Profile pictures at work

[rhino12345]

Wondered if I could run this past the "hive mind" to get various perspectives before I bring this up in a meeting I have later in the week with our HR director. We've never had this issue before so I'm wondering if I'm just getting old fashioned or if I'm being reasonable with this.

Work for a very large company that has a regular intake of "younger" staff members (we have a very competitive grad scheme plus a very good internship scheme so about 30-40% of our workforce are under 25).

We use Whatsapp, not always, but sometimes at our client's request to share information ahead of meetings or presentations, as well as for occasional internal comms too. These Whatsapp chats are linked to our employees' personal phones and thus personal Whatsapp profiles.

It's made very clear to staff that they'll be expected to use their own personal Whatsapp profiles when they start and they are asked to ensure that profile pictures and names are "professional". They are given a small amount of training on this (usually it's things like nothing overtly political), but as I said, up until now it's always been self-explanatory and there haven't been issues in the past at all.

Here is my AIBU - some of the profile pictures that the newer cohort of staff are using I find are inappropriate and thus unprofessional, but I'm not sure if I'm just being prudish or old-fashioned.

A large number of them have pictures that would be more appropriate on a dating app than for a work environment if I'm being totally honest (boys posing in a gym mirror with a tight vest on, or even on the beach topless with just a pair of shorts on holding a pint of beer, or girls with a full length picture wearing a short skirt or taken from above looking down their cleavage). Some of them have friends in a profile picture where they're all pulling a silly face which I think makes them look very immature and childish, when in reality they're professional people in their 20s working in a very competitive industry who earn a very good salary!!

In my view, it just comes across unprofessional, and makes me cringe when I add them to the chats with our clients who are often CEOs or CFOs of huge multinational companies. It even makes me cringe when I'm adding them to internal chats with colleagues to organise internal events etc!

I've run it past a couple of people outside of work, mostly senior people in similar corporate environments, who've said these sorts of pictures for a work environment are totally inappropriate, but then when I've mentioned it at work to colleagues (not formally, just in passing) I've been looked at like I'm some sort of dinosaur!

AIBU?

Personally I think you need to provide work phones. I wouldn’t be consenting for my employer to share my personal number so that I am always contactable not only to those within my
organisation but to outside organisations too? i would imagine this has potential to cause all kinds of issues.

You need to provide work phones.

That’s shocking you don’t provide work phones. It’s extremely unprofessional to expect employees to use their own personal phones, not to mention an invasion of their work life balance.

This thread is turning into another 'Cancel the cheque!!' thread with everyone saying the same thing over and over 😄

Have any of these WhatsApp profile pictures offended or raised questions from clients? Or just you?

^^ This! 100%

The only unprofessional thing here is your expectation that they’ll use their personal phones and WhatsApp accounts for work with clients. It’s an invasion of their privacy and indicates that your company is really bad at looking after its employees and doesn’t give a shit about their work-life balance.

Also unprofessional is calling them ‘girls’ and ‘boys’. They’re adults and they’re colleagues.

There are a myriad of problems with employees using their personal phones/WhatsApp which urgently need to be addressed. I think their profile pictures are the least of the worries in this situation.

Your organisation is being massively unreasonable to suggest staff use their personal phones and accounts for professional communications. Do you not have a legal or compliance team that raised the risk of this?!

If you want to insist on corporate photos, you've got to issue them with corporate phones. (I'm stunned a large organisation that expects staff to communicate with clients doesn't do this as standard.)

You need to provide company phones for this.

I would hate my personal whatsapp to be used for company business and my profile picture is my own affair if I'm paying for it.

I think this workplace has an absolute cheek to be expecting personal phones used for business and everything after that is ridiculous. Give them work phones if this is the expectation

We have WhatsApp groups for my team and it’s a very casual thing for sharing funny things or letting people know if we’re not well/running late. Photos are not scrutinised.

What you’re using it for sounds ridiculous and like you’re blurring the lines between home and work. Provide work phones or use Teams.

There’s no chance I’d be using my personal phone for work and, in particular, my personal profile on WhatsApp!
You/work have no business monitoring or having expectations of what their profile pictures should look like in their private WhatsApp account.
If the company wants what is acceptable as a professional profile picture then the company should behave professionally and issue staff with work phones. In any case, using WhatsApp for work matters is really unprofessional.

Also you can change your number and details on WhatsApp. My workplace don’t approve it for business use so there is that issue too.

Personal what's app for work purposes. Yikes. Only time I've used porskbal phone at work has been when I had a phone benefit. Currently have a work phone and what's app with the work number.

CEO’s and CFO’s are people who enjoy a night out with friends and gym mirror selfies too. I doubt any of them care. It shows a human side and nice to think people have a decent life outside of their job too

The issue here is that you are expecting them to use their personal phone and WhatsApp profile.

You should be providing them with work phones if you want professional profiles....

I think it’s unprofessional to use their personal phones for this full stop, they should have work phones if WhatsApp is mandatory.

YANBU that the pictures sound unprofessional in the work place but your company is BU expecting employees to use their personal phones / accounts

Thanks for all the comments - it's good to hear other people's perspectives, especially from those I presume across other industries to see how they work.

To answer a few of the points raised:

They used to offer phones to staff when I first started (it was a choice between an iPhone 5c or a Blackberry, so going back a while now!) but staff overwhelmingly voted to get rid of them about 10 years ago and opted to just use their "personal" phones instead, so I guess things have changed in that time. I found it really irritating having two phones, and my DH's company doesn't provide work phones to staff either so I'd never even considered it an issue.

To my knowledge there haven't been any concerns raised about personal phones being used for work chats by our compliance team. Data sharing isn't much of a problem - Whatsapp is only used if the client requests it (so maybe every other month) and we only use to confirm room or google meet link for example, not for chatting. I do look at people's profile pictures as I can see who is going to be in the meeting, and same with Teams profile pictures. I just used Whatsapp as an example of a messaging system we use as it's probably the most "known" one.

It is part of a wider issue with our newer grads/apprentices behaving in immature and inappropriate ways across the business, hence the meeting later in the week to discuss with our HR team (I haven't arranged this meeting, but have been asked to attend to provide my input). I was reflecting ahead of it, and just wondered if it was worth mentioning the profile pictures specifically as a small aside, but I will suggest bringing back the 'work phones'.

Of course other senior people will think the same. Whereas junior people will tell you to get to fuck or buy your employees work phones.

but I will suggest bringing back the 'work phones'.

Yes but also maybe raise the issue of what's app as a communication with clients in general. Most people have email on their phones now, I would revert back to that, imo what's app is too familiar and an unprofessional medium for communication in a work context. It is also really unsafe in terms of cyber security etc.

Very short sighted of the company not providing work phones. I can see all kinds of things going wrong. Data breaches, clients being poached, that employee with the only fans who really changes their picture to something inappropriate, a SAR coming through that the company can’t provide full data for because personal devices are used. Very, very messy in a large organisation.

Absolutely this.

(assuming UK based)

It really is very very simple.

You are not providing the environment. So (respectfully) you get to get lost here.