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May 19, 2010

When is a tweet too far?

Online social messaging has exploded into our lives and created a culture for tweeting, chirping and blogging ideas, knowledge, advice and opinion on just about anything.

The need to ‘put yourself out there’, sign-up to join an online community and make new ‘friends’ is a social must if you’re to have any ‘street cred’ with Generation Y and X. Not so long ago, social media networking appeared to plug a social need for people to chat in real-time over the web, rather than talk on the phone.

Wind forward a few years and today popular Social Media Networking (SMN) sites have become a global platform for self-promotion, sometimes bordering on narcissism, depending on your view point. Posting pictures of yourself or perhaps a video appears to be par for the course, although others would argue it’s all about ‘staying connected’.
 
On the corporate front, social media advocates say web marketing is the future and if you want to look ‘cool’ and stay in business, you can’t afford not to move into the social media space.

At the last count in Australia alone, there were approximately 8 million people reported to have a Facebook account, LinkedIn passed 1 million and more than 300,000 Australians were ‘tweeting’.

American-based web information company Alexa.com lists Facebook as the second most searched for site after Google. With statistics like these, there’s little doubt that the social media phenomenon is here to stay, but it doesn’t come without risks.

Consider the impact of an employee disclosing confidential information, or a disgruntled worker posting damaging accusations, and not least the greatly increased exposure to computer viruses. 

“Social media networking is a viral form of communication in its infancy and requires written guidelines to protect employee privacy and business confidentiality,” advises Barry Vienet, Managing Director for Beilby.

So what is social media?


Social media is any facility for online publication and commentary, including blogs, forums vlogs and social media networking sites such as Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Flickr and YouTube.

According to Workforce Management, half of Facebook’s active users across the globe log on to their site in any given day, and 35 million users update their status daily. And yet, many companies do not have a social media policy for their employees.

This is surprising because many firms have had to discipline their employees over SMN activities. In some cases it has ended badly and resulted in dismissals and then there’s always the risk of legal action. A bomb hoax on Twitter recently led to the successful prosecution of an unhappy commuter in the UK.

“We would urge employers to take steps to protect their intellectual property and their reputation by being up front about their SMN  policy and encourage employees to tweet smart and stay connected,” said Mr Vienet.

“It makes sense to be proactive and have a concise documented policy on internet use and employee privacy because no-one wants to react to a situation that could have been avoided,” he added. 

Social media guidelines should be made available in handbooks and online from day one, starting with new employee inductions. In an era when so much information is shared electronically, employers must act to protect their interests.

More importantly, employees should be reminded that social media sites are global public forums and there is always the likelihood of competitors trawling the sites for inside information.

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