Benefits and pitfalls of a CEO’s personal Twitter messaging

Abstract

Social media platforms such as Twitter represent a new and potentially potent corporate communication technology. A stream of tweets from a corporate CEO’s personal Twitter account can be an effective component of the communication media used to exercise leadership through language. The tweets on a CEO’s personal Twitter account can be used strategically to help establish the organizational culture of a company, and build and maintain the CEO’s personal image, for example, as a transformational leader, a servant leader, a social progressive or an agile strategist. There are benefits and pitfalls of a CEO’s use of a personal Twitter feed. Tweeting can facilitate direct, “unfiltered” communication, enable faster and more immediate lines of communication and provide access to larger audiences. A CEO’s tweet can convey an “elevator pitch” of inspiration to employees or a strategic message to corporate investors. Nonetheless, given the immediacy of this medium, there is a risk that Twitter will expose “inauthentic” or narcissistic leaders if used in an undisciplined way. Alertness to some thoughtful approaches and cautions are likely to be beneficial to CEOs who are considering communicating with stakeholders and the media via Twitter. Twitter has become a ubiquitous and continually-evolving social institution. In January 2019, approximately 500 million tweets were sent daily from the Twitter social media communications platform; and 326 million people used Twitter monthly.[1] On August 7, 2019, the three most-followed persons on Twitter were U.S. singer Katy Perry (107.8 million followers); former U.S. President Barack Obama (107.5 million); and Canadian singer Justin Bieber (106.1 million).[2] The most prominent purveyor of tweets is U.S. President Donald Trump. On August 9, 2019, his personal Twitter feed had about 62.8 million followers and he had sent about 43,000 tweets.[3] His use of Twitter has been credited to be “a new form of presidential talk.”[4] Some observers regard his tweets as contributing to a “semiotics of authenticity”[5] while others see them as enabling the “politics of debasement.”[6]