Guidelines for developing social media policies within institutions of higher learning

Abstract

The growth and significance of social media especially with institution of higher learning have brought many new opportunities for marketing, interacting and communicating with all stakeholders. Unfortunately with the many opportunities and advantages that social media brings it also brings along many disadvantages and risks. Institutions of higher learning need to have social media policies in place to protect the institution as well as the employees and the students from the risks of social media. The problem is the lack of guidelines to assist in the development of social media policies. This dissertation aims to propose guidelines that can be used by institutions of higher learning when developing social media policies. This was done through a qualitative research methodology in a semi-structured interview where after a thematic analysis was used to decode the data. The findings first explored the various advantages as well as disadvantages and risks of social media. The findings further explore how social media policies can help to maximise the advantages of social media while at the same time mitigate the risks and disadvantages of social media. The last chapter proposed social media policy guidelines that can be used by institution of higher learning to develop social media policies.