Two guiding principles can often govern employee use of Social Media at work: business use and common sense. These principles are understood by employees and remain a valuable tools for virtually any employer.
Business use means that an employee should use social media, such as Facebook, with ‘their company hat on.’ They’re helping customers. They’re applying social media in the context of their job. They’re posting comments and content for the company’s benefit.
In these instances, employees should always be authentic. They should include their name and, when appropriate, the company name and their job title.
“Instead of fighting employees’ usage of Twitter and Facebook, organizations should be focused on bringing and using this networking functionality home. Social networking is here to stay and many corporations have been visionary enough to incorporate it as part of their internal communication procedures, boosting internal knowledge sharing, cross-functional team-work and collaboration, innovative thinking,” said Vera Neves from internal communications at NetJet Europe. “Depending on the size of the organization, you will want to set up a governance model around business networking tools similar to facebook, instanting messaging, etc, that matches your needs.”
Few employees, with the exception of those working in customer service or digital marketing have daily, ongoing business uses of social media. For other employees, common sense rules apply.
Common sense means that an employees use of social media doesn’t negatively impact their productivity, time use, or the company. If an employee tweets about their lunch, they can do so on their lunch hour. If they want to send a Facebook status update or friend request, they should practice the same discipline and restraint required for other potential work distractions such as Google, personal email, personal telephone calls, personal errands and private conversations in the workplace. Employees always need to abide by copyright restrictions, company data and privacy guidelines, and exercise good judgment.
Employees need to understand that companies monitor employee use of social media, social networking and other web sites. As a result, many common sense rules apply equally to employees when they are outside the physical workplace. When employees participate on social networks. They are participating in public forums where they are accountable for their activities. For example, it’s inappropriate for a customer service representative to blog, Tweet, or post Facebook status updates about the experiences they have at work if doing so violates company guidelines related to company data and privacy.
“Effectively, we were answering the same question in the early ’90 about allowing employees to have internet access on their computers, ” said David Barrett, the public relations director for Creative Industry. “If Twitter and Facebook help get the job done (or provide off but creative task doodling time) all well and good, as long as there is a well understood and enforceable responsible use policy in place to protect people and companies from themselves.”
Credits: Cartoon courtesy Rob Cottingham @ Social Signal. This post was inspired by the question “ Should employees be allowed access to Facebook and Twitter at work? What side of the argument are you on?” from Larry Porter, Vice President at Gingerquill Inc. on LinkedIn.
Facebook Status: Unemployed
Social media and boredom are a bad combination. There are thousands of active posts on Facebook and Twitter from people complaining about boredom at work. Perhaps their time would be better spent updating their resume?
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