• 23
  • January
    2011

With the increased use of social networking many employers are finding themselves in uncharted territory as former employees claim that they were unfairly terminated due to online comments or photos on sites such as Facebook and Twitter.

And while there have already been - and currently still are - numerous lawsuits out there related to wrongful termination, some experts claim that without companies adopting some sort of social media policy, the lawsuits can continue to grow in number and scope.

Even right now the National Labor Relations Board, which is a federal agency that oversees employees' rights, is for the first time ever considering a wrongful termination lawsuit that is related to social media.

The case stems from a former medical transportation employee who claims that she was fired from her job with American Medical Response after she posted comments about her boss on Facebook. The ambulance and medical-transportation company is denying the wrongful termination allegations, and claims that the woman was fired for complaints related to her behavior and not because of the criticizing comments she made about her boss on Facebook.

In another lawsuit, a former high school teacher is also claiming that she was forced to resign due to photos of her drinking alcohol while on vacation. In this situation, the local school

And while both of these unresolved cases deal with wrongful termination, experts agree that with so much personal information about a person being on a social network, companies can find themselves dealing with even more lawsuits.

For example, what if a person applies for a job and feels that he or she is the best candidate, but then doesn't get the job? Could it be possible that he or she didn't get the job after the employer did a quick social network search and found out what that person's sexual orientation is? Or what if a supervisor continuously tries to friend a coworker on Facebook? Could this be grounds for a sexual harassment lawsuit?

As the popularity and use of social networking continues to grow, it's going to be these types of questions companies will have to address, or else run the risk of seeing more employment-related lawsuits.

Source: Times-Herald Record, "Legal battles brew over crackdown in the workplace on social media," 23 Jan 2011