I am the general manager of our company and I did something I feel really bad about now.?

I manage a small company and today I checked someone's IM history because there was a lot of negative office politics I was hearing about. Another employee saw me and told the employee. I actually did tell the employee that I checked her IM history and she at that time told me another employee had told her already. Now I feel gulity and feel like I have nourished a paranoid and distrustful environment. Was it okay to do this if I knew this person was spending time on IM simply talking about co-workers and causing strife or what can I do now to correct the guilt I feel and create an environment where employees feel comfortable sharing their problems openly.

A manager is permitted to check their DP services. Company communications are the property of the company and are not private.

Discuss things on an individual and group basis with employees as necessary to improve morale.

Instead of checking the IM you should have had a staff meeting with all employees and gone over that negative office politics does not make for a healthy work environment. She might take this as harrassment against her and file a claim. You have nourished the fact that you are not trustworthy and do not believe everything that is being said around the "water cooler." It might not be too late to have your staff meeting.

You need to call a staff meeting pronto. Talk to your staff members about their duties and what is expected of them. Then i would put out a memo regarding the company's policy for IMing. And reiterate that the computer is company property and is not a personal belonging. You need to take control of the situation before it gets out of hand. Make sure you do this right, you don't want any possible lawsuits. Good luck.

Damage control. Seek out HR and have them mediate the situation.

don't feel the guilt.

What's done is done, and I relate, from going through garbage cans, to looking through IMs.

After 20 years with my own stores, the best approach is putting on the face of good management. Don't feel you need to comment any further on this. If asked by other employees, deflect their questions with a comment such as "its a private matter."

Let it go, and pretend nothing happened.

You don't have to feel guilty. You have the right to know what people are doing on company time and equipment. And it sounds like this person is a trouble-maker - you actually have an obligation to know about things like that if they're going on, and to do something about it. Don't let her lay a guilt trip on you - she's the one who was guilty.

Why are your employees IMing at work about personal matters? And yes, gossiping about other coworkers is a personal matter.

Send a memo reminding everyone of the company's policy on using the computer, remind them that violations of this policy is reason for termination. Let them stew about it for a few days, then call a staff meeting and reiterate.

It's your job to know what your employees are doing on company time with company resources. Don't feel guilty. That person was wasting time you were paying them for on a computer that you paid for.

Best thing would be to deal with this issue with the guilty offender and not discuss it with anyone else. If others ask, tell them that it is a matter between you and that person and you feel it would be disrespectful of you to discuss the details with anyone else. That way they'll know that, if they ever get in trouble, they can trust you to not blab it and make a huge deal out of it to everyone else in the office.