I work for you, please ‘Friend’ me.

The trouble with Social Media's.

You may be addicted to it, hate it or just don’t understand it but social media is here to stay. We all know that social media is a great way to promote your business. A good presentation of a business on a social network can do wonders for your word of mouth advertising. It can however turn from good too bad in an instant and that great reputation that’s taken you so long to get is lost before you know it.

Any business owner will tell you that the staff make or break the success of the business. You want a strong team and want to provide an environment that everyone enjoys working in and where everyone gets along with each other. Sooner or later you’re going to get those seemingly harmless social media friend requests from your work colleagues. Should you accept? Those with social media experience would probably suggest no.

Staff on a roster are renowned for switching shifts, cancelling a shift just hours before it starts and even sometimes just not showing up. Typically a staff member calls, or even worse, sends a text message, to say they can’t work their shift due to some personal emergency. You then see photos of them on Facebook having a great night out and getting drunk with their friends. While everyone at work is putting in the extra hard effort to cover being a man down. It’s a situation that occurs quite often and usually ends up with the said staff member having their employment being terminated.

That’s when the real trouble starts as the now ex-staff member, feels unfairly treated and proceeds to post unpleasant messages about your business and you on just about every social media outlet they can find. If they’re online friends with you those messages can end up on your own social media feed and before you know it all of your customers, staff, friends and family are being told about it too. So what’s the best way to handle the situation?

Keeping your personal life separate from work is a good start. Do you really want your staff to see that not so complimentary nightclub photo of you taken at 3am? Even worse exposing your family and friends to a disgruntled employee is never going to turn out well. Keep in mind though that a lot of employers do like to friend their staff as a way to keep an eye on them, so it does work both ways.

The best way to handle a friend request, either sent or received, is to redirect it to a professional service. If an employee sends you a friend request on Facebook, decline it but send them a request from your LinkedIn account instead. If you do decide to accept a friend request on your personal account then make sure you are up to speed on your privacy settings and set them accordingly. Go through the settings and turn off anything that is public for a start. Some social media sites allow you to group friends, Google+ calls these circles, Facebook has lists, so does Twitter for example. This then lets you control which groups see what.

So, is it okay for your staff to “pull a sicky” and have a night out with friends instead?

If you find out you are going to feel upset and it’s not only the deception but also the effect it has had on your business. Before social media there was a pretty small chance you would ever have found them out. You also have to ask yourself do you really have the right to know what an employee does when they are not at work. It can quickly get very confusing and emotional so stand back and ask yourself a different question. How valuable and reliable is that employee and are they easily replaced?

Letting staff go is never pleasant but make sure you protect yourself.

According to the Fair Work Ombudsman (http://www.fairwork.gov.au) immediate dismissal without notice or warning is legal if the employer has reasonable grounds. These grounds are if the employee has committed theft, fraud, violence or a serious breach of occupational health and safety procedures. Taking a sick day when they are not really sick may be considered fraud at a stretch but it won’t be easy to prove. Depending upon the size of your business though you may not need to go to such extremes for a reason to terminate employment. If the staff member has worked for you for less than 12 months and the total number of your staff including you is under 15 then they won’t be able to make an unfair dismissal claim against you. If your total number of staff is over 15 then they are only able to make an unfair dismissal claim once they have been employed for more than 6 months.

Small businesses are encouraged to follow the Fair Dismissal Code Checklist (http://www.fairwork.gov.au/termination/unfair-dismissal/pages/small-business-fair-dismissal-code.aspx) when terminating an employee. Reading through this checklist is a great way to know your rights as an employer and also the rights of an employee.

What to do about defamatory comments or posts

If you are subjected to uncomplimentary comments about you and your business there a number of things you can do. The most important thing is keep your cool. Reacting in a similar manner or responding to the post only adds fuel to the fire. Online ridicule, stating that someone is corrupt, dishonest, has broken the law or any comment that is likely to cause a person to be shunned or avoided may be grounds for defamation. In Australia, defamation is quite serious and there are strict laws to protect a person’s reputation. If you’re not ready to take immediate legal action, try contacting the person first and ask them politely to remove the defamatory comments. Do this privately and courteously, posting it on their Facebook wall for example is not a good idea.

Need to go legal?

If the situation can’t be resolved you should get professional legal advice. For more information on Online Defamation and what you can do about it can be found at http://www.findlaw.com.au/articles/4237/social-media-and-defamation.aspx.

Social media checklist for success

Used correctly social media can really help your business and following these simple steps will add to your chances of success:

Set your social media privacy settings accordingly.
Create a social media page for your business and keep your personal account private and separate.
Don’t accept or send friend requests from your personal account for business contacts. Use a professional service like LinkedIn instead.
Always be positive and never negative in all of your communications both online and offline.
Know your rights when it comes to defamation and be prepared to handle any disgruntled employees or patron’s online comments.

Source: http://www.eatdrink.com.au/2012/11/i-work-for-you-please-friend-me/