The Wardman Wire

There are 7 ways I can think of to blog about your employer:

1. Don’t
2. Persuade them to let you.
3. Be anonymous, but not anonymous enough.
4. Ask, and risk a “no”.
5. Be anonymous and notorious.
6. Do it as part of your job.
7. Employ yourself.

In this article I describe each option, and my assessment of the pros and cons - where they occur.

If you do blog about your employer, any option (except number one) should make your life more “interesting”, for a time at least.

1 - Don’t blog about your employer

Have a blog - either in your own name or under a pseudonym - and don’t mention them at all. That is more or less what I aim to do.

2 - Blog about your company or organisation as part of your job, officially.

That’s self-descriptive, but you need to be well positioned and well respected (or have management willing to take a risk).

Expect some argy-bargy with the Communications and PR Departments since you will be trespassing on their magic kingdom.

3 - Blog pseudonymously without being thorough enough, and criticise things at your employer.

This is liable to be fun for a bit then get you sacked. In all cases if you mention any problems you will be told that you should have raised them internally - and indeed you should.

You’ll be doing a sword dance to avoid breach of contract, and (probably) find yourself out of the door if you step over the line at any point.

See the case of Petite Anglaise, and have a plan B for earning a living that doesn’t depend on a book deal; there are more dooced (=sacked for embarrassing blogging) bloggers out there waiting tables for the minimum wage than living off their books in plush penthouses.

4 - Ask your employer before you start to blog about them.

The danger is that they will say no. Try to work out the likely atttude of your company before you ask them, or sound out a manager at policy-making level whom you can trust to keep your informal enquiry confidential.

The response - post-civil serf (good idea to start a debate on her now vacated blog Simon) - is now more likely to be an unthinking, policy-driven, risk averse, reflexive “No“. You then have to decide whether you are going to obey with the answer or not, and take it from there.

One positive approach is to start by doing an official blog for a professional or voluntary organisation for a few months, so that your employer knows you have the skills and the discretion necessary - before asking.

When you approach the management, consider taking a written set of guidelines to the meeting with you; it may help.

5 - Be anonymous and notorious

Go for them hammer and tongs, as Civil Serf has done. If you plan do that long term you need to be as professional in arranging your anonymity as they will be in arranging their investigation.

And this of course, circumscribes what you can write about. No “x and y had an affair in the cupboard this morning”, if x and y and Mrs X and Mr Y are going to recognise themselves. You will truly be a “blogger in pyjamas with the curtains closed”.

If you are found out, you may be sacked you on the spot - or after an investigation; or you may survive.

I differ (probably only very slightly) from some commentators when they say that there is no place for anonymity. For example, Dave Briggs says (among other excellent points that I do agree with):

Anonymity is A Bad Thing, and only trouble can result from it. Don’t think you are being clever: you will be found out

In my opinion sometimes trouble is necessary. I think that there is a place for anonymous bloggers as whistle-blowers and revealers of illegal activity - for example institutionalised child-abuse would (in my view) justify anonymous whistle-blowing.

However, I don’t have any sympathy for those being snarky just for the sake of being notorious.

6 - As part of your job

Get a job where you have to blog.

7 - Employ Yourself

Be your own employer. This opens up another set of debates - it is very easy to lose clients.

As a good example, the Devil blogs quite “vigorously” but also does freelance work for clients; he built a Chinese Wall between his politics and his business.

Wrapping-Up

I’ll probably stay with the topic of Civil Serf for a few days - as there’s an interesting debate developing.

In the middle of the current case, we must not forget that the far bigger agenda for bloggers is the Civil Liberties and Free Speech agenda. See, for example, the list that Open Democracy have compiled of liberties lost since 1997 (which I recommend as strongly as I can).

What do you think?