Expectation of Privacy on Facebook?
April 27, 2009 by Darlene McDaniel
Filed under Jobs
There are countless stories about employees who have lost their job or job seekers who have lost an opportunity to get a job because of a comment they left on their Facebook profile. Facebook is a great social media for people interested in connecting with people, friends, and family. But if you have an expectation of privacy, you are deceiving yourself. Here is a
comment from one of the readers over at Slacker Manager, Wrongly Fired or Just Desserts.Phil didn’t ask me what I thought, but I thought I would take this opportunity to help my readers.
I had been a manager at a local company and had been with them for 3 and a half years. During this timeframe I was promoted 3 times, never received any disciplinary action, and consistently had strong performance reviews. Yesterday I was fired for complaining about my job on my Facebook status. NOW, however I am very aware that perhaps this may be wrong or not the smartest… I also have my profile privacy blocked so that you would have to be my friend to see it. With that in mind, it was not as if I was providing this “Complaint” to the entire world wide web, and in fact, there would have been very very few people that worked for this company that would have seen this. I also never named the company, any other employee names, etc…
How am I still in the wrong and losing my job over this? Don’t I have some sort of protection that at least requires them to not only warn me that they think this is an issue, but provide me with some sort of documentation on how I violated a policy??
If you are a job seeker or you are employed, Facebook is not the place to vent about your current organization or any organization you are interested in working for. Facebook is a fun place to connect online. It is truly social in my opinion. The problem is that people share their thoughts freely with an expectation of privacy that is unrealistic. Facebook is a public site. Albeit, you need a login and password and you have to “Friend” someone, however, everyone in your community on Facebook is not “for you.” Who knows how the organization found out about this reader’s comments, the bottom line is that once you put your thoughts on a public site, you give everyone with access to your profile the opportunity to use that information however they see fit.
Our greatest creation may one day be our greatest demise. Facebook is not bad in and of itself. However if you as a job seeker want to operate from mystery and tell yourself that your Facebook profile is private, you are mistaken. There is nothing private about Facebook, whether people are in your community of friends or not.
Two years ago, I enrolled my oldest daughter in college. One of the many discussions the school had with parents and students was about Facebook. The private school she attends openly shares that they check student profiles often. They make enrollment decisions based on Facebook profiles. It is a private school and they don’t want anyone attending whose values don’t align with their values. That is exactly the same premise that organizations are taking on this issue. Branding is a hot word right now. If you are connected to a brand, and make no mistake, your organization has a brand that they are attempting to maintain. And if you are employed by the organization. Anything that you do or say that blemishes the brand is fair game in the mind of the employer or the school. What you do on the internet matters.
This reader learned a hard, yet real lesson the other day. She paid a heavy price for her venting. There is no expectation of privacy on Facebook. Keep your venting to a select number of friends and family, off line and behind closed doors. If you decide to write your vent as your status on Facebook, you have just invited the world into your community and whether they leave a comment or not, the information may extend beyond Facebook over and to the organization where you work.
Great points Darlene, and good for you for helping your daughter understand the importance of being careful with what she says online. That’s a lesson MANY are learning the hard way. It’s sad but true, and there’s not much we can do except share these stories and remind folks that what you say online is NOT private!
How is it that prospective employers are able to gain access to a person’s profile?
While I get that “what goes on the Internet stays on the Internet” and live by it, it is pretty interesting how thin-skinned companies are about complaints on the company.
Think about it: they had pay someone to look for poor comments or follow-up on a tip. They had to go to HR to make sure that firing this person who named no company or employee in the comment was legal to do, Then they had to go through the process of firing someone for one comment.
I’m sure they don’t fire the Wall Street analyst telling investors their stock sucks. I’m sure they don’t fire their customer complaining about poor products and services. I’m sure they don’t fire their bank for the actions they need to do so the bank will continue their loan. I’m sure they don’t fire the auditing company going over their finances and telling the company of their poor business practices that need changing.
I’m also sure they don’t fire employees for complaining about the company while at the water cooler. Or at lunch. Or during a break. Or while talking to their spouses at home. Or at a dinner party. Or while talking to their friends and family on the phone.
But, employee complaints on Facebook? No problem.
While there is ugly commentary on the Internet and no one likes complaints (including me), this says a lot more about the company than the employee.
Hi Phil, Thanks for stopping by. I am amazed about the number of people who don’t understand that what we write online does impact us! For some the consequences may be heavier than we are willing to pay.
I wish to know the same, I use every privacy setting and I never add coworkers or any professionally connected (even friends) people, I even check my profile to be unsearchable from day 1. I dont mess with unknown friend requests untill after work hours & I do watch what I say but still, if a company can bypass this easily then I need to really read the TOS.
Hi Jenn,
Thanks for stopping by! My first question is how did you see the post I wrote? I would venture to guess Facebook. Is that correct? Second, I am not sure how the organization found out about it. That is the million dollar question. Some how they found out. I would guess someone who is in the person’s community of friends mentioned it to someone and there it went, but that is a guess at best! Great question. Something for me to explore. Thanks!
Hey Scot, Thanks for stopping by and weighing in. Oh, how I love your comment. It gives a different perspective on the conversation. And I appreciate that. Feedback is feedback. And one of my questions is what is a person (or organization) to do when they receive it. First, we can evaluate it for validity. If we determine that what is being said is true, the next thing we must determine, is what are we willing to do about it? In this case and in the case of other organizations, that have chosen to terminate the employment of people who may be venting about the organization, rather than determining the validity and what they can do constructively to change the work environment.
Thank you for giving a different view. I love it!!
Have a great day!
Darlene, when you say to look at the process in a company about complaints, it is very logical. What I think many people miss about business — they think business is data driven, process minded, continuous improvement oriented, etc. — is that business is far more social and emotional than all that management theory stuff. Though we like to think we’re good at the management theory stuff!
On this unfortunate comment on Facebook, someone in that company took emotional offense to it for whatever reason, justified or not, and used their power to fire this person. I doubt that it was logically thought out. The management saw, got emotionally ticked, and then went and fired this person using whatever logical reason made legal sense. But, the emotion came first.
Not data driven, not process oriented, not trying to understand the complaint and change behavior. Instead, like junior high, but with employment consequences.
Management (and employees!) need to be better than junior high behaviors.
A very interesting post. I think the argument about “is it OK to comment about the company on Facebook” is really an argument about how much management is willing to embrace — or control — criticism from any source. In this case…control at any cost.
Actually, Twitter! Lol! I downloaded an application to my phone that gives me hourly “tweets” Lol! It sparked my interest because I was at school in the Assistant Director’s of ALANA office and she was going through applications for a new Graduate Assistant. She was on facebook looking them up. I was never really sure if prospective employers really did that, but I saw first hand that theu do!