DISQUS

KnowHR Blog: Just Because You’ve Been Diagnosed as Paranoid Doesn’t Mean That Your Company Isn’t Watching You

  • Chris Took · 2 years ago
    Too true. There was that quality story at a law firm the other day where the entire company got copied into a dispute over a ketchup stain on a suit. One of the directors on circa 100k was trying to squeeze our of a PA on circa 20k the £5 dry cleaning cost. I think is now on a sabbatical.
  • Frank Roche · 2 years ago
    Chris, that is another really great story of e-mail staying around...and being used. Amazing about that one. I wonder what it costs to wash shame out of his clothes.
  • Scott McArthur · 2 years ago
    I have to "let go" 60 people a while back for distributing porn over the company email system. Totally stupid and a waste of a lot of people's time. I belive that people should be free to do what they like but that was taking it a bit far!
  • Frank Roche · 2 years ago
    Scott, that is a zoiks! moment. I guess that I can think of ways that companies can make sure their employees are not working in a hostile working environment and still not be Big Brother. Wow, 60 people. What was the 'for cause" element? Misuse of company resources? Or was it about porn specifically? In other words, was it bandwidth and not content?
  • Scott McArthur · 2 years ago
    It was a combination of denial and content! Terrible few weeks for the business and the individuals alike.
  • Frank Roche · 2 years ago
    Ah, yes, the denial. It's the Prisoner's Dilemma. And inevitably there's evidence. Add this to another cautionary tale. Wow...I can't imagine how upside-down it must have been minus 60 people, no matter the size of the organization.
  • Scott McArthur · 2 years ago
    Yea! What made it worse was that it was a manufacturing business with some very specialised skills. We did manage however and in fact the factory broke records the following month. I wonder what that says for the workforce. I put it down to a kind of corporate "action slip" where a group of people make a mistake and get in so deep they can't get out.

    The one thing that makes you reflect though is this, often although the pain at the point of separation is shared between the person and the business (especially the HR professional) the pain tends to fade quickly for the staff but lingers for the HR practitioner. I have the scars to show for it!