Social Media Policy - Assignment Example

Running Head: Social Media Policy Social Media Policy Name Course Lecture Date Question 1 (a) Post on social media platforms like Facebook cannot be considered private even though just a few people are supposed to the view the content. According to Goel (2014), if your privacy setting is set to public on Facebook, the information posted by a user can be accessed by everyone even those who are not on Facebook. Even though Facebook purport that they can assist in limiting the number of people who see your posts, this is not true. Once you post contents online your friends can share it with other friends (Comer, McKelvey and Curran, 2012). People are also bound to talk about what we post orally or through other means of communication especially if the post contains controversial information. Furthermore, posted information can be downloaded and re-uploaded by other users without the permission of the one who posted it. MacDonald, Sohn and Ellis (2010) caution people to upload pictures that they can be comfortable hanging on the wall of the job cubicle. Therefore, it is wise to consider that once you post content on facebook you lose control over it despite Facebook’s advice to the contrary. Although Facebook provides users with a means to control those who can view their post, the effectiveness of facebook’s privacy settings is still in doubt. Facebook argues it is the user who controls what others can see when it comes to posted contents. Facebook can enable a person to share posts specifically to a group of people, a person or a group. However, Goel (2014) argues that setting Facebook privacy is tedious as it requires one to change dozens of controls. This complexity has seen many users ignore the issue of privacy on their computers. Although Facebook tries to increase the awareness of users over the privacy of information they post, this has not been effective. Facebook now enables individuals to control the privacy settings of any piece of information before they post it on the website (Goel, 2014). This new service has seen more users take up the usage of Facebook privacy controls and enables more people manage the privacy of their posts more effective. A person no longer has to go through a settings page to change the privacy settings. However, the privacy settings for older contents remain the same and may require a person to go through all the content in their Facebook wall to be firmly in control of the privacy of their posted content (Goel, 2014). However, users should understand the basic principles and underlying security concerns of Facebook. A more educated and aware user will be able to maintain more control over their Facebook privacy. Question 1 (b) Posting something that an employer should not see is a risky undertaking for any employee. In the workplace, careless posts may poison the relationship between an employee and employer. In some instances, employees have been fired for criticizing their bosses through social media. Furthermore, information gathered through social media may form the basis for decision on whether to promote an employee or lay them off during workforce streamlining programs (Skeels and Grudin, 2009). Today employers are increasingly looking at the social media profiles of prospective employees before hiring them. It is imperative then for employees to resist posting information that may lead to their dismissal or diminish their eligibility for jobs and promotions (Skeels and Grudin, 2009). Recently, cases of employees getting fired over negative comments about their bosses and employers have been on the increase. Damien O'Keefe of Good Guys clothing stores in Australia lost his job after complaining on his Facebook wall about the a pay problem at the company (Hurtst, 2011). The complaint was interpreted by the employee to be a threat to a senior colleague at the firm. When O’Keefe lodged a claim with Fair Works Australia for unfair dismissal it was dismissed. He had argued that his privacy settings on Facebook did not allow his employer to view the message. However, 11 of his colleagues were friends on his Facebook profile allowing his employer access to the offending message (Hurtst, 2011). This example shows that people who do not have direct access to a person’s Facebook wall can still get to know what they post on their wall. Similarly, an Apple employee lost his appeal against unfair dismissal after criticizing his company on his Facebook wall several time (Martin, 2011). Samuel Crisp was suspended from his job after responding negatively to Apple’s social media postings (Martin, 2011). Interestingly, it was his colleague who saw the post and alerted his boss of Crisp’s actions leading to his dismissal. Both employees argued that the privacy setting for the offending posts was “private”. However, in both cases the employment tribunal agreed with the employers that the dismissals for the two employees were justified on grounds of gross misconduct. Question 2 Ethics denotes an adherence to moral standards of behavior that are in most cases above the legal threshold (Light and McGrath, 2010). Ethics is as also defined as a discipline that deals with what is good or bad and brings about moral obligation and duty (Fritzsche and Oz, 2007). Telsta 3 R policy assists employee in retaining integrity while interacting with other people on social media. Under the pillar of respect, the employees of Telstra are unlikely to disrespect the rights of people who hold intellectual property rights over social media content thus avoiding prosecution. Telstra’ social media policy also advises employees to observe the terms and conditions of social media platforms. The term of use of most social media platform provides dos and don’ts that ensure that a person does not break his ethical responsibility. Organizations like Telstra also feel they are exposed to lawsuits based on the unethical conduct of their employees online, therefore organizational policy would push for the most ethical way of using social media. As seen in the case of The Telstra employee who created a fake accounts for a politician. The Telstra policy requires users to follow the terms and conditions of facebook which ban the production of pages not bearing a users true identity. By basing their social media engagement policy on ethics, Telstra are able to give the impression that employees have a moral obligation to follow the company’s policy as this is doing what is right. According to Fritzsche (2007), people have an intrinsic motivation to do what is right and thus would more likely to adhere to an ethically based social media policy. Question 3 Grounding a social media policy initiative of an organization has a number of benefits (Fritzsche (2007). First, it legitimizes the policy’s dos and don’ts by basing them on society’s sense of what is wrong or right. The use of information technology presents ethical dilemmas to users every time they switch on their computer and connect to the internet to chat with friends. One of the most common dilemma’s in the usage of Information communication technology is the question of who is the owner of information (Baase, 2008). The Telstra policy is clear about the ownership of information and articulates the right and ethical action for an employee to take whenever he/she comes up against this ethical dilemma. Telstra argues that ethical conduct demands social media users respect IP rights holders as the owners of information and other digital media (Baase, 2008). An ethical base for a social media policy also reminds employees of the consequences of acting unethical. Ethics reminds employee that the consequence of unethical practices on social media is profound (Mehrotra, 2012). Just a small error in ones judgment can lead to negative consequences that follow one throughout his life. For example, the Telstra employee who impersonated Stephen Conroy a government minister may never get employed again as a consequence of his acts which seemed amusing at first. Furthermore, the ethical policy may not cover all areas of concern as social media and technology create many ethical grey areas (Laudon and Laudon, 2004). By having ethics in mind employees are able to deal with novel ethical dilemmas they may face in their everyday work. Question 4 Telstra knows that by asking employee to follow the terms of use of major social media cite they can enhance their control over marketing communication that takes place on these platforms (Breakenridge, 2012). On facebook, spam posts and messages are not allowed. Telstra thus is able to guard itself from spam marketing which may negatively affect the perception of marketer by the recipient of spam messages. If Telstra allows employees to overlook the spam messaging rule on facebook and post spam messages on their behalf, the firm may develop frosty relationships with owners of social media sites who do not take kindly to social media spamming. According to Comer, McKelvey and Curran (2012), most users of social media accounts abhor advertising content. People allow social media companies some limited advertising in exchange for the free usage of the social media site. Any extra advertising through spamming will upset this sensitive balance and probably upset the users of the social media platform. Organizations also want to maintain close control over their marketing communications (Breakenridge, 2012). Facebook rules limit the usage of copyrighted material, organizational trademark to authorized users of the mentioned content. This leaves organizations in control of these important elements of marketing communication. The terms of conditions of many social media sites also do not allow people to communicate on behalf of organizational entities unless they have been expressly permitted by the concerned organizations. Therefore, social media terms and conditions of usage are an important tool for organizations to control the nature of marketing communication over social media. Question 5 Representation as a pillar of Telstra’s social engagement policy is concerned with the actions of employee on behalf of Telstra on social media (Quinn-Allan, 2012). This principle asks employees to disclose their relationship and position within Telstra while making any comments about the organizations. By posing as Stephen Conroy, the Telstra employee failed to represent a good image of Telstra. Telstra feels that their employees represent their company in the actions they choose to take on social media. The employee brought a lot of negative publicity to Telstra and caused a lot of embarrassment to the firms. In the preceding months, Telstra had been engaged in a tug of war with the government over the national data network (). The employee’s actions can be taken as some type of retaliation against the government by Telstra employees. Telstra knows that people are naturally drawn to view the actions of employees as motivated by the achievement of the employers objectives (Laudon and Laudon, 2004). In this case, the identity thief is taken by some as acting on behalf of Telstra to cause embarrassment to a member of the Rudd administration. Many people think that big organization like Telstra are profoundly capitalistic and will use all manner of tactics to pressure governments to favour them in formulation of policy and the award of tenders. The second principle of Telstra social media policy is concerned with the responsibility of employees over the content their share on social media (Quinn-Allan, 2012). Telstra cautions employee that even though they have the freedom to post what they want on social media this should be done responsibly. By acting as a fake Stephen Conroy, the Telstra employee acted irresponsibly; he ought to have been aware that he would be ultimately responsible for his actions. The responsibility principle as articulated by Telstra enables the organizations to escape blame for the irresponsible actions of its employees on social media. The final principle of Telstra’s social media engagement policy is concerned with respect for legal conformance while using social media. Telstra cautions its employee to respect copyright laws, privacy and other government policy on the posting of contents to social media sites (Quinn-Allan, 2012). The Telstra employee clearly violated privacy laws by identifying himself as Stephen Conroy on his social media account (Raynes-Goldie, 2010). The employee also disrespected facebook policy which asks people to only create accounts in their actual names and avoid giving false personal information. The employee’s action is also a violation of the social contract between users and the social media platform (Comer, McKelvey and Curran, 2012). The action goes a long way to justify the inclusion of the respect principle in the Telstra social media engagement campaign. Applications of the respect principle would have prevented the said employee from taking up the personality of well known politician and posting on behalf of him. References Baase, S. (2008). A gift of fire: Social, legal, and ethical issues for computing and the Internet. Pearson Prentice Hall. Breakenridge, D. (2012). Social Media and Public Relations: Eight new practices for the PR professional. Pearson Education. Comer, R., McKelvey, N., & Curran, K. (2012). Privacy and Facebook. International Journal of Engineering and Technology, 2(9), 1626-1630. Fritzsche, D., & Oz, E. (2007). Personal values’ influence on the ethical dimension of decision making. Journal of Business Ethics, 75(4), 335-343. Goel, V. (2014). Flipping the Switches on Facebook’s Privacy Controls, New York Times, January 29, accessed 28th march 2014, http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/30/technology/personaltech/on-facebook-deciding-who-knows-youre-a-dog.html?_r Hurtst, D. (2011). Good Guy fairly sacked over Facebook rant, Sydney Morning Herald, August 18, 2011, accessed 28th march 2014, http://www.smh.com.au/technology/technology-news/good-guy-fairly-sacked-over-facebook-rant-20110818-1iyv2.html#ixzz2xDYZ8aLW Laudon, K. C., & Laudon, J. P. (2004). Management information systems: managing the digital firm. New Jersey, 8. Light, B., & McGrath, K. (2010). Ethics and social networking sites: a disclosive analysis of Facebook. Information Technology & People, 23(4), 290-311. MacDonald, J., Sohn, S., & Ellis, P. (2010). Privacy, professionalism and Facebook: a dilemma for young doctors. Medical education, 44(8), 805-813. Martin, C. (2011). Apple upheld in firing employee for Facebook rants, The Inquirer, November 2, accessed 28th march 2014, http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/2128899/apple-upheld-firing-employee-facebook-rant. Mehrotra, M. C. (2012). Ethics:―Its Importance, Role and Code in Information Technology‖. International Journal, 2(7). Quinn-Allan, D. (2012) Telstra - the 3 Rs of social media engagement, in Belch, George; Belch, Michael; Kerr, Gayle and Powell, Irene (eds), Advertising : an integrated marketing communication perspective, pp. 78-81, McGraw Hill, North Ryde, N.S.W Raynes-Goldie, K. (2010). Aliases, creeping, and wall cleaning: Understanding privacy in the age of Facebook. First Monday, 15(1). Skeels, M. M., & Grudin, J. (2009, May). When social networks cross boundaries: a case study of workplace use of facebook and linkedin. In Proceedings of the ACM 2009 international conference on Supporting group work (pp. 95-104). ACM. Williams, P. (2006). MySpace, facebook attract online predators: experts say be careful what you post online–somebody is always watching. MSNBC Interactive, accessed 28th march 2014, http://www. msnbc. msn. com/id/11165576. Read More