Stephen J. Hirschfeld, the CEO of the ELA and a partner in the California-based labor and employment firm of Curiale, Dellaverson, Hirschfeld & Kraemer, LLP, says, "Work-related blogging was once thought to be benign, but it is now one of the hottest, and most complex and far-ranging issues in the workplace.''
Hirschfeld says blog-related issues cover a broad spectrum well beyond concerns by employers over the web-posting of company secrets. "For example, can the employer regulate off-duty blogging because they believe the content injures the company's reputation, is embarrassing to a company, or disparages a company's products, management or customers? There is intense debate over blogs, but no debate over the need to have clear blogging policies,'' he adds. The practice of firing a worker for what is deemed inappropriate blogging, notes Hirschfeld, even has its own name, doocing (named for a fired worker who maintains the website).
Hirschfeld said the telephone poll of 1,000 adults, with a confidence interval of plus/minus 4 percent, was conducted over the weekend of January 22, 2006. Besides finding that 5 percent of American workers maintain personal blogs and that only 15 percent of their employers have a policy directly addressing blogging activities, it also revealed that:
- 59 percent of employees believe employers should be allowed to discipline or terminate workers who post confidential or proprietary information concerning the employer
- 55 percent think employers should be allowed to discipline or terminate employees who post damaging, embarrassing, negative information about the employer
- 23 percent support fellow workers being free to post criticism or satire about employers, co-workers, supervisors, customers, or clients without fear of discipline
Of the employees polled who work for a company with a blogging policy:
- 62 percent say the policy prohibits posting any employer-related information
- 60 percent say the policy discourages employees from criticizing or making negative comments against the employer
- 58 percent say the regulations deal with all blogging regardless of content.
Dr. Ted Reed, President of the Reed Group, LLC, a Philadelphia-based research firm and Survey Director for ELA, says the poll is indicative of a steady growth in adult blogging. A 2003 national survey by the Pew Internet & American Life Project found that approximately 2 percent of American adults who used the Internet maintained a blog.
"Based on our current research, we can have as many as 10 million bloggers among the American workforce,'' he noted.
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