It is important mention that as we all will become Baruch graduates and the next generations of managers we have spent a great deal of our lives online. A major portion of our communication has occurred through instant messaging, texting and social networking sites. Devices becoming both smaller & quicker have changed the current trend of technology. These innovations will bring with them new questions. Technology has changed the workplace setting beyond recognition and many of our previous assumptions about monitoring and freedom will have to be renegotiated; much like our phones the old answers that’s need to be upgraded privacy laws concerning the internet also need to be upgrade. DEFINITIONS ARE IMPORTANT one must ask what do these significant actually mean?
According to the Journal of Business Communication INFORMATION PRIVACY deals with one’s ability to control access to one’s own personal information while COMMUNICATION PRIVACY deals with one’s ability to control WHO can access the content of one’s communication. Author of Privacy & American BusinessAlan Westin – defines information privacy as “the claim of individuals, groups, or institutions to determine for THEMSELVES when, how, and to what extend information about them is communicated to others.”
While we can all agree that an invasion of privacy is accessing someone’s private account without their permission; we also need to remember the American Civil Liberties Union statement, “The things we do and say online leave behind ever-growing trails of personal information. With every click, we entrust our conversations, emails, photos, location information and much more to companies.” Floodgates of litigations have exceedingly risen based on the extend of business relations and electronic correspondences especially since NO ONE OWNS THE INTERNET– boundaries become blurred.
With the internet population has steadily doubled within the past five years more of our personal information is online since most corporations view lack of monitoring (whether that be through keystrokes, capturing screen shots, voicemail and web retrieval) as “costly in terms of lost business opportunities. Employees are not given the option to OPT OUT- they are unable to choose whether they would like to be monitored or not, instead there is a CONTRACT ASPECT that needs to be address. In order for monitoring to be legal and for companies to enforce web monitoring we sign agreements waiving our privacy (NOT SIGNING THE AGREEMENT MEANS NOT GETTING THE JOB)
Definitions of Privacy, Contracts & the Global Aspect are important because lines become unclear & it’s up each one of us to change the workplace setting and renegotiate these definitions and create new guidelines. Bottom line is simple, if you don’t want your information to be viewed keep it under a private status or more importantly learning how to self-regulate what we choose to disclose is key. Another preventative measure we might look to is when writing anything that will be posted online – write as if your boss will be reading your email (because as it stands now he probably is)
