Teen Fired for Dissing Her Job on Facebook Options

[superstitious]

These days, millions of people are on some sort of social networking website -- and so are their bosses. A 16-year-old British girl said she was fired from her office job after managers saw that she had branded her position "boring" on Facebook.

British teenager Kimberley Swann says she was called into her manager's office and fired from her job as an office administrator because she had called the job "boring" on her Facebook page, The Daily Telegraph reported Thursday.

"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," the letter read.

"I did not even put the company's name -- I just put that my job was boring. They were just being nosy, going through everything. I think it is really sad. It makes them look stupid that they are going to be so petty," Swann said.

How can you prevent your own teen from following in this now unemployed teen's footsteps? Family counselor Rosanne Tobey offers some tips on how to talk to your kids about the dangers of posting questionable information and photos on the Internet.

By the time your private business has gone public, you can't take it away.
"I think this is a perfect example parents can use to illustrate why NOT to post things you don't want the entire world to see," Rosanne says. "Once it's out there, it's essentially impossible to get it back."

Kids must understand the permanence of the actions they take.
"Teens tend to be so savvy, yet they sometimes have a hard time realizing the reach that the Web might have," Rosanne says. "If a racy pic or personal information is up somewhere with your name attached, and your employer or even a future employer Googles you and finds it, it can really come back to haunt you."

http://www.momlogic.com/2009/02/facebook_fired.php

It just goes to show you that people should exercise a certain amount of caution in what they post online. I think that the firing was a bit excessive and chances are, they were looking for a reason to let this individual go. Although, if they were facebooking while on the job, I can understand why that could be consider grounds for a firing, or a warning at the very least.

[Gigi]

^ But is it really the employee's problem if the job is boring? Is it really their fault if they don't like their jobs? It sort of shocks me how the company doesn't look at it and say to themselves, "Hey, what are we doing wrong? Why does she find her job boring? Maybe we should do something about it" but instead place the blame on her, firing her for finding the job they gave her boring. It's passive, not proactive on the company's part, an entirely apathetic response.

/too much Organizational Behaviour. That course drilled into my head that most good companies seek ways to maximize employee motivation by giving them meaningful jobs and whatnot.

On the other hand, I have no idea what kind of job she was holding, so if it was like a burger flipper then the above doesn't really apply.