In my talk on Enterprise 2.0 governance issues at the Enterprise 2.0 – Integrating Web 2.0 Into the Enterprise Conference in Rome, I covered some of the things that can go wrong when there Is not proper enterprise 2.0 governance in place. Some of the most public examples are blogs and internet forums. Here are some incidences of what can go wrong.
Whole Foods banned executives from participating in non-company blogs and chat rooms, except in connection with absolutely personal topics in an update to its corporate Code of Business Conduct, This was apparently in response to CEO John McKay’s anonymous, negative chat room postings about competitor Wild Oats Markets, which led to an SEC investigation.
Friendster fired one of its employees for her personal blog. Joyce Park, a Web developer living in Sunnyvale, Calif., said her managers told her that she stepped over the line with her blog, Troutgirl. They declined to elaborate how this occurred. Park said, "I only made three posts about Friendster on my blog before they decided to fire me, and it was all publicly available information. They did not have any policy, didn't give me any warning, they didn't ask me to take anything down.”
Nintendo fired an employee without warning for writing an anonymous blog that did not mention her employer. The Nintendo policy did not ban or encourage blogs. The company clamed the blog was “inappropriate.”
CNN fired a blogger for blogging without permission and then implemented a policy that says: "You shouldn't post commentary on anything you might cover in your work or CNN may report on, or write about the CNN workplace or post CNN material without permission by a senior CNN manager."
Target, the retailer, is suing the unidentified "John Doe," a blogger believed to be from Georgia, in federal court for posting Target's anti-theft procedures on Web sites and various retail-employee forums on the Internet. The information is used to secure Target's merchandise from criminals. Target said in a court filing the information is provided to employees on a "need-to-know" basis.
Apple sued Think Secret, a rumor-gathering blog launched by a teenager, and the blog has ceased publication as part of a settlement with the company. The case drew national attention because it raised important questions about press freedom, trade secrets and how First Amendment protections extend to blogs. The suit was triggered by a pair of Think Secret items that described the $499 Mac Mini and the iLife ‘05 software suite — two weeks before Jobs was to unveil them at Macworld.
The first four, and possibly the fifth, are employee examples. A sound and well-publicized governance policy covering participation in blogs and internet forums might have avoided some of these instances and made the violations clearer. The last one and possibly the fifth example are transgressions by outsiders. In this case policies and procedures on how to respond to the internet attacks, both through the courts and through the web, coupled with a good web monitoring system could mitigate the negative effects.
In these six examples you can see potential problems at all levels of an organization. In my next post, I am going to cover some best practices in enterprise 2.0 governance that will address some of these issues.
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