Technology and Workers Rights Essay Example for Free

Technology and Workers Rights EssayWhether it is over a cup of coffee with friends at the local Starbucks, in a crowded lunch room at work, or on a coworkers Facebook wall, employees atomic number 18 talking closely their jobs, especially to atomic number 53 another. New trends in ripe technology, such as the recent explosion and popularity of substantially-disposed networking sites like Facebook and Twitter, continue to constantly change the musical mode employees finish engage, sh ar, and voice their work related concerns. jibe to the National Labor dealing Board (NLRB), an independent administration agency charged with mediating disputes between management and labor unions, this new trend has become an important remindering device that sometimes harsh criticism by employees is defend by federal law at work, at home, and now on the Internet. Although social media provides another forum for employees to exercise their protected collective be activeivities, such as share complaints or address concerns to improve working conditions and pay, employers must make sure newly actual social media policies give due consideration to employees rights that are protected under the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA).The New York Times recently published that under the NLRA, employees acquire the right to join together, with or without a union, to exercise their protected collective activities to share complaints, address concerns with employers, and negotiation to improve their working conditions and pay. The NLRA overly protects employees rights to discuss work-related issues with other employees that was first made into federal law back in 1935. Basically, criticism of an employers practices rough wages, hours and working conditions is protected no matter how it is expressed, as long as it is protected, concerted activity. The NLRA says that protected is any statement about wages, hours or working conditions, and concerted means the employees st atements were engaged in with or on the authority of other employees.Workers need to be aware that statements made through this casing of forum have to be directed to other employees or to the beau monde on behalf of the employees not full personal gripes. However, employers need to understand that it doesnt matter where or even so how the employee makes these statements as long as it is protected and concerted. As popular social media sites like Facebook and Twitter continue to influence the way co-workers communicate on the job and outside the workplace, companies feel they do have the right to legally monitor their employees activities online, in order to ensure a most professional and lawsuit-proof workplace. Bosses can penalize employees for what they deem as inappropriate post, videos and pictures on social-networking sites, even if a worker uses those sites during non-working hours, states Lewis Maltby, author of the workplace rights book, Can They Do That? though the mo st frequently cited justification for workplace monitoring is to prevent employee theft, sabotage, and violent incidents on the job, companies have alike voiced concerns that they run huge risks with employees leaking trade secrets or other confidential and proprietary information about their people, products, and services to outside competitors online.In his book, The natural Employee, author Frederick Lane, a workplace expert on the preserve of technology and society, points out employers are increasingly more interested in hiring employees who will not violate the company to additional costs and liability, while not hiring employees who will increase their cost through negligence, misconduct, and error (28). But the biggest threat companies are now beginning to fear is the line between an honest online preaching that may lead to defamation of a company, which can be blurry in certain situations, make it even more difficult to distinguish the truth. Although computers have revolutionized employees workplaces in slipway that earlier generations could not have imagined, U. S. companies, such as retail giant Wal-Mart, may realize they are in catch-up mode with modern technology, due to new challenges brought on by the recent explosion of social media sites.The NLRB found that employers facing this increase trend need to establish social media policies that do not infringe on workers rights. For example, the NLRB learned that one company mandated its employees to stay away from controversial topics such as religion and politics, and adopt a professional tone in the use of their social media, while other companies had gone so farthest as to blatantly forbid their employees from posting anything potentially misleading about the company online, and even told their employees to be careful about friending other co-workers on Facebook. The Washington Times reported that in June of this year along, the NLRB as well as found that six of the seven corporate so cial media policies it examined included provisions that failed to pass regulatory muster, proving to be too vague or intrusive on their workers rights to free expression online. NLRB General Counsel, Lafe Solomon, cited other companies, including dish up Network and Target, have also maintained similar corporate social media policies that at least partially violated provisions of the NLRA.This delicate balance became strikingly apparent in a recent subject area filed with the NLRB by a non-union employee fired from a non-unionized emergency medical response team. The employee filed a charge with the NLRB against the company for wrongful discharge after losing her job for posting negative comments about her boss on Facebook. According to the employer, the posting violated a company policy that prohibits employees from making negative remarks on the Internet about the company or its employees. However, the employee claimed that the policy and her discharge from the company violated the NLRA by denying employees their right to engage in the protected, concerted activity of sharing complaints about working conditions with fellow workers. The case settled before an actual hearing with the company agreeing to revise its policy to eliminate any social media restrictions on its employees that could be in violation of the NLRA. In the initial complaint against the company, the NLRB claimed the employers policy was overly broad and prohibited employees from committal to writing personal personal depictions of the company online without permission or posting any disapproving comments.Cases such as these should serve as a reminder to every employer that the NLRA applies to unionized and non-unionized workers alike. But in this increasingly technologically savvy world, the larger questions looming for both employers and employees alike should be what are the boundaries of an employees privacy, and who is more entitled to vomit up that line. Companies should protect th emselves and their employees by setting clear expectations on proper social media use in the office, says dean Debnam, CEO of Workplace Options, a public policy polling company that surveys American workers. However, employers must be vigilant of how far they take these regulations. While social media polices are not a problem, survey results show that employees do not support any intrusive measures, such as demanding access to passwords.As new avenues of ego expression created by social media and newly developed technologies evolve, employees should definitely be mindful as to what constitutes a legitimate basis for termination. Companies rights to dismiss employees at will, unless that is some statute, like the Labor Act, prohibits a particular act of retaliation, should not be taken lightly. In this tough economy where companies feel that image is still everything, even applicants who have applied for jobs may find out later they have been denied employment, due to messages co mmunicated to their friends on social networking sites they thought were private and password protected. The bigger notion thats scary for some employees is that once you are hired, you may find that your employer has taken drastic steps to make sure that access to your privacy extends well beyond company working hours.Lane agrees that workplace monitoring is a major problem, because technology makes it affirmable for employers to gather enormous amounts of data about employees, and often goes far beyond what is necessary to satisfy recourse or productivity concerns (3-4). Few rights are as deeply treasured by American citizens as their freedom of speech. As the Internet and social media sites becomes more mainstream within the workplace, employers must find better ways to draft and implement employment policies that protect the company from things such as legal disputes and charges of discrimination, while at the same time making sure employees rights under the NLRA and other fed eral employment laws are protected and preserved.Works CitedBuddenberg, Roger. Can Workers Vent on Facebook? Lawyers Tips on Social Media for Workers. Omaha World Herald (NE) 10 Oct. 2011. faculty member Search Premier. Web. 30 Oct. 2012.Devaney, Tim. Tweeting Workers Friended by NLRB Memo Warns of Restricting Rights. Washington Times 26 June 2012. Academic Search Premier. Web. 18Sep. 2012.Kim, Susanna. NLRB Backs Workers Fired After Facebook Post Ripping Boss. ABC News, 10 Nov. 2010. Web. 4 Dec. 2012.Lane, Frederick S. The Naked Employee How Technology is Compromising Workplace Privacy. New York Amacom, 2003. Print.Petrecca, Laura. More Employers Use Tech to Track Workers. ground forces Today. USA Today, 17 March 2010. Web. 6 Sept. 2012.