My former employer has been contacting current and former employees which were my co-workers and forcing them to remove their personal recommendations for me on linkedin. The empoyer is stating that by recommending me the employees are violating some company policy - which I never heard of. They have threatened to fire one employee unless he removes his recommendation of me from linkedin and they have contacted other employee who has quit 4 months ago and also told him that he needs to remove/modify his recommendation because it violates some agreement that he signed. This is a public traded company - is it legal for them to do this? Is this defamation of character?

Hello elb:

You can sue anybody for anything in this great country of ours. It might BE defamation, too. I don't know what they actually said.

What I can tell you is this. In our civil courts system, there are two parts to a civil case. First you have to prove that they did something wrong. Then you have to prove how much their wrong cost you. Although you might be able to prove the first part, until you've been turned down for a job DUE to their action, you have no damages.

excon

Thank you for the response. I should have been more specific in my question - I am not necessarily trying to sue the company for money - I am trying to take action which will interject with them forbidding current and former employees for posting personal recommendations for me on a public networking site which has no connections to the company. Is it legal for my former employer to do this?

Hello again elb:

Nope. ALL you can do is sue 'em. You CAN'T get them to do what you want WITHOUT suing them.

excon

Hmm I thought I posted a response here. But to answer your second question the answer is; there is probably nothing you can do. A company can legally set a policy that prevents employees from doing anything more than verifying employment. Whether they can extend that policy to employee's actions outside the workplace could be a question. There MIGHT be a first Amendment issue there. However, if there is the employee would have to bring action, not you. You would have no standing in such a case. The employee would have to show that the company had violated their first amendment rights.

The only case you could bring is if the company were deliberately and maliciously saying untrue things about you. But if they are just enforcing a company policy, even if it's a brand new one, you have no recourse.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by elb2007

Thank you for the response. I should have been more specific in my question - I am not necessarily trying to sue the company for money - I am trying to take action which will interject with them forbidding current and former employees for posting personal recommendations for me on a public networking site which has no connections to the company. Is it legal for my former employer to do this?

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It's no longer your fight - your fight with them is over. You've left their employment. Now it's up those who have been "advised" to remove their recommendations to claim the company is being unfair or unjust. You have suffered no damages and, quite frankly, these "moral" issues, trying to teach someone a lesson, usually fall flat. If the other people don't want to put up with this situation, then it's up to them to try to stop it.

And - I think I'm parroting excon - the other employees and former employees can only stop the company's behavior by going to Court and proving the policy or agreement not to disclose is illegal and setting it aside.

You are not a party to this action.