Virgin Atlantic recently fired 13 employees who were part of a Facebook group that criticized the airline and its passengers. The 13 employees supposedly spent most of their time on Facebook.

The staff members slammed the airline’s maintenance records on Facebook. They also criticized passenger hygiene. They called some passengers smelly and annoying. This is not very smart behavior on facebook or any other social networking eco-system.

The delineation between work and personal are continually being blurred and this is further proof that employees need to think before they share their negative thoughts about their employer in social networks. The good news here is Virgin got to clean house of employees that were not ” fully on the team” so to speak.

Employees must grasp the fact that their social lives are truly public when they engage on social networks and behaving in the manner that could be looked down upon by their employer might have negative repercussions. The fact that these Virgin employees took these actions in a public group just illustrates their lack of thinking about the potential consequences of their actions.

The internet has no “erase” button. People need to remember this. Employers are increasingly watching social networks to see what is being said about them.

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