Following a worker’s recent dismissal for disparaging remarks about her job, Monster has issued guidelines for the use of social networking websites.

Kimberly Swann was made an example of calling for her job “boring”. Monster’s guidelines are:

• Be smart about what you write online. If you want to write negative comments, be sure they’re justified or within reason. Avoid coming across as a negative person.

• Be careful what you write about yourself. Don’t highlight bad behaviour for all to see.

 • Don’t be caught out by pictures posted online. Don’t take a  post-birthday sick day if your friends are likely to post incriminating pictures of you the night before.

• Separate business from pleasure if necessary. Use different networking sites for different purposes, such as Facebook for friends and add colleagues to professionally-geared sites such as LinkedIn.

Jenny Ungless, Monster career coach, says: “Social networks such as Facebook and Twitter are great ways of raising your profile. However, it is extremely easy for your information to fall into the wrong hands and snowball into trouble. If you use sites like Facebook for both business and pleasure, you must exercise caution in what you write.”