Are You Anti Social Networking?

Whether your organisation supports social media sites or believes that sites like Facebook, MySpace and Twitter are time wasters, you can’t deny their popularity. I guarantee that a large number of people in your company are registered on one or more of those sites.

What does that really mean for you as a manager or an employer? Like it or not, it affects you. Telstra for instance, made the news because it was revealed that the online satirist impersonating Communications Minister Stephen Conroy (Fake Stephen Conroy) on Twitter was a senior Telstra employee. Click here to read the full story. Not a good look!

It was this story that got me thinking: where do you draw the line between what is considered personal use and what is work related? It can be argued, if an employee states on their profile/page that they’re employed in a particular company, then they automatically become a representative of that company. If this is the case, then relevant company policies (eg, Confidentiality) would apply to this employee.

Companies that acknowledge this link are now formulating policies and guidelines to govern conduct on these mediums. Since the fake Conroy debacle, Telstra has issued a policy statement on employees’ use of social media websites which you can find here in its entirety.

What are your thoughts on the subject? Is your company taking proactive steps to address this issue?