Beth Dunn writes about the growing number of companies that are developing policies to guide employee blogging, and cites Beth Kanter's recent call for policy examples, like those from IBM, Sun, and Opera. She aptly points out the three concerns executives have about employee social media:
It seems like executives (and nonprofit boards) are primarily concerned about three things:
1. Employees will say bad things about the organization (sponsors, vendors, customers, etc.);
2. Customers/constituents will say bad things about the organization (sponsors, staff, vendors, etc.);
3. Employees will tell secrets.
All three have one thing in common. The shared root of the concerns is control: controlling the outbound message, and controlling the availabilty of venues for customers to say bad things about the company. Beth goes on to say:
It's been said that companies would do well to remember that they have to trust their employees on these issues every day already â€" every time they talk to a customer, deal with a member, gab with a vendor, or work with a sponsor, you are trusting them to represent you and your brand responsibly, with discretion and integrity.
Companies need to realize that they can't control what people say about them. If a product sucks, customers already tell each other - if not in public then in private. If the work environment sucks, employees will talk about it with each other, and with family and friends.
What companies can control is the quality of their products, services, work environments, and cultures. And if those are all good, they'll have nothing to worry about when it comes to social media.
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