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In theory, empowering employees is a great way to get them to do the right thing with respect to social media. But, in reality, I think you still have to offer guidelines about best practices and how to behave. It provides the company with a fallback when things go off the rails, which they will from time to time.

Mark

But unfortunately most, if not all, social media policies I’ve seen so far were little more than threats. Do this and you’ll face the consequences. Much scaring, little trust, even less empowering with the sole purpose to create cover for one’s corporate butt.

I repeat, turning your employees into your biggest fans – see Zappos for an example – is the best social media policy there is.

Like it or not, for companies to NOT have a social media policy in place is a liability. Plain and simple.

If anything, a policy is a document that clearly communicates guidelines of conduct to employees. It’s a reference: This is acceptable. That is not. The consequences could be X.

The policy doesn’t have to be written in the context of “if you say something bad about us on your blog or FaceBook, you will open yourself up to disciplinary action.” We aren’t children. (More on that in a sec.) A policy can also explain how a casual conversation about work or a competitor could turn into a huge black eye for the company as a whole. In other words, a social media policy can help employees understand how to become better internet denizens during their off-hours.

If a social media policy is written with the purpose of outlining not only corporate guidelines AND educating employees as well, it can become a very powerful tool. From an HR perspective, it can help avoid internal problems. From a PR perspective, same thing.

I would even argue that a policy document isn’t alone. You have to combine it with a modicum of awareness training in order for it to work its magic.

And while, yes, we know that if we call our boss a hack on Twitter or our company a “soul-sucking cubicle farm” on Facebook, we know that it will earn us a trip to the HR department, it doesn’t hurt to remind people of this in an official company document, and to also explain why.

If none of the above is enough to convince you, consider the potential impact of recent changes to FTC rules regarding disclosure and corporate responsibility. If anything, even if you remove “employee behavior” from the conversation, employees now HAVE to understand how not to put the companies they work for in a position to be fined (heftily) by the FTC.

A social media policy (or corporate social media guidelines) can at the very least help employees avoid legal and financial pitfalls dealing with disclosure and libel.

But you’re right: A policy that attempts to control employee use of social media, censor them outright or ban it in some way is a complete waste of everyone’s time.

Thanks for writing this. Cheers.