MySpace & Employees
kldrake
30 Posts
After being told by an employee that they had a concern for what was being posted on myspace, I found some terrible comments regarding our company from one of our employees and somethings I would naturally investigate if reported, but they have not been reported. Additionally, I found a posting that states the following about our company "why I hate to work at ....". , this person is entitiled to an opinion and to express frustration, but is there a line that can be crossed when they are an employee? This raises concern for me in many areas. Also Stating such comments and also incidents that if truly are occuring the employee is obligated by the State & our Corporate policy to report? Any experience or ideas with this type of situation? I certainly don't want employees to think that management is "spying" on them, but these are public sites and there are others in the company who found this and suggested I look into it. If other employees are seeing this certainly this message has gone further than just the employees.
Thanks
Comments
I agree with HR36 and I would go one step further. I think you need to investigate this further. Someone has brought this to your attention and after you looked into it you found things that could ultimately affect employees and the employer. I don't think you should let this go. This information was put out in a public place and other people have found it. I would document everything, starting from the person that brought this to your attention, to what you found online (I would print it out) and then any other details as you continue your investigation. My other suggestion would be to get a corporate attorney involved. This is such a new area for HR that you may want the advice of the corporate attorney. Good luck.
I would have IT look at their computer usage. If the employee is posting this information during work time and using company resources to do it, depending on our companies policy, you may have grounds for disciplining that employee and bring these issues to light.
I agree that this information needs to be investigated. If there is harassment involved and it can be shown that you knew about it, even from this venue, then there may be a legal problem for your company if it isn't investigated.
You might also talk to the employee, stating that you are aware of his or her concerns/unhappiness, and try to work out a solution to make the employee happier at work. Try to get something positive out of it. Take the employees feedback, however inappropriately communicated, seriously because there might be things that need to be improved at the company.
I happened upon this article about dealing with employee blogs that might help you out.
http://www.laborlawyers.com/showarticle.aspx?Ref=list&Type=1119&Cat=3386&Show=10050
Good find GoPatsNH! That article is one of the better ones that I have seen.
My CIO and I have been working on updating our Internet/e-mail usage policy. I sent him the article because I want to incorporate a few of the points into our policy.
Thanks!
Aside from our code of conduct, we also have a statement in our laundry list of impermissible things about making false or malicious statements about the company or any of its employees.
If you choose to investigate this, and I agree with the majority that you should do so, you may want to bind participants to confidentiality and cooperation if that is not already part of your invetigatory process.