This document discusses the importance of confidentiality in the workplace and the types of information that should remain confidential. It notes that confidentiality is important for legal and reputational reasons and outlines five types of confidential information: 1) employee information, 2) managerial information, 3) organizational information, 4) customer or contact information, and 5) professional information. It distinguishes between casual expectations of confidentiality versus legal requirements and stresses the importance of protecting confidential information.

1. Confidentiality in the workplace

2. Confidentiality, or not disclosing certain information, is
important in a wide range of jobs.
Confidentiality matters for legal and reputational
reasons, and it also matters because your future
employment may depend on it.
Some information is protected by law in several
countries, including personally identifiable information
and also ‘trade secrets’.

3. Types of Confidential
Information

4. 1. Employee Information
In the course of the job, you will hear information
about individuals within your organisation. Some
of this will be unsubstantiated gossip, and some
will be information that you have come across in
the course of your work, especially if you are a
line manager or you work in human resources.

5. 1. Employee Information
If you come across private information in the course of your work, including any
information that identifies an individual (name, address, maiden name and so
on), then you should not disclose it to others. This also applies to information
collected at interviews about ethnic background, disabilities and so on.
There are legal requirements about keeping that kind of information safe and
secure in many countries. If you break those laws, you are likely to be
personally liable and potentially face prosecution.

6. 2. Managerial Information
Managerial information includes both information
about individuals, such as disciplinary action, and
also about broad management actions such as
planned redundancies or employee relations
issues.

7. 2. Managerial Information
Some types of managerial information will become
public in due course—such as planned
redundancies—and other information may remain
confidential for much longer.

8. 3. Organizational Information
Organizational information is also known as business information
or ‘trade secrets’.
The definition covers anything not in the public domain that helps
the organisation do its work better or more efficiently. It would
therefore include, for example, information about industrial
processes, budgets, costs, forecasts, and even customer contact
information.

9. 4. Customer or Contact Information
Customer and contact information is partially covered by ‘trade secrets’.
However, forthcoming changes to data protection law in Europe (and relating to
any data held on a citizen of a European Union country) means that it needs to
be considered and held differently.
If you think this may affect you or your company, you are advised to seek legal
advice.

10. 5. Professional Information
Some professionals — including doctors, lawyers
and accountants — come across information
about individuals or organisations through their
professional position.

11. 5. Professional Information
For example:
• Doctors know about the details of their patients’ conditions and treatments;
• Lawyers know about details of wills and court cases, some of which may be
protected by law; and
• Accountants will know about their clients’ tax and income.
• These professionals are often bound by professional codes of conduct as
well as formal legal requirements.

12. Casual vs. Legal Confidentiality
There is a distinction to be drawn between casual expectations of
confidentiality and legal requirements.

13. Casual vs. Legal Confidentiality
There is information which you may be told, and asked to keep secret, but
where the only obligation to do so is personal
For example, a colleague tells you that she is pregnant, and explains that she
has not yet told anyone else and would prefer it not to be public for the time
being.
She wanted to tell you because you are a friend/someone she trusts to cover
for her if her morning sickness is bad/her line manager.

14. Casual vs. Legal Confidentiality
There is no absolute or legal requirement on you not to tell anyone else.
However, be aware that if you do so, you will have broken her trust.
You would not expect her to be happy, and your reputation as someone to trust
and rely on will be gone (and probably not just with her).

15. Casual vs. Legal Confidentiality
There is information that legally cannot be shared with other organizations or
individuals except under certain very specific circumstances
For example, you may want to share or sell a list of customer contact details to
another organization. In many countries, you can only do so if you have
obtained explicit consent from those customers.

16. Casual vs. Legal Confidentiality
Most personal information (that is, any information which
is personal to an individual, such as national insurance
numbers, full name, address, email address or similar)
cannot, by law, be disclosed without consent.

17. Casual vs. Legal Confidentiality
You can also be sued if you share information that is
individual to your employer with any of the company’s
competitors or disclose it in a way that may damage the
share price. This includes information about employees,
processes, or products that is not already in the public
domain.

18. Protecting Confidential Information
If you regularly handle confidential information, you
should take steps to ensure that you protect it
adequately.

19. Protecting Confidential Information
These should include, for example:
• Ensuring that confidential information is always locked away at night, and not
left unattended during the day;
• Password-protecting sensitive computer files;
• Marking confidential information clearly as such, and ensuring that paper
copies are shredded before disposal; and
• Ensuring that you only disclose confidential information to those who need to
know.