health beauty america 2005 awards

The Internet and corporate responsibility

Manageable liabilities are part of the cost of doing business; extraordinary liabilities as combinations Working hostile, negative public relations and negligent disclosure of personally identifiable information can go a long way toward damping your business. As new responsibilities you have brought to you since your company has decided to get online?

The term "hostile workplace" evokes images of people who come to work with lead pipes or screaming supervisors of employees to strike on the head with their staplers. All that has changed: Sally passes cabin Fred and Fred was the Pamela Lee video running on its screen. Then Fred, who has always had a strange sense of humor, email broadcasts an off-color joke he thinks is a riot. Most beneficiaries Fred thinks joke is slightly funny, if that, but Sally, who is unhappy to begin with, is now posted on the board and decides to retire imposing legal action in the workplace hostile on you. Sounds like an exaggeration? The Internet has broadened the definition of sexual harassment. Edward Jones The World's ninthbiggest

brokerage firm, issued a memo instructing its employees to disclose whether they have sent pornography or color jokes on the brokerage system for e-mail. Forty-one employees who confessed were punished, but 19 that failed to appear learned. Dow Chemical fired 24 employees and disciplined hundreds more for storing and sending sexual images or violent on company computers. Twelve librarians in Minneapolis filed a complaint saying that visitors to the library were Downloading Porn, including bestiality and pedophilia, and leave for librarians and patrons to see. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) has ruled against the library for librarians saying that the library "does not subject the load to [a] sexually hostile work environment ". Losing these lawsuits can be very costly. Recommended restitution for librarians was $ 900,000. Chevron accepted a settlement of $ 2.2 million for a lawsuit brought against him for offending emails women. According to statistics from the EEOC, the American companies pay more than $ 50 million a year in judgments relating to charges of sexual harassment. This bill does not include benefits Money obtained through litigation does not include legal fees and totally unproductive time defending these lawsuits. And this applies not only to blue chip companies. According to AIG, the EEOC continues fervently small and medium enterprises with the average awards of about $ 1 million. A client of our employees and management of Internet software implemented our solution in their business because they suspected employees lost too much time on the Web and sending an excessive amount of personal e-mail. Not only his instincts are correct, it also found an employee who was starting his own website on the Internet for adults - while at work! While on the company dime, the employee grew its Web site, including downloading pornography to publish on its website and the creation stories of sordid sex for its potential customers. Talk about a productivity hit combined with a possible claim for hostile work environment - yes, 14% of men have laid charges of sexual harassment 2005. The woman in question was immediately rejected by the business client before the situation worsened.

Public Image and how customers perceive your business is crucial for a successful enterprise goodwill is an intangible asset that adds significant value the equity in your company. Just think of Enron to achieve the range of issues beyond the Internet that can affect the image of a company forcing the company to fold or place an excessive amount of money to rebuild the way people perceive. But the Internet brings a new dimension to the potential nightmare of public relations. Nadine Hoabsh, deputy editor for Ladies Home Journal, has decided to publish details of work in his Web log while anonymous and very popular (Blog) Angelina Jolie in NYC. She wrote about lavish perks given only frameworks, detailed a "hierarchy of beauty" in the organization and the names of employees appointed favored. When was Hoabash unmasked as the author of the blog, his criticism of his employer was an embarrassment for Ladies Home Journal with its customers, employees and competitors. One of industry clients of our service business is incisive concerned that hours of billable client are accurate and verifiable. Our client feels that his credibility would be destroyed if a disgruntled employee were to lead customers to believe they were charged for the time employees spend using Personal Internet. Whether you're a small or large organization, if you are a company who spends much time or money to build a image, nothing can tarnish the image and erase the value of advertising dollars faster than being involved in child pornography. One of our customers multinational manufacturers quickly dismissed an employee for downloading child pornography and intentionally reported the individual authorities. Our client not only had they realized that circle the wagons to protect their image, but had a legal and moral responsibility of the community in which it resides.

In addition to image problems, legislators have piled on a host of laws and regulations requiring the protection of personally identifiable information. Violations of laws such as HIPAA, SOX and GLB all contain heavy fines and even imprisonment for violation of their regulations. Notwithstanding these mandates, questions abound protect privacy on the Net. In 2005, Bank of America and Wachovia reported more 100,000 customers that their accounts and personal identity information were in danger because of a scheme by bank employees who have selling data to an intermediary who then negotiated with collection agencies. In February of that year, a statistician at the Florida working for the Health Department of Palm Beach, has inadvertently sent an email containing a list of dissemination of confidential names and addresses of 4,500 Residents of Palm Beach County with AIDS and 2,000 others were infected. The email was sent to employees of more than 800 health department County. In 2001, Eli Lilly sent an email to all participants of its time-to-take-your-Prozac Reminder Service. But instead of sending an e-mail individually to each client, Eli Lilly released the email to all recipients by placing the addresses of all subscribers in the "To:" field of e-mail as well, involuntary disclosure of each subscriber to the e-mail to all subscribers. Not quite a cure for depression. Lilly received a lot of bad press and a slap on the wrist by the FTC required Lilly to strengthen and monitor their procedures for data security.

if Please Visit us at: http://www.pearlsw.com.

About the Author

Pearl Software provides Employee Internet Monitoring, filtering and control solutions to companies, schools, libraries and government agencies.

Whisper of a Thrill EARTH SONG Thomas Newman