No socialising at work

Arjun Raghunath
The New Indian Express
2 Aug 2010

Concerned over the pros and cons of the social media, many leading IT firms are either prescribing a social media policy to its employees or imposing a blanket ban on the use of social media networks during work hours.


If leakage of vital information from the company’s network is one of the prime concerns of the employers in their employees using social media, social media has its own advantages like promoting the company through the cyber media.

While UST Global, a leading IT firm that has its branch at the Thiruvananthapuram Technopark, has already rolled out a social media policy, Infosys, which also has its presence here, is in the process of developing a policy on social media.

Experts in the IT sector point out that more than 96 percent of the IT companies in the country have imposed a blanket ban on the use of social media during working hours. Global IT giants like Microsoft and Intel have already brought out a social media policy for their employees.

IBS Software services and Toonz Animations, two leading Technopark-based firms, are among the firms which have banned the use of social media at the workplace.

According to Toonz Animation India Chief Executive Officer P Jayakumar, the firm is following a selective social media policy. “Majority of our employees are restricted from accessing internet from their work stations due to security and confidentiality requirements. For selected trade areas like Marketing, Corporate Communications and Concept Development, social websites like Facebook, Linkedin, Twitter etc are essential tools and hence we do not put restriction on their use,’’ he said.

At IBS, though social media networks are banned on the office network, kiosks are provided on the office premises so that the employees can access internet. The employees, however, will have to impose self-restrictions on sharing vital information regarding the company on social media, an IBS spokesperson said.

UST Global brought out its social media policy last year. “All our employees are required to follow the policy guidelines mandatorily so as to ensure that confidential or proprietary information is not passed on to the external world through social media, ’’ said Alexander Varghese, Country Head of UST Global.

The community managers within the organisation are responsible for monitoring whether the policies are followed by everyone. ‘‘Access to the social media sites from the corporate network is provided only after a thorough evaluation by our Information Security team,’’ he said.

UST Global, however, promotes its own exclusive social networking site, which is deployed in the corporate network for the employees to interact and exchange ideas, Alexander said.

Infosys is in the process of collecting employees’ feedback on the proposed policy. “Based on the feedback, our policy council takes its decision on a policy and its implementation. This will happen next month, post which the policy will be announced. The policy is aimed at creating awareness on responsible social media activity, keeping in mind client confidentiality, company intellectual property and the Infosys code of conduct,’’ said an Infosys spokesperson.

Meanwhile, techies feel that a total ban on the use of social media is an encroachment on their freedom of expression. “Social media is a forum where we techies can exchange our ideas. Hence, imposing a total ban is not advisable. However, some sort of guidelines on sharing company information cannot be blamed from the point of view of an employer,’’ said an IT professional at a leading Technopark firm who did not want to be identified.

Moreover, nowadays, the techies least depend on office networks to access social media sites as most of the modern mobile phones offer such facilities.

arjun_raghunath@expressbuzz.com