The Modern Manager 175: A Manager’s Guide to Social Media with Bianca Lager
The rise of social media has allowed employers and managers to gain access to their people’s private lives in ways never before possible. While it may seem like a gift to be able to instantly gain insight into who someone “really” is, the question every manager must answer is, “is it worth it?”
Today's guest is Bianca Lager. Bianca is a business manager, consultant and public speaker whose specialties include organizational development, career growth, and online reputation management. Bianca is also the President of Social Intelligence, a consumer reporting agency focused on online risk for human resources.
Bianca and I talk about social media and work - what’s appropriate behavior and what’s not, social media and hiring, and more.
Get a sample social media policy provided by Bianca when you join the Modern Manager community. Check out membership levels at www.themodernmanager.com/join - and get 20% off any level if you work for a government or nonprofit agency.
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Read the related blog article: Is It OK To Check My Employees’ Social Media?
KEEP UP WITH BIANCA:
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/biancacalhounlager/
Key Takeaways:
- Checking on our team members’ social media accounts hampers our productivity and may result in a false narrative about the person.
- Ethically and legally, checking can be a violation of the person’s protected class info.
- Checking for hate group affiliation is often too complicated, as these groups use benign names. Seeing political affiliations may not be constructive for building relationships.
- Assess the level of threat of possibly problematic posts, acknowledge the narrative you created, and decide on a course of action with your HR partner.
- If an employee is using social media during the work day, don’t react in the moment. It may just be a quick break. Don’t over police people’s behavior. Address it later as part of your regular feedback process if the behavior becomes problematic.
- Create a Social Media Policy. Outline expected behaviors, rules, legal standards, documentation procedures, and any punitive actions.
- Give everyone the same policy. The more universal and consistent, the better.