Running head: Karl Knauz Motors

Title: Karl Knauz Motors vs. Robert Becker

Abstract
Becker was terminated on June 22, 2010 for his Facebook postings back on June 14th. Two crucial issues in this case study are, was he fired because of both postings, the hot dog cart incident of the event and the Land Rover accident, or only for the posting of the Land Rover accident, and were these postings protected concerted activities. The end ruling will show that there is a fine line between appropriate and inappropriate online speech.
Karl Knauz Motors V. Robert Becker
With the recent boom of social media websites such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, employers have grown concerned with protecting themselves from negative attention towards the company, while respecting their employees’ rights to communicate freely. The National Labor Relations Board has made up rulings that help serve companies in regards to what they can and cannot do when it comes to disciplining an employee for what has been said on a social media networking site. This brings me to the board’s first social media discipline and discharge decision on the case of Knauz BMW vs. Robert Becker.
The NLRB had filed a complaint on behalf of Robert Becker against Karl Knauz BMW, after Becker was fired back on June 22, 2010 for his conduct on Facebook regarding an event and an accident that happened at the BMW dealership. A week before Becker was fired he posted comments and pictures of a sales event in which the dealership served hot dogs and bottled of waters to customers for the launch of the new luxury car. Becker had mocked the dealership for serving the cheap food and drinks and took it to Facebook to vent. A couple days later an accident took place at the BMW dealership, when a sales associate allowed one of his potential customers’ son to sit in the driver’s seat of a vehicle. The 13 year old somehow managed to drive the vehicle down into a small pond.
Becker managed to capture pictures of the incident and took it to Facebook to let others know what happened. Under the picture Becker wrote “This is what happens when a sales person sitting in the front passenger seat allows a 13 year old boy to get behind the wheel of a 6000 lb. truck built and designed to pretty much drive over anything. The kid drove over his father’s foot and into the pond in all about 4 seconds and destroys a $50,000 truck, OPPS!”( site) Management learned about the postings and asked Becker to take the postings down. They then had a meeting with Becker about the situation. Becker stated “It’s my Facebook and his friends and it was none of your business”. The next day Becker was terminated from the company after management found that the post was damaging to the company, as well as the individuals that were involved.
The BMW dealership did not violate the Federal Labor Law in firing Becker after he embarrassed the company in his Facebook posting. It was determined that Becker was not fired because of the posting on the dealership event but for the BMW car incident. It was found that the sales event posting were protected concerted activity and was protected by federal law. As for the BMW incident, it was neither protected nor concerted activities due to it not having anything to do with his conditions of employment. Becker violated section 8(a)(1) when it maintains a work rule that reasonably tends to chill employees in the exercise of their section 7 rights.

The NLRB had every right to rule that the employee Robert Becker was rightfully terminated. Becker not only publicly humiliated the dealer ship but damaged the companies’ image and reputation. When Becker posted the pictures and statement of the accident on Facebook it wasn’t long until management started receiving calls from other dealers about the situation. The images and post were even shared by others via Facebook, which made the word travel faster. Becker thoroughly embarrassed all management and all of his coworkers by shedding light on the situation. He publicly humiliated the family that was involved in the incident and took pictures of the 13 year old that drove the car into the pond. Some people may think this situation wasn’t all that serious, but to the family that was involved and the employee that was involved it was a much bigger deal.

If a similar case like the one above was to happen at my employment, it would lead to worse employee relations because people would feel like their rights were being violated as to what they can and cannot say out of the work place. At my current employment we do a lot of advertising via Facebook and if something like this was to happen, marketing wouldn’t feel comfortable in advertising our company on any social media networks. Our employees would feel like their rights were being violated and wouldn’t feel comfortable around the work place. We as employees would feel that our policies would get stricter and would create a culture of monitoring and suspicion in the work environment.