In January 2013 HMV provided a text book case for the need to appropriately control social media when they failed to secure their Twitter account and ended up broadcasting the firing 190 administrative staff live on Twitter.
HMV had entered administration with Deloitte’s on the 15th January and were facing some tough decisions for their global empire with what was later to be revealed a whopping £110 million of debt. The following day HMV’s Irish stores ceased trading and 300 employees lost their jobs, then on the 17th January HMV’s head office were called to a meeting with HR and told that over 60 of them were being made redundant. That figure ended up being 190 nationally across UK head office and distribution centres.
It was what happened during this meeting that got attention on Twitter worldwide:
HMV Twitter feed – 17th January 2013
Poppy Rose, who had created the Twitter account as an intern for HR years earlier used the account to express her and her colleagues views stating “We’re tweeting live from HR where we’re all being fired! Exciting!!” and “There are over 60 of us being fired at once! Mass execution, of loyal employees who love the brand.” The complete lack of control was cemented when Rose tweeted “I just overheard the Marketing Director (he’s staying folks) ask “how do I shut down Twitter?”” Ouch!
HMV had just committed 3 of the cardinal sins (risks) as identified by Dawson (2008):
- Loss of Control – the Twitter account was never under executive control, managed solely by the employee who created it.
- Reputation – serious reputation damage at a critical time, compounding the worldwide store closures and massive debt.
- Security – information loss of this significant event to the public before it could be communicated with context.
So what could have HMV done instead faced with such daunting lay-offs?
Executive management and administrators should have secured control of social media accounts prior to this meeting. If they had a good understanding of the power of social media they could have even turned this into an opportunity to convey a sincere message condolence and explanation to it’s customers and staff alike, showing the humanistic side of the business. Instead, HMV was on the receiving end of a serious PR slap in the face.
Hindisght is a wonderful thing but HMV demonstrated a complete failure to control their social technology and a lack of understanding of the power of social media. Lesson learned, the hard way.
Has anyone were you worked gone soap box on social media?
Comment below and let us know!
References:
Dawson, R., Hough, J., Hill, J., Winterford, B., & Alexandrov, D. (2008). Implementing enterprise 2.0.
San Francisco; Sydney: Advanced Human Technologies
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