Fired Over A Facebook Status- Again!

So, it happened again. A 16 year old girl was fired from her job because she posted on Facebook that her job was boring. According to the report a CNet, Kimberly Swann wrote in her Facebook status “My job is boring.”. Her employer, Ivell Marketing and Logistics of Clacton, U.K posted this comment to her status.

"Following your comments made on Facebook about your job and the company we feel it is better that, as you are not happy and do not enjoy your work we end your employment with Ivell Marketing & Logistics with immediate effect."

I have said it before, and I will say it again: Don't post anything on social media that you don't want everyone in the world to see. It is just a good habit to get into, because a simple post can cause you lose your job and make it very difficult to find another one.

But the deeper issue is this- Where is the line between your rights as a person, and your employers right to protect their corporate image? When is checking employees social media statuses just plain snooping?

It seems like the more connected we are, the more power employers have to censor our private lives. Any negative comments or nay saying isn't allowed and even when you aren't at work, you still have to monitor what you do, say or share. Don't post pictures of yourself having drinks with your friends or make comments about how wasted you were at your friend's cookout. Any of these things could come back to haunt you.

As a first line of defense, I always recommend having a personal account and a professional account of any social networking site, just to keep things separate. But even this isn't enough to protect you or give you free reign to post whatever you like. All it takes is one person, who is friends with both your personal account and your employer or your co-worker, to comment on your status or photo and suddenly the information is visible to your professional network.

So what do we do? How do you have a private life online? What steps have you taken to keep your information private? Let me know in the comment section.

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By Melissa Kennedy- Melissa is a 9 year blog veteran and a freelance writer, along with helping others find the job of their dreams, she enjoys computer geekery, raising a teenager, supporting her local library, writing about herself in the third person and working on her next novel.