Social Media Policies, Concerted Activity, and HR Management In the last few yea

Question

Social Media Policies, Concerted Activity, and HR Management

In the last few years, companies have begun initiating and implementing social media policies for their employees to follow. These policies range from encouraging employees to utilizing social media for marketing purposes, to restricting the use of social media for employees in order to ensure that they do not hurt the company image. As these policies become more widespread, both the Society for Human Resource Management and the NLRB (National Labor Relations Board) have become concerned about the limits on speech and activity that employers are imposing on their workers. Further, in some states, laws are being passed to protect employees and potential employees from being required to disclose social media passwords during job interviews or after hire. Finally, many ethical concerns are being raised about the use of social media as a method of doing quick, informal background checks on potential hires or current employees.

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Questions to Research and Answer

The NLRB has made findings regarding the use of employee posts on social media sites to discipline or terminate those employees. Typically, these cases occur when an employee posts negative information about his or her current employer or boss. Sometimes, these are public, and other times, the employer uses spies or fake friending to see the Facebook page of the employee.

Find at least one case or article online regarding this topic, and briefly explain the facts of the case, and the determination of the NLRB as to whether the employee was properly or improperly disciplined or terminated as a result of his or her use of social media to complain about, criticize, or publicly bash his or her company or boss. Provide the citation to the article that you discover. (Use the term concerted activity in your query or search to help you find one of these cases.)

Do you agree with the decision of the NLRB or court in the case that you described in Question #1 above? Why or why not? (2 - 3 paragraphs).

Assume that this case happened at a place where you have worked in the past, or where you work now (or want to work.) Give an example of how the decision in the case above could lead to better or worse employee relations in your company.

Explain how you would communicate this decision to your employees or supervisors (depending on the decision you have selected) to ensure that situations like this do not occur again. In your answer, determine whether or not you feel a social media policy is a good method. If so, list at least three things you would include in your policy and why you would include them. If you do not feel a social media policy is appropriate, explain why you would not implement one (give at least two valid reasons). (3 - 4 paragraphs)

Explanation / Answer

There is one case which needs to be highlighted after the research online. The case is one employee of a company posted on the Face book and Twitter stating “ Sometimes you just need to F..off from work”. Couple of minutes later somebody else showed the post to his manager on Face book.The employee gave a reason as his house is on fire and after 40 minutes there was post on face book by his wife with a picture in front of his house and the husband was tagged in the post. This made everyone in the company angry and the employee was put on final warning and end of the day the employee was terminated from company. The employee had to pay for what he had done which is really unethical behaviour.

Any employees in the company are not supposed to show any kind of unethical behaviour especially when they are still employed in the firm. This is against to policy and doing that will harm the goodwill of the company. I do agree with the decision of the court and this stands out as a warning to other employees and they will be well aware of what is supposed to be done and what not. Also posting unethical posts on the social media do harm the goodwill of the company and it may impact the company business as well.

2) If the similar situation happens in the company it will really take a bad turn among the employee and employers. There are many companies who use social media as medium to promote the company brand and this will be access by the Top Leadership till the fresher in the company. One single wrong post can harm the entire relation inside the company. One post can lead to difference of opinion in the organization and can change the perception of employees or employers. This will bring a gap between people which is not good.

3) It becomes very important in situations like this to bring awareness inside the company to not post the unethical posts on the social media. To do this all the employees need to be kept well aware by having meetings frequently with employees of all the levels and explain what is ethical and what is not ethical. Also they should be given some examples of unethical post on social media and the consequence of the issue. This would make all the employees be alert. In addition to this even the HR team need to conduct meetings with employees and explain them the HR policy and what happens if there is any violation in the policy. After all the sessions the awareness program should go on recurring very frequently to ensure employees do not forget of these important things along with the work.

Yes, it is very important that Social Media policy has to be in place for a company to promote its brand. Since the current generation is very much addicted to social media the marketing becomes very easy and less costly. If it is used appropriately by all the employees it leads to success. As we all know that every single thing has its own pros and cons, to avoid any damage through social media the company will have to incorporate certain policy in place to avoid any damage by employees. They are,

Employees are not supposed to post anything negative on the company manager.

Employees cannot make any negative statements which is anyway linked about the work or job

Employees should not post anything related to work on the social media.

The above three mentioned points to policy helps to avoid any kind of damage which can be caused due to negative statements on the company or the manager. If any statements are made people who are working in the company along with the employee and the employee’s friends outside the organization will see those post and start building negative opinion about the company and spoil the company image. Also if employees post anything related to work on the social media, it becomes difficult for the company to keep the data confidentiality and also the competitors in the market will gain undue advantage. There are chances that it may lead to competitors gain the competitive advantage.

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