Hide your phones, hide your booze!

Social media is one of the most fascinating emerging areas in workplace law. There's an incredible range of scenarios to mine and last week was no exception. Congressman Rick Larsen (D-WA) fired three staffers in Washington, D.C. office after they unleashed a torrent of drunken Twitter posts. This episode will go down as a cautionary tale for millennials in the workplace, which as a generation clearly doesn't have a grasp on how dangerous social media can be for their careers.

Last Thurdsay after the NW Daily Marker wrote an article on the tweets, the political careers of these young employees came to an abrupt end. The content of the tweets wasn't particularly offensive, but it did cover a range of sophomoric subjects. Seth Burroughs apparently didn't like his boss too much, tweeting: "I really like DC, but could have used another day away. The silver lining is that I don't have to see my idiot boss." Ben Byers and Elizabeth Robblee followed close behind in the stupidity race with tweets about drinking Jack Daniels in the office, failing sobriety tests and walks of shame.

I'm a big fan of Twitter. Social media is an incredibly transformative tool for organizations and individuals, but it's a pandora's box of sorts. A single errant tweet or Facebook post has the power to do incredible reputational damage in the absence of appropriate controls. The danger generally lies with in the actions of a single employee; left to their own devices individuals can make inappropriate choices on social media, leaving the wider organization to bear the brunt of the damage.

Organizations can reduce the probability of social media disasters by engaging in proactive planning and risk management, consider the following tips: employee training in social media can be useful in exposing the possibilities and pitfalls. Developing proper protocols and policies on social media usage is useful. Designating a senior employee with communications or public relations experience as the social media lead is good strategy to harness the power of social media. Don't get left behind, social media isn't going away and ignoring it can have a negative impact on your bottom line.