Managing Workplace Conflicts: Free Speech vs. Workplace Obligations

This research report presents a comprehensive literature review on the contentious issue of free speech versus workplace obligations, with a specific focus on the Australian context. The report delves into the impact of social media on freedom of speech, exploring how it has amplified debates and blurred the lines between personal expression and professional conduct. It examines relevant Australian cases, the Fair Work Act, and Enterprise Bargaining Awards, providing a detailed analysis of legal and ethical considerations. The report also considers the influence of international cases and legislation for comparative purposes. By analyzing incidents like those involving Israel Folau and Williamson, the report sheds light on the repercussions of employee actions and the importance of balancing individual rights with organizational interests. The review utilizes a wide array of journal articles, news reports, and legal documents to support its arguments, offering valuable insights into the evolving landscape of free speech and workplace obligations.

Running head: MANAGING WORKPLACE CONFLICTS
Managing Workplace Conflicts
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

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Table of Content
Introduction................................................................................................................................3
Free speech and Workplace obligations.....................................................................................4
Role of social media in freedom of speech................................................................................5
Australian Law...........................................................................................................................7
Conclusion................................................................................................................................12
Gaps in the research.................................................................................................................13
Reference..................................................................................................................................14

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Abstract
This research report is a review of previous research papers that have been performed
on free speech, social media and workplace obligation. Major purpose of the review is to gain
an insight whether free speech of individuals actually affect employers. Review also sheds
light on the role that social media plays in influencing the freedom of speech among people.
Provocative posts, freedom of speech against social norms with the wrong intent have
resulted in suspension in school, workplace firing and even worse. To learn more about the
free speech and the regulations grounds supporting the issue has been reviewed with
contemporary affairs and real-world facts of free speech. Moreover, the review particularly
considers two significant issues related to free speech and workplace obligations like Israel
Folau and Williamson. Report presents the repercussion against Willamson and Folau actions
towards the freedom of speech.

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Topic – Review of issue of free speech vs workplace obligations
Introduction
Free speech and workplace obligation and its relation to each other has always been a
significant and debatable context. Social media has been the factor which triggers the debate
on free speech and workplace obligation. Social media platform undoubtedly transfigured
communication in several ways that were once unimagined. According to McGinley and
McGinley-Stempel (2012), social media plays a great role in making the ideas more perilous
than it was ever. Provocative posts, freedom of speech against social norms with the wrong
intent have resulted in suspension in school, workplace firing and even worse. The urge for
freedom of speech is now driven by technology advances. Certainly, social and national rules
are sometimes comprised of illogical practices with limited significances. Consequently,
people in today’s technology-enabled society often seeks to make and apply changes to
existing practices and hence, social media allows individuals to receive response from mass
crowd belonging to a remote locations. Social media provides the scope for free speech.
Review of existing research papers presented in the following shows that freedom of free
speech is often misunderstood by people due to emergence of social media and unclear
employment contract.
The following review has been conducted by using a large set of journal articles that
were published in 2010 onwards. Journal articles are based on four different keywords –
social media, free speech, workplace obligation and Australian Regulation. To support the
argument, newspaper articles have been cited and to highlight the regulatory grounds,
journals from the International labour review have been chosen. In the context, free speech on
social media, data sources are taken from Journal of Mass communication. In addition, to

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collect the data both scholarly resources and peer-reviewed journal articles have been
selected.
Free speech and Workplace obligations
However, there have been several incidents where the individuals expressed their
personal views obnoxious to the organizations and dismissed from their jobs or any other
form of retaliation. The incident published on the Canberra Times reported a woman sacked
from the operation due to series of comments about the reform of abortion. The woman was
reported to be campaigning for abortion reform on social media with the claim that she
insulted Tasmanian government (Maiden 2019). In this context, Fasterling and Lewis (2014)
commented that the right of freedom of speech is treated as the fundamental value in the
constitutional form of government but sometimes the expression of the right may give rise to
conflict, disagreement and offense. Considering this issue, there was a battle line crated as
crop of free speech incidents that often grabs high court’s attention. This analysis also sheds
light on a series of commonwealth regulations that could be observed as the most interfering
with the freedom of speech and expression. The analysis presented in the following tells how
these regulations impose limits on freedom of speech.
When analysing the issues related to freedom of speech and workplace obligations,
scholars have come up with both positive and contradictory views on the context and here
social media certainly adds a bit oxygen to fire of debates. Wragg (2015) argued that
organization and organizational members should create balance between these two
contending ideals and one of this may seem as the individuals, citizens should hold the right
to express their views regarding the issues that are significant, especially when they are not
working. On the contrary, business organizations should insist on the fact that employees are

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supposed to do their jobs that are they are hired to do and they should remain free from
expressing opinions that cause trouble that can be against the corporate values and policies.
For example, in the case of Willamson with Cricket Tasmania, the board member stated the
fact Cricket Tasmania certainly respects the right and opinion of the individual but in return it
also expects workers to refrain from expressing contradictory views on public forum that
damages organizations’ policies (Maiden 2019). Thus, there should be a mutual balance
between both the parties with respect to free speech. Individuals hold the right to speak their
minds but they should not make it objectionable to the parties they work for, while the
organizations should not scrutinize and discourage individuals from expressing their views.
Role of social media in freedom of speech
In response to the above statement, Sánchez Abril, Levin and Del Riego (2012),
mentioned that issue is widely driven by internet and technology disruption because social
media allows opinions outside work to be exchanged with millions of people. Consequently,
the issue that may be resolved without hazards do not remain free from being publicized and
amplified and it eventually leads to a degree that businesses’ images and brand reputation
suffered. For example, if the incident published on Canberra times is aligned with the above
statement, it can be stated that incident eventually led to distraction due to excessive public
attention. Consequently, Williamson was cyber-trolled by the government staff who allegedly
sent an email to Cricket Australia in Melbourne with the screenshot of the tweet (Maiden
2019). If the opposite action is considered, the situation would seem to be creating scope for
public exaggeration.
Wragg (2015) mentioned that due to employees’ surprises, organizations classically have a
significant deal of autonomy under the regulation to end the employment as the consequence
of public speech by employees, irrespective of whether speech occurs during work or outside

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the work –meaning that least attention given to the conditions. In this context, Reader (2012)
commented that if the public speech of employees turns out to be distraction or the causes
that organization is being under the negative light with the public, employers go on
terminating the individuals to close the matter as early as possible. In the case of Willamson
as reported on Canberra Times, Cricket Tasmania hires Willamson against the respective job
responsibilities but as per the employment contract, employees’ roles would also be requiring
the individuals to support and represent Cricket Tasmanian. Thereby, Willamson comments’
have indirectly affected the brand or public image of Cricket Tasmania. For the interest of
brand’s public image, employment contract was ended irrespective of the fact that the
comments are not made in relation to the job responsibilities Willamson perform whatsoever.
Lander and Rogers (2019) argued that if the incident of Willamson is considered then it is
worth stating that freedom of speech on social media is actually not free of consequences.
Likewise, the incident of Israel Folau on social media regarding the anti-gay opinion on
social media created trouble in his Rugby career in Australia and further led to termination of
endorsement contract (Robinson 2019). These incidents make it vividly clear that both the
parties can be hold accountable for the consequences. Employees in the first place are not
supposed to tarnish the image of the brand they are loyal to and on the contrary, employers
should limit the penalty policies, they should instead investigate the extent of outcome of the
incident.
In the context of freedom of speech and workplace context, Norton (2016) mentioned
that employers should be aware of the federal laws as well as the state laws, protecting
employees’ speech in some cases irrespective of the fact that employees might not hold a
constitutional right for freedom of speech. Another incident regarding the sacking of
employees whose electronic communications violates the code of conduct of the industry –

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the recently occurred of incident of Scott McIntyre, who alleged crimes by Anzacs raised
the concerns regarding the proper constraints on freedom of speech (Carroll and O'Dea
Lawyers 2019). So it can be mentioned that when the incident is considered under an
Australian context, it is seen that under Australian law, no particular formal right is found but
in action everyone is free to say as well as write whatever they like and such freedom passes
the exception.
Australian Law
Unlike all other criminal regulation, Australian holds no right to protect the right to freedom
of speech. On the basis of existing Australian Constitution, Australian courts implied right to
freedom of political as the most significant aspect of representative democracy. However,
the citizens cannot consider the political communication as the right for themselves; instead it
is treated as the constitutional right of the individual citizens. However, when comparing the
incident of Willamson’s termination under the cause of public tweets, with the principles of
Fair Work Act 2009, it is learnt that employers must give certain time period before
terminating the employees for whatever the causes (alrc.gov.au 2019). In this context,
Papandrea (2016) mentioned that amount of notice or payment in lieu of notice is usually
determined as per employee’s period of continuous service with the organization. Moreover,
conditionally, the period can be increased by a week if the employees are over 45 of age and
served employers for at least two years. Therefore, Willamson’s dismissal from the work
with no period of time may be unjustified under this Fair Work Act Australia. On the
contrary, Kim (2012) argued that free speech or free expression remains as the most
significant element of individual’s right of self-development as well as fulfilment; however,
more impotence is given to political speech because the political issues are significant for
Australia’s system of representative government. Nonetheless, there should be a clear limit to
free speech of individual because benefiting or exempting the political speech is biased and it

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makes complications. People in the society may not always be able to judge their speech to
limit to certain point.
The context of Freedom of Speech and workplace obligations can also be analysed
with Enterprise Bargaining Awards which interprets the wage and conditions of
employment that are negotiated at the degree of individual organizations (alrc.gov.au 2019).
However, the working conditions under this Enterprise Bargaining Awards were often
challenged by citizens. Thomas, Rothschild and Donegan (2015) mentioned that an officer of
Army Reserve Australian was dismissed from the terms of employment when the individual
published series of personal opinions by blogs through social media platforms. The opinions
includes contradictory views about gay members of Australian Defence Force. Considering
the consequences of dismissal Mr, Gayon challenged ADF but Australian Constitution
imposed certain constraints to political communications but the incident cannot be treated as
the right for individuals.
In general, Fasterling and Lewis (2014) mentioned that whether employers can sack
workers for speaking their mind is doubtful however, if that expression constitutes breach of
policies or non-compliance to reasonable direction, organizations can take actions.
Nonetheless, the controversies arise between the freedom of speech and workplace
conditions. For example, University makes some changes in employment contracts of staff in
the academy (theconversation.com 2019). In the view of the controversy sourcing in social
media about the freedom of speech, some particular universities in Australia are all set to add
new clauses into their employment contracts. Chatterjee and Maira (2014) argued that this
initiative certainly limits the ability to speak minds publicly. University of Sydney in
particular state that employees are encouraged in the debate on agenda of public importance
and here the employees are motivated to take part in the public debate, while the Melbourne
University are in the queue of restricting staff’s ability to make public opinion to the field of

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expertise. Papandrea (2016) arguably stated that although the universities are stepping ahead
towards the freedom of speech but the limits of specialities are yet not clear. Cutting out the
freedom to speak publicly to ones’ area of expertise lead to the arbitrary decisions of
management on the limits of academics’ expertise. Reader (2012) also argued narrowing the
right of topic to speak in which university staff can be involved is actually a major limitation
on their academic freedom. Nonetheless, it is yet not clear why these two universities
imposed the stated restrictions on university staff on public commentary.
On the basis of scholarly assumptions, the restrictions have been considered as the after-
effect of the controversy involving Roz Ward who was dismissed from the employment
contract once made at La Trobe University for the investigated issue of social media opinion
which surrounds the criticism on Australian flag no longer representing indigenous people.
Wragg (2015) stated that despite the positive actions taken by the university, the attempt to
penalize the individual for speaking out the political views is greatly considered as the
overreaction of university management. Thus, it is certain that right to freedom of speech is
actually tied to some certain clauses. Freedom of expression of employees should not harm
the reputation of the institution or the company in any manner. The institution or the
employer under any circumstance should not be affected by negative public opinions. In the
context of freedom of speech, Kim (2012) mentioned that employees or the organisational
members are supposed to speak their minds on public debate but within their specialised field
as well as general matter of interest. This means this is certainly up to employees concerned
to understand whether they are apt to involve themselves on the issues. Hence, Reader
(2012) commented that involvement of University staff in public debate is fundamental if the
university staffs are supposed to create impact on society and enhance public policy with the
purpose of developing emerging solutions to the complex issues. On the basis of the above
argument, it can be stated that freedom of speech in public should take place under certain

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conditions. This means individuals working for a particular setting may speak in public but
remaining in their field which could both enhance social thoughts and organizational
reputation.
Following the decision to sack relation manager of Tasmanian government after her
action on social media platform about the hospital policy of hospitals, a general refrain is
observed when the online and public conduct is significantly increased by organizations.
Wragg (2015) performed a study in the context of Freedom of Speech and mentioned that
employers in today’s dynamic market environment seek to build a workforce of driven and
passionate people. Even the stated fact is considered, the professional passion might come out
an individual who significantly passionate in their personal life. Thus, authors came up with
two basic causes –such as free speech is often understood mostly in America context to
assure freedom of expression but this is not entirely applicable to Australian Constitution.
Norton (2016) mentioned that some courts and tribunals in the country Australia are prepared
to indicate constitutional right in the context of political communication. Therefore, it can be
stated that the right is fundamentally more limited compared to the classical concept of free
speech. Australian law on freedom of speech does not enable an individual to put themselves
in a way inconsistent with employment contract despite the justifications that employees
might give in return in the conduct. The second cause was analysed by Papandrea (2016), in
which the authors state that the mind of free speech significantly fails to acknowledge the
realities of todays’ dynamic business. Papandrea (2016), stated that it can be ineffective to
consider an organization as entity which is immune from acts as well as decisions of its
members. If the existing employment culture and contracts are taken into account, it is no
longer inappropriate to state that when an individual or employee state their opinions across

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the potentially unlimited horizon of the digital platform, the effect on the organizations who
were not involved whatsoever in the case, might enormous.
Furthermore, Kim (2012) mentioned that in the light of significant consequence,
organizations would be appropriate to be concerned under certain context, where the
individuals hold the right of shaping the work in the social media tools and end up making
comments that steals public attention. Chatterjee and Maira (2014) stated that fact that in
order to resolve the conflict between freedom of speech, there should be a set of social media
policies which balances employers’ expectation in relation to how individuals can conduct
themselves and creating clear consequences of failing to meet the expectations. Norton
(2016) stated the fact that it is significantly important that employees are the copy of the
policy and when the employees are made aware of the consequence and failure to comply
with employees’ expectations can be treated as the breach of policies. Moreover, the policies
should also enable the scope for removing the act in the social media platform. For example,
if employee’s comments are significantly offensive as well as carries a significant connection
to workplace, organization in return apply actions –guiding employees to remove the
comment or contracting the social media partners to withdraw the actions.
Furthermore, in the rectification of policies, Wragg (2015) specified a ‘call of time for action’
–this means every enterprise or the organization should know before determining the actions
against the individual whether there exist a connection between employees’ comment and the
employment. This means there may be two scenarios –one is involving employees to make
comments that employer might personally disagree and other could be as the comments made
likely to impact the business potentially.
Likewise, the issue related to the publicity over Israel Folau as well as his issue with Rugby
Australia in relation to the controversy about the homosexuality generated a series of