A recent trip to Cleveland, Ohio got me thinking about one of the biggest presences in the Cleveland area: The Cleveland Clinic. With an overload of commercials and radio spots it was hard to ignore how much an impact the facility has on the area. For those of you who may not know, The Cleveland Clinic is a non-profit academic and medical center that provides clinical and hospital care. Additionally, it is one of the leading research centers in the region.
After deciding that I should focus on the clinic for my social media policy assignment, I quickly found their social media policy. I was pleasantly surprised at how easy and accessible it was to find. The Cleveland Clinic’s policy is linked directly to their website and is a separate document that appears on the ‘About This Website’ section of their page. Because it is directly linked to a specific page and appears alone, it is clear that the social media policy does not belong to a bigger policy of the organization. I think this is something important to note because it shows that the clinic values the social media aspect of the organization enough to separate it from another policy.
Highlights: One of the highlights of the policy is that is protects against any individual posting information regarding a patient to any affiliated social media site (ie: pictures, videos, information etc). This is extremely important, and relevant, because it is a medical facility and they must secure the rights of their patients. It is for this same reason, that I find it very smart to include this in the first portion of their media policy.
Aside from this, I believe it was smart for them to include a clause that prohibits endorsements, or influence of any political parties. Many times on the web, especially sites that allow for commenting, individuals attempt to feature endorsements, pitches, and comments related to personal branding/marketing. All of these things take away credibility of a website or media platform. Therefore the fact that the Cleveland Clinic is working against that is very smart. Again, because it is such a well-known and reputable institution, content must be monitored and secured in a way that only relevant information may appear.
Low Lights: The only aspect of the policy that could poses problems in my mind is the fact that a clause is included which states that all content posted is subject to be reproduced, distributed, published, or displayed. While I do think that the organization has the rights to monitor, remove, terminate, or modify posted content to t heir sites, I do not find it necessary for the automatic rights of distribution etc. to be signed off on content posted. To me, this should be something separate that an individual must adhere and agree to before the clinic would go ahead and do so.
Overall, I think the policy is well thought out, as well as, well presented. My only recommendation would be to adapt the clause stated above that appears within the policy. Again, I would do this because I think people should have the right to post content to given social media sites without the automatic distribution or replication of their work to other sources.
While we may not agree with every term in a social media policy, they are extremely important. What people put on the web is a huge reflection of the organization or company, and it is that company or organization’s job to protect themselves against the will of the public. Just as we need to protect and “button” up the content that appears on our social sites, they need to protect the content that appears on theirs. Reputation really is essential, and social media is a place where that could be tarnished.
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