If I was paying money to someone, and they were slagging me off online, I'd immediately cease paying them.

Depends on the details. For a lower level position I might give a written warning, on the provision they take down the offending post(s). But since she’s named a client, that could harm business relations. So in that instance the severity of the misdeed is greater.

I’m sure their performance would be taken into account too. If someone is generally a high performing individual who had this one incident then a more lenient outcome might be expected. But if the company are already unhappy with the employee’s performance then this might just be used as an excuse to terminate their employment.

How would you feel if you were paying them and they were slagging off you?

Did you ever consider listening to the reasons they were slagging you off? Was it true, did you make changes

They should come to me with their issues, not social media. If a mutually acceptable accommodation can't be reached, it's time to part ways. After that, then they can slag me off online all they want, short of slander.

> They should come to me with their issues, not social media.

So many companies say this to just fire people that bring feedback. Whistleblowers are needed for a reason.

This concept that companies are always right is alien to me. I have only heard it from management, and only towards subordinates because management are the first ones to badly complain about their own salaries and jobs.

Whistleblowing is something different.

> This concept that companies are always right is alien to me.

I wasn't saying that they were. I just said I don't care to pay people that say hateful things about me. I seriously doubt you or anyone else would, either. Suppose you hired a maid, who then posted online about all your unattractive habits?

I answered that question. In short, “it’s nuanced”.

There needs to be a line drawn somewhere and the company suspending that individual while that review her case to see which side of the line she falls seems like an entirely reasonable reaction.

Or you could treat them like humans and they wouldn’t be complaining about being poorly treated while you’re paying them?

Cratchit, you'll want the whole day off tomorrow, I suppose.

Social media is no longer a side technology, it is the main method of communication for a generate or more of adults.

Demanding workers adhere to a restriction on their inalienable right to free speech cannot continue.

It doesn’t matter if their main method of communication was crop dusting entire neighbourhoods with thousands of tattooed teddy bears. What matters is the content of that speech. If you’re publicly slagging off a company that you’re contracted with (whether that’s as a supplier or employee) then that company is reasonably within their rights to say you’re bringing their image into disrepute and thus terminate that contract.

The only issue social media brings I to the equation is that it makes it much easier for silly people to post silly things to wider audiences (and easier for employees to evidence that silliness too).

Now given this employees job is support and that she’s already named the client that her employees serves, this could theoretically impact her employers renewal as a supplier (because that client are just as much in their right to terminate their contract as the employees are). Which is a pretty serious problem and might even cost her employers more than one FTE in lost revenue — in fact I’d almost guarantee that would be the financial cost to her employer in such a scenario otherwise it wouldn’t make financial sense hiring that employees to begin with.

So what would you do? Keep an employee on the payroll who is costing you more than the value they add? Also bare in mind that they’re (if I read the article correctly) still within they’re probation and thus are still yet do demonstrate themselves.

In this instance the company’s approach is correct: review her case but make it explicit that a potential outcome might be dismissal. This is exactly how a well structured HR department should operate even within territories with much stricter employment laws.

The fact that she’s still sharing internal company discussions despite now being aware of the reach is has and the potential ramifications shows a lack of remorse. And that wouldn’t help her case during the review.

This is not a free speech issue, the government isn't involved.

Why would companies want to pay people to publicly trash them online?

You're conflating the 1st Amendment with free speech. The former is rooted in the latter. Free speech is a natural right, applicable to all situations. This is a free speech issue.

This is the argument used by people who think you should be able to say anything on Facebook, Twitter etc. And the response is always the same - you have the right to say what you want, but there are consequences. In this case, firing.

You made the same mistake as the higher comment. Yes, this is how it works legally in the US. But the concept of free speech is not tied to US law. It is a free speech issue and it’s perfectly conceivable that a countries laws would reflect these rights for social media protections.

You’re agreeing with the op. You do have free speech on social media. You also have consequences. Same as on the street, work, school, playground, grocery store, car dealership…

Employers should not and can not apply consequences for any reason they like. You could say “you are free to wear any color shirt you like, but if you pick the wrong one, you could be fired”.

That may be true in America but it isn’t in other countries. Arguably some speech on social media should be protected and not a reason for employment termination.

This is true in Europe and I guess in any other normal country.

If I stayed to insult my employer (wherever, including social media) they would have the right to fire me.

If I do not agree, I can go to court.

Of course, the nature of my comments matter. If I say that I like the color blue and they do not, they cannot do anything.

If I say that their products suck, they will fire me and the court will agree.

If I say that their products are dangerous (whistle blowing) then they can try to fire me but I will be protected by law.

in germany you have the right to publicly share your own opinion about your employer. you may not insult them, but you may well criticize them or their products, working conditions or anything else that is factually true.

you may also share your political opinions, something US companies seemingly often like to stop, as long as you are not disruptive.

>Arguably some speech on social media should be protected and not a reason for employment termination.

Why? Not saying I disagree, but I find the selective support of this concept interesting. So I'm curious to hear your argument and the framework for determining what speech should be protected on a private platform.

The problem in my view is tech companies have squeezed their way in to our lives and managed to get the majority to post their private conversations publicly. So posting a mild complaint about your place of work on social media has become today's version of complaining to a friend in person or on the phone.

Yes I do think employers do have reason to want to protect their image online, but I also don't like the situation where people are always under public watch. So either you should be allowed to say these things on social media without losing your job, or social media companies should be cracked down on for what they have done.

>So posting a mild complaint about your place of work on social media has become today's version of complaining to a friend in person or on the phone.

Significant difference in audience size and staying power of the comment. Telling a person privately stays private and is likely gone forever. Even if they blab to someone it's just second hand at that point. Posting shit about your employer on social media is more akin to putting it on a billboard or writing an op-ed in the paper trashing them.

Yes, but newspapers didn’t socially engineer everyone in to writing these things and publishing them to the world. It was the norm for your comments to be private and forgotten. Now it’s the norm for the same style of comments to be public.

I’m saying the system is at fault here. Either what the tech companies have done or the fact that a normal action is now a firable offence which has become a new problem.

It's not normal though. Most people would never consider shit talking their employer on social media. People with poor decision making skills do.

I think the negative content about the employer was the fact that her employer was monitoring their employees through the webcam, anything directly said about the company I see is other users reacting to the employer's surveillance.

The employee is just stating a fact about their employer which everyone feels is scandalous or negative including the employer themselves.