Mashable has an excellent article on How to Provide Social Media Support to an Executive - I think it has some pretty useful main points (and pains) that you may experience working in communications.
1. Listen First
Listen to the customer/audience before diving in with a blazing flag and blaring message.
2. Communicate Externally and Internally
If an executive were to spend all their time gazing at the beautiful view from their 44th floor corner office they probably wouldn't notice Patrick Bateman behind them with an axe. Basically, you need to keep the lines of communication strong internally as well as externally - by mirroring these networks adoption will be closer to integration.
3. Be Open and Accessible
Approachable executives are paramount to foster a culture of openness and sharing. Encourage your leadership team to establish direct lines of communication.4. Coach and Reverse Mentor
Traditional mentoring has been a top-down process during which an executive mentor adopts a junior mentee. However, social rests on a different set of skills. Therefore, it may make sense to pair up “digital natives” with “digital dinosaurs.”5. Start Small Conversations
Start executives off by encouraging them to post to a private space that you can monitor, then provide direct feedback.6. Focus on Impact
It’s important to stress from the beginning that executive involvement will affect how the organization views social. As leaders, executives must recognize that their actions will affect not only themselves, but also the entire social process.
For example, my company’s customers generally report significant bumps in engagement after the CEO joins and engages on social media. One customer organization saw a 27.93% increase in messages, a 28.37% increase in replies and a 49.60% increase in “likes.”
Think they're of any use?
Getting bosses to understand and admit the use of social media is one important move to improve employee relations and internal communications. It can largely cut down the budget spent on internal communications materials. But the reality is that most bosses don't approve social media as a tool for internal communications and even ban the use of social media at work. Thus, coaching to boss is necessary.
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