social media is not only the new town crier

Social Media is not only the new Town Crier

…It is a significant tool for Public Value creation

Research Team: Khayri Omar, Rosemary Stockdale, Helana Scheepers

(Council’s Director Corporate Services)

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“How best to use them, when to use them, when not to use

them, what they can help with, what they can’t help

with?”

“How do we respond to it?”

“How do they respond to issues?”

What the council thinks

3(Council’s Director Corporate Services)

What the council thinks Cont’d..“Once you move into that

space quite heavily you need to service it, and in servicing it, how do you measure the

benefit of what you get back?”

“it is challenging for council because it sometimes means more work and be more responsive and governance needs to be in place, but overall, if you do it properly and carefully you can achieve

amazing benefits.”

“… the questions you’ve asked, I’m going to have to

think about a lot more of these things as well because it will impact in how we think about

our service delivery in the social media stuff.”

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Accountability

Adaptability

Citizen involvement

Friendliness

User Democracy

Dialogue

Robustness

Equity

Fairness

Timeliness

Honesty

Integrity

Listening to public opinion

Openness

Professionalism

Reliability

Responsiveness

User orientation

Self-development

Social cohesion

Stability

Common good

Public interest

Quality of Public

Services

OutcomeTrustPV

Source: Kelly et al.(2002)

Jørgensen and Bozeman (2007)

“There is no more important topic in public administration and policy than public values.” Bozeman (2007: 355)

OPENNESS

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“I think it [council openness] does come across in the online services. Obviously, as I said before, I expect their information to be current and for everything to be online for me to access so I know what’s going on with them… definitely [social media

platforms make the Council] more open and transparent.”

“You can access more information. In some ways it

will be harder for them to hide things from you or not tell you about things. I think it empowers the user more because you can find out

more.”

“Because it’s been noted and it’s been recorded, what time residents have made a comment or a question, or just made some

kind of statement that requires the councillor to provide them with feedback, or just kind of reply to. So if they leave that sitting there for

two months, it’s for everybody to see. If you’re on vacation that’s a different story, but

again, it is completely transparent.”

citizen

DIALOGUE

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“Yes, and I would make that a regular kind of appointment [the past Mayor was up on

Facebook]. A couple of times I put up comments or responded to comments, and I was interested in the exchange, in reading it. So I would read it like I would read a local newspaper. I’d check it

out. The current Mayor is going around different places to meet people face to face. Now I’m not

going to go around to those places.”

“Well you can be more informed about the range of opinions, whether it necessarily

leads to a consensus in terms of agreement. But you can see other people’s issues and

sides of things more easily, because in public meetings and things people just tend to get up and just sound off and then it’s a

bit like a Parliament, like it’s an oppositional kind of thing. Whereas with social media you can have more of an exchange of opinion –

you can take on board a wider range of opinions.”

“I would be concerned about [putting negative comments] on the Council

Facebook page with my name saying that.. If they're not getting positive comments, that can indicate they're not doing things well. Yes. Just because you haven't got any negative comments doesn't mean that.. If people just ignored it, yep, you

might have to rethink whether that was a good idea or not.”

“It’s just ads, so it doesn’t encourage

people to be involved, it’s just another ad from

council.”

citizen

CITIZEN INVOLVEMENT

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“Because you can access and see other people’s opinions and comments, you get a sense more of the people about you. It [Facebook] attracts you to go to

events – I went to a concert, I went to a lecture, I went to a garden demonstration all last year, which I wouldn’t have gone to otherwise, and met people from the community that I wouldn’t have met otherwise, and we exchanged information about things. Yeah, but again it’s a means of putting you in touch with people

face to face, personalising the community a bit more for you.”

“The Facebook led me to the meeting. It was the main motivator… I wouldn’t have gone to

the Council meeting if it hadn’t been for having the Mayor’s Facebook page, using the web

page, getting the alerts from the Council, that sense that I felt I had almost like a duty to go.”

“Well I suppose I’m beginning to feel more that it’s the only level of

government that you can connect with, and so really all my efforts I suppose in a way would be directed to living more in this community and trying to improve this community and connect with the

people in this community.”

citizen

SELF-DEVELOPMENT

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“you can learn about the people you’re voting for, you can learn about the people who are actually making decisions about

your life.”

“More services as well because before you mightn't know what – it sounds silly, but you mightn't know what you wanted to know. So,

online you can hunt around and look at everything and you might find 50 different things that you can

find the answers to, that you mightn't have even known existed with the Council… So, with online you can be aware of more things than you would

have been before… I often didn't know things were on or I missed out on them. This way [Facebook] it

creates more awareness.”

“I’ve been interested in some of the comments on Facebook, because

people are doing things they’re just useful ideas, themes that you can

adopt yourself.”

“I don’t want to go and sit through Council meetings and community

meetings, spend hours and hours a week doing that to get that breadth of

knowledge.”

citizen

“I suppose you have a lot of other people’s input as well in other parts of community members

contributing to it [social media]. So you’re not only depending on

[Government].”

USER DEMOCRACY

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“A feeling that your opinion is more important… When they have that have your say column down the left hand side, it

really does project an idea that your opinion is being sought and is going to be important.”

“Absolutely, I think that’s the perfect platform [to have resident’s opinion taken into account]. Again, because

you can voice your opinion, someone has to hear you, someone should

reply to give you information especially if you’re ill informed”

“There are certainly social media campaigns that have happened in the last 12 months in

[council X] that if they didn’t happen we would have had a very different result and

that those campaigns sway – they put pressure on Council to make different

decisions.”

citizen

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ACCOUNTABILITY

“I think they can be held to account more, … yes, this councillor was elected on the promise of doing X and now

they’re doing Y, and point that out to people. It also gives them a chance to perhaps say why they’re behaving like that.”

“… if I make a Facebook comment, or like or unlike, or – it’s for everybody to see. It’s not just putting it in an envelope, and putting it

through the mail slot, it is for everyone to see, and then other people can say, yes I agree, no I don’t think that’s a good idea. So it’s a public

open conversation for everyone… they are too loud.”

citizen

LISTENING TO PUBLIC OPINION

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“Now you can say “Well really this is important for these reasons and I’ve spoken to my neighbours,” or “The people in my group

think this, that and the other”. So it does enable them to perhaps re-prioritise things if they understand reasons for things.” Well I

think that’s the aim [having residents’ opinions taken into account].”

“It may be more of a distraction but it may in fact enable them [the council] to

kind of put their finger on the pulse a bit more and see what’s important to people…and get a feel of what people

in the community are thinking”

“If Facebook is used the right way it’s a very powerful tool and if people use it correctly

they’ll get that instant feedback, straight away. ….. all that instant feedback that this is happening right here, right now so then

Council would be able to be more flexible and respond to that…Yes, that’s what social media

is about, community definitely.”

citizen

RESPONSIVENESS

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“I find it a lot quicker online, and Yes, I think it is [social media]. It's quick and immediate.”

“I think it can be an easy way of gaining, quickly, quite a lot

of comment.”

“I’m happy with the responses…Yeah more people see it, and if they don’t respond right

away, someone will go you haven’t responded, you’re obviously hiding something. So yeah

they’ve got to…Whereas beforehand I’ll probably just go, you know, wouldn’t have

known it, wouldn’t have cared, wouldn’t have had feedback.”

citizen

“The most important thing for me would be to stay on top of any pressing issues

or emergencies, so I would trust on Council to provide that information via

the social media. So I think it’s important to me, depending on what you’re looking

for, but for urgent information. ”

EQUITY

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“I think it does allow more residents to have access to council information. Yes, I do think that it increases the equality for

residents.”

“Well it’s much more equitable … so in a community event, or if you have to meet the

councillors in [X] street or go to the [X] festival, I’m not going to get a say because I’m small,

middle-aged and I’m female, and their attention is going to be focused on males, younger people,

people with louder voices. I just know what happens. So I’ve got more equitable access in terms of having a conversation or having my

input, which I wouldn’t have face to face.”

“No one's getting different information from a different person behind the counter.”

citizen

SOCIAL COHESION

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citizen

“A healthy community as being a community that's happy and

harmonious. I think social media and online services can promote that sense of understanding for one

another which makes the community healthier.”

“Social media should be light-hearted and as a Council it is all about community,

bringing community together so if you can get the community to provide feedback on stuff within their community in a positive manner, I think that is the best way to use

social media from a Council.”

“you can be made to feel like you're part of a community with being on Facebook and you feel like you're being invited to

things whereas if it's in the paper or something that's sent out you might miss it, whereas on Facebook you

actually feel like "Oh, they're asking if I want to go.”

“I think Facebook's so amazing because it does provide that connectivity...I think that's where the council Facebook page could be so powerful because it could

really, really create that [social cohesion] and that's so important for a healthy

community.”

“Yeah I think it has [create a sense of community], and it’s put me more in contact with aspects of the community I hadn’t experienced before.”

“ I think it’s the perfect platform for that [creating a sense of

community] because you’re not alone in the sense that other

people are sharing information with you and sharing your concerns

etcetera, so I think it would improve that for sure.”

“Because more people can agree with that or disagree with that. If you’re all agreeing on one thing, then you’re all kind of combining your views, and that is a sense of

community I guess, when everyone feels in a group.”

“Because they can – they’ve obviously had to understand their community by getting a Facebook page, understanding that that’s the

way the world’s moving. And then we understand them because they’re

giving us more information, kind of closing that gap a little bit more.”

“Yeah, for your active life, yeah, you can because there’s a lot more opportunities than you

think…once you look it up you realise how many more things there are that you can join.”

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Motivators: professionalism, adaptability, user-orientation, self-development, reliability, responsiveness, dialogue, citizen involvement, social cohesion and friendliness.

Negatively or very low: Honesty, Integrity, and Common Good.

Dominating: Openness

Citizens themselves playing a significant role.

Through Social Media platforms, Public Value can be generated by government, citizens, and technology.

Public value could be created even though the local governments do not have direct aim to create it.

Citizens perceive most of the values examined.

Professionalism perceived in a different way.

Facebook is the most used.

Summary

THANK YOU

Khayri OMAR

PhD Candidate,

Tel: +61 415178473

Office: EN611c d1

Email: [email protected]

Helana SCHEEPERS

Associate Professor,

Tel: +61 3 9214 5422

Office: EN607b


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Rosemary STOCKDALE

Department Chair,

Tel: +61 3 9214 4529

Office: EN607c


For more information about SM and Public

Value creation contact

Swinburne University of Technology,Faculty of Business and Enterprise,

Swinburne Business School, Department of Information Systems and

Logistics