An HR executive is believed to be the first person in the UK to have sued for constructive dismissal following a dispute with bosses over his profile on professional networking site, LinkedIn.
John Flexman has brought a claim for hundreds of thousands of pounds against gas exploration firm, BG Group, where he earned £68,000 per year as the head of graduate recruitment. He resigned in June after a breakdown in his relationship with senior executives.
According to the Daily Telegraph, Flexman told an employment tribunal in Reading, Berkshire, that he angered bosses after loading his CV onto LinkedIn and ticking a box to say that he was interested in other ‘career opportunities’.
As a result, his manager contacted him while he was on holiday in the US and ordered him to remove the CV. On returning to the office, Flexman was accused of “inappropriate use of social media” and asked to attend an internal disciplinary hearing, where he was handed a list of charges and told he could be sacked.
BG Group claimed that he was in breach of a new company policy on conflicts of interest, which included banning employees from ticking the ‘career opportunities’ box on LinkedIn. It also accused him of including confidential information such as how he had cut the firm’s staff turnover rate in his CV.
But Flexman argued that all such data was available in the company’s annual report and that 21 of his colleagues, including Antony Seigel, the manager in charge of his disciplinary proceedings, had ticked the ‘career opportunities’ box but not been disciplined too.
“He told me to remove from my profile all information regarding BG Group except for job titles and dates. I did not think this was reasonable. It seemed to me that the focus of the charge sheet was the posting of my CV online,” Flexman said.
A spokesman for the BG Group responded: “We welcome the opportunity to present our case at the tribunal, the appropriate forum. We will defend our position, but do not wish to pre-empt the tribunal’s ruling by commenting further.”
The hearing continues.
