Implementation of

'Social Business Concept'

at the HFU

Bachelor-Thesis
By: - Raman Paneru
Matriculation No. 243426, IBM -7
raman.paneru@gmail.com

First Supervisor:
Prof. Dr. Daniel Cerquera

Second Supervisor:
Prof. Dr. Frank Kramer

"I hereby certify that this thesis is my own work and contains no material that has been
submitted previously, in whole or in part, in respect of any other academic award or any other
degree. To the best of my knowledge all used sources, information and quotations are
referenced as such."

____________
Signature, date

Acknowledgement
I would firstly like to thank Prof. Cerquera and Prof. Krammer for accepting my proposal and
being my thesis supervisors. I too would also like to thank all the HFU staffs and students
those who contributed to make this thesis complete. I too would like to thank lati, my friends
and family for their support throughout my studies.

This was a great opportunity to understand how a research work is done. I have learnt a lot
about the topic and also about the way a research work is done. As I keep writing articles for
newspapers and my blog, I thought this would be the easiest part in my whole study.
However, it was the most difficult part where I was all by myself and had to read extensively
from all sorts of sources. It certainly has helped me to grow and learn some important
lessons.

Lastly, I would like to declare that the whole research work presented here is my personal
work. The information I have included are quoted or at least their sources are mentioned as
foot notes in every page. Moreover, I have listed all the sources in bibliography section. I too
have included all the important and relevant e-mails, the questionnaire used, etc in the
appendix section.

Abstract
"Social Business Concept" is a concept of blending innovation in the field of social media in
Business. This thesis aims in establishing an opinion that the "Social Business Concept" is
very much relevant for the HFU just like for other business organizations. In this thesis,
one can get the basic understanding of the concept, its origin and development as well as
some case studies about the successful implementation. This thesis further shows the
initiatives that the HFU has taken in the direction and the progresses made so far.
Furthermore, it suggests some steps that are to be taken to make further improvements in the
direction of establishing the HFU as a well-connected organization.
The theories presented in the thesis and conclusion drawn by this thesis is based on the
various literature reviews, e-mail correspondences with the HFU staffs and online survey
where the students studying at the HFU in different faculties participated.

Table of Contents
Acknowledgement .................................................................................................................................. 3
Abstract ................................................................................................................................................... 4
1. Introduction ......................................................................................................................................... 6
2. Defining "Social Business Concept" .................................................................................................. 7
2.1 Social World ................................................................................................................................. 7
2.1.1 History of Social Media Platform ........................................................................................ 10
2.1.2 History of Instant Messenger ............................................................................................... 12
2.2 Social Business ........................................................................................................................... 15
2.3 Advantages and Challenges of Social Business .......................................................................... 21
A. Advantages of Social Business Concept .................................................................................. 21
B. Challenges of Implementation of Social Business Concept ..................................................... 26
2.4 Measures to Face the Challenges and Mitigate Risks ................................................................. 30
2.5 Success Story of Implementation of Social Business Concept ................................................... 34
3. Hochschule Furtwangen University .................................................................................................. 36
3.1. Introduction ................................................................................................................................ 36
3.2. HFU in Numbers ........................................................................................................................ 37
4. Communication within the HFU........................................................................................................ 38
4.1. Study Portal ................................................................................................................................ 38
4.2 Webmail ...................................................................................................................................... 39
4.3 Felix ............................................................................................................................................. 39
5. The HFU with the Outside World ...................................................................................................... 46
5.1 The HFU Website ........................................................................................................................ 47
5.2 The HFU in Social Media ............................................................................................................. 48
6. Implementation of 'Social Business Concept' at the HFU ................................................................. 52
6. 1. Survey Results ........................................................................................................................... 53
6. 2. The HFU on Implementation of Social Business Concept ......................................................... 58
7. Conclusion ......................................................................................................................................... 60
8. Appendix ........................................................................................................................................... 64
9. Bibliography ...................................................................................................................................... 69

1. Introduction

This thesis aims in presenting the available definition of "Social Business Concept" and its
constituents such as enterprise social network and social media appearances of an
organization through literature reviews and then re-defining it for the context of the HFU.
Additionally, it shows the current progress made by the HFU to implement the "Social
Business Concept". Furthermore, the thesis suggests some steps that can be taken into
consideration to establish the HFU as a well-connected organization.
There are altogether 9 chapters including introduction, appendix, and bibliography. The
chapter 2 explains the whole theoretical aspects of "Social Business Concept", history and
development of its constituents such as social networking and instant messaging and how it
has been introduced to the business world. The chapter 3 introduces the HFU with its short
history and further presents the statistics related to the HFU. The chapter 4 and 5 present the
ways HFU is connected to the inside and the outside world via its website, learning platform,
social media fan pages and so on. The chapter 6 includes a survey results to further support
the idea that the communication culture has changed and how the HFU can use this fact to
shape its mode of communication. The participants of this survey were the HFU students
enrolled in different faculties at the HFU. This chapter further includes the attitudes of the
HFU staffs in implementing the "Social Business Concept" at the HFU. The chapter 7
concludes the whole thesis with some recommendation on successful 'implementation of the
"Social Business Concept" at the HFU'
The theoretical concept regarding the "Social Business Concept" is backed up via the
literature reviews accessed online in EBSCO-Host. Due to the lack of published resources at
local libraries the thesis had to be based on the online resources in many cases. The report on
the progresses so far made by the HFU in the direction of being a "social business" is based
on the information published in the HFU website, e-mail correspondence with the HFU
staffs, social media fan pages and an online survey where the HFU students enrolled in
different faculties participated.

2. Defining "Social Business Concept"

"Social Business Concept" is not as new as it might seem but is known to people under
different names such as Enterprise 2.0 or some other. It is a concept of blending social media
innovation in the business via the use of corporate/enterprise social networks or the fan pages
in social media. The readers should not confuse the term "Social Business" with a similar
term meaning socially responsible business, a business that understands its 'corporate social
responsibility'. It is rather the term used specifically by Bosch for a well-connected business
or 'Enterprise 2.0' as some has defined it. Here in this thesis, the term is rather broadened and
has been presented in the context of the HFU.

2.1 Social World

On 25th April, 2015, there was a great earthquake in Nepal. People started posting different
statuses, pictures and videos in Facebook and everyone could know about it within the hour.
The information was shared so quickly that people started to join hand in hand to support
their family back in home. When telephones, electricity, transport, etc. were not functioning
properly back in Nepal, people outside Nepal started networking with their friends and
collecting all the possible helps they could. Phone calls were not working but Social Media
and instant messengers became the best alternative to contact each other. Viber and Skype
offered free calls to Nepal from abroad.
Facebook itself started a campaign to raise fund for the earthquake victims of Nepal and was
able to collect 17 million USD.
"After two major earthquakes devastated Nepal in April and May, more than 770,000 people
from 175 countries around the world donated over USD 15 million to support the
International Medical Corps relief effort. Facebook donated an additional USD 2 million to
local recovery efforts. These donations have supported International Medical Corps' firstresponse and ongoing relief efforts. We'd like to thank the Facebook community for your
contributions and show you how your donations are helping the people of Nepal."1

https://www.facebook.com/nepalearthquakesupport (accessed November, 2015)

During studies at the HFU, students have to do lots of presentation and project works with in
class. It needed frequent communication and sharing of information. To meet each team
member is somehow difficult as everyone have classes and work at different time. Social
media is the answer to the problem. Students make groups in viber, whatsapp or Facebook
where they continuously communicated to each other. Some of them also use Skype during
exam for preparation.
These days when you work in a small business, you are invited to a small WhatsApp group or
a Viber group to get information about works or changes at your workplace. Even the
dormitories have such groups to stay in touch with each other in the dormitory. Cleaning
schedules or appointments are all communicated via WhatsApp.
Recently, when there was terrorist attack in Paris, many Facebook users from all around the
globe showed their concern by using French-flags filter on their profile pictures. This trend
was there also during pride day celebration. When US Supreme Court's decision made same
sex marriage as an individual right on June 26, 2015, an overwhelming 26 million Facebook
users from all over the world used rainbow flag filter in its support.2
These are few among many examples of social media usage in different aspects of life.
Sharing information and staying connected has become much easier with the help of social
media. It has made world a very small place. One can know about what's happening in one
part of the world in other part of the world in no time.
Social media has encouraged user generated content's concept. This has increased the amount
of information available to us. And it has also reduced the cost of getting information.
Traditional means of communication like telephone and e-mails are seldom used in regular
communications. It is much easier to send text over some instant messenger than to write an
email or to make a call. The invention of Facebook, Twitter, Skype, Viber, Whatsapp, etc has
changed the way people communicate with each. Different social media have become a part
of our life. Communication through Social media has become 21st century's culture of
communication. Mostly among new generation, it is very much popular. Social Media has

Caltlin Dewey. More than 26 Million People have...; June 29, 2015;
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-intersect/wp/2015/06/29/more-than-26-million-people-havechanged-their-facebook-picture-to-a-rainbow-flag-heres-why-that-matters/ (accessed November 2015)

also become platform for sharing information. Different newspapers and electronic media
have their presence in social media. It has become way of protesting against the government
or any other higher authority. Social media has become a mean of collecting funds for
different projects. These days, one can do everything in social media. Hence, the number of
users for Social Medias is increasing day by day.
The following picture shows users categorized according to the Social Media as in January,
2015. As per the graph below, Facebook seems to be the largest Social Media with widest
reach to the 1,3 billion population. Facebook is followed by QQ which is Chinese version of
Facebook. As Facebook is banned in China, it is rarely used there. Some people however use
proxy application to use Facebook even in China. WhatsApp seems to be the biggest Instant
messenger with 600 million users. It is followed by messenger, which is application to send
messages to Facebook friends. Messenger is followed by Wechat which is again a Chinese
Instant Messenger. The micro-blogging site Twitter ranks in 10th position with more than
250 million users.

Fig.1: Leading Social Networks3

Terrence. 5 Social Media Trends For 2015 That All Social Media Marketers Should Know About; January 26,
2015; http://www.hashmeta.com/blog/5-social-media-trends-for-2015-that-all-social-media-marketersshould-know-about/ (accessed November, 2015)

The present picture of usage of Social Media Platform had various stages of adoption. It took
almost two decades for Social Media platform to be part of our daily life and to grow as
modern day communication culture. This whole history can be divided in two sections:

2.1.1 History of Social Media Platform4

'According to Rogers' (1962) work Diffusion of Innovation the adopters of new technologies
are categorized into five groups. The first 2.5% of users are termed as innovators. They are
the early group of users of any new technology. At this phase of adoption the technology
remains in its testing phase. The next 13.5% are called early adopters. This group of adopters
is the risk taker and the ones willing to try new stuffs. They are then followed by the next
34% of the early majority and the next 34% of late majority. The first 34% are the major
influence creator in the market. The late majority is a crowd that lets first majority to try and
give some feedback. The remaining are the ones that do not like changes or the ones who
adopt the changes really late. This is the later 16% of the users group. They are termed as
laggards due to their lack of excitement toward the technology and their nature of adopting
technology really late.
Social Media Platforms such as Facebook and MySpace had these categories of users. This
process took 15 to 20 years for them as well. Some Social Media Platform such as Hi5 died
in the process due to lack of their innovativeness and limited users. Facebook however is
growing day by day and is introducing innovative ways of communicating for its user every
time. The recent change in Facebook includes the ability to keep videos as profile picture
(now it might be called profile video instead of profile picture)
Social Media Platform started appearing since late 90s with the sites such as
SixDegreees.com. The users witnessing these social platforms and adopting them are
categorized as innovators. They existed till 2003. Early adopters began using Public Social
Network Platforms such as MySpace, LinkedIn, and Facebook making such platforms widely
successful by 2005. Public Social Network Platforms were pushed to the critical masses by
4

Cardon & Marschal; June 1, 2015; The Hype and Reality of Social Media Use for Work Collaboration and Team
Communication; Journal of Business Communication;
http://web.a.ebscohost.com/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?sid=9e3a9573-1ff6-4728-8512971dbfb29b4f%40sessionmgr4001&vid=0&hid=4206 (accessed Jan 2016)

early majority from 2005 to 2009. From 2009 till 2012, the late majority adopted Public
Social Network Platforms. The users adopting Public Social Network Platform are the
laggard. The following picture shows the users of Public Social Networking Platforms
categorically.

Fig.2: The categorical adoption of Public Social Networking Platform5

Cardon & Marschal; June 1, 2015; The Hype and Reality of Social Media Use for Work Collaboration and Team
Communication; Journal of Business Communication;
http://web.a.ebscohost.com/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?sid=9e3a9573-1ff6-4728-8512971dbfb29b4f%40sessionmgr4001&vid=0&hid=4206 (accessed Jan 2016)

2.1.2 History of Instant Messenger6

It might seem that instant messaging is a newer concept however it came into existence
earlier than the Social Media Platforms. To be more precise, it was there even before the
existence of World Wide Web.
The first system that allowed humans to send text based messages (similar to emails and
instant messages these days) came into existence in mid 60s. It was called Compatible TimeSharing System (CTSS). Created at MIT's (Massachusetts Institute of Technology), it
allowed 30 users to get into the system at once and send messages to each other. This is so far
the oldest form of what we now know as instant messaging. This was then followed by many
similar services. However, they were all limited within the research institute and computer
lab to exchange information regarding to the current researches.
America Online (AOL) previously known as Q-Link (Quantum Link) released in 1982 by
Commodore International is one of the oldest Instant Messenger outside research lab. It
allowed the Commodore 64 PC users to send texts through its intranet. Later on in 1996, ICQ
launched by Mirabilis, was able to connect broader market of online users. It was invented by
an Israeli Company. This system allowed users to send messages to more than one person at a
time, transfer files, search other users and do more using ICQ.
AOL later acquired ICQ in 1998 and sold it again in 2010. In late 90s AOL launched yet
another Instant Messenger called AIM. It dominated the Instant Messaging market by 2005.
It has altogether 53 million users from around the world.
Yahoo!Messenger is another successful Instant Messenger from the past days. It chat rooms
and address books similar to that of AOL. It also included smiley and ability to send pictures
in its later verson. Lately, it started supporting video calls as well.
Windows Live Messenger is also one of the popular Instant Messenger from earlier days. It
was popularly known MSN. It exists till date and is now. However, like Yahoo!Messenger
and MSN are the Instant Messenger used by old school that existed before the smartphone
generation. These Instant Messengers were mostly used in PCs.

Petronzio; Oct 25, 2012; A Brief History of Instant Messaging; http://mashable.com/2012/10/25/instantmessaging-history/#5gWlijyLzEq9 (accessed Jan 2015)

Fig. 3: A Quick Picture of

History of Social Media7
After the arrival of
Smart-phones
screen,

and

fancier

Messenger

touch
Instant

came

into

existence. Instant Messenger

like Yahoo!Messenger and
MSN were connected to the
respective email accounts
however,

current

days

Instant Messenger are more

often connected to the phone
numbers.

Whatsapp,

Facebook Messenger, Viber,

Snapchat, Skype are the
popular name now a days in
market.
The

difference

between

emails and instant messaging

is that instant messaging
supports, live chat whereas
email is almost one way
communication. Hence, it is
quicker

to

communicate

through instant messaging.

Its user friendly interface is
the other reason why it
became

popular

people in later days.

7

Bennet. July 4, 2013; A Brif History of Social Medial (1969- 2012) [Infographic];
http://www.adweek.com/socialtimes/social-media-1969-2012/487353 (accessed Jan 2015)

among

Social Media Chat is comparatively newer than Instant Messaging. Google Talk, MySpaceIM
and Facebook Messenger came in the market respectively in the years 2005, 2006 and 2008.
The reason why people are attracted more to the Social Media is also because of the variety
of services it provides. For example Facebook allows its user to post blogs (Facebook Notes),
videos, photos, status, etc very easily. It also allows to video chat or to send Instant
Messages. It includes all the services that get available in the market in slightly changed
form. That's why it has become the biggest Social Media Platform of the world. If it was not
blocked in China it could have won more users from there as well. Its advertisement helps it
to earn hefty income to stay in the market.

2.2 Social Business

The change in communication culture in general life has also changed the way businesses
work. Now a day, many business organizations are creating social network within the
organization to make communication within the organization more efficient in terms of time,
cost and effectiveness. This has favored those businesses to great extent. Similarly, they are
using social media to advertise their product and to remain in touch with their customers and
stakeholders.
Social Business is a term used by Bosch for well connected business. "By Social Business,
we mean everything that a highly connected company does. Once cooperation,
communication, and the creation and further development of ideas are being improved or
even made possible in the first place through networking, we are conducting Social Business
successfully. This is the basis of our motto: Cooperate Communicate Create."8
Enterprise 2.0 is other name for a business organization that has implemented Social Business
Concept. The term was coined by Andrew P. McAfee and according to him, "Enterprise 2.0
is the use of emergent social software platforms, or ESSPs, by an organization to pursue its
goals."9 To make it simple, Enterprise 2.0 is an attempt to create a well collaborated business
by using different networking platform that enables each and every employee to stay
connected to each other. There are similar other terms that define use of Social Media or say
web 2.0 technologies in an enterprise. Web 2.0, "a capacity for high user engagement,
intellectual rigor, frequent updating, and collective knowledge sharing based on an
underlying technological infrastructure of blogs, wikis, podcasts, photosharing, RSS feeds,
social bookmarks, and the like (O'Reilly, 2005; Anderson, 2007)" 10 , thus has been
incorporated by the businesses in different names such as Enterprise 2.0, Enterprise Social
Network, Corporate Social Network, Public Social Networking Platforms, and so on with
similar aims of being more and more connected.

Social Business Made Easy, Bosch (accessed September, 2015)

McAfee; November 1, 2009, Shattering the Myths About Enterprise 2.0; Harvard Business Review;
http://web.a.ebscohost.com/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?sid=dad27d38-9e69-4bdd-bcdefd1fba37c158%40sessionmgr4005&vid=0&hid=4206 (accessed Jan 2016)
10

Fahser-Herro & Steinkuehler; Winter 2009-10; Web 2.0 Literacy and Secondary Teacher Education; Journal
of Computing in Teacher Education; http://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ907119.pdf (accessed Jan 2016)

Bosch aims at creating a well connected enterprise with the help of its social networking
platform in its Intranet and they call it as Bosch Connect. It is a platform where every Bosch
employees has access to. They can create and manage their profile, create and follow
communities, wikis, forums, etc depending on the need of the department they work in. It
basically assures two way communications which is transparent for all. One can also create
events and invite the participants in it. These events can also be included in individual
calendars making it easy to remember.
This trend of using social networks within the firm is being common these days. According to
the research carried out by Frost & Sullivan, there were already 208 million subscribers of
full-suite enterprise social network in 2013. 11 The social networks used by firms to
communicate within the company are generally termed as Enterprise Social Networks or
ESNs in short. However, it has company specific terms as well. As mentioned above, Bosch
Connect is an Enterprise Social Network at Bosch. Enterprise Social Networks are sometimes
even called as Corporate Social Networks. However, this term is not very popular.
"Enterprise social networking focuses on the use of online social networks or social relations
among people who share business interests and/or activities.12 Enterprise Social Networking
Platforms (ESNPs), Enterprise Social Networks (ESNs), Corporate Social Networks (CSNs),
Social Software, or Social tools or whatever they are referred as, they basically are the
platform that provide opportunities to collaborate and communicate within the business with
the tools such as blogs, microblogs, wikis, forums, instant chat and messaging, file sharing,
opinion polls, bookmarks and RSS feeds.
Deloitte predicts over 90% of Fortune 500 companies will have partially or fully
implemented an enterprise social network by the end of 2013. 13 This shows how popular
these Enterprise Social Networks have become these days. There are many software
companies that offer such platforms. Here's a table showing ten business targeted social
networks and companies adopting them.
11

June 1, 2014; Social Networking Offers Increased Agility; CRM Magazine;

http://web.a.ebscohost.com/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?sid=a10727ea-f3eb-4ee0-9ed8237d5e37e91b%40sessionmgr4001&vid=0&hid=4206 (accessed Jan 2016)
12

Wikipedia. Enterprise Social Networking; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enterprise_social_networking

(accessed November, 2015)

13 Fee. July 14, 2013. 10 Enterprise Networks to Improve Company Communication;

http://mashable.com/2013/06/14/enterprise-social-networks/#LMwb.CP55Gqb (accessed November 2015)

Enterprise Social Networks

Companies That Use

Tibbr

Macy's, iHealth and InterPortPolice

Jive

T-Mobile, PWC, UBM and Critical Mass

Yammer

Shell, 7-Eleven and Razorfish

Social Cast

Nokia, Humana and SAS

Convo

The Next Web, TechCrunch and the Oxford

Leadership Academy

Kaltura

Best Buy, Coldwell Banker and Texas Instruments

Chatter

GE, Commonwelth Bank and NBC Universal

Zyncro

Retail and finance to Insurance companies and

NGO sectors

Socialtext

Blue Man Group, SouthEastern and Getty Images

Connections

IBM doesn't name the companies that use

Connections, but it does mention a few clients: "a
leading health insurance network with millions of
members and more than 3,000 employees," "a
training institute for continuing education with over
100,000 members," and "the world's largest
suppliers of building materials, with over 12,000
employees worldwide."
Table 1: List of Enterprise Social Networks and their Users14

14

Fee. July 14, 2013. 10 Enterprise Networks to Improve Company Communication;

http://mashable.com/2013/06/14/enterprise-social-networks/#LMwb.CP55Gqb (accessed November 2015)

Social media has not just encouraged businesses to use Enterprise Social Networks within
their companies but also to be present in trendy Social Medias such as Facebook, Instagram,
Youtube, etc. to maintain regular interactions with their customers. Social Media Marketing
is also one of the major implementation of the innovations made in the fields of Social Media
in business sector. Hence from a small restaurant to a big brand, all have started using
Social Media platform for their marketing and to maintain regular interaction with the
customers.
H&M, a clothing brand, uses Instagram (a social media where people share instant images) to
advertise its recent collection at stores. It has 11.7 million followers alone in Instagram. It
receives wide audience of its new clothing and products at stores and feedback via Instagram.
Similarly it has 25.3 million likes on its facebook page. 15
Hard discount stores such as Aldi and Lidl too have their facebook page which they use to
continuously interact with their customers. Normally, hard discounters believe in mouth to
mouth advertisement. However, their presence on social media shows that they have adopted
Lidl Germany has 1.9 million likes in its Facebook page.16 It publishes posts regarding its
new products available at stores and offers available. Peoples query regarding products and
services are answered instantly. The Facebook has made it possible for firms to verify their
page. If the responses from admin are quick enough they get an active blue check mark
meaning that the page is active. Aldi and Lidl are in Instagram as well.
Moreover, Zara, Deichman, IKEA, McDonalds, Bosch, Harvard University, etc all have their
active Facebook pages through which they are connected to millions of clients. Not just the
big names, there are over 45 million Facebook pages representing small and medium size
businesses around the world. The image below shows updated statistics on Facebook
community.

15

H&M Clothing (Facebook Page); https://www.facebook.com/hmdeutschland/?fref=ts (accessed December,

2015)
16

Lidl: Food & Grocery(Facebook Page); https://www.facebook.com/Lidl/?fref=ts (accessed December, 2015)

Fig 3: Facebook Updates17

41% of small business based on USA use Facebook page. 18 As it doesn't cost anything at all
to create a page for a business in Facebook, it is much popular among the small businesses as
they have very little budget for marketing. Similarly, it helps people to find about business
online. These days most of the people using smart-phones have access to internet. As
mentioned in the Hubspots website, a study suggested that '61% of global internet-users
research products online. (Interconnected World: Shopping and Personal Finance, 2012)'19
Hence, being social makes a business available in online searches. People can easily find out
about the businesses, and maintain a contact with the business. Being social also helps to
create brand awareness among the people. Facebook being the largest social networking site
existing in the world, it's a good platform to advertise the businesses. Therefore, the numbers
of Facebook pages representing brands, companies, artists are increasing day by day. As
anyone can open page in Facebook, it has made it possible for the business to verify their
pages. According to their activities in Facebook and responsiveness, the verified icon toggles

17

Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook Page);

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10102457977071041&set=a.529237706231.2034669.4&type=3&
theater (accessed December 2015)
18

Craig Smith Nov 15, 2015. By the Numbers: 90 Amazing Facebook Page Statistics;
http://expandedramblings.com/index.php/facebook-page-statistics (accessed December 2015)
19

The Ultimate List of Marketing Statistics; http://www.hubspot.com/marketing-statistics (accessed December

2015)

its colour. A white check-mark in blue coloured dot represents an active verified page of a
company with quick responsiveness whereas a grey turned verified sign means that the
messages sent to the page would not be replied quickly enough or say the responsiveness of
the page is not that good.

2.3 Advantages and Challenges of Social Business

Social Business concept has been rapidly adopted by businesses all around the world.
Certainly, these adoptions are based on the advantages of making a business social. Effective
communication in any business is helpful to achieve desired goal of a business. Social
Business Concept assures that part and not only the interaction between the employees but
also with the clients who care about the business. Social Business Concept also helps to
create a brand image of a business. However, there are some challenges to it.

A. Advantages of Social Business Concept

Social Business Concept emphasizes use of social media to communicate outside the business
and an Enterprise Social Network to communicate and collaborate within the business.
Hence, the advantage of this concept can be divided in two major parts:

i. Advantages of Social Media Presence

Social media has changed traditional one way communication through radio & tv
broadcastings, newspaper advertisements, posters & banners, etc. In old days, consumers had
no way to interact with the businesses or even if they had it was way more time consuming
and stressful. This has been all changed by social media. Now anyone can post about their
experience while using some product in facebook or twitter and simply put a hashtag to pull
attention of the company. The other way can be to go to Brand (fan) page of a company and
send a message or post a comment. Similarly it has also given advantage to business to
dismiss the rumours about their products or company being spread among their clients. The
advantages of use of social media for a business are as follows: 20

a. Establishes presence among the customers and general people with the help of Branded
"Fan" pages. It's easy to create Facebook pages or Youtube channel for any business. It
20

Merill, Latham, Santalesa, & Navetta; 2011; Social Media: The Business Benefits May Be Enormous, But Can
the Risks- Reputational, Legal, Operational- Be Mitigated; http://www.acegroup.com/us-en/assets/ace-progressreport-social-media.pdf (accessed November, 2015)

requires effort to continuously post on behalf of an organization. With that little effort, a
business can maintain its presence among its consumers or even wider audience.
b. Helps to spread authorized opinion regarding false rumours or negative comments in the
market. Social media makes it easy to spread any negative or positive thing in no time.
Companies can use this wider reach to make authorized statement to fight against any false
claim. The alternative can be a press conference and news based on that conference. If we
compare the cost and effort for these two alternatives, we can easily accept the fact that social
media is way more cheaper, convenient and effective way to voice the official opinion of a
business.

c. Helps to disclose public information to bigger mass. Twitter posts or Facebook post reach
many audiences these days than the publication in newspaper. The time it takes to reach this
greater mass is just few seconds. Even Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg choose social media
post to update about their projects these days. Bill Gates even writes blog post mostly to
inform about the activities of Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Mark Zuckerberg uses his
own facebook page to update company progress and his upcoming projects.

d. Helps to find out potential candidate for vacant posts via social sites like LinkedIn, Xing,
Step-stone, etc. There are many social networking sites used by graduates and students these
days to be seen by their potential employers. In one hand, it serves the students to present
themselves better in the job market and on the other hand it helps companies to find out best
candidate available to them in least price and effort. Social Media seems to offer the win-win
service for both.

e. Helps to get quicker feedback from the consumers. People post comments regarding the
restaurant they visited or a hotel room they booked in sites like Tripadvisor which helps
business to improve on regular basis. Even facebook reviews are easier way to gather
consumers voices regarding the service customers are getting.

f. Social Medias are also helpful in advertising contests or events, or any promotions being
offered by a business. These things help consumers to stay with the business. Even the hard
discounters such as Lidl or fast food restaurant McDonald do these stuffs.
Mondelez International, a snack and food company experimented by using social
media marketing in isolation. It spent all its advertisement budget to promote its valnilla
wafers: Nilla. VaynerMedia that took charge of their social media advertising created
targeted advertisemts for mothers under the campaign called "Momism". The result was that
Nilla Wafers Facebook page like increased by more than 340 thousand. Moreover the sales
went up by 9 percent in comparison to the same period in previous year (2012). 21

21

Segal. Nov2, 2013. Riding the Hashtag in Social Media Marketing;

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/03/technology/riding-the-hashtag-in-social-media-marketing.html?_r=0
(accessed November 2015)

ii. Advantages of Enterprise Social Network

Fig 4: Before and after the use of Enterprise Social Network22

The above picture is the simplest explanation of what Enterprise Social Network can deliver
to a business. ESN basically organizes communication within the business and assures its
effectiveness. It avoids bureaucratic movement of information and thus saves time as well. It
helps to focus everyone to the goal of a business. It makes sharing of information easy via
blogs and wikis. It also helps to conduct meeting among the employees seated far away from
each other with the help of Web Conferencing tools, thus saving time and cost of travelling.
Here are some more advantages of ESNs or say implementation of Social Business
Concept:23

a. Connect & Engage

The main purpose of ESNs is to create a network to unite people and help them focus in one
goal. To serve this purpose, ESNs include various quicker and efficient way of staying in
touch of one another. Similar to Social Media like Facebook, you are able to post statuses,
22

https://www.exoplatform.com/lp/collaborationsoftware?utm_content=56809852552&utm_term=social%20collaboration%20software&utm_campaign=socialcollaboration&utm_medium=cpc&utm_source=Google&gclid=CjwKEAiA7_OzBRDA8OfT3orp51oSJACVqslIsjbiCiE_7Cyr84hu
EHrXC_hwZ1a77LC2AwCq4z2IKhoCVY7w_wcB (accessed December 2015)
23

http://socialcast.com/#free-signup (accessed December 2015)

send messages and like and share others posts. Integration of tools like Business Skype helps
in video conferencing with employees seated in different part of the world. Similarly the web
conferencing tools help to conduct trainings at global level. The forums available in ESNs
can help questions answered by related person in real time on any device. The communities
created can bind people related to one field in one place and also makes it easy to message all
members at once. The blogs can be used to update news regarding the company or a
department to be specific. Thus one of the major advantages of ESNs or Social Business
Concept in general is to assure efficient communication within the company and also to keep
employees engaged.

b. Work Smarter
ESNs help to work smarter. It helps to manage every 'document, deadline, and deliverables'.
Tools such as shared calendars make it easy to organize meetings. Certain appointments can
be created as events which are later reminded by the outlook. Wikis full of information help
anyone to reach desired information in few clicks without bothering anyone. Hence, it can
also work as a self-help tool along with a tool that encourages team-work.

c. Innovate Faster
Smart people use their brain and the smarter ones use their and the others brain that is
available to them. Steve jobs used Steve Wozniaks techno-mind to build one of the most
innovative companies in the world: Apple. A common platform for all the employees can
make it possible to "tap into the imaginations and ingenuity of every employee to drive your
business forward." Not only that, there are possibilities of creating "ideation blogs" specially
used for genuine ideas of employees. These blogs are later judged by others and chosen as
best idea and later implemented.

d. Centralize
ESNs help to gather all the information, projects and people in one place. Thus enhancing the
productivity and ease in accessing information. It also helps in supervision and control of
activities being conducted within the business.

B. Challenges of Implementation of Social Business Concept

Every invention has two way effects. They don't only bring advantages but makes us to face
new challenges and risks. Some of the challenges can be avoided by careful uses or by
adopting some precautions while others are unavoidable. However, it helps to face the
problem well if we know the problem well. Similar to the advantages of Implementation of
Social Business Concept, the risks or challenges can also be categorized in two categories:

i. Challenges and risks associated to the use of Social Media24

It's very easy to spread information in Social Medias. Information can be positive and
negative. Hence, it is very essential to understand this power of social media and act very
cautiously. If there are any negative rumours, it takes no time to reach wider audience and
blemish the company's image. Similarly, any kind of mishandling of intellectual property
might lead to legal troubles. There are risks of being hacked as well. Sometimes using social
media might cause unintentional download of malware that might infect whole company's
computer in network. This might cause great loss to the company. Therefore, the challenges
and risks associated to the use of Social Media by a company can be categorized into three
areas: reputational, legal, and operational.

a. Reputational Risks
Any bad behaviour by an employee or posting of awkward information in public platform
like "Fan" page on Facebook can cause reputational damage to the company. Any impolite
word toward a company, client, management or coworker can cause similar damage to the
company. Social media helps to earn reputation in short time. And is similar manner it might
also causes to lose reputation of the company. As quoted by Walter, Warren Buffet Said, "It
24

Merill, Latham, Santalesa, & Navetta; 2011. Social Media: The Business Benefits May Be Enormous, But

Can the Risks- Reputational, Legal, Operational- Be Mitigated; http://www.acegroup.com/us-en/assets/aceprogress-report-social-media.pdf (accessed December, 2015)

takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it. If you think about that, you'll
do things differently."25

b. Legal Risks
Social media activities might sometime lead in breaching of security. If some harmful
applications are downloaded while using social media or if some wrong clicks on spams or
similar links are made, it might infect companies computer causing loose of sensitive data.
This might sometime put company into legal trouble. Similarly, use of intellectual property in
company "Fan" page by any employee without consent with the owner of such property
might cause company to pay huge amount of fine or face a legal trial. If the employees
discuss some confidential trade secrets that a company is legally bound to protect, it might
put the company in trouble.

c. Operational Risks
During the use of social media at company's networked computer might sometime cause a
very big risk. If a virus or any malware is downloaded in one computer in such a network, it
infects all other computers in the network. Such unintentional activity might cause company
to lose important data saved in company's computer.
Sometimes frauds in social media replicate company's page and trick client to provide their
confidential information or download some malware. This might cause legal problem as the
client might fire a case against the company as it is company's responsibility to make sure
that no one else is misusing company's name to trick other and to warn it's client about such
possible mishap.

25

Walter. Nov 12, 2013; 10 Tips for Reputation And Crisis Management in the Digital World;
http://www.forbes.com/sites/ekaterinawalter/2013/11/12/10-tips-for-reputation-and-crisis-management-in-thedigital-world/ (accessed December 2015)

ii. Challenges and risks associated to the use of Corporate (Enterprise) Social Network

Similar to the risks and challenges associated to the use of social media by a company, there
are some risks associated with the use of Enterprise Social Networks as well. If the
implementation part doesn't go that well, company might end up bearing extra expenses for
no good reason. It can be due to less motivated staffs or by management that is not so eager
about the use of ESNs. Due to this reason there are some sad survey results regarding the use
of ESNs and other collaboration platforms.

Fig 5: Status of Use of Corporate Social Networks in Different Companies26

In the figure above it is seen that around 40% of the companies fail to reap the advantage of
Corporate Social Network. They have similar problem of employees being de-motivated
toward the use of Corporate Social Networks and Collaborative Platforms. Corporate Social
Network cost money to the company and if it is not used by employees and adding to cost
without delivering any positive results, the companies would certainly plan to deploy them.
Around 20% of the companies seemed to have reached the decision of deploying Enterprise
Social Networks and Collaborative Platforms.

26

LI. April 7, 2015. Why No One Uses the Corporate Social Network ; https://hbr.org/2015/04/why-no-oneuses-the-corporate-social-network (accessed December 2015)

Hence, the biggest risk of using Enterprise Social Network or any sort of Corporate Social
Network is not being able to take advantage from them and reach the decision of deploying
them. The other risks are similar to that of Social Media uses. It is a little safer as it is mostly
limited to the company employee so there is no presence of any party from outside the
company. However, it certainly makes it easy to motivate or de-motivate the employees of a
company. A positive message posted in company's Enterprise Social Network might give
positive vibes to all the employees. Similarly, a negative message posted will have negative
impact on all the employees throughout the company network.
Loss of interest in employees to use Corporate Social Network is other challenge for a
company that might make it difficult for the company to take advantage from this world
changing technology. The reason why the employee might lose interest in use of Corporate
Social Network has to do with change resistance too. Most of us like to do the stuffs we are
used to do. If the employees are told to communicate via Corporate Social Networks and use
Communities and Forums for sharing information, rather than Emails, they might find it
useless. Moreover, using forums available in Corporate Social Network is like posing
question in front of a big class for a student. People might fear being seen as an idiot and
hence prefer to ask such question in private mails. This doesn't serve the interest of using
public forum to make efficient sharing of information within the employees.
"The problem was simple and obvious because the top executives didnt see collaboration
and engagement as a good use of their time, employees quickly learned that they shouldnt
either."27 If the top executives are not engaged in Corporate Social Network, it might demotivate whole other employees. They might not see relevancy of the use of Corporate Social
Network because management doesn't see any relevance. After all, management is role model
for many staffs in many ways. If the management is not so involved, the staffs don't bother to
get involved in such activities
Similarly, the other problem related to implementation of Social Business Concept is that the
employees in middle-ages or old ages are not used to with the Social Media. It might take
time for them to get used to these platform. However, the new generation who grew up using
Social Medias would find it way less complicated and rather helpful.

27

LI. April 7, 2015. Why No One Uses the Corporate Social Network ; https://hbr.org/2015/04/why-no-oneuses-the-corporate-social-network (accessed December 2015)

2.4 Measures to Face the Challenges and Mitigate Risks

There's a saying, 'if there is a will, there is a way.' There are certainly ways to mitigate risks
associated to the Social Media Uses by a company and to reap the investment made to
implement Enterprise Social Network in the company.

a. Leadership involvement28
Leadership involvement is very crucial part in implementation of Social Business Concept in
any organization. Employees will not engage themselves in something which leadership
doesn't care. They would like to see that their input matters and is crucial for management
decisions. The leaders need to be often in such spaces so that the employees too could take
their initiative as some guiding lines.
Li, in her article presents an example of Red Robin, a restaurant chain with a little less than
500 branches, where Yammer, a Corporate Social Network was implemented. The
management decided to change their one of the recipe and via Yammer, they could collect
overwhelming amount of reviews. These reviews were first sorted and then sent to executives
and test kitchens. It took four weeks to get improved tested version of their menu. This
similar process would have taken 12 to 18 month without the use of digital platform. So the
only thing that made the difference was that the leadership did not only use the Corporate
Social Network but also showed enough interest in its implementation and made their
employee realize that their views are heard and they matter.
Li further gives an example of Rosemary Turner, the president of UPS North Carolina
District, who uses Twitter to connect with 17000 employees busy in their daily chores. Her
twitter posts about the updates on road accidents or pictures with employees and other job
related issues makes her employee feel that she is reachable every moment. It also works as
an inspiration for her employee to be more comfortable to trust her and maintain open
dialogue with her.

28

LI. April 7, 2015. Why No One Uses the Corporate Social Network ; https://hbr.org/2015/04/why-no-oneuses-the-corporate-social-network (accessed December 2015)

In another example she mentions David Thodey, the CEO of Telstra, the Australian
telecommunication company who posed a direct question in his company's Corporate Social
Network to know about the unnecessary processes and technologies. More than 700
responses flowed in within the first hour and helped Thodey to find out what was not working
right in his organization. He and his team used the platform to continue the discussion to let
the employees know that the management was seriously interested in their opinion and their
participation would make difference.
Even Mark Zuckerberg and Bill Gates use Social Media platform to constantly inform and
get guided by their "Fans". They sometime respond back to the comments that they like the
most. This gives reason to the millions of their "Fans" to constantly follow up what they are
doing and get involved in the discussion.

b. Careful use of Social Media Platform29

Social Media has to be taken real seriously than ever. People mind if their comments or
queries go unanswered even if it was posted as a comment in Social Media. Therefore, there
should be regular interaction with the "Fans" or say clients and their concerns should be
heard timely. Removing negative comment just because they are negative might not be the
best solution. Instead, companies can find a better way to address those negative comments
and try to calm the client. It might set an example for other client as how the organization
deals with negative comments. The responses give in Social Media should be well thought
and avoid any kind of further misunderstanding or issues. One should be very sensitive while
using each and every word. The posts and responses should be calmed one rather than the one
full of emotions. Emotions might sometime carry us away make us to post something which
we might regret later.
It is better to have a special team to handle Social Media activities of an organization. They
should have better knowledge of how things work in Social Media and how to handle
situation from getting worst from worse.

They should monitor any kind of rumour or

activities against the organization in time and act to minimize its impact before it gets
29

Walter. Nov 12, 2013; 10 Tips for Reputation And Crisis Management in the Digital World;
http://www.forbes.com/sites/ekaterinawalter/2013/11/12/10-tips-for-reputation-and-crisis-management-in-thedigital-world/ (accessed December 2015)

uncontrollable. Making guidelines for Page or Community might help to deal during some
confusing situations.
Additionally, it is wise to have a person who knows the organization in and out and loves the
customer. S/he too should be an expert with adequate Social Media Skills. This will help in
crisis management as well as to maintain the good image of the organization in Social Media.
A good image adds to the goodwill or brand of an organization. Therefore, to hire a
professional would certainly be a good investment for the organization.
Similarly, the access to the social media should also be managed carefully. An angry
employee having access to the company's authorized Social Media page might post some hate
comments about the company causing loss of face for the company management. It is always
wise to take control of such things before things go bad.

c. Engage Proper Legal Team30

It is wise to consult lawyers in early stage of planning Social Media Strategy. That way the
possible legal risks that the organization will have to face might be sorted out in the very
beginning. This will help to provide any kind of legal troubles for the company. This step
might also be helpful to create rules and regulation or guidelines for Social Media Usage and
activities in Corporate Social Network.
Since, the third party site guidelines can differ as per the Social Platform being used and there
might be updates time to time so a legal team can be helpful in tracking such changes and
updating other employees about them. Moreover, any employee might have some query
regarding the legal risk related to his certain activity (for e.g. using Google images in a Fan
Page without mentioning the source or taking proper consent with the copyright owner of the
material). It would be far safe to have a legal team that handles such queries on time and
provides further guidance to avoid future claims against the organization.
'Google culture' and 'copy & paste' options has made internet full of material that are not
genuine. As an individual, such acts might be overlooked by the person or the company
30

Merill, Latham, Santalesa, & Navetta; 2011; Social Media: The Business Benefits May Be
Enormous, But Can the Risks- Reputational, Legal, Operational- Be Mitigated; http://www.acegroup.com/usen/assets/ace-progress-report-social-media.pdf (accessed November, 2015)

holding copyright. But as soon as it is an enterprise doing the same, the rightful owner of the
copyright material might sue against the enterprise for violating the copyright. This might end
up in payment of huge amount of fine for copyright infringement.
Moreover, legal trouble that might come in future due to some fraudulent act of some
individual using fake Facebook page similar to the name of the enterprise might also cause
lot of trouble to the company itself. A legal team might be very useful to handle such
situation.

2.5 Success Story of Implementation of Social Business Concept

A. Philips Case Study31

'Royal Philips Electronics is a Netherland based company working in Health and Well-being
sector since 1891. It started from light bulbs and slowly expanded in other home appliances.
Philips radios, tape recorders and electronic shaving machines changed the way people used
to live. From 90s, it started concentrating in medical sector and producing medical
equipment easier and comfortable for health workers and patients as well. By now it is one of
the worlds established brand in health and well being sector. Philips is still fully committed
to innovation and dedicated in introducing edge cutting technology in health and well being
sector. '32
Philips with 120,000 employees spread all around the globe in different time zones had a
challenge to face. It wanted to bring all these widespread expertise in one place so that they
could work as a small and motivated team focused in single organizational goal. In 2010,
they started looking for some Corporate Social Network that could help them out to reach
their goal of creating a common platform for its employees scattered around the globe.
They chose Socialcast as their Enterprise Social Network. Being in Socialcast helped Philips
employees to find and follow experts related to their field by looking into their profile. They
could simply post their question and get answered. Expertise all around the world were happy
to share their knowledge with the employees working all around the globe. The Socialcast
users rose from mere 400 to 40,000 and are still increasing. Socialcast has helped to get
involved in company-wide themes and initiatives, sharing ideas, responding to businesscritical issues and to follow the company's progress in its business policy.
By using Corporate Social Network, they could share information that was limited to one
department across the globe. More people got to know what was going on in the company
and keep themselves updated with their organizational developments. Similarly, half of the
questions posted started getting answered within an hour and almost 90% were answered
31

VMware, Inc. 2014; Philips Case Study: Enterprise Social Networking Enables Philips to Extend Knowledge
and Accelerate Innovation; http://socialcast.com/files/Philips-Case-Study.pdf (accessed December, 2015)
32

Koninklijke Philips N.V., 2004 - 2016. More than a Century of Innovation and Entrepreneurship;
http://www.philips.com/a-w/about/company/our-heritage.html (accessed December, 2015)

within 24 hours. More people could access the knowledge base of the company.
Consequently it became easy execute task and speed up the flow of innovative ideas within
the company. It also helped to improvise the customer care.
Philips also launched crowd sourcing projects such as "All Employee Jam". In this project
they asked their employees to bring up their stories related to the Philips Mission and Vision.
The aim of this discussion was to 'bring life to the company's new, refreshed Mission and
Vision statement.' They were overwhelmed to see 390 true stories based on personal
experiences posted by employees from 43 different countries from around the world. This
was more than they expected. These stories were praised and liked by over 3 thouusand users
and there were over 1 thousand feedback from among the readers. This project alone
contributed to add more than 800 new members to the company's corporate social network.
The participation in this project motivated the employee even more and brought them closer
to company Mission and Vision.
To sum up, implementation of Social Business Concept in Philips brought three major
effects: it increased collaboration among Philips employees, helped sharing expertise and
solving problems, created an engaged community and revived their association with Philips.
Philips did a lot to make the implementation process successful. They asked leaders to
personally approach their employees to tell their stories. They updated events or say progress
being made in Corporate Social Network in their intranet so that the people who are still not
inside the network could inform themselves about it. They used the active users of Corporate
Social Network users as a model to inspire other users. They trained the executives and
provided an assistant to coach them during the program. The participation of senior leaders
inspired other employees to participate in the program. The major achievement from this
huge participation was that it helped to raise greater awareness of Philips' new aims and
objectives.

3. Hochschule Furtwangen University

3.1. Introduction
'Hochschule Furtwange University (HFU) has over a hundred and sixty year of history. It was
established on 5th March, 1850 as a Baden School for Clockmakers by Robert Gerwig to
enhance clockmakers skills. After a little less than 100 years, with gradual inclusion of other
engineering courses, in 1947, it turned into Engineering school Furtwangen owned by the
state government. In 1971 it was name Fachhochschule Furtwangen FHF and offered various
training programs in electronic and information technology. After the expansion of FHF in
Villingen-Schwenningen in 1988, it started offering courses such as Media Science,
Automation Technique, Mechanical Engineering, Medical Engineering, International
Business Management, etc. The third HFU campus was established in 2009 in Tuttlingen.'33
It got its present name and logo, HFU in 2005 34 HFU is still growing and offering new
courses every year. HFU currently has 9 faculties in altogether 3 campuses.35
Campus Furtwangen

Campus Schwenningen

1. Digital Media (Digitale Medien)

7. Medical and Life Sciences

2. Gesundheit, Sicherheit,

8. Economics (Wirtschaft)

Campus Tuttlingen
9. Industrial
Technologies

Gesellschaft
3. Wirtschaftinformatik
4. Informatik (IT)
5. Wirtschaftsingenieurwesen
6. Mechanical & Medical Engineering

33

Geschichte; HFU Website; http://www.hs-furtwangen.de/willkommen/die-hochschule/zahlen-undfakten/geschichte.html (accessed Jan 2016)

34

History (From 1850 untill today); http://en.hs-furtwangen.de/welcome/the-university/facts-andfigures/history.html (accessed Jan 2016)

35

Fakultaeten; HFU Website; http://www.hs-furtwangen.de/willkommen/die-hochschule/fakultaeten.html

(accessed Jan 2016)

3.2. HFU in Numbers36

HFU did not just expand its campuses and faculty but also earned a huge number of students.
Similary, the number of administrative staffs and Professors has also increased. The increased
number of students and faculties show that HFU is gradually growing and getting bigger and
bigger.
In the winter semester of 2000/2001 there were 2,635 students. Out of them, 11.1% i.e. 292
students were the internationals. This number has increased by more than two and half times
and reached 6643 in current semester (winter semester 2015/2016). The number of
international students pursuing their higher education at the HFU has reached close to
thousand. It is now 14.9% of the total students studying at the HFU. IF we see campus wise
growth in number of students, HFU Furtwangen had in total 1786 students sharing 67.8% of
total student population where as Schwenningen shared the rest 32.2% of the student which
was a little less than 850. There was no HFU Tuttlingen by then. However in winter semester
2015/2016 the ratio has changed. HFU Furtwangen has 3534 students. It accounts to 53.2%
of total HFU students. This is around two times the number of students at the HFU in winter
semester 2000/2001. HFU Schwenningen has done a lot better and has achieved 2491
students which is almost 3 times the number of students it had in winter semester 2000/2001.
HFU Schwenningen shares 37.5% of the total student which is more than that of winter
semester 2000/2001. The rest 618 students which is close to 10% of the total HFU belong to
the HFU Tuttlingen.
As mentioned in HFU website, there are 172 professors in total, 420 other employees and 288
part-time lecturers and professors (as of 1st April 2015). There are altogether 142 partner
universities all around the globe. The student exchange program is therefore one of the most
attractive offer that lures student in pursuing higher education at the HFU.

36

Zahlen und Fakten; HFU Website; http://www.hs-furtwangen.de/willkommen/die-hochschule/zahlen-undfakten.html (accessed Jan 2016) (The number of faculties and faculty members were recently ammended)

4. Communication within the HFU

As from previous chapter, it is clear that the HFU family is increasing gradually. As big it
becomes, communication becomes difficult. The amount of information created and to be
transferred also increases. HFU being an educational institution, sharing of information is
also one of the crucial issues here. The students and professors conduct many researches each
year and to let everyone know the outcome of such research is very much necessary to make
the research meaningful and worthy of hard work done by professors and students
participating in it. Similarly, the students need to contact with the professors regarding their
curricular activities. The professors need to share their study materials with the students. The
communication between HFU administration and students is equally important. The HFU
itself too need to communicate many things to the students and the professors as well. To
sum up, there is a two way communication between HFU administration, professors and
students.
These three parties share huge amount of information with each other on daily basis. HFU
provides several ways to conduct these communications. The major three among them are:
Study Portal, Webmail, and Felix (a learning platform).

4.1. Study Portal37

Study portal is a platform where students can see their report cards, know about the exams
they are registered, re-register themselves for new semester and ex-matriculate themselves. It
is an online version of HFU administration to publish student's status regarding the courses
taken at the HFU. One can also edit his personal contact information in Study Portal.
Study Portal is also available as an application for smart phones. One can see summary of
credits accumulated in all the study modules. Similarly, a user can choose to see his/her
performance in certain compulsory subject as well as an elective. One can also see the
registered subjects whose grades are not yet available.
Studiportal has a quick link for the web version of online study portal where one can again
see the detailed transcript of passed exam and the list of exams one is enrolled. Studiportal is
37

weblink: https://studi-portal.hs-furtwangen.de/qisserver/rds?state=user&type=0

one of the apps by HFU that actually works well. It was developed by Christian Wuertner in
2014 as given in the description of the application itself.

4.2 Webmail38
Just like any other website offering email, webmail offers the similar service. One main
benefit of using webmail over other emails to contact anyone enrolled in HFU or HFU
professors and staff is that, if you know their first name or last name, you can easily find their
email addresses. The matching email address for certain family name or first name is shown
in a dropdown menu from where you can select the one you want to email. This would not be
so easy in other general mails unless you have already sent them email or you have saved
their email address in contact.

4.3 Felix39
Felix is a platform that supports internet based learning and exchange of information. Felix is
a platform which is popular among students at the HFU as a platform to find out lecture
presentation files. Similarly it is also used as a gateway to online language portals. In some
lectures, students even get their home-works and results of their test in Felix. It's basically a
platform to share information among, which is mostly one way, i.e. from professors and
lecturers to the students. The same ID and password is used to log into the study portal,
webmail and Felix as well.
Felix offers many services. The home page of Felix has a quick link to course, calendar,
bookmarks, notification, groups, etc. Similarly, there are separate tabs for group, course
memeo and HFU services.

i) Bookmarks and notifications

The bookmarks and notifications are a little complicated function. When you visit a link you
have possibility to save it as a bookmark. For example when you are inside a course folder
38

weblink: https://webmail.hs-furtwangen.de/ox.html

39

weblink: https://felix.hs-furtwangen.de/dmz/

and you want to save the link so that you could easily reach there in one click you can click
on bookmark icon and it will be saved as your bookmark. Next time you want to visit the
folder you can simply click on the book mark and there you are.
Similary, the notification feature allows you to notify if any changes are made or if any extra
files are added to the course folder you are interested in. You can click the notification link
on the home page of felix and deicide to unsubscribe any folder anytime you want. You can
subscribe any forum, folder, wiki, task, file discussion and portfolios.40

ii) Courses
The course is one of the important for student to get the presentation of their lectures. It is
also one of the most used functions in Felix so far. There are separate catalog for separate
faculties. There are altogether 10 links for different faculties and some extra link for folders
that contain general information material not related to any specific faculty.
The course folder for Business English course by Ms Morag Lehman can be discussed here
as one of the best example of the course folder. 41 She offers this course to the IBM and IBW
students. The course materials are put in separate folder categorically. She has made it
possible for students to upload their assignment via felix. The information regarding the
changes in the course or other updates are published on regular basis in Message section. One
can subscribe it to be able to read the messages via emails.
"Basically I use FELIX to post all course information including scripts, script keys,
assignment topics, presentation topics and groups, for uploading and giving back grades,
posting extra information such as interesting links and as a messaging tool to contact all class
members. For these functions it works generally very well. Now that students have to pay for
the scripts, some students just use the one on FELIX in class or download it. This works well

40

Felix website; Subscription and notification; https://felix.hsfurtwangen.de/help/en/org.olat.core.commons.services.notifications.ui/home-notifications.html (accessed

Jan 2016)
41

weblink: https://felix.hs-furtwangen.de/auth/1%3A1%3A0%3A0%3A0/

and I think more students will do this in the future when they realize that they dont have to
buy a Script." mentioned Ms Lehman in her email.42
Morag Lehman was nominated for E-Teaching award43 for three times. The HFU has been
rewarding this prize to the professors, lecturers and instructors for using Felix in creative way
in their lectures each semester since 2008. Some of the examples of creative uses are: virtual
classroom to discuss literature and previously given assignments, live programming, online
assignments, etc.

iii) Calendar
Calendar can be used like normal other calendars to mark appointments. Normally, it would
have been nicer to somehow integrate HFU lecture plan and calendar. That would make more
sense as there are many other calendar offering similar services but not all the calendar can
show HFU lesson plan. This feature could be the unique selling point for the HFU calendar
and make it usable for the students.
Calendar offers changeable views for weeks and months.

iv) Groups
Groups are least used so far. There are some groups which contain nothing and some lead to
the respective course folders. Although groups offer various functionality of a social network
such as wiki, forum, discussion, group email, folders, etc. Anyone having access to Felix can
create his/her own group and start discussion like in any other social network. One can
upload files smaller than 52.4 mb. There are separate roles for the participants. The user
interface is not like that of common social network. However, one can learn it himself/herself
in no time.

42

43

Email from Ms Morag Lehman; see appendix

Preistraeger/innen: E-Teaching award; HFU website; http://www.hs-furtwangen.de/willkommen/diehochschule/zentrale-services/informations-und-medienzentrum/learning-services/hfulehrpreis/preistraegerinnen.html (accessed, Jan 2015)

v) MEMEO
MEMEO stands for Meet Me Online. MEMEO is one of the most advanced video
conferencing tool available in the market. It is way more advanced than Skype. MEMEO is
free of cost for all the students studying at the HFU. MEMEO offers various functionalities to
work online when physical presence is difficult. It allows to upload file and work together on
the same file which is not so common feature in Instant Messengers used in daily life that
support video calls. It supports voice calls and video calls as well. The MEMEO window
consists of video section, list of attendees, chat box and a work space. The host can choose
presenter and allow videos from the participants. The participant can then decide whether or
not to broadcast his/her video. Host can upload and share a presentation and give right to
others to do the same. These shared files can then be edited using smart board tools
available alongside the workspace. The host/presenter can make private/public notes.
There are many other features that can be very helpful to conduct an effective web
conference.
MEMEO requires Adobe Connect 9 to be installed in your PC. Once it is installed you don't
need to run any extra application to conduct a web-conference. It is available for mobiles too
under the name of Adobe Connect. The functions available for mobile version of the
application are very much similar to the one available for PC. However, there are some
functions such as smart board tools which are not there in mobile version. But to be honest,
MEMEO is a very fantastic tool for online collaboration.
MEMEO tab in Felix is just to give info about the web conferencing tool whereas the quick
link44 for the page to use MEMEO is available under HFU Services. You can log in to the
page using HFU ID.
One more advantage of MEMEO over other web conferencing tool is that it can be used to
conduct web conference with the participants that are not enrolled at the HFU. It has option
to let participants log in to participate or participate just by clicking the link and providing
their name. This feature makes it even more useful. Imagine a student willing to
enroll in HFU having a web-conference for taking part in an introductory program through
MEMEO.

44

weblink: https://memeo.hs-furtwangen.de/

a. Advantages of MEMEO for Professors and Students:45

MEMEO can be very useful to conduct a fruitful conversation without the participants
being in same place.

It is helpful for the professors to provide supervision to the student writing thesis
outside campus. This will benefit students as well as they don't have to be physically
available at the HFU even for a smaller advice.

It is helpful to conduct online-meetings with the students. This is mostly beneficial

during semester abroad or during thesis in some company outside campus.

It is helpful to manage projects with external partners regardless of their location. As

MEMEO can be used to participate in a web conference without logging in anywhere,
the external partner can easily participate in web-conference via MEMEO.

MEMEO can be used during project works for discussion among the student
especially when it's difficult to get a common time to meet each other.

MEMEO can also replace Skype or any other Instant Messenger allowing video chat
and help students to prepare during exams by sharing their notes and allowing them to
work together in a same page.

It helps professors to conduct virtual classrooms

With all these advantages, MEMEO too has some limitation. It is limited for its usability in
web-conferencing only. It cannot be used to send instant messages. This would have helped
to replace the obligatory use of webmail to communicate with the HFU administration or
professors and even the students. It would have been great if MEMEO was somehow
integrated with the HFU contact list to make it easy to invite certain people to conduct videoconferencing. Adding a feature to quick text any HFU member (this function can be made
limited to the users registered at the HFU) could make life way easier. Since it's already
available in mobile, it could be an Instant Messenger for HFU members.
Looking at the various features of MEMEO and its report regarding meeting, it still seems to
be in its developmental phase. It has not so often been used by professors neither is
introduced to the students. However, when it is effectively used, it seems to be boon for HFU
students, professors and faculty members.

45

MEMEO, Felix Lernplatform; HFU Website; https://felix.hs-furtwangen.de/auth/1%3A1%3A0%3A0%3A0/

(accessed Jan 2016)

vi) Video2brain46
This is available as a quick link under HFU Services menu. Video2brain is a platform where
you can find various video trainings over different subjects in German. It is a platform that
contains 1,553 video based seminars, 69,296 video lessons worth more than 40 thousand
Euros.47 It normally costs 19.95 Euros per months for the general subscribers but for HFU
students, they can log in with their HFU IDs and apparently can access the video library for
free of cost. The premium subscribers can download the training video via Video2brain app
available for android, windows and iOS. However, the video has either to be deleted after the
end of subscription period or to be purchased for further use.
Video2brain is a linked in company based in Austria. For HFU students Video2brain stands
for a video library where they can find lots of useful video trainings to help them out in their
studies as well as in attaining some new skills. Video2brain being a platform targeted for
academic use or say educational use, you can rely on the information you gain there. These
videos trainings are mostly provided by the experts of their fields. Hence, these videos are
credible than the normal videos one can find in YouTube. The videos available are
categorized under different topic making it easy for the user to find desired video without any
trouble. Some of the categories available are business-skills, marketing, programming, photo
editing and photography, web etc.
Video2brain is the first platform in Europe to provide video trainings and exists since 2002.
They have videos in several languages such as English, German, French and Spanish on
various topics.
The major customers of Video2brain along with HFU are Technical University Munich, TU
Kaiserslautern, Hohenheim University and others.

46

webink: https://www.video2brain.com/de/edu-login

47

Video2brain website; Vorteil; https://www.video2brain.com/de/abos#vorteile (accessed Jan 2016)

vii) Lynda48
Lynda is another service available for HFU students in Felix. Its quick link is available under
the menu HFU services. Just like Video2brain it is also a video library that contains video
trainings and lessons over different topics. It is basically in English. However, you can switch
to German language and access to the videos available in Video2brain. Lynda.com, Inc is
also a linked in company founded in 1995.49
The quick link under HFU services doesn't work (it might be a temporary problem). However
you can directly go to the website and log in using hfu URL. Lynda offers various type of
membership similar to that of Video2brain. Moreover, it offers group membership as well
with all the access and rights.

48

weblink: https://shib.lynda.com/Shibboleth.sso/InCommon?providerId=https://idp2.hsfurtwangen.de/idp/shibboleth&target=https://shib.lynda.com/InCommon
49

Lynda Website; About us; http://www.lynda.com/aboutus/ (accessed Jan 2016)

5. The HFU with the Outside World

An organization has not only to communicate within itself but also with the outside world.
There are many outsiders willing to know about the organization. They can be possible
investor or the interested customers. In case of HFU, the students seeking for the opportunity
of higher education at the HFU are the possible customers. Similarly, HFU need to make the
world aware of its presence by creating a brand. That is possible if HFU can communicate its
mission and vision effectively to the outside world. Similarly, the HFU need to showcase
what is in it for the student if they choose the HFU as their destination for higher
education.
There are several ways for an organization to communicate with the outside world. The
company advertisement in various magazines or in electronic media channels is one way to
make people remember the name. After all advertisements are merely peeps into the product
or service offered by the organization. Just like the trailer of a movie, it gives summarized
information of the unique selling points of the company. Similarly, an attractive website with
easy user interface where visitors can find information easily is a must in today's digital
world. Moreover, the world has become social and hence the organization too has to become
social. They need to reach out to their target audience. If their target audiences are in social
media, they ought to be there as well.
The HFU has used advertisements, website and Social Medial pages to reach the outside
world. One can see the advertisement of the HFU courses while travelling with the German
trains (Deutshe Bahn). The HFU website is well managed and regularly updated medium to
get information about the HFU. It is available in both English as well as German. However,
the German site has more information and is regularly updated in comparison to the English
site. Similarly, the Social Medial fan pages representing the HFU are also one of the easiest
ways to get updated about the HFU. The Social Media pages available in Facebook seem to
be more responsive and interactive.
More on the ways the HFU is connected with the outside world can be discussed under
following topics.

5.1 The HFU Website50

The HFU website is available in both English and German languages. The English version of
the HFU website does not contain the same amount of the information as the German version.
There is sometime different information available in same web page if seen in English and
German language. The German version of HFU page seems more complete and regularly
updated in comparison to the English version of the HFU website. There are some pages in
English version of the HFU website which are not yet complete. 51
The welcome page of the HFU website consists of slide show of current HFU notices and
news threads. On the top-right is the calendar that displays future events at the HFU. The sub
tabs of the welcome page consists information about the university itself, research
opportunity at the university, opportunity for studying abroad as well as information for the
internationals at the HFU and so on. Every sub tab opens with a pointer hovering over it and
has a quick link for the services provided by HFU such as webmail, felix, lesson plan, library,
etc. on the right hand side. HFU website contains a huge amount of information for every
kind of visitors to it.
Besides the welcome page, the HFU website has separate tabs for student interested to join
HFU, companies, the students studying at the HFU, the staffs and the Alumni. Each tab
further has sub tabs with related information for the students, companies and staffs. Again
these sub-tabs open with a pointer hovering over them. Each sub-tab has similar quick links
for HFU services like that of the sub-tabs of welcome page. This categorical division of
information for the visitors with different interest has actually made it easy to fish
information. Moreover, the search box at the top right corner of the website can always be
useful to search information using key-words.

50

weblink: www.hs-furtwangen.de

51

weblink: http://en.hs-furtwangen.de/welcome/international.html

5.2 The HFU in Social Media

Apart from the HFU website, the presence of HFU at different social media has also helped
HFU to contact with the outside world. Unlike the features of the HFU services such as Felix
where log in is required to retrieve information, these social media pages are open for both
student and non-student of the HFU. Additionally, the success of social media can be
measured through like and involvement of subscribers in the posts made in the respective
pages. Similarly, the social media pages of the HFU help to conduct two way interactions
between the visitors of such pages and the HFU team.
The HFU is present in Social Medias such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Youtube, Xing
and LinkedIn. The German version of the HFU website contains the icons to some of these
social Medias. Similarly, the English version of the HFU website has a link to HFU
International, a Facebook Fan page of the HFU in English. This Facebook page is specially
targeted to the English speakers at the HFU. Moreover, the alumni section in the German
version of the HFU website has links to Xing group of alumni of different faculties at the
HFU. The HFU is also present in Youtube with 83 subscribers. It has some videos from its
past hangout sessions in it and few playlist of videos somehow related to the HFU but
uploaded in other youtube channels. Not only that, the HFU is also present in Instagram.
Instagram channel is full of some wonderful picture of the HFU surrounding. The HFU has
not spared twitter world either. It has been in twitter since 2008 December and has collected
huge number of fans till date. To sum up, the HFU has more or less maintained its presence
in different popular Social Media platforms.
The presence of the HFU in Social Media categorized as per the different social media is as
follows:

i) Facebook
Facebook being the worlds' largest Social media at present with 1.59 billion users52 using it
each month is the best platform to connect to the world. The HFU has several fan pages in
52 Mark Zuckerberg; Facebook Page;
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10102621100061261&set=a.529237706231.2034669.4&type=3&
theater (accessed Jan 2016)

Facebook. Hochschule Furtwangen53 (Zuckerberg, 2016), a varified Facebook page of the

HFU has 7.6k likes in the facebook. This is so far the most liked page of the HFU which is
verified. It has the rating of 4.4 stars out of 5 and has altogether 71 reviews in total. The posts
are in German language. The address is of Furtwangen campus. This page was merged with
HFU page recently and hence has got the highest number of likes among the HFU official
pages. The messages sent to the page are quickly responded, almost within a minute.
The other HFU page is for HFU Business School.54 It has total of 1.6k likes and 35 reviews.
It is rated 4.1 out of 5 stars. It has total of 35 reviews. It's address is of Schwenningen
campus. Its posts are all in English.
The third most popular HFU fan page in facebook is HFU International.55 As this page targets
international students studying at the HFU and the international students willing to study at
the HFU, it is in English language. It has altogether 1.4k likes. It's address is Furtwangen
Campus.
Apart from these three pages, there are many HFU related pages in Facebook. Not just pages
there are many facebook groups representing different batches of HFU students. They are
mostly used to circulate message to the classmates by the class representatives. The admin of
these groups are basically the class representatives and the membership of these sorts of
groups is limited to the students belonging to the same class only.
Making groups for different projects are also the common practices in the HFU. These groups
make it easy to work and share information among one another.

ii) Twitter
Twitter, a micro-blogging site that allows users to have their page and share their opinion in
limited number of character (i.e. 140 characters), is another bigger social platform where
HFU has been present since long. It has altogether 356 tweets (posts). It is followed by total

53 weblink: https://www.facebook.com/HochschuleFurtwangen/?ref=br_rs&rf=106203872748090
54 weblink: https://www.facebook.com/HFU.Wirtschaftsingenieurwesen/?ref=br_rs
55

weblink: https://www.facebook.com/HFU.International/?ref=br_rs

of 1197 followers. The user name for the HFU's official twitter account is hs_Furtwangen.56
The tweet language used in this twitter page is German. The most of the retweets in this page
are the posts of GLF Campus TV. GLF Campus TV produces videos covering news and
information regarding HFU.
The HFU's Twitter account was open in December 2008.

iii) Instagram
Instagram is another popular social media of present day. Basically Instagram is used to share
pictures and memes(photographs with funny quotes on them). These days it has also
integrated messaging facility. It was initially available for smartphones only but now a day
you can also log on to it in PC just like Facebook. You don't need any special app for that.
The HFU is present in Instagram with the user name Hs.Furtwangen. It has almost 62 posts
and close to 100 followers as of 12th January 2016.57

iv) Xing
Xing is a "career-oriented social networking site" that enables job seekers to meet their
potential job givers. It is in various languages including German. It allows individuals to
make their profiles with their professional achievements. It has basic membership for free and
premium membership for some nominal charges.
The HFU is available in Xing as an employeer.58 The page is in German and it has 4.58 stars
with 5 employee ratings.

56

hs_Furtwangen; Twitter page; https://twitter.com/hs_furtwangen (accessed Jan 12, 2016)

57

Hs.Furtwangen; Instagram Page; https://www.instagram.com/hs.furtwangen/ (accessed Jan 12, 2016)

58

Hochschule Furtwangen University; Xing Page

https://www.xing.com/companies/hochschulefurtwangenuniversity (accessed Jan 20, 2015)

Similarly, there are some groups of HFU alumni in Xing. One of them is "Network W
Hochschule Furtwangen University. It has 243 members and there is no description available
for the group.

v) LinkedIn
LinkedIn is a social networking site similar to that of Xing. It is also available in various
languages and has over 400 million users. Being on LinkedIn therefore means to get exposure
to these 400 million users.
The HFU has a page named "Furtwange University"59 in LinkedIn. It is followed by more
than 1.1k users. The description is again in German language.

59

Furtwangen Univesity; LinkedIn Page;

https://www.linkedin.com/company/74435?trk=vsrp_companies_res_name&trkInfo=VSRPsearchId%3A18633
59611453251025882%2CVSRPtargetId%3A74435%2CVSRPcmpt%3Aprimary (accessed

Jan 20, 2015)

6. Implementation of 'Social Business Concept' at the HFU

Prof. Dr. Nikole Hale once said during the re-entry seminar of IBM 2012/13 batch that to
update students of the HFU about the changes in department has not been so easy in the past
(even now). The university however is trying to reach the newest horizon in the coming days.
'Flying University over webinar' was one of the ambitious missions Prof. Hale mentioned
during the seminar.
Implementing 'Social Business Concept' at the HFU is an attempt to make the HFU a well
connected organization. It is to make the existing means and medium more efficient and
effective. Being a 'Social Business' might never have been the priority or the strategy of the
HFU whereas it has done a lot to establish itself as a well-connected business. The regular
improvement in the HFU website, the updates and changes in the Felix, the learning platform
of the HFU, presence in the social medias such as Facebook, twitter, Instagram, etc are some
examples of the HFU's attempt to become a well-connected organization.
Regarding the need of a networking platform for the HFU members, Dr. Sandra Huebner, the
department head of Learning Services at the HFU suggested that many features offered in an
enterprise social network is already available in Felix that can be used by all the HFU staffs,
Professors and Students. However, she claimed that these features are not being used so
often. She further mentioned that the Learning Services department of the HFU is focusing
in Felix instead of any other networking platform. When asked about future updates of Felix,
she herself was unaware and suggested to contact OpenOLAT, the service provider.
Felix as mentioned in earlier chapter is a great platform so far. There are too many features
which are overlooked in the felix. Most of the features are unused because no one knows
about them. During my own study period at the HFU, all we were getting from the felix was
the presentation files. Somehow, the user interface of felix is not very clear and one cannot
find an obvious way to learn more about it (unless you plan to write thesis on it). Services
such as MEMEO (skype like feature of Felix) and Video2Brain (video portal that can be
accessed via Felix) are some of the wonderful features that can help students a lot in online
collaboration and self learning activities. However, not many of the HFU students are aware
about such features in the HFU.
The survey results done to assess the situation and verify the need of "Implementation of
Social Business Concept" would be relevant to present here.

6. 1. Survey Results
According to the online research60 conducted to find out about the communication habit and
need assessment of a common networking platform for HFU members, many astonishing
figures surfaced. The main communication medium for the HFU students to get notices from
the university and to contact the professors is still the Email. Despite having so many
alternatives available in Felix, the learning platform hosted by university, the email
conversation is still the major source of information among students, professors and
university staffs. 62 out of 140 participants answered that they rely on emails mainly to get
information from the University. Similarly, the respondents relying on email communication
to contact department heads and Professors is close to 75% of the participants. The second
major source they considered to get information from the University was the Social Media
sites such as Facebook. Generally, the class representatives are requested in the beginning of
the semester to create a facebook group adding the entire class member to disseminate the
information they get. Probably, the participants were signaling toward the same source.
There is nothing wrong in using email. However, there are some drawbacks in using emails
to share information that are of public concern. The information in the Emails is limited up to
the receiver of such emails and if someone else requires same information, he/she has to write
similar one making it difficult for the source of information to respond each time. This adds
to unnecessary work load for the professors and university staffs. The huge amount of email
to the professors is sometime the reason why they are not answered in time.
For the question regarding how they share the research results to the other classmates, more
than half of the respondents suggested that they rely on Social Medias. When it is about
contacting many people in lesser effort, social media are the boon. The groups created in
Social Medias containing the class members are basically the major platforms where such
results are shared. Most of the exchange of information that takes place during a project work
is done via a facebook group that includes group members only. After the completion of such
project works these groups are left by the group members and the information in such group

60

online research; https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1qP8NhGSi2lGkCf9uogOiOtb8trpgziCZcZAb_0UBCU/edit?usp=drive_web (accessed Feb 3, 2016); see appendix

for details

remains buried in them. The information that could have been useful for other dies inside
some secret Social Media group.
There are few groups in felix created to perform similar project works. But they are very
limited. Many of the HFU students still rely on groups in Social Media as they find it easy
and user friendly. Besides, the class members are already in their facebook friend list making
it easy to add them in such group.
More surprisingly, 99 out of the total participants suggested that they never use University
Website to publish such project reports. This is a bit saddening. Actually, the University
Website should be the major platform to bring out the results of hard work of their students.
Similarly, it should be as an archive of information for further use. The result of one project
can be helpful to use in the other projects in future. Similarly, it might be used as a helpful
model for conducting project works in future. Hence, the University Website was supposed to
be the most used platform to share and save such project conclusions.
The participants were asked about the way they collected information about the university.
More than 50% of the participants said that they relied on Social Media contacts and
university website. The respondents relying on university website to collecting information
about the study opportunity at the HFU is higher than those relying on their Social Media
contacts. This response might be taken as a reason to keep the University website upgraded
timely. It might also be taken as an encouragement for the team handling university website
for being successful in helping out the students willing to continue their higher education at
the HFU.
Jutta Neumann the press officer (Pressreferntin) at the HFU suggested that the HFU website
is being re-launched with many upgrades in 2018.

61

Hopefully, this upgrade would also

include the inclusion of many imformation missing in English version of the HFU website.
For now, there is not only limited information in the English version of the HFU website but
also the information does not always match. So, the English website is not just the translation
of the German website of the HFU but it has sometimes different information as well.
Moreover, the search results in English result do not match with the search result in German
website. Searching "Jutta Neumann" in German website would lead you to the contents
where this name is mentioned including her contact page, whereas same search in English
61

see appendix: email from Ms Jutta Neumann

website would display no any results. Hence, it is very complicated to non-German speaker to
find relevant information in English version of the HFU website. Just as a reminder, the
numbers of foreign students are increasing semester by semester in the HFU. Every year the
HFU is introducing new programs both for bachelors and masters level in English. They
would be more effective if there will be diversity in such classes. As mentioned by Prof. Hale
in her lecture during regular conversation the HFU is planning to offer International Business
Management course with 50% foreign student participants in summer as well. However, the
HFU is not sure if they will get enough foreign applicants to participate in their program.
Improving the quality of the English version of the HFU website might help people to get
HFU as one of the top search result for English courses available in Germany for the
foreigners.
With regard to the question about ease of finding information from the HFU website, more
than 40% of the respondents claimed it to be easy. However, 36% were indecisive and chose
the "not so easy not so difficult" option. Similarly, more than one-fourth of the participants
suggested that it is difficult to find out relevant information in the HFU website. Although the
respondents in favour of the way one can retrieve information from the HFU website is more
than the ones finding it difficult to get information from the website, the HFU administration
should try to make it as an easy platform for all.
Regarding the question about the HFU's presence in Social Media, close to 80% of the
respondents replied that they were aware of the HFU's presence in the Social Medias. Only
12.9% of the respondents showed their ignorance about the presence of the HFU in Social
Media. Out of the respondents suggesting their association with the HFU in the Social
Medias 97.3% reported that they were associated to the HFU via Facebook. This figure
shows how important is the HFU's Facebook page and how powerful it has become by now.
The other Social Medias such as LinkedIn, Xing, Youtube, and Instagram were found to be
less popular among the participants of the survey. As a result, less than 5% said to have
followed the HFU's Instagram channel. A little more than 15% replied to have joined the
HFU page in LinkedIn making it the second most popular Social Networking Site among the
participants of the survey. A little more than 10% were associated to the HFU via Xing which
is similar to the LinkedIn. Around 7% said to have subscribed the HFU's youtube channel.
Similar results were discovered in chapter 4 while looking at the HFU pages in various
Social Media. The number of the followers of the HFU's page in the Facebook was the
highest.

The HFU's reach to their students via Social Medias can certainly increase if there are some
awareness programs in the HFU regarding their presence in Social Media. Thereafter, the
HFU will benefit by having broader audience bases for their posts via Social Media. Making
an individual like a post means informing everyone in his friend list about the post. If they
further like the post it reaches to their friend lists as well increasing the number of audiences
exponentially. Similarly, the HFU can also use their social Media platform to advertise the
courses available at the University during the admission period increasing the chances of
getting more applicants. Similarly, this will significantly reduce the marketing budget of the
HFU as the Facebook posts are way cheaper means to advertise in comparison to the other
marketing approaches.
Furthermore, close to 90% of the survey participants replied that the Social Media and instant
messenger are their major means of communication. The phone calls were the second mostly
used means whereas emails were the least chosen option. In fact, a fourth of the participants
even chose emails as a mean of communication which they never use in day to day life. The
aim of this question was to reassure the presence of the HFU students in Social Media. As
discussed in the chapter 1, the world has become social now and the social media
communication has become the communication culture of 21st century. To take benefit from
this opportunity, the implementation of social media innovation in an organizational
communication is very much important.
They were further asked about their comfort level in communicating their classmates via
social media. To this the one third of them mentioned that they are uncomfortable whereas
almost the same number of participants mentioned that they were fine with it. The other one
third of the participants were indifferent about the use of their personal IDs in social media to
communicate with the classmates and university staffs. The problem in using private social
media IDs for formal communication or in communication with people you are not that close
with might not always be preferable to everyone. Some people want to have a small friend
circle in Facebook and prefer to have limited audience to their personal posts.
Because of similar reasons as mentioned above, the majority of the participants supported the
idea of having a separate platform to communicate among the HFU members. The percentage
of the participants supporting the idea dwindled in between 70% to 80% depending on the
number of participants of the survey.

Fig 6: Survey Results62

The further explanation of this figure can be justified via the age group of the participants. To
identify which age group the participants are in, there was an additional question to mention
which age group they belong to. For each 10 participants of the survey 7 belonged to the age
group of 18-25. A little more than one fifth of the participants belonged to the age group of
25- 30. Throughout the survey time, there was a close correlation between the participants in
favour of networking platform for the HFU and the number of participants belonging to the
age group of 18-25. Similarly, the number of participants connected to the HFU via Facebook
is also very close to this figure. What we can assume from all this is that the generation that
grew up using Social Medias and Instant messenger in their day to day life prefer similar
platform for their academic as well as professional life.

62

see Appendix

6. 2. The HFU on Implementation of Social Business Concept

Although the HFU members contacted during the research phase to collect information about
the thesis topic had not much idea about the "Social Business Concept", however, the HFU
had done a lot in the field of being a well-connected business. The HFU fan pages in
Facebook are very much active and respond very quickly to the messages. The posts on the
official HFU page is all in German and there is an alternative page, HFU International, for
the non-German HFU students who do not understand German or want to follow updates on
the HFU in English. These Facebook fan pages usually contain all the information that might
be interesting to the students at the HFU such as about the library schedule, any events
beneficial for the students, new study programs at the HFU, etc. The HFU International
sometimes posts voice of the international students at the HFU.
Due to many facebook pages it is sometime not possible to get all the information at one
place and it would certainly cost more effort and time to manage multiple pages instead of
one page for the whole HFU with all information in it. Moreover the official fan page of HFU
being in German is difficult for the internationals to follow. The posts posted there are mostly
related to the students at the Furtwangen campus when it should be the ones relevant for all
the HFU students studying in all three campuses and even for the students willing to start
their higher education at the HFU.
Felix, the learning platform of the HFU actually offers similar features as available in any
enterprise social network. The collaboration between the students is supported via the tools
such as MEMEO, the online audio & video conferencing tool of the HFU. Moreover, the
students can create groups and exchange information among them. The links to access video
tutorials in Video2Brain and Lynda is an additional feature that helps the HFU student to
learn better. The course folders for different folders offer the related information for the
courses available at the HFU. However, the user interface is not so friendly and needs a little
bit of effort to understand. One cannot create normal blogs or any notes. It doesn't support the
feature of individual profile available for public viewing. Neither does it allow connecting
people just like in general Social Medias.
Despite of some similarity of Felix with the social networking platform, it's available features
are not often used by the students and professors says Dr. Sandra Hbner from Learning

services.63 It seems that there is lack of motivation among the professors and the students
and also many of the students are unaware of the features available in the Felix. These
features were supposed to be somehow integrated in the learning process at the HFU by
Professors and brought into use. However, it is limited to the certain professors. The HFU has
therefore established the E-Teaching award as an incentive for the professors to use Felix in
the best way they can. This has encouraged some of the professors and lecturers to use it in
optimal ways. While there are others who simply use it to distribute the lecture's presentation
slides.
The HFU department responsible for managing online learning services might be very much
motivated in regard of implementing social business concept at the HFU; however, they have
not been able to get proper support neither from the students nor from the professors. The
Felix is still in its developmental phase. The German version of the HFU website still needs
some simplification. The English website is incomplete and the social media pages are kind
of scattered. Thus, the implementation part needs serious attention.

63

email from Dr. Dr. Sandra Hbner; see appendix

7. Conclusion

To sum up all the above chapters, it is clear that the world has become more social than ever
and businesses have adopted social medial innovation in enhancing communication within
and outside the organization. The concept of establishing a business or an organization in
general is "Social Business Concept". The HFU being an organization that deals with
thousands of students from all over the world and close to 1 thousand staffs can always
benefit from a platform that connects all these students and staff within the HFU. Similarly,
the alumni networks and an official network for each faculty can be realized on this platform.
The HFU too need to communicate with the outside world so as to establish itself as one of
the desired destination for higher education in Germany. It needs to have effective marketing
to make the newly introduced courses successful. Social media marketing, which is a part of
establishing a well-connected organization, can be very useful in this case. Hence, the "Social
Business Concept" is very much relevant for the HFU.
So far from the survey and e-mail correspondence with the HFU staffs, it is clear that, there
have been some efforts made in the direction of establishing the HFU as a connected
organization. However, it has not been giving the expected results. The major reason behind
this is the lack of proper implementation strategy for such plan. Many of the students are not
aware about the HFUs presence in other Social Media beside Facebook. Besides, the need to
follow the HFU in social media is not clear and sometime the target audiences are also not so
clear. There is a language barrier that needs to be overcome to make one page relevant for all
the students that come to the HFU or the students that are planning to join the HFU for their
higher studies. Similarly, the Felix available for staffs (academic) and students lacks the
charm to motivate its users in consistently using it. The interface is not still clear and the
changes or the facilities available are not well communicated to the students neither is it
integrated somehow in the learning procedures so as to make both staffs and students used to
with such facilities.
There are some improvements that can be done or should be done to make effective
implementation of "Social Business Concept" at the HFU. For Social Media Fan Pages, the
HFU can use one page for all its purposes and appoint content creators from each campus to
post the posts related to the respective campuses. That way the main HFU page would be
more relevant to all the students studying at the HFU in different campuses and not only for

the students studying at the HFU Furtwangen. Similarly, the official page can be used to post
the official notices and notices regarding the examination or re-registration, semester routine,
etc. The posts in the pages can be made bilingual: English and German. It is not a very good
idea to have two official pages for same institution. That creates confusion and divides the
audience. Instead of having separate page for international center, library, faculty and so on
the HFU can appoint separate content editors for same Facebook page who would be
responsible to make posts and respond to the queries of their respective field. To make it
relevant for the non-German speakers in different campuses of the HFU, the official
Facebook Page of the HFU should actually use both the language instead of using German
language alone. The posts in the official page can be posted with English translation to make
it easy for the non-German speakers. The merging facility available in the Facebook can be
used to merge some pages that would not serve any interest. Moreover, the HFU can create
some Facebook contest to gather more likes. Launching a Facebook advertising campaign via
some professionals (just like in case of Nilla Waffers discussed in chapter 1) can also be one
of the ways to gain wider audiences for the official page.
For the Felix, there need to be some awareness program about the usefulness of its services.
The Students and the professors should know what tool available in Felix can serve their
interest and how can they use the different tools available in Felix in an optimal way. Apart
from these, felix needs some serious upgrades. These should be some easier way to add blogs
and wikis in each group so that the internal communication for certain subject or faculty can
be handled within the Felix. A group for a course (for e.g. IBM) where the course coordinator
posts useful information in regular basis would be very useful. Similarly, there should be a
folder containing files with useful information about the study module and requirements
students have to fulfill each semester. This would end the problem of difficulty in
communicating changes in the HFU courses in time to the students. The students can be made
to join these groups in their early days in the HFU. Moreover, there should be some way to
search people and view their public profile in Felix as well. Until now, the German version of
the HFU website is capable of searching the contact details of the HFU staffs.
The tools such as Video2Brain and MEMEO are the least used tools so far. As a student of
the HFU I never recall myself knowing about such tools until I decided to write the thesis. To
make Video2Brain tools useful, the professors can allocate some extra credit offers for selflearning about certain topics and writing the report on them. MEMEO is a very useful tool for
video conferencing and online collaboration. In case of IBM, it can be best used to conduct

online conferences during the re-entry seminars and viva. I have met student who flew from
London or USA just to attend the re-entry seminar. Same is the case during Viva. Very few
students stay in Schwenningen for thesis and they have to travel to Schwenningen just for this
Viva. It can be avoided by conducting Viva on MEMEO. There are many companies doing
Skype interviews these days. I think conducting Viva on MEMEO makes more sense than
making students travel to Schwenningen just for a half-an-hour viva. It's difficult to manage
accommodation just for a day and the hotels are too expensive for the students. And this all
can be avoided by using MEMEO. There can be similar application for other subjects as well.
Professors can conduct online session sometime from their home or office. This might make
the working time of Professors more flexible. This might also be helpful to conduct lectures
via guest professors from abroad. MEMEO can also be used to conduct interview during
admission period.
The companies now a day are providing web-based trainings where a trainee reads some text
or views some videos and appears some online test. Based on his performance he is rewarded
a certificate. Why not make similar arrangement for the electives one has to take during
his/her study at the HFU.
Only by using the tools available can be the investments made on them make some sense. If
they are there and left unused, they are simply waste of time, money and effort. They best
implementation can take place by integrating the use of the tools available in study program.
Just like mentioned by Li in her article "Why no one uses Corporate Social Network", the top
level executives need to use such tools to motivate the other staffs.64 In HFU's case it might
be understood as the professors, deans, department staffs, course coordinator, semesterspeakers, class-representatives, etc using the Felix to its best and motivating others to do the
same. Instead of professors asking class representative to create a Facebook group and add
the entire class member, the class representatives can be asked to create a Felix group and
add all the class mates and conduct whole communication via Felix. This is just a small
example how implementation of "Social Business Concept" can be realized in the HFU.
Similarly, they themselves can find ways to make the students use Felix for other than
downloading lecture presentations. Some of them might be online exercises just like in case
of language courses. Similarly, they can make students to deposit their term papers and other
64

LI. April 7, 2015. Why No One Uses the Corporate Social Network ; https://hbr.org/2015/04/why-no-oneuses-the-corporate-social-network (accessed December 2015)

written assignment via Felix instead via emails. Moreover, they can use one group over and
over again with course description and proper folders with proper updates if there are changes
in courses.
The task of improving website can also be given to the HFU students. In fact, the HFU can
include it in its study module to propose the best upgraded version of the website from the
student each year. The incomplete web pages in the English version of the HFU website do
not look so good. The HFU can rather get rid of such incomplete pages. Or, the HFU can ask
its students to complete such pages as a project work during their studies. Every year, the
IBM and IBW students keep looking for projects; why not give them the projects of
improving web content of the HFU websites.
Thus only with the proper imitative from professors and the HFU staffs as well as with some
improvements in existing social networking platform, the "Social Business Concept" at the
HFU can be well implemented. Everyone would benefit from this. Felix would turn out into
an archive with valuable information and communication hub for all the HFU members.
Similarly, the Social Media fan pages of the HFU would become one of the mean to reach
thousands of students willing to pursue their higher education which can't be done otherwise
by local advertisements.
The number of users for WhatsApp has reached 1 billion by the end of January. 65 It was 900
million till December 2015. One month and 100 million extra users certainly show how the
social media communication is gradually becoming part of everyone's day to day life. This
further emphasizes the importance of establishing a business as a well connected business.

65

Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook Page, 1 Feb, 2016; https://www.facebook.com/zuck/posts/10102630245039651

(accessed Feb 2, 2016)

8. Appendix

1. Email correspondence
a. E-mali from Ms Morag Lehman

Dear Raman,
I was nominated for the E-learning prize 3 times but I never won it. It has now been replaced a Teaching Prize
which has been awarded for the last 2 semesters. Information on the English website can be found here:
http://en.hs-furtwangen.de/welcome/news/news-singleview/134-10th-e-teaching-prize-awarded.html
http://en.hs-furtwangen.de/welcome/news/news-singleview/224-e-teaching-award.html
Information on the German website can be found here:
http://www.hs-furtwangen.de/willkommen/aktuelles/aktuelles-einzelansicht/1470-e-teaching-award-fuer-profdr-andreas-gollwitzer.html
http://www.hs-furtwangen.de/willkommen/aktuelles/aktuelles-einzelansicht/643-e-teaching-award-an-prof-drseemann-verliehen.html
http://www.hs-furtwangen.de/willkommen/aktuelles/aktuelles-einzelansicht/2102-prof-piepmeyer-erhaelt-eteaching-award.html
You can contact Learning Services at the university for more information on FELIX and can also contact the
winners of the E learning prize to find out more about how they use FELIX. My courses you already know.
Basically I use FELIX to post all course information including scripts, script keys, assignment topics,
presentation topics and groups, for uploading and giving back grades, posting extra information such as
interesting links and as a messaging tool to contact all class members. For these functions it works generally
very well. Now that students have to pay for the scripts, some students just use the one on FELIX in class or
download it. This works well and I think more students will do this in the future when they realize that they
dont have to buy a script.
I always give homework from the scripts and some students do homework it regularly and check the answers in
FELIX. I suspect that most do not do this but I dont know as I do not check. This is a university after all and
not a school
The forum does not work well unless I post a question and require everyone to answer it. Students do not use the
forum among themselves at all they use Facebook for this which is why they are generally unwilling to use
another platform to communicate. My experience with FELIX is that students generally are unwilling to use
FELIX unless they are forced to.
I now require all students to upload all assignments to FELIX and set an automatic deadline in the system. I also
post grades on FELIX. At latest then, students sign up to FELIX. This is a good way to make sure assignments
are submitted on time and to give back grades but it is quite a lot of work for me to post each grade individually.
The FELIX system unfortunately works from 1-6 in that 6 is the best. The opposite way round from our grading
system so it means I have to enter each grade individually instead of just ticking a box.
I also use FELIX for the project groups which I supervise for the students to post updates and for me to
communicate with the group.

Hope this helps. Good luck with your thesis.

Best regards,
Morag lehmann (Ms)
Business English Lecturer HFU Business School / Editor HFU English website
Room: F1.06, Jakob-Kienzle-Strasse 17, 78054 VS-Schwenningen
Email: Lemo@hs-furtwangen.de
Tel: +49 (0) 7720-307-4360

b. E-mail from Dr. Sandra Huebner

Dear Raman Paneru,
I am sorry, due to the exam period I am very busy and until now I have not found the time to answer your
question.
In my opinion, FELIX already supports a lot of features of a social network. However, these features are not
used
very
often
(either
from
students,
or
from
professors
or
HFU-staff).
In our deptartment, we are focussing on FELIX as a Learning Management System. So I can't say anything
about the furture development of FELIX with regard to fearutes of Enterprise Social Networks.
Perhaps it might be helpfull to ask the software-developers from OpenOLAT (http://www.openolat.com/). This
is the Learning Management Systems, were FELIX ist based on.
Best regards,
Dr. Sandra Hbner
IMZ | Learning Services
Leiterin Abteilung Learning Services

c. E-mail from Jutta Neumann

Dear Raman,
thanks for the outline of your topic. Here are my comments and suggestions. You should make clear, that the
audience of Bosch Connect or any other social platform is used only within the company, i.e. among the
employees. With HFU, we have employed members of staff, professors, a huge and varying number of
Lehrbeauftragte (part time teaching staff with a term-wise contract for a specific subject for a semester),
students and alumni. The group of students would match with customers in a different scenario.
How fluent is your German? The information we have on our German website and our German Facebook site is
different from the ones at our English website and English Facebook site.
Were planning to relaunch our website (target-date: 2018). So it will be interesting to learn about your results.
Please keep me informed how you are getting ahead. When do you have to hand in your thesis?
Best regards,
Jutta Neumann, M.A.
Pressereferentin
Hochschule Furtwangen | Furtwangen University
Robert-Gerwig-Platz 1
78120 Furtwangen

2. Survey Results66

66

survey regarding implementation of Social Business Concept at the HFU;

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1-qP8NhGSi2lGkCf9uogOiOtb8trpgziCZcZAb_0UBCU/edit?usp=drive_web

1- very easy

5- very difficult

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