WHAT ARE THE RISKS TO EMPLOYERS FROM SOCIAL MEDIA WEBSITES?

What is social media?

As an employer your employees’ opportunities for networking have increased hugely in the last few years due to the popularity of Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.

Whether you embrace these changes or discourage them will depend on the culture of your business.  LinkedIn provides a forum for professional networking.  Through its website business people can contact each other and share information and recommendations about other professionals.  This can lead to new business opportunities. Having a high profile in social media can be good for your recruitment appeal.

However, there are some risks associated with the visibility of your employees on these online sites.

Your views about these risks will determine whether you want to ‘police’ your employees’ activity by way of a prescriptive policy on social media use or whether you will leave your employees to rely on their own judgement and loyalty to your organisation.

What are the risks?

• Before employment

There is likely to be significantly more information about a job applicant on the web than will be on their application form. Be careful you don’t reject their application because of what you have seen on their web profile.   If the applicant became aware of the reason they could bring a claim against you.

• During employment

You should make it clear to your employees, how much, if any,  use is allowed of social networking sites at work. In the absence of a clear policy there is risk that productivity will fall.

• After employment

An employee’s business connections listed on their Linkedin profile can cause problems.   For example, a salesperson may have a list of their customers as their contacts. They are easily accessible if the employee leaves your business and their use could potentially be a breach of a non–solicitation restrictive covenant although as yet there is little case law on this subject.

Adopting a Policy

We recommend that you introduce a policy for your employees setting out what use is authorised at work and how you plan to monitor their use. You should also remind them that they must not disclose your confidential information online.

We recommend that you review your contracts of employment to ensure that they state that such contacts are your property and that when an employee leaves they comply with an express obligation to remove all references to them on social media. Please contact Fiona Hume on 01283 531366 who will be pleased to advise you further.