Linking online social proximity and workplace location: social enterprise employees in British Columbia

Abstract

Online professional networks have the potential to expedite and expand the success of corporations and, especially, socially oriented enterprises – such as non‐governmental organisations (NGOs) and social enterprises, which are businesses owned and operated by a non‐profit. Research to date has not examined the extent and composition of online professional social networks among social enterprise employees nor their inter‐relationships. Specifically, the link between individual connectivity and physical workplace is not understood. The purpose of this study was to provide a geographical understanding of communication amongst social enterprise employees. In British Columbia, Canada, 358 social enterprises and their most senior staff member were located on LinkedIn. Social network analysis, geographic information system (GIS) analysis and statistical analysis revealed that senior staff which had a betweenness centrality score were more than expectedly located in workplaces within the metropolis (Greater Vancouver) and within very highly materially deprived areas within the city. Further analysis showed that the majority of senior staff that had a betweenness centrality score, or that were directly connected to a senior staff member with a betweenness centrality score, were clustered within a 65 square kilometre downtown zone in the metropolis. This suggests the existence of ‘local buzz’, ‘regional pipelines’ and a digital divide drawn along metropolitan lines. This research represents the early understanding of social networks and their role in connecting enterprises with similar (or competing) goals along the axis of space.

Social media platforms and social enterprise: Bibliometric analysis and systematic review

“…Huang and Cox (2016) observed that engagement through social media platforms effectively allow us to alleviate poverty among disadvantaged people in Taiwan. Building upon a case study from Canada, Keane et al (2017) found that senior staff of SEs use LinkedIn to communicate across space and access updated knowledge sources. LinkedIn communication networks also offer communities quick access to jobs (Ellison et al, 2007).…”

“…Moreover, LinkedIn is used to communicate across space, access updated knowledge and offer jobs to needful people (Ellison et al, 2007;Keane et al, 2017). Yearworth and White (2018) noted that social media-driven collaborative awareness campaigns enhance their performance in terms of community empowerment and citizenship behavior.…”

Co-creation and co-destruction paradoxes for social enterprises

“…Online value co-creation through online communities has been explored in different disciplines (Barrett et al, 2016;Yan et al, 2016), however, little is known about the role of online communities as the facilitator of SE's value co-creation to address their challenges. Furthermore, during the last years, SEs have used Information and Communication Technologies (online communities and digital platforms) for different purposes such as marketing (Mitchell et al, 2015), scaling up (Braund & Schwittay, 2016), and communication amongst social enterprise employees (Keane et al, 2017). However, the main focus of these cases has not been on value co-creation.…”

Integration and segregation for social enterprise employees: A relational micro‐geography

“…Links between social integration and social enterprise workspaces are poorly understood, and lack empirical assessment (Keane et al., ). We applied mixed methods to explore how relations within a social enterprise contribute to social integration.…”