No Twitter for You Mister
SteveCatching up this weekend on a backlog of unread blog posts and news articles, and I stumbled across this piece on SportsBusinessDaily - ESPN's Bill Simmons Discusses His Two-Week Twitter Suspension.
For those that may not be familiar with Simmons, he is an extemely popular writer for ESPN.com, and author of several books. He is active on Twitter, tweeting under the account sportsguy33 and has amassed over 1,000,000 followers. 
Flickr - sean_alexander
But his Tweets recently landed him in hot water with ESPN, and the article describes how Simmons tweeted that ESPN radio affiliate WEEI in Boston employed "deceitful scumbags". This was AFTER, the radio station named Simmons its "Fraud of the Week" on its website and on the air. Simmons claimed that his tweet was an expression of frustration in that ESPN failed to intervene on his behalf after being ripped by WEEI.
Let's see if we can break down the series of events.
1. Employees (if not direct employees, at least employees of an 'affiliate' organization WEEI) publicly ridicule and blast another employee (Simmons)
2. After employer (ESPN) apparently does nothing, Simmons takes matters into his own hands, and fires back at WEEI via his Twitter page (which appears to be a personal page)
3. ESPN then declares Simmons to be in violation of its corporate social media use policies and suspends Simmons from using Twitter for two weeks.
4. But Simmons is on a multi-city book tour, and is permitted (or simply decides) to continue to Tweet about the tour and book signing details. So it is really a 'partial' Twitter suspension.
A really strange set of circumstances and while I am sure there is more to the story that has become publicly available, it does point out some really interesting questions.
1. What should employers do when employees start taking shots at each other in social media?
2. When employees have exceedingly strong and large personal networks (as Simmons does), does the employer need to manage this much more carefully than Joe on the loading dock?
3. At what point does the employee's network and activities on social media become too powerful, and begin to eclipse the company itself? Or does this ever really happen?
4. Did ESPN act hypocritically by ostensibly allowing WEEI to say whatever they liked about Simmons, but only stepping in when Simmons went on Twitter to fight back?
My take - ESPN at the very most should have asked Simmons and WEEI to bury the hatchet and apologize, or at least try and play nice in public. If that was not going to be possible, then at least get them to stop taking shots on the air on on Twitter. Not all employees have to like and respect each other. Just keep it off the air and out of the Twitter stream of 1,000,000 followers.
But as an employer, especially such a high-profile on like ESPN that wants to be a player in social media, you can't have it both ways. Sometimes you are going to have flare-ups and embarrassing situations. The right thing to do is manage them reasonably and consistently.
The wrong thing is to issue a half-baked 'Twitter suspension' on the guy who tried to defend himself.
Reader Comments (5)
I really enjoy Simmons' writing - the bit he did on the group of 40 year olds heading to Vegas for a reunion/40th birthday party/fantasy football draft was pure gold.
ESPN has a long history of spineless and then punitive responses to their lead personalities...Olberman, Kilborn, etc.
While I think your take is a rational, reasoned response it is far too academic ... I'm thinking that corporate infighting creates fine theater and there is no such thing as bad press in the constant quest to acquire and retain eyeballs. So the Simmons/WEEI feud is probably "good" for ESPN in a buzz/ratings sense, after all they keep getting scooped by TMZ on the top "sports" story of the year down in Orlando.
I ask myself the question every day especially when I have candidates contacting me on MY TWITTER account. When does it become my employer's account in my name? And I maintain my right to "swing back" if someone comes at me, employer or not. I do not however, have a million followers.
This topic is going to become much more serious in the future and if it isn't now, ownership of 'brand' will be included in contracts ands non-disclosures.
Now if only Tiger Woods had been tweeting his more recent events .....
@Richard - Thanks for the comments and for stopping by. I think you are right, for the media entities the buzz is probably all good. For the rest of us in 'normal' organizations, these issues may not be all that welcome and could be a real issue.
@Dee - Great point, as more and more HR and Recruiting people are visible on social nets, the lines will start to get more and more blurry. Even in small organizations, a savvy HR and recruiting pro can really become a 'big fish' so to speak, How employees and organizations react and manage this will be more and more important.
Wow ! that’s great …..hope to expect more.
I like your Twitter Nazi take on this. I think another thing this episode points out is that comanies have more reason than ever to treat employees well. One negative tweet can do a lot of damage.