[AAM] my new employee keeps tagging us in negative social media posts after we’ve told her to stop
*I am not OP. OP is a reader who submitted to Ask a Manager on April 29, 2020.*
[Source with Alison Green's advice](https://www.askamanager.org/2020/04/my-new-employee-keeps-tagging-us-in-negative-social-media-posts-after-weve-told-her-to-stop.html)
My company hired a new employee just before the pandemic work from home shift. We were hesitant to hire her for my department to begin with — she didn’t have glowing recommendations and she’s got a patchy work history, but she has experience in the one thing we can’t train on right now, so we hired her reluctantly. It turns out she’s an oversharer on social media and a “list post” person: Every single detail of her day is listed in a giant personal social media post at least three or four times a day, and she tags everyone she comes in contact with: businesses, products, people. It’s unusual.
We had about a week in office with her before we had to switch to telework. She was very opinionated about how we did things and doesn’t really want to participate in feedback or training. She’d also go home every day and write a long, detailed post about who she interacted with, what she did all day, and her opinions about it and then tag her coworkers and our company. It was borderline negative/critical of the company that really reflected more on her as a person and less on how we do things. I’m not sure if she realizes how it looks or if she’s just an oversharer.
We’ve got a pretty straightforward social media policy — don’t tag us, don’t list us as your place of work, and don’t friend or interact with your superiors on social media (most of our managers don’t have social media anyway and we have an internal policy not to friend our subordinates on social media). That keeps management out of it pretty well. We were very clear on this policy when she was hired. I reached out to her and reminded her of the policy, and I ended up tagged in one of her long, daily, detailed posts.
HR reached out to her and reminded her of the policy and that while her social media is her space, to not tag and mention our company by name and to appropriately address needs, questions, and conflicts through the right channels. She then complained about that, with direct tags, on social media.
Other than this glaring issue, the quality of her work is okay. It’s not stellar, and it’s not bad. But her attitude is a mess.
I’m new as a manager, my team and I all get along and have great boundaries. I’m not sure if she’s a bad fit or if we need to give her more time. Her 30-day review is due next week. Would I be wrong to recommend we let her go and wish her well? Is this behavior just because of the general stress we’re all under? I don’t want to put someone out of work if we don’t have to, but I also don’t want to poison the well — we have such a great and positive team and wonderful rapport with customers that I don’t want to jeopardize.
**Update** [posted on June 1, 2020](https://www.askamanager.org/2020/06/update-my-new-employee-keeps-tagging-us-in-negative-social-media-posts-after-weve-told-her-to-stop.html)
I have a quick, hilarious update for you.
I checked in with my boss and HR about our 30 day review and my instinct to let her go. I was told because of the pandemic and people being stressed out to give her a final warning one more time and let her know we were extending her probation. I get where they were coming from and it’s why I enjoy working with them – they try to be understanding and lead with kindness when someone makes poor choices. The staff member, myself, and my boss met with her via a video conferencing app. Little did I know she was live-streaming her freaking 30 day review. (She legitimately had a screen share app up and was running it on Facebook Live.) There was nothing else I could do then and now but laugh.
We ended the call when we found out about 10 minutes in and wrote up formal termination paperwork that we mailed to her, wishing her well. The team was great about picking up slack and dividing her tasks and projects. We found a contractor for overflow. She emailed me this morning for a reference, which I forwarded to HR.
That’s one for the WTF books.
*Alison then asks OP if "she had a theory about what this was all about":*
We think she’s aiming to be an influencer of some kind. Based on all social media she has (Facebook, tiktok, Instagram, a YouTube channel, Twitter, some multiple accounts) it looks like that’s what she’s aiming for. Good luck to her!
*Again, not OP, these posts came from [Ask a Manager](https://www.askamanager.org/).*