Digital Picket Lines : Strategic Employee Disclosure

Using survey and archival data, we examine how employees strategically disclose on social media to manipulate the public image of their employers. We find that when unions renegotiate collective bargaining agreements (CBAs), employees write more Glassdoor reviews and leave lower ratings in these reviews. Our survey responses from over 300 union representatives indicate that strategic disclosure on social media is a nontrivial union strategy. Further building on survey responses, we demonstrate that strategic disclosure during CBA renegotiation intensifies when the union is less exposed to right to work laws; when strategic disclosure can significantly influence CBA renegotiations; and when CBAs encompass a larger number of employees. Lastly, we find that strategic reviews associate with lower equity market returns, and that this association does not differ for non-strategic reviews. Moreover, no reversal is observed in market returns following the negotiations. We conclude that employees strategically disclose to target their employers on social media, and that these disclosures have negative consequences for employing firms