Dealing With Negative Tweets

Today's post continues our look at "millennial employee issues," the subject matter of the last two days. You may want to read those posts first.

Should an employee use personal communications devices to perform personal tasks at work? We dealt with that on Monday. What if one employee texts a derogatory remark to another employee? We dealt with that yesterday. What if an employee makes negative comments about the company, co-workers, customers, their boss, etc. on Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, YouTube, etc.?

Of course that's not good. But what exactly can you do about things employee's do on their personal time outside of work that reflect poorly on the company. Especially an employee who does all the right things at work (Dr. Jekyll) and is just the opposite outside (Mr. Hyde).

If you have a well-written legally correct policy covering social networking, then you should be able to deal with violations of the policy as a disciplinary issue. Understand though, that because of "employee rights to privacy" and "freedom of speech" issues, a policy covering social networking using company time and equipment must be carefully written. And while it's possible to write a social networking policy covering employee activities outside of work, those must be even more carefully written. Such a policy should also be thoroughly reviewed by an attorney specializing in employment law prior to being issued. None-the-less, as with so many other issues we deal with as managers, written policies, procedures and guidelines can definitely help with social networking issues. Click here to read an article on this topic written by the Baird Holm law firm for the Nebraska Bankers Association.

But what if you don't have a written policy. Then your task of dealing with the issue becomes far more difficult. But not necessarily impossible if you have a good rapport with your employees. Along with good leadership skills. And if you are skilled at a counseling technique called moral suasion. What's that? It's the subject of our February 24, 2009 post titled "Do Me a Favor - Discipline." Click here to go directly to that post.

About me: Before becoming a full time educator, my career experiences included being vice president of a consulting firm, vice president - finance of a publishing company, vice president - sales support services for a manufacturing company and vice president - operations for a distribution company. As a full time educator working principally in Rhode Island (RI), Connecticut (CT) and Massachusetts (MA). I am pleased to share my experiences and business philosophies with managers at all levels.

Copyright © 2009 Daniel W. Pelley
All rights reserved.