Bosses warned of social media snooping risks

Why using social media to vet your new recruits might not be a great idea...

Bosses should not be "heavy handed" when it comes to monitoring social media usage in the office, and could also risk leaving themselves open to charges of discrimination if they use social media to vet potential employees, according to employment relations body Acas.

But it also warned that staff also need to remember that whatever they post online could be read by their colleagues or manager.

Bosses: When it comes to social media you need to think before you snoop. Photo: pixelbully

More than half of staff use social media at work - but employers are concerned that staff are abusing it by posting derogatory comments about managers and colleagues, but only one in 10 employers has a social media policy, said Acas, which has drawn up a guide to help businesses and staff to agree how to handle the use of the internet, blogs and social media websites such as Facebook and Twitter inside and outside of work.

Acas said employers should consult with staff and trade unions to create a social media policy and make clear the consequences of breaching its policy - which should become part of contracts of employment for staff.

Acas CEO John Taylor said that online conduct should not differ from offline conduct, and that employees should assume that everything they say on the internet could be made public - and seen by billions of people worldwide.

But he said if bosses check on employees' use of the internet and social media, they must make it clear what they look at - and why.

"A manager wouldn't follow an employee down the pub to check on what he or she said to friends about their day at work. Just because they can do something like this online, doesn't mean they should," he said in a statement.

A report commissioned by Acas said that a number of organisations are using social media to vet potential recruits, and warned that while there is no legislation that prohibits employers from considering information from an individual's Facebook profile when making a recruitment decision, given the amount of information available about candidates on social network sites, employers leave themselves open to charges of discrimination.

That's because by vetting candidates online, employers are likely to know a range of information about candidates including sexual orientation, ethnicity, religion, marital status, age and political views, making it easier for rejected candidates to claim they have been discriminated against, the report said.

However, the report noted that in reality, applicants usually have no information about the other candidates for comparison: "This places considerable onus on employers to self-regulate and act responsibly to comply with employment legislation," it said.