Social Media Policy - Session 6

In this digital age, most companies have opted to create a social media policy to protect their reputations. This policy sets out to align the company's reputation with it's code of conduct to ensure that all content posted to the internet by their employees is representative of their values. The question is, does this social media policy infringe on the rights of their employees to post what their hearts desire to their personal social media accounts? Let's discuss.


The purpose of a social media policy is not necessarily to hinder an employee's ability to post on their social media pages, but instead it is to hinder them from damaging the positive image of the company and by extension themselves. Some companies are compelled to develop a company social media policy, in most cases, as a response to a major public relations disaster. The evidence is there that many social media scandals that illustrates instances of an employee tweeting something offensive from an official company account, a hashtag campaign backfires or even an employee sharing confidential company information online.

A well-crafted company social media policy can help any organization proactively prevent these types of scandals. And, if PR issues do arise, a social media policy will help them effectively address and defuse the problem before it does too much damage.