Google Blogger Firing Highlights Why Guidelines Are Essential

News yesterday that Mark Jen, a Google employee, had been fired for blogging serves to add yet more focus to a matter that has become increasingly important to companies and employees alike ... ... establishing clear guidelines on blogging in the workplace. This subject is beginning to sound like an auto-repeat CD (yes, I have moved on from the 'stuck record' analogy), but it is a subject on which many people have commented in past months, me included, and continue to comment. For opinions about Jen's doocing, take a look at the Technorati is listing. The trouble is, most of these blog posts are emotional and hardly balanced or factual, with wildy differing accounts of what happened, and many decrying Google for stopping an employee's "right to blog." Then look at Oops - a sure sign that he must have known he was making some people at his new employer not too happy. Amongst all the blog noise, here are some comments from three influential US bloggers that struck me as providing some thoughtful perspective: Employers - You must establish the framework under which employees can blog in their workplace, creating the guidelines that make it clear what the ground rules are, and then communicating them to your employees in a way that they clearly understand. The responsibility for this is yours, as are the consequences if you don't have clear guidelines. Both of these 'lessons' go hand in hand - you can't have one without the other. Finally, the last word (in this post, that is): Crayon. Visit Neville Hobson's blog: