In a news report from the BBC today the Trades Union Congress reckons that social networking sites such as FaceBook, MySpace and Bebo should be allowed at work:
Employees should have access to social networking websites such as Facebook during office hours, the TUC has said.
This is utter utter crap. These sites have the “social network” tag for a reason. They are SOCIAL sites, not WORK sites. I don’t know about you, but the only friends I have on Facebook are friends, no work colleagues.
When you are at work, you are there to WORK. If you are surfing Facebook you aren’t working. You are not doing your work, you are reducing productivity and effectively costing the company money.
Some firms have blocked workers’ access to the sites, or disciplined staff for misuse of the internet.
However, the union organisation says it is unreasonable to try to stop staff from having a life outside work and suggests setting guidelines instead.
My employer blocks all the social sites, including Face Book and MySpace, they even block eBay. It’s no bad thing. Since blocking these sites we saw a reduction in internet usage. We also installed monitoring software which has had a similar result. Allowing users to to access non-work related sites simply adversely affects performance.
Stopping staff having a life outside work? What utter crap. The organisation is trying to get the time back that the employee is paid for. Thankfully there is some sense in all this:
Employment Law Advisory Services, which provides advice for employers, said access should be for business use only.
Personally I believe that many more sites should be banned too. The shopping sites like Amazon and play.com would be a good start!
Does your employer block any sites? If they do, what do you think of the ban?
