COMPANY bosses on Teesside are being warned to keep a careful eye on their Tweeters to stop loose words costing business.

As social networking burgeons across the region’s business community, the technology is throwing up all manner of issues for company executives, according to legal experts at Stockton legal practice BHP Law.

Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook have become part of daily activities to establish relationships with other businesses.

But this micro-blogging can lead to time-wasting, computer viruses and public humiliation, which is giving many executives sleepless nights.

BHP Innovation Team consultant Deb McGargle said: “One bad comment could leave your business reputation in tatters and it’s not scaremongering, it’s already happened. Just look at Virgin Atlantic where employees publicly called all their customers ‘Chavs’, or the employees who tell the world exactly what they think of their boss in a status update. It’s a disaster waiting to happen you might think; all the more so if you sent your employee on a social media training course in the first place.”

Deb said she had come across many employers who were putting forward the idea of using disclaimers stating that the views of the blogger were not those of the company.

“While disclaimers are often a lawyer’s best friend, in this case they are a company’s silent assassin,” she warned.

By using a disclaimer companies were announcing to the world they may not know their employees well enough to trust them to speak on behalf of the company.

Secondly, it was impossible to negate voiced opinions in what is known as a vacuum cleaner-type action, where every employee is caught up in an action against a company.

“If the people inside the business have that view and they are the ones working for the business, the business image is that view,” she said. “Ultimately, you can’t separate the two.”

Despite the pitfalls, Deb said she was still an advocate of social media, when used properly, as it could help companies become an integral part of the business world and was a cost-effective way of marketing.

The key to managing it was to have in place an understandable and well thought-through policy to fit individual businesses and to clearly set out what was appropriate for business and personal usage - together with the repercussions if used incorrectly.

“This isn’t a universal document that can be downloaded from a search engine,” she said. “It must work for you and it must protect the rights of your employees.

“In this emerging world of internet engagement it may just be the most important employment policy you issue.”

Twitter @BHPinnovate