hr management for internet policy academic essay assignment -

2009

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8/30/2009

HR Management for Internet Policy

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Table of Contents

Telstra social media policy ........................................................................................................ 3

Telstra’s 3 Rs of Social Media Engagement .......................................................................... 3

Hr Roles and Responsibilities ................................................................................................ 3

Technological Impact ............................................................................................................. 4

Private usage of internet in the workplace ................................................................................. 4

Internet Abusing Ways ........................................................................................................... 6

Legal Implications .................................................................................................................. 6

Internet Workshops for Policy Acceptability ............................................................................ 7

MCB (Muslim Commercial Bank, Pakistan) – Internet Abuse Policy ...................................... 8

Vision Statement ................................................................................................................... 9

Mission Statement ................................................................................................................. 9

Internet Policies at MCB ...................................................................................................... 10

Conclusion ............................................................................................................................... 10

References ................................................................................................................................ 13



Telstra social media policy

Telstra is global provider of managed networked solutions with unrivalled experience in

Asia, Europe and America. Telstra previously encourages its staff to engage in social media

to share information and views, but with the passage of time the company recognizes that

there is a need to set some policies regarding the use of social media especially where the

engagement of social media is related to Telstra. Telstra has observed that the pervious

relaxation to employees to use the internet has started decreasing the employee’s

productivity.

Telstra’s 3 Rs of Social Media Engagement

Representation

Responsibility

Respect

These Rs are applied when one is authorized to represent Telstra on social media and when

one makes reference to Telstra, its people and products and services while using social media

platforms.

Representation refers to that one should disclose that they are Telstra employees and the

business unit they are representing. Then it’s the responsibility of the person who so ever is

representing Telstra that the correct information is published. Additionally ensure that don’t

post any material which is offensive, threatening, harassing etc. lastly the element of respect

is also applicable. This includes the respect for copyrights, privacy, trademarks etc.

Hr Roles and Responsibilities

Human Resource Management encompasses the major functions of management, including

hiring, compensating, and controlling of employees. The most important function is

controlling of the employees who represent your company both inside and outside the

workplace boundaries. Telstra a telecommunication company, offering a bundle of services

including: internet, telephony, TV, and mobile, faces rigorous competition around the

country. The major challenge faced by the company is in the form of its employees’ loyalty

and focus towards the central goal of the firm. In this highly competitive era of business

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environment it is almost impossible for firms to tolerate the abusive activities of its

employees on the workplace because it involves the resources of the firm including financial

capital and human capital as well.

The roles and responsibilities of human resource management have changed significantly in

the past decade. Many of these changes have been in response to trends in globalization,

technology, diversity, e-business and ethics. The impact of technology and ethics are not new

to organizations or human resource managers. Globalization, diversity and e-business are

terms that were not even considered until this past decade.

Technological Impact

Technology impacts every aspect of how we as human beings perform our work. Technology

is a tool that allows us to leverage our abilities to perform at a higher level of output.

Certainly technology has replaced the need for workers in some instances. However,

economics suggests that if one worker is displaced by a more efficient process, that same

worker can be redistributed for greater usefulness elsewhere in the economy. Technology

does create a series of challenges for the human resources professional.

It has been seen on the workplaces and also proved by research that more than fifty percent of

the employees of a firm in the highly technological diffused departments are involved in the

abuse of the technology. Technological abuse appears in these forms: Social Networking

Sites, Online Shopping, Chatting, etc. Employees who are assigned the duties to work solely

for the betterment of the company and here the important thing is that they are providing

service to its employees so all matters here in terms of their products being offered. They

provide telephone, internet and TV services where they are supposed to be working solely for

the improvement of the product and working towards getting the highest satisfaction from

their customers, including both corporate and home users. In such a globe environment

customer satisfaction is one of the single most important factor for any business success.

Now the switching cost from one services provider to other is very easy and cheap, so the

firm has to make sure that its employees are solely working for the satisfaction of the

company customer.



The internet has changed the whole world and it has brought the world so close which we

didn’t even think few decades back. The Internet as a communication medium has become an

important and increasing part of many day-to-day working lives. Internet has become an

essential part of our lives and today has become the single largest source of social networking

and entertainment. Where there are enormous benefits of internet and it has really made the

whole world a global village there are some serious issues which has been found in the

workplace due to internet usage. As with the introduction of other mass communication

technologies, issues concerning use, abuse, and addiction have surfaced. It is clear from many

research findings that Internet abuse is a serious cause for concern, particularly to employers.

The issues which concerned the employers the most are the less attentive behavior by

employees towards their work and leakage of vital and important information about the

company through these networking sites.

Research about Internet addiction suggests that it does, indeed, exist but that it affects only a

very few users. These are usually people who use Internet chat rooms or participate in fantasy

role-playing games, activities that they would not engage in except on the Internet itself. To

some extent, they are engaged in text-based virtual realities and take on other social personas

and social identities as a way of making them feel good about themselves. In these cases, the

Internet may provide the user an alternative reality and allow him or her to experience

feelings of immersion and anonymity, feelings that may lead to an altered state of

consciousness. This altered state of consciousness may itself be highly psychologically and/or

physiologically rewarding. Case studies of individuals who use the Internet excessively may

also provide better evidence of whether Internet addiction exists, because the data collected

are much more detailed than data from surveys. Even if just one case study can be located, it

indicates that Internet addiction actually does exist--even if one individual is unrepresentative

of most Internet users.

The Internet has become an invaluable resource in the workplace, the world's biggest

reference library, social media center, and pornography outlet is now only a click away. This

availability presents a significant risk factor for employer liability and costs employers

thousands of hours in productivity each day. Had the employees put those hours working

solely for the betterment of company the productivity of them would have become much

better. Monitoring employee Internet use is one way to reduce employer liability, and Top Grade Papers GET YOUR WORK DONE BY www.TopGradePapers.com


whether or not you agree with the principles behind Internet monitoring, many employers

agree that it is a necessary evil.

Private usage of internet in the workplace

Use of internet in the workplace is very common; companies provide the internet facilities to

the employees to stay competitive, to reduce the communication gap within and outside the

organization and to make the operation of the organization faster and free of errors. But the

problem here arises when the employees use these internet facilities for non-work-related

activities. This kind of internet usage can cause various risks to the organizations. Such risk

could result in leakage of very important information about the company business plans,

packages, marketing strategies, economic and financial health. Today the business has

become very competitive and in order to survive in such a environment companies have to

show vigilance and have safe guard their important file and documents. Foremost duty of an

employee is to achieve the organizational goals but the non-work-related activities lead them

to focus more on the personal goals. About 50% of the employees in the organizations use

internet for their personal uses which leads to internet abusing.

Internet Abusing Ways

Internet abusers range from upper management employees in private offices viewing

hardcore pornography, to the department managers that spends 3 hours a day doing online

shopping, making travel arrangements, and paying bills through the company Internet, and

visiting social networking sites more frequently. Internet abuse is endemic in the workplace

and organizations are being forced to face the problem head on, or suffer the consequences.

Among the many consequences of Internet abuse is a loss of productivity and scores of

litigation issues such as sexual harassment, hostile work environment and discrimination.

Monitoring Employee Internet access is one way that an organization can limit its liability.

This objective could be achieved by putting restriction on the sites which are not directly

related to business of the company and put a strong check and balance system from top to

bottom by the compliance department of the company. Such steps would prevent employees

from using internet for their personal use at workplace. Top Grade Papers GET YOUR WORK DONE BY www.TopGradePapers.com


Internet abuse and Internet addiction are related, but they are not the same thing.

Furthermore, the long-term effects of Internet abuse may have more far-reaching effects for

the company for which the Internet abuser works than for the employee himself or herself. It

may be that Internet abuse has no negative effects for the user other than a decrease in work

productivity. But when competition is at its peak even among employees, those who fail to

give their 100% in the workplace often end up losing their job because there are lot of

competent people around and in today’s situation where the world is hit by a deep recession

and even the best of the lot are losing their job, it won’t take too long to these people to lose

their job. Young (1999) claimed Internet addiction was a broad term that covered a wide

variety of behaviors and impulse control problems that have been classified by five specific

subtypes (i.e., cybersexual addiction, cyber-relationship addiction, Net compulsions,

information overload, and computer addiction). These subtypes can be adapted and refined to

produce a typology of Internet abuse in the workplace. The types of Internet abuse in the

workplace are cybersexual Internet abuse, online friendship/relationship abuse, Internet

activity abuse, online information abuse, criminal Internet abuse, and miscellaneous Internet

abuse.

Legal Implications

Whenever an employee is hired he is made to sign a document saying that he will work

towards the betterment of the company and will utilize the time in the best manner he could.

But most of the employees are seen to use the internet in the wrong manner on their

workplaces, they frequently go to the social networking sites and involve in the discussions

which are totally irrelevant to the company. Sometimes they are also involved in the activities

where company’s privacy is on stake and some are involved in the information theft.

Generally speaking this is illegal and unethical to use internet on workplace in a manner that

is totally irrelevant for the betterment or quality maintenance of the company. This is proved

by certain research papers that employees ruin the performance of the company compared to

the competitors with loyal and focused employees by using their time in unfair and

unjustified activities.

Organizations are concerned with their long term continuous improvement in their products

and services which ever are assumed their unique selling proposition (USP), their main focus

is always on the USP to get employees, customers, owner and management on board with the



central or planned goal of the firm. This can only be done only in the way when employees

are committed to work in the right manner for the betterment of the company, if they are

concerned of the company’s performance, and if they feel ownership of the company.

We can discuss the matter in two major perspectives: legal and ethical perspective. As we are

now familiar with the major problem facing by the company and we are also familiar why

this is important for them to take this as serious because this is critical for their existence in

the market as a major competitor or market leader.

Legally, employees are bound to work for the betterment of the firm because they are legally

bound to sign the agreement for the firm on joining that they will work for the sole objective

of the firm and they will not use any mean and will not be involved in any activity which will

hinder the performance.

Internet Workshops for Policy Acceptability

Holding a series of Internet workshops with the employees of your organization is one way to

introduce your new acceptable use policy. As an educational session, an Internet workshop

can address the sensitive issues surrounding Internet abuse in an open forum where

employees can ask questions and provide input in a non-confrontational setting.

During the Internet workshop, the organization can begin to educate the employees about

Internet abuse and give them a chance to re-evaluate their Internet habits at work. It is

important to be as open as possible with your employees regarding your chosen methodology

for enforcing the policy.

For example, if the organization has decided to employ Internet blocking technologies, the

document should define the specific types of websites that will be blocked, for example,

many organizations block pornography, “gross depictions” and “hate” websites. Discussing

the types of websites the organization has decided to block and answering questions

regarding the reasons for blocking will reinforce the organizational mission, and demonstrate

the types of websites that are inappropriate within your organization.

If your organization is going to monitor and report on employee Internet access, the

workshop will give you a chance to show the employees what the Internet reports look like,

and discuss the circumstances in which they will be used. Taking the mystery out of what the



organization is planning in regards to Internet monitoring and blocking will reduce employee

speculation and set new expectations throughout the organization.

In most of the organizations and educational institutes the social media site are blocked. But

the employees use different means to excess those sites for their personal use. This leads

them to addiction which in turn results in internet abuse.

So the organizations should be concerned about their internet policies because at the end of

the day they have to bear the losses. So the internet policies plays crucial roles to keep proper

check and balances on the employees who miss use the internet facilities. They are for the

ease of employees and for the better functioning of the operation, but without proper policies

the results could be the other way round. Companies human resource management

department are responsible for these kinds of activities. In the initial stages of training of new

employees, human recourse department can lower the rate of misusing internet by conducting

various training and awareness programs.

MCB (Muslim Commercial Bank, Pakistan) – Internet Abuse Policy

Below is MCB’s corporate information, keeping in mind these values; the MCB IT

department implemented policies that ensured that these values were enforced.

Vision Statement

“To be the leading financial services provider, partnering with our customers for a more

prosperous and secure future.”

Mission Statement

“We are a team of committed professionals, providing innovative and efficient financial

solutions to create and nurture long-term relationships with our customers. In doing so, we

ensure that our shareholders can invest with confidence in us.”

MCB being one of the largest banks of Pakistan promote its core values as integrity, respect,

excellence, customer, centricity and innovation. They act as the trustees of public funds and

serve the Pakistani market with veracity and integrity. MCB believes in being the best and it



has consistently being positioned as the most premier financial institution of the country. It

was award with the best bank in Asia, by euro-money in 2008. Customer satisfaction is the

primary goal of MCB and it respects the morals, beliefs, traditions, custom and history of its

valued clients. MCB is an equal opportunity employer and it promotes diversity in gender in

its workforce. It provides equal chance to its every employee to achieve success in their

professional career while working at MCB. It is lassie with the most modern technology to

run its operations and it provides state of the art facilities to its customers and ideal working

environment to its employees. It encourages its employees to stay up to date with the ever

evolving banking practices. It takes personal conscientiousness for its role as leaders in the

pursuit of excellence. It believes in results and it is a purely a merit based performance

oriented organization.

MCB believes that its customers are most important aspiration for it to strive for excellence

and they are at the heart of everything it performs. It thrives on the challenge of

understanding their requirements and objective, both realized and unrealized. It is working

day and night to achieve rather exceeds customer expectations through superior & better-

quality services and solutions. It promotes and reward people who dare the status quo and

think beyond the boundaries of the usual and conventional.

Internet Policies at MCB

Muslim Commercial Bank has hundred of branches nationwide in Pakistan. These branches

are controlled by regional offices that have successfully implemented an Internet usage policy

in their workplace. Internet is a basic requirement for employees as it allows for a cheaper

connection to the international and local business environment. Internet has a significant

importance to MCB due to online branches network and its online banking. The bank has to

make sure that its network is working correctly. Unfortunately, the growth of Facebook and

Orkut along with various social media websites has meant that employees have the potential

to spend company time perusing non-business related websites. As a result, MCB’s

productivity was severely compromised as employees would spend a majority of their time

on social media websites. Not only was productivity affected but the overall security of

MCB’s Intranet and servers. With the growth of sophisticated viruses and Trojan software,

coupled with the sensitivity of the financial data stored on MCB servers, it was important for

the company to immediately control Internet abuse in its offices. Top Grade Papers GET YOUR WORK DONE BY www.TopGradePapers.com


As a result, the CTO (Chief Technology Officer) began enforcing Internet policy usage which

resulted in all computers being tied to a single server that was capable of monitoring

employee Internet usage. In addition, the IT department also moved all Web-based activities

to a separate server and created localized email accounts for employees. Upon doing so, the

need to log into websites such as Yahoo and Hotmail decreased drastically. Automatically,

the productivity of employees increased since many employees had little reason to log on to

their personal email accounts. Along with creating localized email accounts, the IT

department also blocked access to social media websites such as YouTube, Facebook and

Orkut. By blocking these websites, the IT department noticed that employees were only using

the Internet for research related projects.

To further prevent abuse on the Internet, the senior management of MCB decided to

implement a localized ERP system that ran independently of the Internet. Since the localized

email accounts allowed the employees to communicate within the organization, and the local

ERP managing daily business activities, the IT department could now easily turn off access to

the Internet without affecting the operations of the company. In addition to this, the legal

implications of MCB were significantly reduced. Since the Internet policy could easily be

monitored and enforced, any suspicious emails or fraudulent activities could be terminated

without leaving MCB in a position where they could be sued for fraud or illegal activities.

In addition to this, the ethical dilemma is solved when employees are abusing the system

claim that they have not utilized the Internet in a non-productive manner, since the company

can easily track and record all activities remotely. This ensures that employees remain

focused and utilize company resources in an ethical manner rather than abusing the system.

The various procedures outlined above have helped MCB remain a productive bank amongst

extremely competitive international banks and assisted MCB in remaining profitable and

competitive.

In a nutshell, Muslim Commercial Bank (MCB) had successfully achieved its goals by setting

appropriate policies regarding internet. Moreover the proper check and balance has allowed

them to figure out the flaws in their systems. This practice has minimized the non-work-

related activities during working hours. Employees of MCB use the internet efficiently and

effectively to increase the work efficiency. The customer base of the bank has increase

dramatically over the period of time because its employees are working online to help serve

its customer effectively without any second thought in mind; they are attentive towards their



work and they knew that there is zero tolerance for non serious and non productive attitude in

the company. All this has smoothed the workflow and the overall performance of the Bank

has improved. MCB has been declared as the best bank in Asia by euro-money and this result

shows that human resource department has been continuously working hard to improve the

polices and system of the bank.

Conclusion

The main competitive factor for a company to remain profitable is to have an active HR

department, who continuously work for the betterment and control of all the employees to

make them work for the company rather than for their personal use. This could be done by

implementing the strong check and balance on every employee and put an effective

compliance, IT department along with human resource department. Human resource

department should take corrective measures in this regard, because the human resource

department can play a vital role in achieving the organizational goals. Human resource

department should convey the message to its employees and develop polices which are

important to meet the objective of the company. They should work in a manner that will

inculcate all the loopholes in the workplace which hinder the performance, and try to fill the

loopholes and make the policy in a way that will be welcomed by most of the employees. The

motivation factor is also very important. Employees who are motivated produce much better

result as compared to those who are not. The human recourse department has to articulate

such polices which encourage employees to perform better and make their objective very

clear and result oriented. They should incorporate the feasibility and convenience to set

parameters of control by taking into account the cost, convenience, time line, and employee

involvement. The effective control on the communication channels and compliance system

could help human resource department to safe its company from the non productive use of

the internet.



References

Jengchung V. Chen, Charlie C. Chen and Hsiao-Han Yang (2007), “An empirical

evaluation of key factors contributing to internet abuse in the workplace”

Sharman Lichtenstein and Paula M.C. Swatman (1997), “Internet acceptable usage policy

for organizations”

Jessica Li, Gary Brake, Angeline Champion, Tony Fuller, Sandy Gabel and Lori Hatcher-

Busch (2008), “Workplace learning: the roles of knowledge accessibility and

management”

Gupta, A. and Hammond, R. (2005), “Information systems security issues and decisions

for small businesses”

Jang, Keum Seong; Hwang, Seon Young; Choi, Ja Yun, (March 1, 2008), Internet

addiction and psychiatric symptoms among Korean adolescents.

SK Mishra, “Human Resource Management: Some Vital Considerations”

Eric W.T. Ngai, Chuck C.H. Law and Simon C.H. Chan and Francis K.T. Wat (2006),

“Importance of the internet to human resource practitioners in Hong Kong”

Huub J.M. Ruel, Tanya V. Bondarouk and Mandy Van der Velde(2006), “The

contribution of e-HRM to HRM effectiveness”

Craig Labovitz, Ahba Ahuja, Roger Wattenhofer, Srinivasan Venkatachary, (2001), “The

Impact of Internet Policy and Topology on Delayed Routing Convergence”

Mohamed Ibrahim, Sherif Kamel(2003), “Effectiveness and Applicability of Internet-

Based Training in the Corporation – Case of Egypt”

Lee W. Mcknight, (1997), “Internet telephony and open communications policy”

http://www.telstra-international.co.uk/legal/acceptable-use-policy/, date accessed 8 May,

2009

http://www.mcb.com.pk, Viewed at 30 August, 2009



http://www.telstra-international.co.uk/legal/acceptable-use-policy/

http://www.mcb.com.pk/

hr management for internet policy academic essay assignment -

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