Over the last few months, it became clear to the companies that people were getting into blogging more frequently. Some people even blogged straight from the workspace, others blogged at home and many bloggers started to vent their feelings and thoughts about their employer. Many marketeers jumped on this train, starting to preach the netiquette and so called ground rules for corporate blogging.
One of my first posts on this blog dealt with this topic, so I’m just going to refer to that one if you need more info about ‘the rules’.
The reason I’m dealing with this matter again, is because of an interesting and relevant thought Nev0n has quoted on his blog.
I’ll get to the quote he posted after a short introduction. Then I’ll add his personal opinion about this thought.
It’s concerning the article in last week’s PR Week on policies and guidelines for employee blogging. Here are some short excerpts :
“We see blogging as a great opportunity for direct and deep two-way conversations with developers and customers,” says a Microsoft spokeswoman who asked not to be identified. “We get important, real-time feedback on our products, and customers get greater insight into what’s going on with key technologies inside the company.”
“While some companies might be concerned about what employees will say about them in the blogosphere, Blackshaw says parameters of restrictions should be considered carefully.”
“Companies may want to think twice before saying that employees can’t give any details about their job experience,” he says. In fact, research by Intelliseek shows that the overwhelming majority of bloggers’ postings about their employers were of the “I love my job” variety.”
The keynote Nev0n points out is the following :
“Still, Hannegan notes that employees are less likely to blog about frustrations with the company if there is another outlet for their frustrations. So facilitating greater employee-manager communication might help alleviate a staff member’s need to vent on the web.”
Nev0n adds the following thoughts to this quote :
“This is a an excellent point to think about when considering all the elements about enabling employees to blog. It highlights a fact about organizations and relationships in the workplace – if you provide people with an outlet to express themselves in an environment where such outlets don’t exist already or are not trusted, the new outlet you provide (in this case, blogs) will likely be used in unexpected ways that don’t bode well for their nurturing and development, nor for good employer-employee relationships.
And remember one crucial thing. Like any other communication tool used by employees, a blog is no substitute or surrogate for the personal communication and trust that must be built and maintained between employees and their direct managers. It’s a relationship that takes some work and requires the willing and active participation of all parties.”
Read more at [Nev0n's blog]
Read the article on [PR Week]