Facebook is to take on LinkedIn and Google Drive by allowing professionals to connect with each other and work together online. The new service, called Facebook at Work is to offer a similar layout to its main website, but users will be allowed to keep their personal accounts separate from their work profiles.
The facility will allow users to chat to their colleagues, network with professionals and share documents. It’s believed that the social media giant is already using the service internally. It’s though that the service has also been challenged to take on Microsoft Office. The current incarnation of Facebook has been banned from in-work use by many companies, who believe it to be an obstacle to productivity. Meanwhile, professional networking service LinkedIn is currently the biggest of its type, with over 300 million users spanning more than 200 different countries.
Some critics have been sceptical about the move, saying that there is no reason to believe that it will make employees more productive, whilst others claim that the service could be beneficial as long as it is used correctly.