHODOLOGY

The study adopted the survey research design. The study utilized primary data collected from respondents from the Andela and Flutter wave companies in Nigeria. The population of this study is the entire staff of Andela and Flutter wave in Nigeria. The target population focuses on Andela and Flutter wave in Nigeria. The researcher adopts the stratified random sampling technique. This research study utilizes primary data sets. Such data sets would be sourced exclusively from the respondents gotten from the Andela and Flutter wave companies. The idea is to estimate empirically the relationship between social media and employee commitment, also to estimate empirically the relationship between social media and employee productivity.

Primary data sources were used as the main instrument for data collection with the aid of questionnaire. A total number of 200 samples were selected for this study. In other words, 200 staff of Andela and Flutter wave consisting of administration, marketing, information technology department, and security department.

Sample Description:

Of the 200 respondents, 72.5% were male, while 27.5% were female. The age of the participants ranged from 18 and 70, with 33% of the respondents aged between 18-27 years, 37% aged between 28-37 years, 25.5% aged between 38-47 years, and 4% aged between 40 years and above. The educational levels of the participants were: SSCE 8.5%, Diploma 9.5%, BSc/HND 71%, and Postgraduate 11%.

In analyzing the data for this study, data was analyzed using tables and percentages. While correlation coefficient analysis using the SPSS software was employed to test the hypotheses of the study.

Correlation coefficient analysis model

                       (1)

Where

n = the Sample Size

∑x = the sum of x (independent variable)

∑y = the sum of y (dependent variable)

∑x2 = the sum of the square x values

∑y2 = the sum of the square y values

∑xy = the sum of the cross product of x and y

Correlation decision rule:

r values from 0.1 to 0.3 indicate that the relationship is “weak”

r values from 0.3 to 0.5 indicate that the relationship is “moderate”

r values from 0.5 to 0.9 indicate that the relationship is “Strong”

r value of 1 indicate that the relationship is “perfect”

r value of 0 indicate that the relationship is “none”

This is irrespective of direction (±) that may occur.  (Turney, 2022)

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

In the course of this research, some hypotheses were developed subject to the objectives of the study. these hypotheses are stated and tested in this section. The hypotheses are stated for the purpose of clarity.

Ho1: Social media has no significant relationship with employee commitment

Ho2: Social media has no significant relationship with employee productivity

Test of Anova regression output. This test show whether the model is of good fit.

Table 1. ANOVAa
Model		Sum of Squares	df	Mean Square	F	Sig.
1	Regression	21.594	4	5.398	3.630	.007b
	Residual	289.986	195	1.487
	Total	311.580	199

a.  Dependent Variable: Employee Performance (employees’ commitment, employee productivity)

b. Predictor: (Constant), social media

The assumption here is that Multiple R in the population = 0 (in other words the model cannot predict accurately the outcome). The table shows how well the model fits. Therefore, since the significant value of .007 is much less than 0.5, which means a 5% error rate or 5% false positive rate, this implies that there is a statistical significance for the model and the model does a good job on predicting the outcome better than just chance. The model indicates a very tight model and fits really well.

Going forward, we test the formulated hypotheses using correlation.

TABLE 2. Correlations Result for Hypothesis I
			Social media can help workers work efficiently in an organization	Allowing employees use of social media sites can help improve employees’ commitment toward the organisation
Spearman’s rho	Social media can help workers work efficiently in an organization	Correlation Coefficient	1.000	.917**
		Sig. (2-tailed)	.	.000
		N	200	200
	Allowing employees use of social media sites can help improve employees’ commitment toward the organisation	Correlation Coefficient	.917**	1.000
		Sig. (2-tailed)	.000	.
		N	200	200

**. Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2-tailed).

Source: SPSS Output (2023)

The table presents the Spearman’s rho correlation coefficient, which shows the significance value and the sample size that the calculation is based on. Since r values between 0.5 and 0.9 indicate that the relationship is “strong”, the result on table shows a strong relationship between the two variables tested with a value of 0.917 at 0.01 significant level. This means that changes in one variable does strongly correlate with changes in the other variable. The result indicates a 91.7% correlation between social media and employee commitment. The null hypothesis is then rejected while the alternate hypothesis is accepted. This implies that there is a positive significant relationship between social media and employee commitment. The result shows that social media affects employee commitment in the organisation as indicated in table 2.

Table 3. Correlations Result for Hypothesis II
			Social media can help workers work efficiently in an organization	Does social media have an impact on employee productivity?
Spearman’s rho	Social media can help workers work efficiently in an organization	Correlation Coefficient	1.000	.909**
		Sig. (2-tailed)	.	.000
		N	200	200
	Does social media have an impact on employee productivity?	Correlation Coefficient	.909**	1.000
		Sig. (2-tailed)	.000	.
		N	200	200

**. Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2 tailed).

Source: SPSS Output (2023)

The table presents the Spearman’s rho correlation coefficient, which shows the significance value and the sample size that the calculation is based on. Since r values between 0.5 and 0.9 indicate that the relationship is “strong”, the result on table shows a strong relationship between the two variables tested with a value of 0.909 at 0.01 significant level. This means that changes in one variable do strongly correlate with changes in the other variable. The result indicates a 90.9% correlation between social media and employee productivity. The null hypothesis is then rejected while the alternate hypothesis is accepted. This implies that there is a positive significant relationship between social media and employee productivity. The result shows that social media affects employee productivity in the organisation as indicated in table 3.

DISCUSSION OF FINDINGS

Relationship between social media and employee commitment:

It is observed that the result of the correlations test in Table 2 show that social media is significantly correlated with employee commitment which stood at a positive coefficient value of 0.917 at 0.01 significant level. This indicated that social media is able to influence employee commitment by 91.7%. Based on the apriori expectation, the result is consistent with the apriori expectation. The hypothesis tested showed that social media has a significant impact on employee commitment, indicating that social media usage is a factor that can influence employee commitment.

Our result is supported by the finding of Gonzalez, Leidner, Riemenschneider and Koch (2013) who found that social related social media use is associated with knowledge of organizational culture, social acceptance, and affective commitment. Murphy (2013) posits that an employee’s perceptions of appropriateness of using Facebook to talk about work did not significantly moderate the expected relationships except for organizational commitment predicting work-related Facebook postings, in which the interaction is significant only at high levels of organizational commitment. Further, Moqbel and Aftab (2015) finding does corroborate our finding indicating that social networking site use has a significant effect on organizational commitment.

Relationship between social media and employee productivity:

It is observed that the result of the correlations test in Table 3 show that social media is significantly correlated with employee productivity which stood at a positive coefficient value of 0.909 at 0.01 significant level. This indicated that social media is able to influence employee productivity by 90.9%. Based on the apriori expectation, the result is consistent with the apriori expectation. The hypothesis tested showed that social media has a significant impact on employee productivity, indicating that social media is a critical factor of employee productivity.

Our result is supported by the Uses and Gratifications Theory as Ali-Hassan et al. (2015) indicated that the use of social and cognitive technologies positively affected employees’ daily work and innovative work. The result is further supported by the finding of Ibekwe, Agbaeze, Nwakoby, Abner, Kelvin-Iloafu and Akpan (2019) who found an encouraging link between social media and service quality transcending into positive employee productivity. Also, the finding is substantiated by the finding of Varghese and Kumari (2018) positing that the use of social media during productive hours has a significant influence on staff productivity. Our finding is further buttressed by that of Assa and Nyaribo (2013) who found a positive relationship between social media participation and employee productivity. However, our finding is not in corroboration with the result of Wushe and Shenje (2019) whose finding revealed that social media usage in the workplace resulted in significant drop in employees’ productivity because of time spent online keeping in touch with friends, sharing pictures and communicating with colleagues.

CONCLUSION

The findings and conclusions of this study clearly show the effectiveness of social media on employees’ performance. Social media generally stimulates collaboration and knowledge sharing between individuals, which can lead to increased employee commitment, and employee productivity. Social media if channelled in effective ways could ensure maximum results, as there are pitfalls that employees may succumb to if left to their own strategies.

The review of literature reveal that if social media is not well managed, social media participation may lead to a loss of employee performance due to distractions. However, if well managed, it propels the employee more productively and efficiently transcending into positive organisational performance. Therefore, establishing strategies to address social media issues in the organisational environment such as personal usage, business relevance, site restrictions and information confidentiality without restricting employees to benefit personally as well as professionally from this social web technology, will have a positive effect on employee commitment, and employee productivity, and ultimately benefit the organisation. The more information each employee has, the more he/she will feel empowered to execute his or her tasks with confidence and direction. The study concludes that social media impacts on employees’ performance in information technology companies in Nigeria.

RECOMMENDATIONS

Based on the findings of this study it is recommended that;

1. The result makes certain the importance of social media in driving employee job satisfaction in the organisation. Therefore, management need to find ways at integrating social media into almost all sphere of the work carried out by the employees to increase employee job satisfaction.
2. The result ascertains the importance of social media as a mechanism to drive employee commitment to the organisation. However, there is need for the management to constantly motivate employees through social engagement.
3. The result ascertains the importance of social media as a catalyst driving employee productivity in the organisation. However, there is need for the management to do more through sensitising, orientating and managing social media usage if high and efficient productivity is to be upheld.

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