A National Labor Relations Board ruling against Chipotle may prompt companies to re-examine their employee social media policies. Image source: Mike Mozart via Flickr
Companies may wish to revisit their employee social media policies following a recent National Labor Relations Board ruling. Many companies enforce social media policies that restrict employees from criticizing their employers on social media. Those polices are now legally questionable.
The National Labor Board recently ordered Chipotle to rehire a worker fired in March after complaining about the fast-food chain on Twitter. The chain was wrong firing the employee as well as limiting his commentary on social media, the board stated in its decision.
The board told Chipotle to pay the employee back pay, post signs to inform employees its social media policies violated federal labor laws, and change its policies to allow employees to circulate petitions. The board eviscerated Chipotle’s social media policy, saying its restrictions were illegal. Notably, it ordered the company to drop a prohibition against “posting incomplete, confidential, or inaccurate information and making disparaging, false, or misleading statements.”
The decision does not prevent companies from monitoring employees’ social media comments, commentators note.
The Message is Clear
“The message from the NLRB is that, barring anything libelous, freedom of speech is protected for employees who want to criticize their employers on Twitter …,” warns Gene Marks, a customer relationship management consultant, in his Washington Post column.
Many organizations have created employee social media policies to prevent PR crises. Ironically, a social media policy designed to prevent a PR crisis created one for Chipotle as media outlets covered the labor ruling and commentators criticized the company.
The employee at a Pennsylvania Chipotle, James Kennedy, had complained several times on Twitter about the company’s low wages, lack of breaks, and being required to work during snow days when public transporation was shut down.
His first anti-Chipotle tweet was in response to a customer who tweeted her thanks for a free food offer in January 2015. He replied: “@ChipotleTweets, nothing is free, only cheap #labor. Crew members make only $8.50hr how much is that steak bowl really?”
Early this year, he deleted a tweet after being warned by management. He was fired after circulating a petition about the lack of government-mandated breaks.
A ‘Wild Expansion’
The board’s social media rulings are a “wild expansion” of protected concerted activity under the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), Phillip Wilson, president of the Labor Relations Institute, a labor relations consulting firm, told the Society for Human Resource Management. The rulings eventually may be challenged in federal appeals courts, he said.
Bottom Line: A labor board ruling will likely prompt PR, social media and corporate communications managers to re-examine their employee social media policies. Employees have a legal right to complain about working conditions on social media, according to the ruling.
William J. Comcowich founded and served as CEO of CyberAlert LLC, the predecessor of Glean.info. He is currently serving as Interim CEO and member of the Board of Directors. Glean.info provides customized media monitoring, media measurement and analytics solutions across all types of traditional and social media.
