The Emergence of Web 2.0 | People and Technology

Concerned with technology systems that support interactions with a variety of user types such as HR experts, managers and employees, and modern systems allow these interactions to be performed through Web browser software. These systems, however, mostly operate pre-defined processes, controlled by the organisation. The most recent developments in Web-based technology represent a move away from prescriptive, organisation-centred systems to collaborative Web-based applications, collectively called social media technologies or Web 2.0.

This section, which draws heavily on a CIPD report, describes the key elements of these new technologies and how they are being used to support strategic HR initiatives.

The term Web 2.0 is now freely bandied around in the popular press and has been the subject of recent articles in HR professional publications such as people management. However, the available evidence on the use of these social media technologies in Human Resource Management (HRM) and people management suggests that HR professionals have little understanding of the nature and potential of these technologies, though they are aware of the risks of allowing employees access to social networking sites at work and of employee 'misbehaviour' on blogs and social networking.

According to experts in the field, these media have enormous potential to change the way people collaborate, communicate, organise their work and give voice to their opinions and expectations, especially when they are physically dispersed across time and space. Equally important, they help organisations communicate with and learn from a new generation of employees which have grown up with such technologies — the so-called V(irtual) Generation. Because of these features, Web 2.0 offers HR professionals an opportunity to transform its 'business model' — new ways of adding value to internal stakeholders and a more contemporary organisational architecture — to make a greater contribution to their organisations' strategic and reputational aims