Should Companies Be Allowed to Monitor Their Employees’ Social Media and Even Fire Employees Who Express Opinions That Are Detrimental to the Company?

Should companies be allowed to monitor their employees’ social media and even fire employees who express opinions that are detrimental to the company?

Social media networks offer a window into people's lives. But Should companies look at their employees through that window? This question is gaining more and more importance. The number of people fired for what is on their social media networks is increasing, and many companies carefully study the activity of a candidate in the network before deciding whether to hire her or him.

To get an idea of the relevance this practice is acquiring, it is enough to consider a survey of CareerBuilder, which helps corporations identify and recruit workers. According to the survey, 39% of companies investigated social pages of the candidates, while 43% claimed to have found something that induced them to Discard an Applicant – practices such as posting inappropriate photos or information, or unacceptable expressions about their former boss (Hayes, 2018).  On the other hand, The Wall Street Journal indicated that 19% said that they had found information that made them opt for a candidate - such as communication skills or a professional image (Feintzeig & Fuhrmans, 2018).

Advocates of the idea, such as Nancy Flynn, the founder and executive director of Epolicy Institute, argue that companies should control social networks even more (Beaubien, 2014). They should be kept attentive to the tweets and updates of the workers 24 hours a day. Meanwhile, those who advocate for privacy and workers ' representatives, such as Lewis Maltby, the president of the National Workrights Institute, claim that it is not necessary since most of what people post have nothing to do with work, they warn, and they should not be controlled unless there are clear reasons to suspect bad behavior (Beaubien, 2014).

According to Flynn, the company has the right and the responsibility to control the use that the employees of the social networks make at all times. If companies don't pay attention, they can suffer serious problems. Unhappy employees can easily enter social networks to criticize clients, harass subordinates, and show bad behavior. Sometimes that can cause stress and protests at work, others can end up damaging the company's image on the market and can sometimes derive in demand or the actions of regulators. Moreover, like emails, social network records can be claimed and used as evidence (Beaubien, 2014).

On the other hand, some critics claim that it is exaggerating; that most of what people post on social networks is private and harmless and is not related to their work. These critics also expose that companies often perform these pursuits as an ideological witch hunt. In fact, a significant percentage of employees recognize that they should not post information. This is reflected in the results of the 2009 Electronic Business Communication Procedures and Policies Survey developed by the American Management Association (Feintzeig & Fuhrmans, 2018). In The poll, 14% of the employees admitted sending confidential information about the company to third parties through email; a 6% sent credit card data and customers' Social Security numbers; And another 6% transmitted protected information about patients' health, according to The Wall Street Journal.

Some of the examples show how serious these events can be. There are hospital employees who have received criticism or have been dismissed for talking about patients on Facebook -something that not only violates the policy of the hospital but also the law of Portability and Responsibility of Medical Insurance of USA (Beaubien, 2014). A municipal authority accidentally posted private information of some employees on a public page, and then put a link to it on Twitter, which gave rise to stealing the identity of the workers and opened the possibility that the city had to face regulatory actions, negative publicity and lawsuits. In many other cases, employees complained about their company on Internet, or they have posted funny videos that created a bad image and caused considerable damage. Strict control allows companies to anticipate potential problems, delete that information as quickly as possible and impose discipline on the employees involved. Aside from looking at what happens in the internal networks and social media, some companies consider requiring the access to Facebook accounts of employees and other social networks.

Conversely, some critics expose that it is unfair for companies to use social media as a factor in choosing between potential candidates. This could translate into discrimination and can dismiss good candidates who have done things that do not please the company but are not related to work. There is no doubt that it is important that companies do not use social networks to discriminate based on aspects such as age, ethnicity or religious beliefs. Companies should make sure that there are reasons to legitimately reject a candidate. when companies search social networks. However, for potential aspirants, they usually seek legitimate evidence to withdraw or rethink a job offer, such as signs of drug abuse or other illegal activities, comments or harassment, or signs that a candidate may have lied on her or his job resume.