Sonja Galton, Agnico-Eagle Mines Ltd.
Like many, I find myself watching with a sort of morbid fascination as new and often strange scenarios unfold as a result of social media. Society’s seemingly unending appetite for news and the always-on nature of social media have converged to create an environment that is ripe for entertaining (and disturbing!) mishaps. Reflect for a moment and I’m sure you can come up with dozens of examples, one of which might be the saga of a well-known pizza company and the video posted to YouTube by one of its employees, showing its gross mishandling of food that was apparently intended for a customer’s consumption.
Of course these incidents are only entertaining when they don’t happen to you or your company. But what if it’s part of your role to try to ensure the ongoing integrity of your employer’s brand and corporate reputation?
While perhaps not as dramatic (read: likely to engender revulsion), an employee’s mishandling of corporate information or inappropriate disclosure of material information is equally likely to cause damage to a company’s well being.
What is clear in both cases, though, is that the relationship between a corporation and its shareholders or stakeholders is only as strong as the weakest link. Sometimes that weakest link can be your own employees. Which brings us back to the question of how to manage employee behaviour when it comes to the highly public and uncontrollable communications platforms that make up social media.
Set the expectations
One excellent example of a social media policy is written and enforced by Best Buy (NYSE:BBY). At just over 570 words in length, it uses clear, concise language to set out precisely what an employee should do: disclose his or her affiliation, state that the message is his or her own opinion and not the company’s, protect him/herself as well as the company, act responsibly and ethically, honour people’s differences/not make discriminatory statements, etc. And, what employees should not do is: disclose numbers of any type, give out personal or legal information, post anything that belongs to someone else, or share confidential information.
Best Buy also provides an easy measure employees can use in determining what to do if they are unsure, or think they are in a grey area. The company includes the following statement: “Basically, if you find yourself wondering if you can talk about something you learned at work – don’t. Follow Best Buy’s policies and live the company’s values and philosophies. They are there for a reason.” Best Buy takes things back to basics. If you’re not sure if it is okay to say, follow your instinct and don’t say anything at all.
Of course, Best Buy’s policy and the tone in which it is crafted may not be the right fit for your organization. The good news is that there are other examples to be found. In fact, there are several online repositories that provide a broad array of examples from which you can draw.
One that I’ve found particularly helpful is a website called Social Media Governance (see Resources section for link) run by Chris Boudreaux, an author and business transformation specialist who has led programs at Fortune 500 clients including Boeing and Microsoft. His online database of social media policies, guidelines and templates includes examples from Canadian, American and international organizations.
Articulate the consequences
Those who know me will tell you that I am a proponent of speaking plainly no matter what the situation. When it comes to spelling out consequences, though, my feeling is that plain speech is not optional. It is simply better to be blunt.
Your social media policy will delineate where the lines are drawn. It will state unequivocally what you will and won’t accept in terms of employee use of social media. So try to avoid soft, potentially confusing language when you write the section on consequences. Get straight to the point. There is absolutely nothing wrong with stating outright: "If you ignore this policy, you could be fired."
It is also a good idea to provide plain language explanations for some of the other common ramifications of violating disclosure and/or social media policies. For example, doing so:
- Could cause legal problems between the company and its shareholders or stakeholder, potentially resulting in legal proceedings against the employee themselves; and
- Could cost the company the capital required to do business, or sometimes event the license to do business, resulting in the downsizing and/or closure of the company.
Don’t overcomplicate!
Don’t misunderstand me. I’m not saying that this is a simple process, but rather that the drafting of a social media policy should be steeped in common sense and not made more complicated than necessary by the often over-hyped mystique that surrounds social media.
At some point in the process you will, of course, need to involve your legal counsel. You should also make a point of consulting with your information technology department, especially as the lines between investor relations, corporate communications, public relations and the technology used to perform these roles continue to blur.
Your corporate spokesperson(s), and whoever else interfaces with the traditional media outlets, will also need to be fully engaged. And finally, you may want to gather input from your human resources team and potentially some of your employees whose personal online participation, as it pertains to your company, is already well established.
Just don’t lose sight of the fact that at the end of the day, as Best Buy puts it, the “Guidelines for functioning in an electronic world are the same as the values, ethics and confidentiality policies employees are expected to live everyday, whether you’re Twittering, talking with customers or chatting over the neighbour’s fence.”
Resources:
Best Buy Social Media Policy
http://bbyconnect.appspot.com/participation_guidelines/
Social Media Governance
http://socialmediagovernance.com/policies.php
Sonja Galton is Web and Communications Specialist at Agnico-Eagle Mines Ltd. in Toronto.