Employee Blogging

We spend a lot of time monitoring what employees are saying about their clients, which is quite a lot. Unsurprisingly this has resulted in many companies developing sophisticated employee blogging policies. (The best of which is simply: "We pay you. We read what you post. The two are linked.") Some companies have chosen to be quite draconian, whilst others encourage a free open, and often, public debate. it seems this may change, in the US at least , following an NLRB ruling, which appears to provide a considerable level of protection to employees from any disciplinary action resulting from posts about their work.

"Employees have a protected right to discuss matters affecting their employment amongst themselves. Explicit or implicit criticism by a co-worker of the manner in which they are performing their jobs is a subject about which employee discussion is protected by Section 7. That is particularly true in this case, where at least some of the discriminatees had an expectation that LC might take her criticisms to management. By terminating the five discriminatees for discussing LC's criticisms of HUB employees' work, Respondent violated Section 8(a)(1)"