Enterprise Social Network: How to Overcome the Limitations?

Over the past few years, enterprise social networks (ESNs) have become an essential tool for organizations. By 2017, nearly 70% of French companies had adopted an internal social network, doubling the figure in just two years! Why such success? These communication platforms, reserved for employees within an organization, strengthen employee engagement and foster team communication.

However, despite all their benefits, professional networks have their limitations. In this article, Mozzaik explores the shortcomings of these solutions and explains how to overcome them to further improve employee engagement and experience. Enjoy your reading!

What is an Enterprise Social Network?

The enterprise social network is an increasingly used and well-known collaborative tool. Here’s a look at its characteristics, advantages, and use cases.

Enterprise Social Network: Definition

An enterprise social network (ESN), or internal social network platform, is a communication and collaboration tool reserved for members of a company, administration, or association. This type of social media is inspired by popular public solutions such as Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn. It may include various features, such as:

• A personal profile for each user with a photo and details about them;
• A news feed where members can post, view, and react to content;
• Instant messaging for real-time communication;
• Groups where employees can meet in smaller committees;
• A video conferencing tool for live interaction.

Various providers allow companies to create their internal social network platforms. Microsoft offers a particularly interesting solution integrated into the Microsoft 365 ecosystem: Microsoft Viva Engage. Until recently, the well-known social media platform Facebook also offered a version dedicated to organizations: Workplace from Meta. However, this solution is expected to disappear by 2026.

Advantages of an Enterprise Social Network

The advantages of an enterprise social network are numerous. This type of tool enables:

• Strengthening internal cohesion and employees' sense of belonging, as colleagues can interact smoothly, even informally, regardless of their department. An internal social network thus breaks down silos and promotes not only top-down but also cross-functional and bottom-up communication;
• Facilitating adherence to company culture, as employees can quickly access information posted by their employer and engage with it effortlessly through "likes," comments, or even polls;
• Valuing employees and giving them a sense of recognition, as they can easily express themselves, make their voices heard by management and peers, and be mentioned by others who wish to thank them for their work or share content that will be read by others.

In summary, an enterprise social network is an internal communication tool that fosters a positive work environment and engages employees.

Enterprise Social Network: Practical Use Case

In practice, an employer can use their internal social network to make an important announcement to employees. The leader can post a message on the platform's news feed. Employees who see the post can then react by expressing their emotions with "likes" or by asking questions in the associated "comments" section.

Administrators can answer employee questions directly under the post or organize a video conference on the platform to provide detailed answers and deepen the dialogue. After this exchange, managers can access statistics to identify the questions that generated the most engagement among employees. These could lead to the creation of dedicated content, such as blog articles accessible at any time by employees.

The creation of this content can be entrusted to a collective of employees who are experts in the topics addressed. To communicate more effectively and work as a team, they can form a group on the enterprise social network. This discussion space, reserved for a limited audience, allows employees to exchange visual, written, or audio content efficiently to progress faster on the project.

Finally, once the project is completed and the content delivered, the leader can make a new post on the internal social network’s news feed to congratulate the contributors and highlight their participation to all their colleagues. This strengthens employees' sense of recognition and engagement within the company.

How to Overcome the Limitations of an Enterprise Social Network?

An enterprise social network is an indispensable ally for a good internal communication strategy and employee engagement. However, this type of collaborative tool should not be overestimated.

The Limits of an Enterprise Social Network

Be careful not to confuse an enterprise social network with a true intranet. While this solution indeed fosters collaboration and internal communication, it does not:

• Consolidate all the applications and business software employees need to work efficiently daily;
• Share, store, and modify files and documents as a team to progress quickly on projects, especially in the case of remote work;
• Disseminate, host, and organize large volumes of information, contacts, or internal knowledge to make them easily retrievable;
• Offer employees a unified navigation experience, allowing them to move fluidly, comfortably, and securely between their discussion spaces, tools, and documentation.

The Solution to Overcome the Limitations of Enterprise Social Networks

To overcome the limitations of internal social network platforms, you should equip yourself with a true Digital Workplace rather than specialized networks. A 2.0 enterprise intranet, like Mozzaik365, offers several significant advantages as it:

• Centralizes all digital tools and information employees need to be productive daily and have a good digital experience;
• Integrates communication tools, including an ESN, to keep employees well-informed of internal news and develop connections through informal and cross-functional exchanges;
• Integrates advanced collaboration tools that allow employees to co-edit documents and work better and faster as a team;
• Integrates knowledge management tools to create, store, organize, and make the company’s intellectual capital and standards easily accessible.

Digital Workplace: Practical Use Case

The use cases for a complete enterprise intranet are almost endless. The Digital Workplace is particularly effective in internal communication. This 360° solution handles the entire communication cycle, from content creation, whether individually or in a team, to storage and dissemination to employees.

For example, an HR department equipped with Mozzaik365 Digital Workplace can create a working group in Microsoft Teams to produce HR content for employees. Contributors can collaborate on a shared Word document. Once the content is finalized, the HR team can publish it on the company’s HR intranet, where employees can easily find it, both immediately and in the long term.

To promote these new materials to employees and ensure everyone has access to the information, the HR department can also post the new articles on the company’s news feed. If a specific group of employees is particularly relevant to the information, the HR team can implement targeted communication. In this case, the information is shared only with the intended audience, such as new hires or client relations officers. This precise targeting avoids many communication issues, such as information overload.

If the shared information is likely to interest the general public, the HR department can also share it on the organization's public social networks, like LinkedIn. Thanks to the social media feed aggregator present on their communication intranet, employees can react to their employer's post and share it on their networks without leaving their Digital Workplace. This allows employees to contribute to promoting the employer brand effortlessly.

Enterprise Social Network VS Digital Workplace: The Comparison

In summary, a Digital Workplace is a far more powerful tool than a simple enterprise social network. The comparison between these two solutions is clear:

The Limits of an Enterprise Social Network: Key Takeaways

An internal social network is an essential collaborative and communication tool within an organization. However, this tool has its limitations. It enables communication across the organization or within teams, but it does not ensure optimal knowledge management, centralize all digital tools for employees, or provide a unified navigation experience.

The solution to surpass the limitations of an enterprise social network? Opt for a true Digital Workplace that integrates an ESN and a document management system (DMS), collaborative work tools, and an interface that allows seamless navigation between these features. The ideal setup for maximizing employee experience and engagement!

Want to learn more about the Mozzaik365 Digital Workplace? Click here to request a demo