LinkedIn is one of the fastest growing social networks and is now used by employers to build contacts and find new customers and suppliers. The number of LinkedIn users has been swelling, and now the site boasts nearly 1 billion accounts. The professional network is an essential sales and marketing tool for many companies, and recruitment firms would find it very difficult to stay competitive without it.

The website extends a company’s reach and can be used for a variety of purposes. Company news can be announced, new products marketed, new employees found, and the site contains many interesting industry articles, providing hints and tips for busy professionals. Many users now search LinkedIn for information before using the search engines.

Companies now use the social network as well as their employees. In fact the boundary between the two has become somewhat blurred. For instance, if an individual spends personal time building up contacts, are those contacts connecting with the person or the company? In many cases it is a mixture of the two. So who actually owns those contacts? The employee or the employer? A recent court case in the UK sided with the company. However, without social media usage policies in place, a court case could go either way.

Recruitment consultant discovers his LinkedIn contacts are not his own

A recruitment consultant at Hays Recruitment had been building up contacts via his professional account. When he decided to leave his employer and set up his own business, he copied contacts to his personal account. These were people he had been dealing with frequently as his job demanded.

Hays objected to this activity and took the ex-employee to court over the matter. The judge agreed with Hays and ruled that LinkedIn contacts built during employment at Hays be handed over. The employee was also required to disclose all of the emails that had been sent to those individuals.

The employee, Mark Ions, maintained that by connecting with individuals they had disclosed their contact information and were no longer confidential. Hays maintain that Ions stole business contacts.

This landmark case highlights the potential problems with the use of social media accounts at work. Many companies actively encourage employees to the use LinkedIn to build up contacts, but then claim that those contacts are confidential and cannot be used by the employee for personal purposes.

Court cases such as this are likely to become much more common as the use of professional social networking sites increases. Another case went to the courts in July of last year. Whitmar Publications discovered that some former employees had used the company’s LinkedIn network to market the services of a rival business. Again the courts ruled in favor of the company. The former employees had breached an implied duty of good faith by using the list.

Other problems can arise from the use of the professional network. What happens if an employee of a company wants to find a new job? Can an employee upload a CV and tick the career opportunities box indicating he or she is in the market for a job?

The matter was taken before the courts recently, although the ruling did not exactly clear up the matter. While employed at BG Group, HR manager John Flexman indicated on his LinkedIn CV that he was assisting his current employer reduce its attrition rate. This was deemed to be a breach of confidentiality by BG Group. The company also claimed Flexman had breached its social media usage policies by indicating he was in the market for a job.

BG Group demanded that Flexman remove all details of the company from his profile, other than the company name and his job title. Flexman did not agree. The situation deteriorated and Flexman eventually felt he had no alternative but to resign. He then claimed constructive dismissal. In this case the court ruled in favor of the employee.

Social media usage policies must be developed by businesses

Some companies may have already introduced social media usage policies to cover the use of personal Facebook and Twitter accounts in the workplace, banning staff from spending company time accessing their own accounts. These legal cases highlight the importance of developing comprehensive policies covering all uses of social media websites at work, including contacts that are developed as a result of employment.

Employees must be informed about contact ownership. Any information that is in the public domain – i.e. could be found in a business directory or phone book – cannot be classed as confidential information. However, other information that has been obtained by employees during employment is different. This includes the email addresses of those contacts and their direct dial telephone numbers.

Since LinkedIn is a relatively new website, and legislation on employment law has yet to be introduced to address the issue, there are many gray areas; in particular, when personal accounts are used by an employee. Employers are advised to ensure that LinkedIn accounts are set up and maintained by the company, and employees are not told to create their own accounts for work purposes. All contact information then belongs to the company not the employee.

Policies on the use of LinkedIn and other social media websites should be clearly stated. These could be included with general Internet and email usage policies that are issued to all employees.

Social media usage policies are required to cover use and ownership of accounts, but it is important not to ignore the security aspect. Employees must also be told about acceptable use of the sites from a data security perspective, and instructed what can be uploaded and downloaded to accounts.