Kenton Case: The Vosper V. Solibrooke Case

881 Words4 Pages

In summary, the issue at hand stems from a disconnect in company policy, and emerging issues related to social media use in modern workplaces. James Kenton, a valued employee of Downcity Motors took to his personal Facebook, outside of working hours to voice his concerns and opinions that had been previously neglected by Management. Although his status’s did contain truths that were shared among many employees, the sarcasm and disparaging remarks depicted the company negatively. There is the potential to damage the brand as Kenton has a wide network of stakeholders such as other employees, customers and industry professionals on his page. The first time Kenton posted remarks to Facebook, the boss Dell wanted him fired immediately, however Susannah …show more content…

It was found the employer was unethical in choosing the disciplinary action. As demonstrated by this case, the broader issue for organisations in terms of ethics and the development of social media policies is the idea of Retributive Justice. This comes from the Latin principle of Ceteris Parabis, meaning the severity of the punishment must fit the severity of the issue at hand (Hogan and Elmer, 1981). It can be inferred that Employee Dismissal is the pinnacle of punishment, therefore it should be used only in the most serious breaches of conduct in the workplace (Durkheim, 1952). However, There is no general consensus on the type of social media breaches that warrant employee dismissal. Managers have an ethical dilemma determining the severity of breaches against the severity of punishments as little precedent …show more content…

Before social media this issue was not wide-spread, but now questions of whether non-work-related material can be classed as a breach of company policy run rampant in ethical consideration. For example, in the case of Chief of the Defence Force v Gaynor (2017), Gaynor had his employment terminated for posting anti-muslim and anti-trans hate speech to his private Facebook. It was questioned whether or not employers have the right to scrutinise employees on non-work-related matters over social media. However, according to a new study 70% of hiring and recruiting professionals have rejected a candidate based on data found online (Sprague, 2011). If employees are already using social media to base their opinions on potential employees, is it ethical for them to monitor the online behaviour of existing ones? These are just some of the issues that companies must address in the broader context of determining a social media