Social Media And Its Impact On The Workplace

When I was a manager at a company, I had to administer many policies as they related to my employees. On of these policies was called the Social Media Policy. This policy was meant to protect the company from malicious posts regardless of the intent. To summarize this policy stated that if you in anyway identified yourself as an employee. So if an employee wanted to they could rant about the company or other employees as long as they did not identify the company, list the company as an employer or list the names of employees that are know to work for the company. This policy was created solely because of individually that lacked a filter or the common sense to think about what they were posting.

POLICY: This policy provides guidance for employee use of social media, which should be broadly understood for purposes of this policy to include blogs, wikis, microblogs, message boards, chat rooms, electronic newsletters, online forums, social networking sites, and other sites and services that permit users to share information with others in a contemporaneous manner.

The purpose of this literary review is to enlighten my viewers of the importance of the ethical idea of companies crossing the lines of business with your personal life, when involving social media accounts. Most of my research has operated from the ATU library using the find it tool. Furthermost, the researched information use was from peer-reviewed research journal. I will discuss includes social media cons in the work environment, if it is ethical to get fired over a post, and laws that protect both parties. Social media includes an assortment of electronic communications—most commonly networking sites such as Facebook, LinkedIn, Myspace, Pinterest, Instagram, and the likes thereof. Social media also covers all forms of blogs, including Twitter (a micro-blog), wikis, online journals, diaries, personal newsletters, and World of Warfare and YouTube also are included under the umbrella term of social media (Lieber 2011).

Prof Warren from Deakin University indicates researchers have found that a lot of business organisations have no policy regarding social media, with very few offering any social media training at all.

These new tools are “dedicated to community-based input, interaction, content-sharing and collaboration,” (Social Media, 2015). Everyone is on social media these days, including your employees, your competition, clients, and future clients. Being able to communicate with everyone is vital to the growth of the NSC. The problem with social media is that NSC can be held liable for legal issues arising from our employees’ social media use and accounts. Examples of issues include incidents such as discriminatory social media messages, different forms of harassing on Facebook, or even radical up scene tweets. Companies can also witness the issue of employees leaking of crucial company or customer information. These risks exist regardless of whether the employee commits the offense at the office using company-owned computer resources or at home using their personal social media accounts, since they are often identified as an employee of the company in their social media profile. Setting guidelines, training, and purpose behind social media can help the company grow expediential, while minimizing the negative ramifications affiliated with social

Although reconsiderations should be made, the society should be trained and educated on how to behave maturely when using the cyberspace. There should be emphasize on the laws that should be applied if an employee is working in the private sector or the government. The private sector and the government should use different doctrines and labor laws in the workplace. There aretwo questions that should be asked about the government, and the private sectors, when using social media. One is: Is posting personal information on social media likely to bring repercussions or legal action against the employee or the employer? The second is: Should employers restrict the type of information that should be posted on social media by employees?

The use of social media has greatly influenced how people communicate. Facebook, one of the largest social media platforms, has over one billion active users. Employers find social media both useful and challenging. Companies now have a platform to reach millions of potential users of their products for marketing purposes. The downside is their employees also have access to millions of users. In the case of Peter Whitney, Peter’s employer terminated Peter for disparaging comments about co-workers on his personal blog. He views his termination as unfair. As this technology develops, employees need to self-censor their social media to prevent termination.

In today's society, technology has been the driving force in the success and failure of many things. However, it is the quickest way to get things done. A subheading of technology is social media. Social media is described as, "Websites and applications that enable users to create and share content or to participate in social networking." Technology and/or social media can have both positive and negative in business or personal settings. In a work setting, there this a possibility that the use of technology and social media can become negative over positive. Many would agree that employees may develop an addiction, develop an interpersonal relationship with client, have involuntary contact, and/or become too aggressive

In the last decade, the corporate ethic policy has evolved from a relaxed series of documents into a sequence of ironclad forms that define a defense from the actions of the generation at hand. Though I have not witnessed violation of company ethics by leadership, as a long term member of the management within a company, I have witnessed firsthand the ever-changing importance of having a policy for every employee as it relates to ethics within the workplace. Human Resource advisors have had to adjust to the needs for new discrimination protection; alongside the outline of a social media policy as it relates to standard forms of communication. With the explosion of social media such as Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, and Instagram, every company instantly had to define what an acceptable action was, along with when communication through these mediums was acceptable. In the end, I view the management and definition of social media policy as the most important aspect of every corporation moving forward.

In this new age of technological advances and innovation in communication, employers are using new platforms to increase their team’s communication and to reach out to other companies for networking (Cardon and Marshall 2015). In addition, these new technological advances have increased the curiosity of the academic world. Therefore, prompting many studies examine the advantages and disadvantages of social media use to employers. Research suggest that employee’s usage of social media while working has positive effects on the employee’s productivity, creates happier or highly satisfied employees, increases the sharing of knowledge amongst employees and improves the lines of communication within the organization. Conversely, other

Social media policies are becoming more and more prevalent and are a commanding tool that companies can used to protect their image and reputations. These policies often have "strict rules regarding what employees can post about the company online, including whether or not they are even employed by the company." (Admin, 2013) When an employee breaks these policies and posts something that is inappropriate, too personal or unprofessional, the lines between personal and professional lives are blurred and careers can be

In Genova’s No Place to Play, we are told that this is becoming a more common criterion for termination. Employers are learning that these social networking sites are a great way to “keep an eye on” employees. Genova highlights the lack of legislation in the area. While the employee’s right to privacy and other various older laws are relevant, there are few specific regulations on this monitoring behaviour. A large number of employers assume that it is acceptable to view and, where necessary, use information gained from social networking sites in recruiting and disciplining employees as long as specific laws (e.g., civil rights laws) are not violated (Roberts & Roach 2009). Without any legal understanding on the issue, surely it then becomes the responsibility of the employer to come up with a method of defining the terms of use. Companies

There are a number of governmental policies and regulations in place for employers to consider when developing, implementing and enforcing a social media policy. In contrast, the lack of a social media policy leaves an employer at a loss in regards to their avenues of disciplinary action towards employees who take to social media. The governmental policies revolve around the Constitutional right of the First Amendment and the freedom of speech. While this provides some protection for employees there are limitations and exclusions that resulted in the National Labor Relations Board stepping in and providing opinions for the legality of employer disciplinary actions regarding social media content and participation.

This experience is the first time I have been introduced to professional relationships. I took the time to set up a LinkedIn account. It always brings a smile to my face when a subcontractor requests to connect with me. I believe that social media outlets such as LinkedIn give professionals an opportunity to keep up with each other 's successes.

Social media has become a huge part of our lives in and out of the workplace. In different situations, social media can be harmful or informative. Social media is used for many things especially for marketing, sharing, recruiting, networking, and helping with personal issues. Some of the most popular social media sites are Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, and YouTube. Using social media for recruiting is also very important because if someone has an Instagram or Twitter that is filled with inappropriate posts your potential employer might not hire. In today’s world, something posted in the morning could end up being an international headline on the evening news channels. Even though there are bad things from social media it can also be widely used to spread knowledge and concepts. As civil engineers, social media should always be used responsibly and professionally in the workplace.