Government agencies adopting social media tools are faced with a number of issues and concerns, as well as a number of potential benefits of such use. Some of the problems facing government entities replicate issues faced by private companies, while others are specific to the public sector. While much has been written about social media in trade journals and in news media, the public sector is still wrestling with many unanswered questions in its adoption of social media tools. The purpose of the government workshops was to bring forward questions that are specific to NYS agencies at this time. The eight categories of concerns and issues are not mutually exclusive, but rather overlap to some degree, as do the eleven value statements, which seem to be cumulative and mutually reinforcing.

Based on these results and internal CTG discussions, the second phase of the social media project will be aimed at producing practical advice for government professionals centered around the eight concerns identified above. For a more detailed project description of phase II, please see Appendix C.