Chris Brogan has a blog post titled "Shut Up- You're Helping the Customer!"

It is an interesting case-study. Check it out. I am reposting my response to it below:

It is easy to draw simple black-and-white narratives from this case study. My sense is that the realities are a little more complex. I don't know Bob the Social Media Guy from Joe the Plumber so I will reserve judgment on his actions. What I will say is this:

Companies of all sizes need to grok Social Media. But most don't and many institutions of significant size have reason to be wary of social media. This is new frontier for most current corporate leaders. Considering this. In the 'modern' age of marketing and advertisement, success has largely been defined by how well you 'create-and-control' your messages--marketing is about creating images/ideas that can be repeated consistently and predictably. We have mastered the art of industrializing corporate marketing where we count on a lot of repeated messages with a few actual messengers.

Social media turns this entire exercise on its head. What corporations fear is not Bob but an army of Bobs who might run around ad-libbing stuff without professional supervision. Oh! Imagine the liabilities! Imagine the muddling of our brand!

Should companies change and get with the social media program? Absolutely. The advice I give to my clients is that the solution to their anxieties is not less social-media engagement but more. That said, the choice and prerogative to participate in social media is ultimately the company's to make, not an employee's.

Now, I am not accusing Bob of insubordination. I am merely asserting that it is entirely reasonable that companies would make bad decisions and ignore good ideas; but it IS their right to do so. We may agree with Bob's instincts and even support his chutzpah, but like it or not, marketing strategy may be above his pay-grade (even if his company would be worser for it).

What I say to employees is that social media may be ground-breaking but it doesn't do away with professional responsibilities. Social media's success in a company is predicated on a great measure of trust. But to be trusted with your company's brand, you have to earn it, and you can't earn it by being a perceived bad corporate citizen. To be clear, I am not discouraging innovation or any efforts to challenge internal corporate dogma. I am saying that as employees, we would do well to differentiate between internal debates and public ones.