There are so many difference social media platforms and most, if not all, of your employees probably engage in some form of social media. Many employers don’t have a social media policy for their employees’ personal accounts. It’s important to put one into place BEFORE someone posts something that doesn’t represent your brand in a positive light.
The policy should be a straight forward, simply to follow social media policy for both you and your employee. The policy safeguards you by protecting your company’s reputation and values. The policy will also protect your employees by telling them upfront what is expected of them.
Every company is different and therefore there is no right way to write a policy. You must ask yourself many questions.
Do you want your employees to post on their personal social media on your company’s behalf?
Do you want your employees to state they work at your company in their bio?
If you allow them to state they work at ABC Corporation, then it could look like their thoughts are thoughts of the company. Therefore, do you want them to post a disclaimer about their own thoughts are not necessarily the thoughts of the company?
Do you want your employees to be “friends” with your clients or vendors on social media?
Along with the above answers, you should state that their posts should honor your employee handbook, such as your discrimination & harassment prevention policy, disclosure of company’s private information and following all laws. They should never disparage the company or the company’s products.
It’s also acceptable to state, that employees that don’t follow the social media policy may be subject to disciplinary action up to and including termination.
Now you can write up a policy. It’s important that it’s short and easy to follow otherwise it’ll make it very hard for your employees to follow and also hard for you to enforce it.
If you have any questions or need help with writing this policy or your overall employee handbook, please send me message via my Facebook or Twitter page or by emailing me at solutions@CreativeBiznessSolutions.com.
There are also some great resources online to help you think through your policy, see links below.
https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtools/tools-and-samples/policies/pages/socialmediapolicy.aspx