Internal Social Networks
Yammer @ SkyDreams
Ruben J.J. Kruiswijk - 6307159
Thesis Master Information Science Program Business Information Systems
University of Amsterdam Faculty of Science
&
Faculty of Economics and Business
Thesis Supervisor: Loek Stolwijk
Version: Final
“Many of life's failures
are people who did
not realize how close
they were to success
when they gave up.”
C
ONTENTS
1 Introduction ... 6 2 Problem Definition ... 8 2.1 Objective... 8 2.2 Research Questions ... 8 2.3 Relevance ... 9 2.3.1 Academic Relevance ... 9 2.3.2 Business Relevance ... 102.4 Scope of Research and Main concepts ... 10
2.5 Business case at SkyDreams ... 12
2.6 Research structure ... 12
3 Research Typology, Model and Methods ... 13
3.1 Type of research ... 13
3.2 Research Model ... 14
3.3 Research methods ... 14
3.3.1 About Yammer... 15
3.3.2 About the subjects - users ... 15
4 Theoretical Framework... 16
4.1 Collaborative software ... 16
4.2 Social Networks ... 17
4.2.1 Traditional collaboration platforms compared to Internal Social Network Sites ... 18
4.3 Technology Acceptance Model ... 18
4.4 Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology ... 20
4.4.1 Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) ... 20
4.4.2 Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology 2 (UTAUT2) ... 22
5 Results... 25
5.1 1st Survey: Social Networks within SkyDreams ... 25
5.1.1 Collaboration without Yammer ... 25
5.1.2 Purpose of using a specific type of media ... 26
5.1.4 Expectations of Yammer ... 28
5.1.5 Ways of Communication ... 28
5.2 Usage of Yammer at SkyDreams ... 30
5.2.1 Having Fun ... 30
5.2.2 Sharing information ... 32
5.2.3 Showing appreciation ... 33
5.3 2nd Survey: Follow-up Survey on Social Networks ... 33
5.4 3rd Survey: SkyDreams Survey Internal Social Networks – Follow-up ... 34
5.4.1 Performance Expectancy ... 34 5.4.2 Effort Expectancy ... 34 5.4.3 Social Influence ... 34 5.4.4 Habit ... 35 5.4.5 Facilitating Conditions ... 35 5.4.6 Hedonic Motivation ... 35 5.4.7 Behavioral Intention ... 35 6 Conclusions ... 36 6.1 Recommendations... 39 6.1.1 SkyDreams ... 39 6.1.2 Further Research ... 39 7 References ... 40
Appendix A: Survey on Social Networks within SkyDreams ... 43
Appendix B: Follow-up Survey on Social Networks ... 53
1 I
NTRODUCTION
In the past decennium we have witnessed the rise of social media websites and platforms which resulted in many studies to the practice of what social media actually is and does for people and society. We found reasons why people practice social media and found clues on questions about what enables people to do what they do.
From a business perspective, we discovered how we can use social media to advertise our products and to market our brands. But why don't we apply those lessons to our information systems? Why do people use social media, but does an organization have difficulties in promoting the use of their own
information system? Why can we find everything about everyone on the social networks, but is it
difficult to link the pieces in your own controlled environment? Hence, why doesn't every company use a social network inside the company itself to solve these issues?
Gartner (2012) predicts that “by 2016, 50 percent of large organizations will have internal Facebook-like social networks, and that 30 percent of these will be considered essential as email and telephones are today.” They identified an “increasing interest for using social technologies within organizations to connect people more effectively, to capture and reuse valuable informal knowledge, and to deliver relevant information more intelligently where it is needed through social filtering.”
People use social network to access information and resources. When the information or resources are not available at your fingertips, people need to find a way to access the information and resources. Based on literature (Sang, 2012), we can assume that a social network has a bigger impact in an organization that is either big, distributed or both big and distributed.
The purpose of this thesis is to identify the implications of an introduction of a 'Facebook-like social network' to a small organization, in order to gather learnings on how social initiatives will improve work practices for both individual contributors, managers and organizations. One benefit of this approach is that the outcome can probably be generalized for the other three elements of the grid that is shown below, while this is not the case the other way around, as a greater distribution and larger size of the population will probably have a positive effect. At the same time, it gives the research a more bounded research environment in this broad topic of information system research.
A disadvantage to the approach is that one possible outcome can be that the type of Social Network Site does not have an effect on the small and concentrated environment. When this is the case, it is
interesting to find out the reasons for this. Results could then be less generalized to the other three elements of the grid as distribution and organization size could be success factors. Knowing why a Social Network Site is less used in a small and concentrated environment can help both the organization and the network.
This research will take place at SkyDreams. SkyDreams is a fast growing lead generation company based in Utrecht, The Netherlands. The about 25 to 30 employees are all working at the one, open floor office. This makes it a perfect small, concentrated organization.
Yammer will be the social network site in this research, as this was the most widely used social network site for organizations.
Large
-Concentrated
Large
-Distributed
Small
-Concentrated
Small
-Distributed
2 P
ROBLEM
D
EFINITION
2.1 O
BJECTIVEAs mentioned in the introduction, (Gartner, 2012) predicts that by 2016, 50 percent of large
organizations will have an internal Facebook-like social network. By 2015, 80 percent of social business efforts will not achieve the intended benefits. These are two predictions that together should warn organizations that intent to be part of the first 50 percent. Their main argument that backs this prediction is that there is an overemphasis on technology and content, and not enough focus on relationships and leadership.
A social network is used and adopted in a different way than traditional information systems, especially in a professional environment. The difference lies mostly in the push versus the pull mechanism. People are already used to participate in social networks like Facebook, Twitter or the more professional LinkedIn. These are all social networks that they chose to work with themselves, i.e. pull. Traditional information systems like CRM or ERP software is mainly pushed by the organization: employees need to use the tool to do their job and there is no alternative.
For internal communication and collaboration there are alternatives. Employees can use email or
telephone to communicate and use documents in various ways to share information among each-others. Therefore, an introduction of an internal Facebook-like social network using a push mechanism doesn't work. The social interaction is a drive behind a social network and once more people tend to use it, the more valuable it will be.
That last statement is an assumption. However, we can say that the introduction of an internal social network will influence the social reality in an organization, either positive or negative. Every change within an organization comes with expectations of results and whether or not the expectations are met after the change is done. By identifying the expectations of an introduction of a Facebook-like social network in an organization, this thesis will contribute to the research topic of the use of social networks in organizations.
2.2 R
ESEARCHQ
UESTIONSIn order to find out how a social network can add value to SkyDreams, it is important to investigate what the benefits of a social networks are above existing work practices.
The main research question of this thesis will be the following:
Q1 What is the impact of the introduction of a Facebook-like internal social network? How does it help improving work practices in a small
The following sub questions will help finding an answer on this question:
Q1.1 How do internal social networks relate to external social networks, i.e. what are the key similarities and differences?
Q1.2 How do internal social networks relate to existing traditional
collaboration tools, i.e. what are the key similarities and differences? Q1.3 How can an introduction Yammer contribute to the current work
practices, i.e. what are the expectations of an introduction? Q1.4 How does the introduction of Yammer influence the current work
practices, i.e. does it meet the expectations of users and management? Q1.5 What aspects do influence the use or lack of use of a Facebook-like
internal social network?
Q1.6 What aspects do influence the work practices during the adoption and to what extend?
Q1.7 What would be the key differences and similarities when comparing a small and concentrated organization with the other three combinations in the grid?
2.3 R
ELEVANCEThe research topic has both academic and business relevance. 2.3.1 Academic Relevance
In the past decennium, a lot of research has been done on social networks. Research has been done in the field of information science, marketing, economics and not too surprising, social science. There is a focus on why we use social networks and how we use social works (e.g. Ames & Naaman 2007) From a business perspective, there is a focus on how to use social networks to interact with a target audience to improve customer service, public relations, branding and marketing campaigns (ie Thackeray et al 2008) Research has been done on the integration of social networks at work. There are DiMicco et al, having done research on a social intranet (2008). They found out that “professionals use the internal social network to build stronger bonds with their weak ties and to reach out to employees they do not know.” Research has been done on the use of blogging software, bookmarking tools and wikis.
More recent, studies on internal social networks for organizations have been performed by large research organizations like Gartner (2011, 2012, 2013), mostly on larger (>1000FTE) organizations. The academic relevance for this thesis is the focus on a small organization and a practice-based approach to identify expectations.
2.3.2 Business Relevance
SkyDreams has set up 10 values that reflect their culture and how they work (SkyDreams, 2012). With at least the first four, a direct link can be made with social media without doing much in-depth research.
1. Growth – as one of the fastest growing technology companies in Europe (Fast-50 2010, 2011, 2012), SkyDreams plans to continue growing. One of the key success factors of social media applications is the constant growth of the user base and building networks. With more people in the office, communication becomes more important.
2. Performance – delivering performance is important in businesses. In social networks, people post updates about achievements and goals, from which they gain trust and encouragement to achieve new goals. This indicates that there are mechanisms supporting performance in the social networking practice. SkyDreamers need to perform on a personal level as well as on a team and organizational level. Social networks provide features based on gamification, to stimulate people to perform.
3. Fun – a value that doesn't seem to need much explanation, but in fact it is one important matter in both organizations and social networks. While people tend to use social media to have some fun and distraction, having fun at work also stimulates people's drive to perform. 'Gamification' increases attractiveness, usability and effectiveness of applications they are found in (Gartner, 2012).
4. Teamwork – people have to work together to accomplish a certain goal. There are a lot of collaboration platforms that enable people to do their job. However, traditional platforms tend to fail over and over again, while platforms based on social networks tend to work, as people choose to use it themselves.
Finding opportunities to improve collaboration, performance and fun with growth as a result make this research topic relevant for an organization as SkyDreams.
2.4 S
COPE OFR
ESEARCH ANDM
AIN CONCEPTSThis section will explain the main concepts that are covered in this thesis. It will also define the scope of this research by clarifying what this thesis is not about.
- Social Media
Social media is generally considered as a broad term for doing things together online. More formal definitions can be found:
“Social Media is a group of Internet-based applications that build on the ideological and
technological foundations of Web 2.0, and that allow the creation and exchange of User Generated Content.” (Kaplan & Haenlein, 2010).
(…) the means of interactions among people in which they create, share, and exchange information and ideas in virtual communities and networks. (Ahlqvist, Bäck, Halonen, & Heinonen, 2008)
- Social Media classification
Social Media can be classified in different categories. Kaplan & Haenlein (2010) created a 2x3 matrix in which they classified social media based on the value of self-presentation and social presence. Yammer falls in the category with High Self-presentation, medium social presence / media rechness. This categorization can be of importance when comparing Yammer with other collaboration tools like the ones offered by Google Apps, being a platform with Low Self-presentation and low media richnness.
Table 1Classification of Social Media based on Haplan & Haenlein (2010) Social presence / Media richness
Low Medium High
Self-presentation/ Self-disclosure
High Blogs Social networking
sites (e.g., Facebook, Yammer)
Virtual social worlds (e.g., Second Life)
Low Collaborative projects (e.g., Wikipedia)
Content
communities (e.g., Youtube)
Virtual game worlds (e.g., World of Warcraft)
- Social Networks
A social network is a special kind of social media of which one of the main purposes is to connect people and to engage them, e.g. to enable knowledge sharing and collaboration in a more direct sense.
- Private Social Networks
A private social network distinguishes itself with a normal social network in the disability to share, collaborate and connect with everyone. It is considered a more closed and private platform, useful when information needs to be protected or made exclusive.
- Online collaboration
Online collaboration can manifest in many different ways. The kind of media determines the specific characteristics of online collaboration, like speed or pace, information richness, open or closed collaboration.
- Yammer
Yammer is considered ‘the Enterprise Social Network’. It acts very much likely as the famous Twitter and Facebook, instead it is a closed private social network.
- Not: Social Media in a Marketing context
While social media can be used as a successful Marketing tool, it falls out of the scope of this thesis. - Not: Social Media in a Client Relationship Manager context
This thesis will focus on the use of a social network from within the company boundaries with the purpose of better collaboration and more sharing and gathering of knowledge and information.
2.5 B
USINESS CASE ATS
KYD
REAMSSkyDreams is an international company that sees the internet as a place where consumers and companies meet to do business. SkyDreams develops product-specific comparison websites, in which consumers can find the best deals, and companies can successfully attract customers. SkyDreams is active in the Netherlands, Belgium, France, Germany, Ireland, Spain and the United Kingdom, but only has one office in Utrecht, the Netherlands.
SkyDreams uses a CRM-like information system called 'the Manager' to manage its business. Account Management uses the Manager to serve their clients, Marketing launches new Marketing campaigns with data from the Manager, Finance uses the Manager to create invoices, HR tracks people's
performance within the Manager and the Management tracks the business performance and sets out strategies based on the information that the Manager discloses.
The Manager however, does not facilitate social communication, other than transactional
communication by transferring tasks from one to the other. Currently email, chat and personal meetings form the main communication channels. Research results already show that having some kind of social platform can improve communication, both qualitatively and quantitatively.
In order to accomplish SkyDreams' goals, the departments within SkyDreams need to work together. Although at this moment everyone is working in the same building, it happens that not everyone is aware of each-others projects and work. While colleagues connect online via LinkedIn and Facebook, telephone, chat, All-Hands-Meetings; the shared workplace at work, the Manager, doesn't stimulate collaboration by i.e. sharing thoughts, problems, solutions and challenges. While sharing 'things' is just one mechanism that social media uses to get people connected, others exist and it could benefit to the organization if the central workplace can support collaboration and productivity as well as fun.
The Business Case at SkyDreams is to find out how Yammer can add value to the organization.
2.6 R
ESEARCH STRUCTUREIn the chapter 3 of this thesis, the Research Typology, Model and Methods are explained.
The Theoretical Framework will be described in chapter 4. It will summarize the models that are used within the research and explain how these are used to create the surveys.
The results of this research can be found in chapter 5, followed by the conclusions in chapter 6.
3 R
ESEARCH
T
YPOLOGY
,
M
ODEL AND
M
ETHODS
This chapter will explain the research typology, the research model and the research methods that will be used to apply the model.
3.1 T
YPE OF RESEARCHIn order to find answers on the research questions defined in section 2.2, a case study will be performed at SkyDreams. It will consist of both a literature study, qualitative and quantitative research. The first two research questions will be answered by studying literature in order to get a full understanding of the topic of social networking for organizations so that it can form the foundation on which a case study can be build up on.
To know how people work together in the current situation, a survey will be used to gather knowledge from employees of SkyDreams in a structured manner, with questions related to their current practices and their use of tools for communication and their knowledge of social networks. A survey has the advantage of quick processing so that more data could be extracted from more subjects than possible when comparing this with an interview. The second goal of the survey is to gather expectations of the introduction of an internal Facebook-like Social Network in general and Yammer in particular.
Observation and participation will be part of this part of the research too.
The more experimental part of the research will be of a type of action research in which Yammer will be introduced in the organization. During this adoption period the use of Yammer will be monitored and interventions will be made in order to find out what aspects or features of Yammer do influence the work practices.
The next part of the research exists of a survey to verify whether the expectations of Yammer were met or not. In addition to the expectations part of the research, a third survey will be performed focusing on the (lack of) adoption of Yammer within the organization.
This will result in three sets of data per subject: - 1st Survey on expectations
- Usage data of Yammer - 2nd Survey on expectations
- Survey on adoption of Yammer
After this research, a full overview of the introduction of a social network platform to a small and concentrated organization is available, regardless whether this introduction was success or not.
3.2 R
ESEARCHM
ODELThe following research model is created to explain the structure of the thesis. It visualizes the most important steps that are needed to obtain the right information to meet the objectives of the thesis.
3.3 R
ESEARCH METHODSIn the literature study, a comparison will be made on social networks in general, social networks for organizations and traditional collaboration tools and techniques.
Focus aspects in this comparison will be an exploration of weak ties and implicit knowledge,
transparency, participation, activity distribution, decision distribution, social feedback and knowledge sharing.
The survey will focus on the same subjects and questions will be based on the results of the outcomes of the literature research. Some subjects of the survey might already have experience with social networks. In order to get a full understanding of current working practices, not only a survey will be conducted, but also observation and participation will contribute to this overview.
The data is collected in a 3 month period from May 21 until August 21 2013.
Depending on how the adoption of Yammer evolves within SkyDreams, interventions will be made that might change the use of the social network. Examples of interventions can be a more active participation by the researcher himself, highlighting features in Yammer, providing extra applications (e.g. the Desktop application, Mobile application or even integration with current information systems that are in use within SkyDreams), actively promoting the use of Yammer or by making certain content available on Yammer only.
A follow-up survey will be taken to find out more about the causes of a, depending on the outcomes and results, success or a failure of the introduction of Yammer to SkyDreams.
Literature Study
• Social Networks • Internal Social Networks • Collaboration tools Case Study • Gathering expectations • Introducing Yammer • Monitoring Yammer • Adoption of Social Networks Analysis • Quantitative results • Expectations • Adoption Thesis • Conclusions • Recommendations
3.3.1 About Yammer
Yammer calls itself ‘The Enterprise Social Network’. It is a private social network that facilitates a timeline, inbox, chat, documents, private messages, organizational charts, notes, user profiles, events, polls and more.
3.3.2 About the subjects - users
The target population of this thesis involves all employees of SkyDreams. All employees will be asked to fill in the surveys and will be provided access to Yammer.
SkyDreams is a company that has about 25 employees (June 2013). About 80% of them have a Bachelor or Master degree and the average age is a few months below 30 years. Teams vary in size from 4 to 8 individuals. It should be noted that these figures (number of employees, age, education, team size) will probably all have impact on the results of this research.
4 T
HEORETICAL
F
RAMEWORK
This chapter describes the main concepts of Social Networks and the history of digital collaboration tools for teams and organizations. Several types of collaboration tools will be discussed in general with an example to explain some key aspects.
Each type of tool suits slightly different needs in slightly different ways. How a tool is received is based on set expectations. This chapter describes the theoretical framework of measuring expectations of collaboration tools, software or services. It is based on the following three models and theories:
Technology Acceptance Model
Unified Theory of Accepting and Use of Technology Unified Theory of Accepting and Use of Technology II
Sections 5.1 Collaborative software and 5.2 Social Networks answer the first sub research questions. The rest of this chapter is used to construct the survey questions for the third survey of this research, based on the three models for technology acceptance.
4.1 C
OLLABORATIVE SOFTWARECollaboration can be defined as working together to fulfill a shared, collective, bounded goal.
Communication plays an important role in that. Life has developed multiple ways of communication in order to collaborate and in the last century digital communication started to play a major role.
Collaborative software can be categorized into temporal and spatial dimensions. The collaborative methods or media listed below are used within SkyDreams. The temporal dimension (time) prescribes if the interaction is either synchronous or asynchronous. The spatial dimension (place) prescribes if the interaction needs to be done at the same location or that it can take place on remote.
Functional category Temporal dimension Spatial dimension
Synchronous Asynchronous Co-located Remote
E-mail x x
Online Calendar x x
Workflow x x
Group decision support x x
Collaborative writing x x x Learning tools x x x x Face-to-face interaction x x Meeting x x Telephone conversation x x All-hands meeting x x
Functionality within Yammer can be used both synchronous and asynchronous and can take place on remote locations. The ability to have asynchronous interaction has the benefit that users can participate when it suits them best, but is not practical when direct action or decision making is required.
4.2 S
OCIALN
ETWORKSQ1.1 How do internal social networks relate to external social networks, i.e. what are the key similarities and differences?
This chapter explains Social Networks, how they can be identified and differentiated from other types of collaborative software and in what types we can divide social networks into.
Social Networks can be called External oriented or Internal oriented.
External Social Networks are open to anyone on the internet by default. Users can share information with every user within the External Social Network or even with visitors that are not a member of the network itself. Examples of External Social Networks are Facebook and Twitter.
Internal Social Networks focus on users and groups within a network that is often managed by a specific organization that the user is part of. Information sharing and collaboration can only be done within the same network that is closed by default. New members can only be part of the internal network on invitation or by verifying that he or she is authenticated to be part of the managing organization. Sharing information is mainly done within the network itself.
Some social networks offer a hybrid network. In Yammer, organizations can connect their networks so that information can be shared between those two networks. When a user of Yammer wants to share information outside the network, it has to do that explicitly.
External Social Network Internal Social Network
User Subscription Open Closed
Sharing information Default with everyone Default within the organization
Privacy settings Set by External Network and Users
Set by Organization and Users
These differences could have different implications for the expected usage of a social network. All three have impact on the user’s perception of privacy. People would probably share different information, knowing that their superior is looking at it then when you share information with people you select yourself.
4.2.1 Traditional collaboration platforms compared to Internal Social Network Sites Q1.2 How do internal social networks relate to existing traditional
collaboration tools, i.e. what are the key similarities and differences?
Traditional collaboration tools are offered by an organization top down. People often have no choice but to use it. Internal Social Networks are mainly used on a voluntary base, with a side note that people could feel obliged to use it due to peer-pressure. Using the network is voluntary in a way that people can do their job without the network, but participating could make them more happy, productive or efficient in doing their job. This is the case when the social network will add value to the organization instead of replacing existing functionality.
4.3 T
ECHNOLOGYA
CCEPTANCEM
ODELThe Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) is a theory that describes how users come to accept and use a technology. TAM suggests that Perceived Usefulness and Perceived Ease of Use influence their decision about how and when they will use it (Davis, 1989).
Figure 1Technology Acceptance Model (Davis, 1989) (Wikipedia, 2014) 4.3.1.1 Perceived Usefulness
Defined as “the prospective user’s subjective probability that using a specific application system would increase his or her job performance within a context” (Yuen & Ma, 2008)
Yammer should give the user the impression that it would increase the user his or her job performance. Therefore the following survey question could be defined to find out if Yammer can deliver on perceived usefulness:
Survey 3: Yammer makes it easier to find information. Survey 3: Yammer improves my information-seeking.
Survey 3: Yammer helps me to find information more quickly. Survey 3: I find Yammer useful in my information seeking.
These survey questions are derived from the research of Choi, Chung, 2012. 4.3.1.2 Perceived Ease of Use
The Perceived Ease of Use is defined as the degree to which the user expected the system to be free of effort (Yuen & Ma, 2008)
In the context of this research model, usability is important for Yammer. The following survey questions are defined in order to find out if Yammer can deliver perceived ease of use:
Survey 3: My interaction with Yammer is clear and understandable. Survey 3: I find Yammer easy to use.
Survey 3: It is easy for me to become skillful at using Yammer. Survey 3: I find it easy to get Yammer to do what I want it to do. Survey 3: If find it clear what I can do with Yammer.
4.3.1.3 Subjective Norm
Subjective norm is defined “as the individual’s perception of how important others in his or her social environment wish or expect him or her to behave in a certain way” (Moan & Rise, 2006) or as “a person’s perception that most people who are important to him or her think he should or should not perform the behavior in question” (Teo, 2009).
In this research, subjective norm is the degree in which a person perceives the demands of important or referent others on him or her to use Yammer. The following survey questions are defined to know how Yammer acts to meet the subjective norm:
Survey 3: It really would not matter to most colleagues I know if I declined to give
up Yammer.
Survey 3: My colleagues expect me to continuously use Yammer.
Survey 3: No one would really be surprised if I just stopped using Yammer. Survey 3: Others would probably make me feel guilty if I quit using Yammer.
4.4 U
NIFIEDT
HEORY OFA
CCEPTANCE ANDU
SE OFT
ECHNOLOGYThe Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology aims to explain user intentions to use
technology and usage behavior. An important aspect that makes this model fit this research on Yammer is the construct Voluntariness of Use, an aspect that has been mentioned earlier as a key difference when comparing a social network site with traditional collaborative software.
Figure 2 Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (Venkatesh et al, 2003) 4.4.1 Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT)
The original Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology uses Performance Expactancy, Effort Expectancy and Social influence as direct determinants of usage intention and behavior. Facilitating conditions is a direct determinant of use behavior. Gender, Age, Experience and Voluntariness of Use moderate the impact of behavioral intention and use behavior. See the figure above for a visualization of this model.
4.4.1.1 Performance expectancy
Venkatesh et al. (2003) defined Performance Expectancy as the degree in which using a system or technology will provide benefits to individuals in performing certain activities. One of the constructs of performance expectancy is perceived usefulness as explained above in the Technology Acceptance Model. It is recognized as the strongest predictor of intention and remains significant in both voluntary and mandatory settings.
Constructs from other models:
Perceived Usefulness (TAM/TAM2, C-TAM-TPB) Extrinsic Motivation (MM)
Job-Fit (MPCU)
Outcome Expectations (SCT)
Yammer should give the user the impression that it adds value to the individual. From Performance expectancy, the following survey questions are created:
Survey 3: I find Yammer useful in my daily work.
Survey 3: Using Yammer increases my changes of achieving things that are
important in my work.
Survey 3: Using Yammer helps me accomplish things more quickly. Survey 3: Using Yammer increases my productivity.
4.4.1.2 Effort expectancy
The Effort Expectancy is defined as the degree of ease associated with the use of a system (Venkatesh et al 2003). Effort related constructs are expected to be clearer when process issues represent hurdles to be overcome in the early stages of new behavior.
Constructs from other models:
Perceived ease of use (TAM/TAM2) Complexity (MPCU)
Ease of Use (IDT)
Yammer should be easy to use and understand. From Effort Expectancy, the following survey questions are created:
Survey 3: Learning how to use Yammer is easy for me.
4.4.1.3 Social Influence
In the same research, Venkatesh et al (2003) defined Social influence “as the degree to which an
individual perceives that important others believe he or she should use the new system.” It is explained as the notion that the individual its behavior is influenced by the way in which they believe others will view them as a result of having used the technology. In Venkatesh et al (2003), none of the constructs below were found significant in voluntary contexts, contrary to situations where use of the system was mandatory.
Constructs from other models:
Subjective Norm (TRA, TAM2, TPD/DTPB, C-TAM-TPB) Social Factors (MPCU)
Yammer should try to get peers onboard, which will help getting reluctant individuals to get along with the social network. From Social Influence, the following survey questions are conducted:
Survey 3: Direct colleagues think that I should use Yammer.
Survey 3: Colleagues who influence my behavior think that I should use Yammer. Survey 3: My indirect colleagues think that I should use Yammer.
Survey 3: Colleagues whose opinions I value prefer that I use Yammer.
4.4.1.4 Facilitating Conditions
Finally, Facilitating Conditions are defined as the degree to which an individual believes that an organizational and technical infrastructure exists to support the use of the system. It includes aspects that are designed to remove obstacles that prevent the individual from using the system.
Constructs from other models:
Perceived Behavioral Control (TPB/DTPB, C-TAM-TPB) Facilitating Conditions (MPCU)
Compatibility (IDT)
Yammer should provide tools and ways to access the network in various ways. Examples could be a website, a mobile website, a mobile application, a desktop application, email integration and integration with other systems that are already in use. From Facilitating Conditions, the following survey questions are conducted:
Survey 3: I have the resources necessary to use Yammer. Survey 3: I have the knowledge necessary to use Yammer.
Survey 3: I can get help from others when I have difficulties using Yammer.
4.4.2 Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology 2 (UTAUT2)
The Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology 2 differs from the original by adding Hedonic Motivation, Price Value and Habit to the range of constructs that affect Behavioral Intention and Use Behavior.
In the section below it is explained why these constructs could be important for the acceptance of a social network application within an organization.
Figure 3 Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use 2 (Venkatesh, 2012) 4.4.2.1 Hedonic Motivation
“Hedonic motivation is defined as the fun or pleasure derived from using a technology” (Brown and Venkatesh, 2005). It has been found as being important in technology acceptance and use by influencing technology acceptance directly. Hedonic motivation is therefore added to the UTAUT2 theory as a predictor of consumers’ behavioral intention to use a technology (Venkatesh et al, 2012).
Constructs from other models:
Perceived enjoyment (van der Heijden 2004, Thong et al 2006)
Yammer should be able to make the user enjoy using the network. If Yammer meets this expectation is being verified with the following survey questions:
Survey 3: Using Yammer is fun. Survey 3: Using Yammer is enjoyable. Survey 3: Using Yammer is very entertaining.
4.4.2.2 Price Value
Price value is defined as “consumers’ cognitive tradeoff between the perceived benefits of the application and the monetary costs for using them (Dodds, Monroe, & Grewal, 1991). It is added as a predictor of behavioral intention to use a technology. A low price value is expected to have a positive impact on intention.
Constructs from other research:
Costs/price as quality vs perceived value (Zeithaml, 1988)
Yammer should be available at low costs for the end user. This doesn’t mean it should be free for the organization to use Yammer, but to onboard individual users, having a price is expected to have a negative impact on the intention to use Yammer.
A license to use Yammer costs the organization a monthly fee. This fee is unlikely being forwarded to the end user so that there are no costs involved. The effect of Price Value could therefore expected to be low, although not nonexistent; when people know that someone has to pay a price for their usage, Price Value is important as they could think it is a waste of money to offer Yammer to the organization, especially when not using it. That way, it could still influence the use of Yammer.
A general question about the value of Yammer to the organization has been added to the survey based on this construct:
Survey 3: Yammer adds additional value to existing tools in the organization.
4.4.2.3 Experience and Habit
“Experience reflects an opportunity to use a target technology and is typically operationalized as the passage of time from the initial use of a technology by an individual” (Venkatesh, Thong, & Xu, Consumer Acceptance and Use of Information Technology: Extending the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology, 2012). “Habit has been defined as the extent to which people tend to perform behaviors automatically because of learning” (Limayem, Hirt, & Cheung, 2007). Different levels of experience over time can result in different levels of habit, depending of their use of the technology. Habit and
experience are important as prior use was found to be a strong predictor of future technology use (Kim & Malhotra, 2005).
Yammer could try to onboard users by involving them on what is happening on the network while they are not actively participating. The more users create a habit checking the network for updates, the more likely they will become an active member. The following survey questions are derived from Experience and Habit while using Yammer:
Survey 3: The use of Yammer has become a habit for me. Survey 3: I logged into Yammer without really thinking about it. Survey 3: I must use Yammer.
5
R
ESULTS
In this chapter, the outcomes of the three surveys are presented along with the results of the
quantitative analysis of the use of Yammer within SkyDreams. Each sub chapter is linked to sub questions Q1.4 to Q1.7.
Chapter 5.1 summarizes the results of Survey 1, which was taken on May 21, 2013, at the introduction of Yammer to SkyDreams. The main focus in this survey was to get data on the use of social networks in general and their expectations on Yammer within the organization.
Chapter 5.2 summarizes the actual use of Yammer within SkyDreams in the first three months.
Chapter 5.3 summarizes the results of Survey 2, which was taken on August 21, 2013, three months after the introduction of Yammer to SkyDreams. The main focus in this survey was to get data on the
experience with using Yammer within SkyDreams so far.
Chapter 5.4 summarizes the results of Survey 3, which was taken on March 11, 2014. This survey was taken to look in retrospective on the use of Yammer within SkyDreams, given the results of the first two surveys and the monitoring of the actual use.
Survey 1 Survey 2 Survey 3
Date May 21, 2013 August 21, 2013 March 11, 2014
Respondents 19 16 15
Total population 24 27 30
5.1 1
STS
URVEY
:
S
OCIALN
ETWORKS WITHINS
KYD
REAMSThe goal of this survey was to find out about the current media usage within SkyDreams and the expectations on Yammer itself, as well as its possible impact on the organization. The full survey including its results can be found in Appendix A.
5.1.1 Collaboration without Yammer
From the given options in the survey, subjects indicated that they use the telephone far less than other ways of communication. Google Chat, Email, Face-to-face communication at the desk and during a meeting where almost equal popular, followed by using an All-hands meeting to communicate with each other.
Google chat is mainly used to gather information from a person directly or to answer questions. Every respondent indicated that they use Google chat. Discussing a topic or scheduling a meeting is less popular than small talk over chat. 15 respondents use Google chat for private conversations.
Like Google chat, email is mainly used to gather information and to answer questions. These two ways of communication can be seen as each other’s opposites, so this is not really surprising. Unlike Google chat, email is almost never used to have private conversations.
Using the SkyDreams Manager as a way of communicating didn’t work for everybody, as more than half of the respondents indicated that they didn’t use the Manager for internal communication. Observation indicated that 18 of the respondents have access to the Manager, while for 11 of the respondents it is in use in their daily working practice.
Other media to communicate with colleagues that were mentioned where SMS (texting) and Github comments.
5.1.2 Purpose of using a specific type of media
In order to find out what kind of media people use to reach a particular goal, responders were asked about their use of different media.
5.1.2.1 Sharing information
When being asked for the actual use of particular media, 8 respondents indicated that when they share information with a colleague, they use Google chat. Another 8 respondents do this Face-to-face at the desk. Nobody seems to use the telephone to share information with a colleague.
When sharing information with their team, less people use chat, but as expected, more general ways of communication are used: face-to-face at the desk, meetings, chat and email. Again, nobody seems to use telephone to share information with a colleague.
Almost half of the respondents indicated that they use email to share information with another team. Chat is used by a quarter of the respondents.
To share information company-wide, email is the preferred way for most SkyDreamers. 16 respondents feel no or somewhat of a barrier to send an email to the whole organization. 3 SkyDreamers indicated that they felt there is a moderate barrier to do this.
5.1.2.2 Gathering information
To gather information from a colleague, most respondents use chat or face-to-face communication at the desk. Again, telephone seems not to be used for this kind of communication.
To gather information from team members, face-to-face communication at the desk or in a meeting are indicated as the preferred ways of communication.
Email is used to gather information from other teams by most SkyDreamers. The same results count when gathering information from all SkyDreamers.
When being asked on how hard it is to find information about specific teams or topics, most of the respondents indicate that they didn’t find it hard to find team specific information.
5.1.2.3 Discussing a topic
To discuss a topic with a colleague, most respondents indicate that they use face-to-face communication at the desk. When doing the same with their team, they use meetings.
When discussing topics with other teams, face-to-face communication (at the desk and meetings) and email is used. When discussing a topic with all SkyDreamers, email or the All-hands meeting is used. It is notable that not one respondent indicated that they use Chat to discuss a topic, while it is often used to share or gather information.
Most respondents prefer to receive information about specific teams or SkyDreams in general by email or in the All-hands meeting.
5.1.3 Social Media
Only 3 respondents are active users if Twitter. This is in contrast with the use of Facebook. Only 2 respondents indicated that they never or almost never use Facebook in their private life. LinkedIn is less used than Facebook, but more popular than Twitter.
5.1.3.1 Twitter
When being asked if the main purpose of using Twitter is to share information, 4 respondents either agree or strongly agree. While there are not many active Twitter users, the results on the question for the main purpose of using Twitter are quiet worthless.
Almost nobody uses or has used Twitter in their professional career. 5.1.3.2 Facebook
Most respondents agreed to the question that their main purpose of using Facebook is to share
information. They don’t equally agree that Facebook is the place to gather information or resources but tend to disagree on the statement that using Facebook its purpose is to discuss a topic.
Most respondents agreed to the statement that Facebook its main purpose is to connect people. The same is true for showing appreciation or to praise someone. Facebook is seen as something ‘Fun’. A few people use or have used Facebook in their professional career.
5.1.3.3 LinkedIn
LinkedIn is used more to share or gather information or resources than Facebook is. Only a few people indicate that their main purpose of using LinkedIn is to discuss a topic, but most respondents agree to the statement that LinkedIn is there to connect people. There is a difference with Facebook on how people think about praising someone, as only one respondent agreed to the statement that that’s the main purpose of using LinkedIn.
Less respondents indicate LinkedIn as ‘Fun’.
LinkedIn is used more in the average respondent’s professional career, but only a few indicate that they use LinkedIn almost every time or frequent.
5.1.3.4 Yammer
Yammer is not used by many respondents. Only 3 indicate that they have used it sometimes. Most respondents indicate that they are not familiar at all with Yammer. Of those three, two respondents
were only slightly satisfied and one indicated to be moderately satisfied. When asked for their reasons, one respondent mentioned the unclear goal of the platform.
“Within Wolters Kluwer it was very confusing when to use Yammer. Some people used it to share interesting updates about projects, others used it for political reasons and personal promotion, while others used it for birthdays etc...” (respondent #16)
5.1.4 Expectations of Yammer
After a short explanation of what Yammer stands for, respondents were asked to indicate how Yammer could affect the ten values of SkyDreams.
Most respondents thought Yammer could have a moderate effect on Teamwork and Collaboration. This is in line on how they think Yammer will help them to work according the Teamwork and Collaboration values. All respondents thought that Yammer will have a neutral to very positive affect on Teamwork and Collaboration.
Some thought Yammer could have moderate or minor effect on Honesty, but most respondents
answered neutral. 3 respondents indicated that Yammer could have a negative impact on being Honest, but the majority of the respondents thought this would be neutral or even positive.
Respondents more believed in how Yammer could affect the value Showing Appreciation. 16
respondents indicated that Yammer could have a moderate to major effect on this value. When asked on if Yammer will help them to work in line with this value, 12 respondents indicated that Yammer would moderate affect the way they show appreciation. Most respondents indicated that Yammer could have a positive effect on showing appreciation.
Growth, Taking the lead and Delivering results didn’t give much clear results.
Having fun could be more affected by Yammer according to the respondents. When being asked if Yammer will help them to in having fun, 13 respondents indicated that Yammer will have a moderate to major effect on that. Most respondents think that Yammer will have a positive effect on having fun. Two respondents however indicated that it could have a negative or even very negative effect on this value. This respondent explains this questions arguing that not seeing each other is less fun.
5.1.5 Ways of Communication
When asked for what media fits best to share information or resources, 11 respondents now think that Yammer would fit best.
Respondents think that gathering resources can be done best in various ways. Either chat, email, face-to-face at the desk or in a meeting or Yammer all score somewhat equally.
People still would like to receive information via email. Only 5 respondents now think that Yammer would be a better type of media to receive information.
8 respondents now think Yammer is the best type of media to discuss topics. Another 8 think a meeting will be better for that type of communication.
For showing appreciation, most respondents now think Yammer would be the way to do this, while 6 prefer to do this face-to-face at the desk.
Face-to-face at the desk or otherwise in a meeting scores best when being honest. Taking the lead can best be done in a meeting.
According to the respondents, embracing change fits best with the all hands meeting. Collaborating can be done best in a meeting.
Q1.3 How do people share knowledge and acquire resources while doing their jobs in this small organization, i.e. what are the current work practices?
Based on the answers from the first survey, in general, employees at SkyDreams share information face-to-face at the desk, in meetings, using Google Chat and email. When sharing information with more than one person or with another team, email is more popular.
Based on observations in the field, every team has a meeting in the morning to give each other an update of the current status of running projects. These meetings are short and aim to get every team member up to speed for the upcoming day. A general agenda of this meeting looks as follows: - What have you done yesterday?
- What have you planned for today? - What impediments are in your way?
The schedule and goal of this meeting is derived from a daily Scrum meeting: a short meeting were information is being shared and gathered in order to get your upcoming work done.
During the day everyone works on their own projects, often interrupted by either a team meeting or a meeting cross teams to discuss a running project.
During the day, information is being shared and gathered by email and chat. Often the urgency of the question determines the choice in this: when it is important to get feedback quick, chat is used more often than email and the other way around. Telephone is not in used very much to discuss internal matters. This could have several reasons:
- Proximity of colleagues: it is easy to discuss topics at the desk - Availability of telephones: Not every team member has a telephone
- Privacy matters: not every topic is suited to discuss over the telephone, as telephone conversations are made in the open office.
Sharing information within teams is mainly done via Google Docs, an online platform to share
documents. This information is often being discussed in scheduled weekly meetings. In these meetings, outstanding issues are being discussed to improve the way of working based on experience in the past weeks.
Every month, all SkyDreamers attend to the All Hands Meeting. In this meeting, one member of every team presents the progress of projects and highlights of deliverables in a way that everyone has at least a general understanding of what everyone is doing.
Based on the first survey, the expectations of Yammer being valuable to SkyDreams were moderately positive. The respondents expected Yammer to have a positive effect on Teamwork and Collaboration, but were more conclusive about the positive effect on Showing Appreciation and Having Fun.
5.2 U
SAGE OFY
AMMER ATS
KYD
REAMSWhen looking at the actual use of Yammer during the first three months, the topics could be categorized in the following groups:
- Having Fun
- Showing Appreciation - Sharing Information - Sharing Thoughts
Examples of posts can be found below.
The number of users increased rather quickly after the introduction of Yammer. Everyone that took the survey signed up within a few days. Some groups were created in order to share information with selected people. Most of the groups were equal to the teams within SkyDreams, others were created around a special topic that users could subscribe to. Examples of those topics are ‘Manager updates’ for updates around the IT systems or ‘Foosball’ for members of the Foosball competition. The latter one proved to be the most active topic on Yammer for the full three months during the evaluation.
In the first three weeks, a few posts per week were made on Yammer. Not every SkyDreamer checked the timeline on a daily basis. The number of posts increased around certain events, like the all hands meeting, a company outing or during the Foosball competition. After the first weeks, only a few members remained more or less active on Yammer. Again, the main focus was on fun, with Foosball being the main topic discussed, partially helped by an integration with the scoring system of the competition that was linked to Yammer by one of the IT team members. This resulted in some automatically generated posts on Yammer that people reacted to.
A few people actively used Yammer by regularly posting information on it or by commenting or ‘liking’ other posts. Most posts were created by only three different users. In the end these users started giving up posting as well, leaving Yammer unused for a long period of time.
5.2.1 Having Fun
Having fun was by far the biggest category of posts on Yammer. Around a company outing, the number of posts about the topic raised.
Foosball was another hot topic on Yammer. One of the playing IT-employees implemented the Yammer API to automatically post updates from the scoring system to Yammer.
5.2.2 Sharing information
Users shared some company related information on Yammer. This was done a few times about milestones that were reached that were shared with the whole organization. Some team specific information was being shared as well.
5.2.3 Showing appreciation
Yammer was also used to show appreciation. Yammer offers a special button to praise someone in the organization.
5.3 2
NDS
URVEY
:
F
OLLOW-
UPS
URVEY ONS
OCIALN
ETWORKSThe second survey was conducted three months after the introduction of Yammer at SkyDreams. This chapter contains the summarized results of this survey. The full results can be found in appendix B. When comparing Facebook with Yammer, a vast majority of respondents used Yammer less than Facebook. This accounts for active use (posting and sharing), as well as for passive use (reading and checking the timeline). All respondents did use Yammer at least once and about 70 percent indicated that they used Yammer on a regular (at least once a week) basis.
Only half of the respondents indicated that they shared an updated on Yammer, while almost all respondents ‘liked’ one or more updates. Four out of the fifteen respondents used the functionality to praise someone on Yammer.
Most respondents were not aware of the existence of a Mobile Yammer App, but were also not interested in using it. Some users did use the Desktop App.
The second part of the survey was about the expectations of Yammer and whether or not they were met during the first three months. Most users could not agree or disagree with the theorem that Yammer met the expectations that were set in the beginning.
Most respondents used Yammer to communicate with all SkyDreamers. Only a few SkyDreamers used Yammer to communicate with their own or another team in specific. More respondents used Yammer to share information than to gather information, but no one strongly agreed to either one. A majority of ten out of fifteen agreed that they used Yammer for fun.
Most respondents could neither agree nor disagree if they found it difficult to use Yammer, because of an unclear purpose of Yammer. When asked about a positive effect of Yammer to the SkyDreams values, only Have fun, Show appreciation and Teamwork could be moderately agreed on. Eight out of fifteen respondents agreed that Yammer add value to SkyDreams in general.
Based on the second survey and the observations and analysis of the use of Yammer during the first three months, Yammer does not seem to influence the current work practices at all. Using Yammer is generally seen as fun, but not really more than that.
Before the introduction SkyDreamers had the expectations that Yammer could have a positive effect on the SkyDreams values and in general add value to the organization. After three months, it met the expectation that Yammer could be fun and that it can be useful to show your appreciation.
5.4 3
RDS
URVEY
:
S
KYD
REAMSS
URVEYI
NTERNALS
OCIALN
ETWORKS–
F
OLLOW-
UPThe third survey was taken in order to find out what could be reasons of lacking active usage of Yammer. This survey was conducted eight months after the second survey. The usage of Yammer dropped to a minimum at that time. The results of this survey support this observation.
5.4.1 Performance Expectancy
No one could agree to the statement that Yammer was useful in their daily work, nor to the statement that Yammer increases their changes of achieving things that are important in their work. Not one respondent found Yammer helping in accomplishing things more quickly and almost everybody
disagreed or strong disagreed on the statement that Yammer increased their productivity. These results were equal for finding information, information-seeking.
5.4.2 Effort Expectancy
Everyone found it easy to learn how to use Yammer. Yammer was generally clear and easy to understand as well. Everyone more or less agreed to the statement that Yammer was easy to use and it was
generally perceived easy to become skillful at using Yammer. In general it was clear what one can do with Yammer, although two respondents slightly disagree with that.
5.4.3 Social Influence
Most respondents disagreed to the statement that direct colleagues thought that they should use Yammer. This was the case for people that they think influence their behavior, indirect colleagues or colleagues whose opinions they value. Most people didn’t thought it would matter their colleagues if
they gave up Yammer and nobody thought that colleagues expect them to continuously use Yammer. In general, social influence seems to be non-existent when it comes to Yammer.
5.4.4 Habit
Using Yammer didn’t become a habit to the respondents and a majority disagreed on the statement that they logged into Yammer without thinking about it. In general, using Yammer did not turn into a habit. 5.4.5 Facilitating Conditions
Most respondents agreed or strongly agreed to the statement that they had the resources and
knowledge necessary to use Yammer. Overall they thought they could get help from others if necessary. They could really say if Yammer improved their social relationships with colleagues, nor that Yammer made it easier to develop social relationships.
5.4.6 Hedonic Motivation
The respondents could not really agree nor disagree if using Yammer was fun, enjoyable or entertaining. 5.4.7 Behavioral Intention
The final results were quiet devastating. Almost every respondent indicated that they disagree on intending to continue using Yammer in the future, but it must be said that this survey was conducted after a few months of radio silence on Yammer.
6 C
ONCLUSIONS
This research focused on the introduction and usage of Yammer within SkyDreams and how Yammer could contribute to the business. Based on this research and the results that were presented in the previous chapter conclusions can be drawn about the impact of a Facebook like internal social network within a small organization. As a reminder, the research question was as follows:
Q1 What is the impact of the introduction of a Facebook-like internal social network? Does it help improving work practices in a small organization?
In this section, answers will be presented for the sub questions that were formulated in the Problem definition. Together they will answer the research question in general. In the section 6.2,
recommendations for SkyDreams related to the future use of internal social networks will be made. This chapter ends with recommendations for future research, based on the results of this research, taken into accounts its limitations and possibilities for generalization.
Q1.1 How do internal social networks relate to external social networks, i.e. what are the key similarities and differences?
Internal and external social networks have a lot in common, being both platforms on which you can share and gather information and connect with people. The main and most obvious difference between internal and external social networks lies in the limitations of sharing information with people outside a specific group or organization. This limitation affects the way people use the social network. An internal social network creates a setting in which people could act different than in an environment in which they set the boundaries themselves.
Peer pressure on how to behave on an internal social network could work different when your peers on the network could be both your co-workers and your superiors, compared with the connections you choose yourself on an external social network.
Q1.2 How do internal social networks relate to existing traditional
collaboration tools, i.e. what are the key similarities and differences?
An internal social network is generally a mix of features, including traditional collaboration tools bundled together on a platform that is focused on connecting people.
Yammer includes traditional collaboration tools like chat and productivity tools that enable you to co-work on documents. The implementation of those tools seemed inferior to tools that are already in use at SkyDreams. Examples are Yammer Chat versus Google Hangouts / Chat, Yammer its Social Content Creation / Notes versus Google Docs or Microsoft Office and Yammer Inbox versus Google Mail.
Q1.3 How can an introduction Yammer contribute to the current work practices, i.e. what are the expectations of an introduction?
Yammer could add value to the current work practices by offering a central place to share information and ideas, collect resources to get things done, interact and add fun. These were things of which the respondents of the first survey were quiet confident about to add value to the organization.
Q1.4 How does the introduction of Yammer influence the current work practices, i.e. does it meet the expectations of users and management?
The expectations that users had in the beginning were not met after three months. This was shown in the results of the survey as well in the actual use of Yammer within SkyDreams. Yammer provided a platform to share primarily fun, but that could not keep the platform interesting enough to be used on a regular basis.
Q1.5 What aspects do influence the use or lack of use of a Facebook-like internal social network?
Based on the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology 2 (Venkatesh, Thong, & Xu, 2012), Performance Expectancy, Effort Expectancy, Social Influence, Facilitating Conditions, Hedonic
Motivation, Price Value and Habit influence the use and acceptance of technology. Not all factors play an equal role when it comes to the use and acceptance of Yammer at SkyDreams.
Performance Expectancy, the degree in which using a system or technology will provide benefits to individuals in performing certain activities is important for an introduction of Yammer, because of the voluntary principle of using a social network platform. People have a choice of not using the application and it is therefore important for Yammer to offer features that the individual helps performing activities. For an internal social network, gathering information and connecting socially to co-workers could be such benefits. Within SkyDreams, people did not have a high performance expectancy, as it turned out that many features of Yammer were inferior to existing, more established offerings. This could be an important factor in the lack of use of Yammer.
Effort Expectancy, the degree of ease associated with working with an application is important when it comes to the adoption of Yammer. When an application is hard to master, users are easier giving up on it. SkyDreamers did not find Yammer difficult to use, so it did not require a lot of effort to start using Yammer from a usability perspective.
Social influence, the degree in which people perceive important others think that they should use the application could be more important for an internal social network than for a normal social network, because of the different level of relationships between co-workers. These relationships could affect the way how people behave on a social network, but also if people are going to use the network at all. However, within SkyDreams, this research could not find strong indicators that social influence is of
much importance for the adoption of Yammer. In the surveys, users indicated that they didn’t find it important how others thought of their use of Yammer.
Facilitating Conditions, defined as the degree to which an individual believes that an organizational and technical infrastructure exists to support the use of the system turned out to be a less important factor in the lack of adoption of Yammer. Although every SkyDreamer could access Yammer on his or her computer or mobile phone, it didn’t integrate with other work practices, so people found it harder to get it going. When compared with alternatives, Google Apps provides a full package of functionalities that Yammer offers too, but because Google Apps is used more widely in the office, SkyDreamers are more urged to use additional functionality in Google Apps than in Yammer.
Hedonic Motivation, the degree in which people get fun and pleasure from the use of technology is an important factor for an internal social network. Using Yammer was completely voluntary and having fun using the network motivates people to return and keep using the application. Within SkyDreams, fun was an important motivator for using Yammer, as shown in the actual use of Yammer. Most posts could be categorized as fun opposed to serious or business related. This could also be a pitfall as having only fun on an organizational platform could result in the platform being taken less serious.
Habit has been defined as the extent to which people tend to perform behaviors automatically because of learning. Using technology as a habit occurs when people use the technology without thinking and use it in their daily working pattern. Examples are the use of email and chat within SkyDreams. Both are used without thinking, because people created a habit using those media to communicate. This was not the case for Yammer.
Price Value is irrelevant for an internal social network, as the use of Yammer is supported by the
company. End-users can use Yammer for free and therefore price cannot affect the usage as it would be with technology that the user choses to use him or herself while having to pay a price.
Q1.6 What aspects do influence the work practices during the adoption and to what extend?
Yammer was primarily used to express fun within SkyDreams. As it was almost never used to gather or share resources or information, it could not influence the work practices by itself.
Q1.7 What would be the key differences and similarities when comparing a small and concentrated organization with the other three combinations in the grid?
This research is all about introducing Yammer to a small and concentrated organization. As described in chapter 5.2, the working structures within SkyDreams facilitate short lines of communication across the whole organization. As everyone is working on the same office floor, there’s no direct need for a
