1. It shows that even a punk kid (whose own site ain’t nothin’ to write home about) who has never stepped foot in a “big company” and doesn’t know the bureaucracies, politics, and obstacles that inherently exist can cause such a commotion.
2. How the widely held notion of social media demanding transparency and timely response can get you fired if your company doesn’t subscribe to that philosophy.
3. The consideration that not not every comment must be met with a response. This was “Dustin Curtis”, not Seth Godin. Frankly, it didn’t warrant a response. How bad must this employee feel that he got fired because of his response to a unsolicited “Dustin Curtis’” web design critique.
4. That ultimately, these so-called “stodgy” companies have billions invested in their their brand and need to be very careful how they approach social media. AA has thousands of employees that everyday could irreparably harm AA with a single careless Tweet. If I were the CEO of AA I would be stodgy too. I can deal with a customer who goes off about something that is core to the business – like taking care of luggage. But I don’t want to have to deal with employees who violate NDA rules by thinking that they need to respond to the “Dustin Curtis’” of the world on every single social media issue, because their irrational social media exuberance says they have to.
5. Like it or not, a company has to control the message be it in advertising, PR, web, and yes, Social media. Giving employees free reign to respond without consideration and adherence of corporate policies is ridiculous. Can you police your staff? – no. Can you show them the door when they violate policy – yes. In this case it was a harmless comment about web design policies but tomorrow it could be a baggage handler commenting on how to best sneak explosives by him.

I really think that from a corporate perspective, companies will treat social media just like any other communication media. Not with a loosey-goosey, “this is social media so there are no rules – have at it people” approach, but with a very strict set of roles, responsibilities and and strategic policies. Because in the end social media is just another communication channel. Albeit a highly uncontrollable communication channel, but a communication channel nonetheless.

While I believe more honest and two-way communications between companies and their customers is becoming increasingly important, I think, at times, the transparency zealots go a little far with their hyperbole. This is one of those times. The opinion that everything should be shared by everybody is ludicrous. In this vein, I think the goal should actually be translucency, not transparency. There are some things that should stay “in the family”, to steal a line from the Godfather.

Bottom line, as other commenters have said, he broke the rules. I also disagree with the notion that the rules should be changed, or that AA is in the wrong in any way. The letter in question, and specifically the “we’re talented individuals but stifled by a terrible culture/bureaucracy” theme did more damage to AA’s brand than their choice of discipline, IMO. It did not serve AA’s brand as much as it did the writer’s.

SG

I was 500K plus on Delta years ago when we disagreed about a deduction on my miles. I used the miles up and have never flown them again. United pulls boneheaded stuff too (not just the guitars, but read Batelle’s recent blog). But forget airlines and big enterprises for now.

As some commenters already mentioned, Mr. X apparently broke a rule. Forget for a moment that the rule is in opposition to transparency. The rule apparently existed, and if this employee knowingly broke the rule (even alluding to his termination) then why is AA the bad guy here? It seems to me that if I write an employee a check, give them rules and they knowingly break the rules, then they deserve to be fired.

Whether those rules are good business is irrelevant.

–

Thanks and Regards

Noel for Nopun.com
a graphic design studio

Second of all, thank you for your post. It validates my feeling (and I guess a lot of people’s too) that American is just too old and uptight. Every time I purchase a ticket with a site like priceline and I see that AA is on my schedule I start to shiver. They’re a company unwilling to change and adapt; boring is the word I’m trying to look for. And I got rid of my AA card long time ago when I saw that their prices were usually higher, even when they tell you their site offers the lowest rates.

And third, well, I do also think their site is 1.0. Probably what this employee wrote was something similar to my second point: “Dear reader: Sorry, we’re boring. But don’t worry: we’re working on it!” –Paul
Paul L’Acosta´s last blog ..marketingfails: Original Latin translation of competition: "To strive together for the betterment of all" @AmyStark http://bit.ly/1U6RCl

1. We’re taking this guy’s word for what happened. Not saying I don’t believe it, but we don’t even know this guy’s name.

2. What he did was stupid on several levels. Again, not saying that he got what he deserved or anything, but sending an email violating your NDA from your company’s email servers is not wise.

3. We don’t know the whole backstory. Perhaps this guy had been warned before about this, or perhaps AA has had problems with employees taking it on themselves to create a culture of transparency. Again, not saying it’s justified, just that we don’t know the whole story.

Oh, and almost everything you hear on social media from Fortune 500 companies is vetted and sanctioned by PR and legal. Sadly, our society is too litigious for anything else.

The comments on Hacker News about this story are really interesting:
http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=922913

Very interesting though, thanks for the post.

@EricUngs
Eric Ungs´s last blog ..e’s Week in Review: SEOmoz and WorkSnug