Employers find online restrictions questioned

Kraft Foods Inc. recently opened access to everything from YouTube to Facebook and Hotmail, with the caveat that personal use be reasonable and never interfere with job activities.

Online policies in the office
Broadening access does, of course, mean some employees will cross lines they aren't supposed to.

Sapphire Technologies LP, an information-technology staffing firm based in Massachusetts, started allowing employees to use most Internet sites two years ago, because recruiters for the company were going on Facebook to find talent.

Martin Perry, the company's chief information officer, says managers occasionally have to give employees a "slap on the wrist" for watching sports on streaming video or downloading movies on iTunes. And he says older managers sometimes raise eyebrows at their younger counterparts' online judgment.

"If you saw some of the pictures that they've uploaded, even to our internal directory, you'd question the maturity," Perry says.

It's the price a company has to pay, he says, for attracting top young talent that's willing to work at any hour. "Banning the Internet during work hours would be myopic on our part," Perry says.

But that also means many companies are still figuring out their online policies and how to deal with the blurring lines between work and personal time — including social networking, even with the boss.

"I think over time, an open embrace of these tools can become like an awkward hug," says Mary Madden, a senior research specialist at the Pew Internet & American Life Project. "It can get very messy."

One option is for companies to allow access to certain sites but limit what employees can do there. For instance, Palo Alto Networks, a computer security company, recently helped a pharmaceutical company and a furniture maker open up social networking for some employees, but limited such options as file-sharing, largely so that sensitive information isn't transferred, even accidentally.

"Wide-open Internet access is the risky approach," says Chris King, Palo Alto Networks' director of product marketing. However, "fully closed is increasingly untenable for cultural reasons and business reasons."

Flynn, at the ePolicy Institute, says it's important that employers have a clear online policy and then explain it. She believes not enough employers have conducted formal training on such matters as online liability and confidentiality.

Meantime, her advice to any employee is this: "Don't start blogging. Don't start tweeting. Don't even start e-mailing until you read the company policy."

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