CIOZone.com - Professional Network for CIOs and IT Professionals

As has been reported in another post on CIOZone, a survey out this week shows that
Fortune 100 CEOs are social media slackers. Apparently they don’t spend a lot of time sending tweets to one another, checking out what their friends are up to on MySpace, or blogging about the trials and tribulations of their day.

Now, before I go too far here, I want to be absolutely clear that I think every Fortune 100 company should be paying close attention to what’s happening in the social media arena. More than paying attention, companies need to be thinking about how they can leverage the various platforms, be it Twitter, or Linked-In, or a professional social network like CIOZone, to their advantage.

But that doesn’t mean Fortune 100 CEOs need to be tweeting. I expect I’ll run into a fair amount of debate on this viewpoint – and I’d be glad to hear your arguments – but I think there is a very real danger for CEOs who start blogging or tweeting about their company’s affairs. Investors and analysts watch every word that a Steve Jobs’ or Larry Ellison utters, and even the most carefully guarded CEO is liable to slip up. The dangers of running afoul of Sarbanes Oxley regulations or looking down the barrel of a class action lawsuit are very real.

It is possible, for example, to use a blog to talk about initiatives the company is undertaking that are not financial in nature –Wal-Mart CEO Mike Duke might want to talk about his company’s green initiatives. But in such a case, you can bet the blog would be a well-crafted PR piece.

This is an area where the CIO needs to step up to the plate. In concert with perhaps the vice president of marketing or a newly appointed head of social media, the CIO needs to take the lead in making sure their company is at the forefront in advances in social media. They need to know what customers are saying about their company in the blogosphere, and they need to be thinking about ways they can use platforms like Twitter to sell products or improve their brand image.

Having the CEO tweet or set up a profile on LinkedIn won’t provide real value, but having an expert in place to sort through the rapidly evolving medium will.
 

Comments (2)

	1. 06-25-2009 12:52
	A good example about the dangers is John Mackey, CEO of Whole Foods. Mackey liked to post on online chat rooms, praising his company, while bashing others, including Wild Oats. And he did so under a pseudonym. Well, when his company acquired Wild Oats and the FTC challenged it, the regulatory agency dug up some of those anonymous posts. That led to an SEC investigation as well. It turned out it wasn't illegal, but it sure was embarrassing. When the FTC first challenged the acquisition, Mackey took to his blog. But the inquiry into those chatroom posts prompted this:    http://www2.wholefoodsmarket.com/blogs/jmackey/2007/07/17/temporary-hold-on-my-blog/    Mackey eventually returned to blogging, but nearly a year later. In his return post, he makes his case for why he did what he did:    http://www2.wholefoodsmarket.com/blogs/jmackey/2008/05/21/back-to-blogging/ Registered

Matthew Quinn

	2. 06-25-2009 16:40
	I’m not sure if this supports or refutes my stance, but it is interesting none-the-less. Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk has used a company blog to launch a war of words against former Tesla CEO Martin Eberhard. In the blog Musk dismisses many of the claims Eberhard has made in a suit against the company, most notably that Eberhard was responsible for many of Tesla’s key achievements.    It’s quite a lengthy blog (http://www.teslamotors.com/blog2) and I’m surprised the company’s lawyers allowed Musk to use the platform in this way. It will be interesting to see how this will play out in court.    For those not familiar with Tesla, the Silicon Valley-based company is at the forefront of manufacturing all-electric vehicles. In fact, it was announced this week that the company is in line for $465 million in federal loans. Registered

Mel Duvall

Only registered users can write comments.
Please login or register.