Are executives laggards? Let’s restrict the discussion here to social media, where the data tells a conflicted tale. On the one hand, executives definitely seem behind the eight ball when it comes to using social media.

A 2012 US study of CEOs of Fortune 500 companies by software company Domo found that only 16 per cent were using social media. On the face of it, a doubling in their 2013 survey to 30 per cent seems significant, but this reflects the sign-up rate rather than active use. In other words, executives are signing up to platforms because they think they should but are not doing anything much once they get there — a bit like going to a business lunch and standing in the corner.

Domo founder Josh James believes these CEOs are hurting their business results and doing their shareholders a massive disservice. Although social media takes significant time and commitment, he argues, ‘If you’re not speaking for yourself, other people will speak for you. And you may not like what they have to say’.

A 2012 study by Stanford University’s Graduate School of Business into the executive social media gap found a similar disconnect. The study ‘What Do Corporate Directors and Senior Managers Know about Social Media?’, which surveyed more than 180 senior executives, found no link between executive understanding of the importance of social media and action.

The study lead, Professor David F. Larcker, said the results showed that executives were well aware of the potential benefits as well as the risks of social media but were not doing a lot about it, primarily because they did not know how to make sense of social media data.

The study reached the following conclusions:

• While 90 per cent of respondents claim to understand the impact that social media can have on their organisation, only 32 per cent of their companies monitor social media.
• Just 14 per cent use metrics from social media to measure corporate performance.
• Only 24 per cent of senior managers and 8 per cent of directors get reports with social media metrics.
• Nearly 65 per cent of respondents were signed up to or used social media for personal purposes, mostly because they had a LinkedIn or Facebook account.
• Still, only 59 per cent of companies used social media to interact with customers and only 35 per cent use it for customer research.

‘The Evolution of Social Business’, a survey of 698 executives by Altimeter Group, also found that only around half of executives in a company were aware of or aligned with their social business strategy (that’s in organisations that have one). It found that organisations where executives do not use social technologies were limited in their understanding of its power as a business tool.

Absenteeism comes at a high cost.

Writer Richard Levick, picked by NACD Directorship magazine as one of the ‘100 Most Influential People in the Boardroom’, argues that leaders well aware of their responsibilities are content to let others control the online narratives that dominate public perception. He says that most directors expect their company’s digital and social media strategy to be managed without their leadership but that this passive approach has allowed adversaries to leap ‘a full Internet generation’ ahead of the companies they target.

‘Adversaries control the conversation.’

Having said that, awareness that social media is important is high and growing. For the past decade, IBM has conducted a longitudinal study of C-suites across 70 countries called the IBM Global C-Suite Study. Since 2004 CEOs have consistently identified market forces as the biggest driver of change, but for the first time in 2012 they identified technology as having the strongest influence on their organisation and strategy. The importance of managing digital disruption and social media was reinforced in the 2013 survey.

A global study of C-suite executives by MIT Sloan Manage­ment also showed 86 per cent believe social business will be important to their overall business in the next three years. Those leaders are readying themselves now by starting to develop a social business vision, a social strategy and social know-how at the leadership level and across the enterprise. Those who are not risk becoming less competitive.

The board appetite for information on social is also growing quickly, with McKinsey studies showing technology increas­ingly on the board agenda not as an IT issue but as a broader business issue. Big data, cloud computing and mobility present new opportunities and risks; technology is shaping business. Some boards are directing risk committees to oversee cyber security.

But there are less dramatic-sounding risks associated with new entrants to the market that could be equally devastating. These include newcomers who cause industry disruptions through pricing or game-changing innovations.

According to the 2013 Social Media Examiner Industry Report, 86 per cent of marketers agree that social media is important for their business, up from 83 per cent in 2012.

These and other reports that show this trend indicate that social media is on the executive agenda but, whether because of anxiety or lack of time or both, they have yet to make the leap.

But they should. When C-suite executives become active on social media it increases brand trust. Moreover, customers want to find them there. In a 2012 BRANDfog survey 82 per cent of respondents stated that they were more likely to trust a company whose CEO and leadership team engaged on social media.

That’s you.

Chapter summary

Right now leaders are lagging when it comes to using social media. Ensure that you’re informed about it and know the best way to be involved.