Facebook is developing "Facebook at Work"

Seeing as most of your employees already do most likely Facebook at work, here's something new for them called (funnily enough) Facebook at Work.

According to an article by Financial Times, multiple sources have confirmed the social media giant is working on a new website to gain a foothold in the office, which aims to compete with Google, Microsoft and LinkedIn.

The new product will apparently allow employees to chat with colleagues and connect with professional contacts, as well as collaborate with documents - much like Google Drive and Microsoft Office products allow.

It's believed Facebook employees are already using the site internally, and that it will remain entirely separate from personal accounts, with no information crossing over between an individual's personal and professional pages.

Facebook has yet to comment on the story.

The development should raise increased urgency for employers and HR professionals to better understand and get to grips with social media in the workplace.

While few companies outright ban Facebook or other social media sites at work, not having a social media policy in place - and a strategy for moving forward and integrating social media into various HR programmes - is a huge missed opportunity for businesses (especially considering a huge amount of job seekers are using Facebook over LinkedIn, and bosses are some of the biggest users of Facebook anyway.)

Although many businesses are catching on to the benefits of social media in the office, its potential is still yet to be seen. That is, if employers can get past the fear that productivity will decrease if allowed unlimited access to social media sites.

In fact, even Facebook's own head of HR for the Asia Pacific region, Madan Nagaldinne, said HR, not IT, has to own the company's mobile, digital and social strategy.

Nagaldinne was not speaking about this Facebook development, but his argument that productivity naturally increases when using social media to give employees all the information they need is a compelling one:

"When your employees have all the information they need about their projects, how to do them, who to contact, and what is happening in the company, that automatically frees up about 20% of a manager’s time," he told Human Resources.

"Managers will still need to give direction, set goals and invest in the development of their teams, but the organic nature of free-flow dramatically benefits them."

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