Social Media Guidelines

Does your company have a social media governance policy? It ought to. These days the Internet is a public arena with a microscope over top. The rules are also different, and evolving. Things you might be able to get away with saying to someone or a group, face-to-face, might not come across properly online.

The most effective rule for any company is to exercise caution and restraint when using social media. Don't reveal too much information about yourself or the company you work for. However, it's far too risky for a company to leave all of the online judgment calls in the hands of its employees. The very first rule any good social media policy should include is if an employee identifies his or herself as a member of an organization online than they are automatically subjected to that organization's social media guidelines. This at least leaves the option open for employees to maintain public profiles that are not appended to their work lives, thus having a bit more flexibility how they manage those accounts.

There are a number of other important rules and guidelines, most of which you can find at a great website I found called socialmediagovernance.com. The site has a number of actual examples of social media policies from a host of different companies. But perhaps the two best because of their inclusiveness and clarity are from Cisco and Intel. I highly recommend reading them if you are trying to create a set of guidelines for your organization.