Facebook

[sls73]

are there any other folks out there having staff come to you about what others have posted on fb? it is more so what staff are saying(some being borderline inappropriate) and what they are saying about the facility. no one has mentioned resident names or staff names.

i am not friends with the staff as i see it as their place to vent with out administration lurking. i sometimes feel it is no different then calling up a friend at the end of the night and telling her about their day. grant it though that's not posted for all to read(including the public). for the most part, i do have an awesome staff and feel that this is a great place to work for. so i am trying to figure out how to handle staff complaints of fb comments (not sure if they are just trying to cause trouble either) and still keep their private life separate.

for the most part i still love technology!

[Magaly63]

I have warned a few people to keep comments non specific and general....It is easy to gradually get too comfortable with FB and not realize the widespread implications and how many friends of friends of friends are out there....and how fast words are shared around......Funny though, I have had staff call out sick and post on FB about how sick they were, I think just to support their "true" sickness.........

[SuesquatchRN, BSN, RN]

I'd get a policy written to address it.

[CapeCodMermaid, RN]

I don't 'friend' my co-workers on Facebook anymore. I had to fire someone and she was on my list of FB friends. I quickly unfriended her. There is work and then there is the rest of life. We recently had to fire an employee for horrible behavior which included telling lies about other staff members. Of course she denied it...but, there it was on FB for everyone to see.

[kdhnursern]

I'd get a policy written to address it.

Our facility recently wrote a policy addressing it. It's one thing to talk with friends on the phone. It's another to spread your feelings worldwide. There is always that old saying "Be sure to make your words sweet, tomorrow you may have to eat them". Not sure of the specifics of what had been posted on facebook from employees, but I have seen some of the photos that have been posted. Not something I'd want a prospective employer in the future looking at!! No thought in their head that they are professionals and should try to promote that image.

[hcox1975, BSN, RN]

I worked in a LTC facility and we had this issue. A girl got fired for dogging the adminstration about how they treated another employee. She was there 6 yrs.

now I work in a hospital and during orientation, they said they didn't even want us to mention anything about work on facebook. Patients, about having a crummy night, other employees. I didn't even put my unit under my info tab. I want to keep my job, so I am not taking any chances.

[CuriousMe]

are there any other folks out there having staff come to you about what others have posted on fb? it is more so what staff are saying(some being borderline inappropriate) and what they are saying about the facility. no one has mentioned resident names or staff names.

i am not friends with the staff as i see it as their place to vent with out administration lurking. i sometimes feel it is no different then calling up a friend at the end of the night and telling her about their day. grant it though that's not posted for all to read(including the public). for the most part, i do have an awesome staff and feel that this is a great place to work for. so i am trying to figure out how to handle staff complaints of fb comments (not sure if they are just trying to cause trouble either) and still keep their private life separate.

for the most part i still love technology!

if staff members have their fb set so that only their friends can see their postings, it seems there are no problems.

why are staff members coming to you about what other staff members say? it seems like an electronic form of tattling on a gossip. i don't know that i'd have a policy, only because how would you enforce it? again, if staff members only allow their friends to see posts, you'd never see it. i'd likely just recommend that the complaining staff members de-friend the people they are complaining about.

[sls73]

I did ask the folks who came to me "why they didn't say anything to the employee if it offended them so much". The next time this person posted a vent about the facility- one of the employees actually asked if she thought that was appropriate? The girl(although she didn't need to-I know) came to me told me what she said and stated the employee took all of her posts about the facility off. I agree though maybe need a policy. I also agree if some of it is just an electronic form of "telling on a fellow co-worker" vs what is really offensive to other staff.

Thanks for the replies.

[CapeCodMermaid, RN]

Facebook can easily get out of hand. At a local high school, one student beat up another with a wrench because the first student had made a comment on Facebook about a friend of the second student. Better to keep work and private life separate.

[Forever Sunshine, ASN, RN]

When it comes to facebook I try to keep those two worlds separate. If someone from work requests me as a friend I will add them, but I'm not going out of my way to search for people from work to add them on facebook.

I won't post anything from work on there except "busy night, long night, etc" or "really need a day off"

[CoffeeRTC, BSN, RN]

I just read an article on this in the LTC Journal (the one you can get for free)

[CloudySue]

My favorite is when people post DURING THEIR SHIFT to comment or complain about their day, using a smart phone w FB. Once in a while I can understand, we do get breaks (usually.) But often you'll have CNAs bantering back and forth with jokes or whatever, even saying things like "Meet me in 212, I gotta tell you something." "Ok, I'll be there soon." Unbelievable!