Children in the workplace

Policy and regulation are essentially 'guidelines' which are put in place to defend against intentional and unintentional property and safety violations.

Kid friendly means safety and balance. Balance means physical, emotional, intellectual and spiritual conditions towards their evolution...

Does your office environment provide that for even you?

Better to take them to a lake or park or travel a bit and show them reality safely and with Love!

They are our Future, it is why we work...

The trend is clear. The workplace is a distinct environment where the company comes first. Workers also expect their resources to be protected from molestation, accidental harm, or use by others (non company business). Think of it like a tool used in the business - like a truck..should the children of employees use the company truck to go to the prom?

Your company sounds like the kind of place that really is relaxed and comfortable, one of those diamond-in-the-rough kind of places. Don't give it up!

As for the kids using computers.... Yes, but within limits. If bringing kids to the office is an accepted practice that shows no signs of being struck down, embrace it.

Find a small corner of the workplace, and set up a few PCs with some (legally-purchased) games or other software to keep them busy. Conect the workstations with a switch, but KEEP IT SEPARATE from the rest of the network at all costs! You don't want malware infecting your network, nor do you want older kids going out onto questionable sites on your 'net connection.

In other words, make a PC lab for the kids. As an added bonus, it can also be used as a training lab for your company's workers. Everyone wins!

Cheers

No. And, that is for 2 reasons:

1) Unless you have a machine and network policy implemented, there is a risk yours or anyone else's children could compromise company resources and affect tens, if not hundreds, of people both internal and external to your enterprise.

2) If they did something and did compromise or break something, not only could it affect your job standing but also others who are responsible for keeping such things from happening (network/system admins and techs). You could not only lose your job, but negatively impact someone else's career.

I'd say...if you're gonna have the kids there, it's great. They get to see what mom and/or dad does and how to get along with people in a professional environment. But if it were me, I'd get a laptop of my own (perhaps the old one your upgraded from?) and load it with games and what not for them to play with off of company hardware and networks.

NO! A business is not a place for kids, unless you run a day-care. As for letting kids play on company computers, I find it hard to believe this is even a question! Would you let anyone that walked in off the street use your company computers? Then why let non-employees use them?

At the risk of stretching a biblical example too far, the child born by the prophet staying in the roof house died while going to work with his father in the field.

While this biblical example could be a means of boosting the prophet's stature, it could also be a lesson that workplaces are really battle grounds between those in the faith, those seeking faith and those against the faith: children deserve shelter from it.

Brian Sroufek

When I come to work, I do not want to be distracted by someone's child running around and being bored. I also don't think people's children should be allowed to play with the tools that people need to do their work. Children are the parents responsibility, not your workplace responsbility. YOu wanted them, you pay for someone to care for them if you are working. In my experience, parents DONT take responsibility for their children at the workplace, they expect everyone else to watch them.

It would depend on the environment that you are working in. If your organization has a training lab setup then it should be ok for the kids to use those machines (if they are not being used). If not, then it would only be wise to let the kids use machines in the production environment unless they know how to use one.

It's hard enough maintaining the integrity of networked systems when adults are using them.

Do what you like. A kid friendly workplace is a wonderful, modern thing. But, make sure the kids have their own logins and are highly restricted. If you don't do at least this much, then this whole thing is a very bad idea.

If they want to play solitaire, fine. Surf the web? Sure. But, make sure you block inappropriate sites. You don't want the kids mom's to find out that her kids were surfing porn at your work site.

BTW, issues with kids in the workplace goes beyond their access. What if they break something, or steal something. Who is responsible?

A former employer of mine had cleaning staff that would bring their kids in (to "help" I guess). But the kids were helping themselves to snack stashes, headphones, loose change, etc. Just in case you thought that "my little Johnny" would never do that...

Good luck.

You are stating that descrimination is clearly against the law. Well you are right.

However what some companies are going to do is exactly that. What they are going to use are the fact that their health insurance is going to be more because of employees who do smoke. What they will do is charge you more on your insurance deductions and very simply not hire anyone who does smoke or have some other health issues. This practice is starting now (read it in information week).

Problem will be is to prove it. Health insurance companies are offering discounts to companies who do not have employees with health issues.

With the amount of time we working parents are required to be at work and the minimal interaction with our kids. I have found it to be both a boon and a great experience for my daughter to bring her in occasionally. The problem lies with parents who do not monitor their children, do not have a firm grasp of protecting company data, or have no access to let alone knowledge of a written kids at work policy.

While there is no written policy here at my office, it is commonly understood that children have a protected login account that they may use. We provide them with educational games and supervised internet access. They are given small projects that they can learn from and help out the group at the same time.

Because of this environment, I've been able to spend some quality time with my daughter and help her to boost her problem solving skills. Considering that we are also discussing the future generations of workers, early exposure equals a more rounded skill set in my opinion.

Having worked in a variety of different locations, there are organizations where "kid-friendly" is possible because of the type of environment allows it to be such (e.g., a physically smaller office environment, not that isolated but not crowded either, etc). For that environment, I think it is acceptable to provide the occasional assistance to the parent who has trouble acquiring child care in a pinch by having a "secure" workstation available (so long as it is an exceptional solution as opposed to the norm).

On the flip-side, the current place I work for has offices all over the place with limited computer access (some are networked, some are not). The offices tend to be cramped and lack the resources to make the professionals' lives easier, let alone cater to their children. If a parent were to bring a child to the office, there's no way anyone in the IT department (my area) would necessarily have knowledge about it nor would we be able to provide any secure form of computerized entertainment/distraction for the child. So, for my current environment, I would argue that children are not permitted because of the liability and the genuine lack of a controlled resource to dedicate to such an endeavor.

As an afterthought, if a business was genuinely "child friendly" or "family-oriented," it would not have a 24/7 type of existence. Most people now tend to arrange their schedules around their professional lives rather than around their family/personal lives. But that's a whole 'nother discussion...

When you say "play with the computers," what exactly does that mean? Depends on how old they are, how knowlegable, etc. We had an employee bring in her teenage son over the weekend. He downloaded music, played games, chatted, and infected the computer with a virus (true story). I can't see any serious company with a computer use policy that allows this behavior. Sure, set them up with a spare junk workstation, but you better set it up on a different network too! And when you set up this play computer, try and put some links to things that could do them so good, educational stuff, etc. Maybe you could put them to work on a research task of some kind that might help them learn something in the process?

...or Aussie Rules Football? Or Rugby? Could have your Aussie kids play those sports, instead of baseball. Or they could ride sheep or kangaroos, play fetch with dingoes, swim with crocodiles, or drink Fosters, or whatever you all do there for fun :-)

But I agree, Kids should stay away from the workplace, since they disturb the other employees, and can get their hands on things they should not be touching. Plus the parent who brings the kids to work is not being productive if he/she needs to look after the children.

That's the same as saying would I let you, as an IT consultant, perform surgery on me, um, no.
On the other hand, I'd let you drive me to work even though you're not a taxi driver.
It's a matter of skill, and my 14yr old has more computer sense/skill than the 40 or so "adults" using computers I'm responsible for.

It would actually be a bonus if the majority of them could type anyway! (they tend to hunt and pick) - why not give them a PC with no office network access and a typing tutor installed to embellish their skills. ICT teachers might think that this is a good idea.

Why not set up a secure connection capability, so your users can log into the network remotely. That way they can do their work from home, and not bring the kids to the work area.

Just an idea.

and they help me do my job.

How many 12 year olds do you know that can make cat5 patch cables up to code?

How many 12 year olds do you know that have built their own computer?

When I have to go to the remote locations to work on the network I take them so they can learn the logic involved in tracking down a problem.

Do the boys get a chance to get bored and want to play on company computers? Only the company computer work bought for me in my house. If I don't have enought to keep them occupied I don't bring them.

Little bit different than the sit down and shut up approach that some people try.

Is there anything wrong with them playing solitare or watching a movie? Not if they are allowed in the office in the first place.

As employees and users of a company we are entrusted and sheperds of our networks. Children do not fall under that purview as they can not comprehend that the cool screen saver on daddy's PC is a fast attack worm. Most networks are still being defended heavily on the perimeter while the core remains soft. If your kid takes down the network - who will face the music? YOU!!!

**So I don't like dogs jumping up on me and slobbering all over me. I prefer cats, but (aware that some people don't like cats) I would not even think of bringing my cats to work. It's just called basic consideration.**

And be aware that there are those of us who would rather not be in the presence of children at all.There are more childfree people than you might imagine and they usually do not like to advertise this at work for fear of being called in on holidays and asked to stay late so Mrs.Mommie can see little Suzie's ballet practice.In my experience, and the experiences of others in my childfree community, this is a truth. In the child-centric society we live in today, this is a complaint that is rarely, or made anonymously, made to avoid rifling the feathers of the parents and bosses who promote "family-friendly" policies.
In addition. the workplace is for *working* and a parent cannot expect to give 100% of his/her attention to the job for which they are being *paid* when they have the responsibility of keeping tabs on their kid.
If there is a day designated for "bring your child to-work-day" or such then that would be acceptable. People who would rather not deal with kids at least know what they are in for and when.

Having just spent the better part of a morning clearing spyware from a work computer (no kids in sight!) and having NEVER cleared spyware from a computer used only on 'kid sites' (pbskids, tv show - including pokemon - sites, etc) I wonder about that!

As far as the "kids at work" debate:

Parents are responsible for the behavior. Period. It is not my job to maintain a separate computer, much less a network for children coming into work. No, I'm not anti-child. I bring my daughter (11) to work occasionally, especially if I get called in on the weekend. While here, she is on MY computer playing WINDOWS games or writing stories in WORD. She also knows how to click "NEXT" to keep an update going if she is following me around. (More importantly, she knows to read messages and ask if they aren't the one she has been shown!) Other parents have had kids in occasionally and I have never had a problem with the CHILD messing up a computer.

Maybe there haven't been that many kids around my workplace, but I have a great deal more problem with the people that work here everyday than the occasional kid!

I already set up an old workstation and its connected directly on to the office PIX.

Letting children of any age play on company computers is a major risk, to the computers and to the network! Also, if the children are using the company computers, the employees are not being productive either. It is a lose-lose situation.

A much safer option would be to provide an area with a couple of computers (NOT connected to the network) with age-appropriate software for the children.

I used to work at a company that was very kid friendly and now work for a company that is equally as kid friendly. The big difference here is this company is more technical.

In my last company kids using company computers caused nothing but problems...from stupid programs that were installed that caused performance issues to viruses and lost files.

My current company, while it does not yet have an officially adopted computer usage policy, those issues are non-existent because the users realize and respect the issues that can be caused by even letting their kids surf the net. That being said...a computer policy is being drafted as we speak.

I agree with what you said. It sounds like the discussion opener already has a kid friendly environment going. If they want to let kids on computers, have some set up just for that, locked down. if you want to let them on the web, restrict the sites they can visit. I don't see a problem with that as long as the kids no they have to behave themselves and not disrupt their parents or the other employees.

I have no kids, but i think the answer is, that's what the guest account is for. so lazy ass IT people, setup that account with bare bone access (i'm one of those lazy asses btw, before you all get pissed at me)

The question about whether or not kids should be on the
computers is moot: they shouldn't be in the workplace at all.

It is not only unproductive, but rude.

They can't be any worse than the users themselves...

No, I don't think kids should be brought to work at all. They distruct some people who want to work quitely. As far as i understand, when you are getting employed, there is no where they say you can allow the 2nd party to use your desk and computer.

Kids are no different than adults when it comes to the internet. Both need to be properly supervised. Go for it.

MAP

To all of you who say that NO non-employee should have access to a company computer, child or not, what do you do when an adult needs access to a computer? Don't you ever have meetings at work with non-company people? Don't they ever ask for access to a computer to check e-mail, etc?

It's easy to allow a select few individuals to bring their kids in for a day at the office. But what happens if everyone in the office requests or demands the same. Could an office function with 100+ kids during business hours? Would you do business with that company?

I was terminated for simply forwarding personnal emails to home over a company computer system from Cingular Wireless. I have had friends who have been terminated because of internet use. If us as employees, "Who Know Company Policy" on company computer use, are at high risk for termination, why even take a risk on a child using corporate systems. Save your job and only use corporate systems for work related business. Todays competitive corporate environment is too sensitive for even one mistake. Don't take the chance.. But then, again maybe your child will help out the unemployment. Get them a laptop.

Jonathan Swift had an excellent solution to the problem of children in his essay entitled "A Modest Proposal". He wrote it as a solution to the economic problems in Ireland in the 18th century, but it seems it would be valid today to solve the issue at hand.

http://art-bin.com/art/omodest.html

That is one of the things I love about my company, in fact almost every company I have worked for in Colorado. In addition to being kid friendly, they are also very dog friendly. In fact my dog is with me today.

Sure they are learning computer skill when they are on computers, but their parents place of employment is not the right place or time for them to be building these skills. I have no issue with people bringing their kids to work, but they should absolutely not be allowed on company PCs unless the company has dedicated PCs for their use that are locked down and completely segmented from the corporate network.

I wish I could do that with my son. He is great with PCs but he can't use them here. As a result, I have had to refuse to work late or weekend. This places a hardship on others and denies me the overtime(or comp time).

Congratulation on having an employeer with brains and a heart!!

...and a few people bring their kids in. It scares the hell out of me.

OK - I'm not getting any younger, so the relative age of the people I'm responsible for drops every year.

These kids work 29 hours a day 9 days a week. Some do have their own kids. I don't mind having runts around - my office was in my house for years and mine were always under foot.

My logic about the whole thing is what my dad/g-fathers/uncles, all who spent their lives breaking their backs in whatever the better paying b-c jobs were "in the day":

Tools are tools - you don't play with them, you use them to help you do your job, and you respect them. Apply accordingly - there are many parallels.

Computers in the office environment aren't toys anymore than a blast furnace at a steel mill. Children need to be taught boundaries and respect for "tools", and relying on the "tools" of your trade (or even worse, a PC belonging to a co-worker) to entertain your kids while you work is self-centered.

I learned a lesson the first time I left a screwdriver laying in the yard for Dad to run over with a mower. Punishment then wasn't so politically correct.

Teach your kids to come to work with you. And learn what that means, first.

A former employer required a lot of seasonal overtime from mostly female employees, I was the tech support dept. Management allowed them to bring in the kids in evenings, the kids played with the workstations and I ended up putting in countless hours of overtime eradicating viruses, malware and spyware that our corporate filters would have normally prevented. These kids were going to the most virulent possible websites and in many cases knew how to actively disable virus and spyware protection in order to visit otherwise denied websites. Needless to say, the kid visits were soon stopped.

In our area we have test machines, some standalone, a dead one here and there and production machines (including servers). From time to time different staff member?s children are here. They know which machines they can touch and which ones that they will lose an arm over and they stay away from.

I think the work place should be clear of children due to the reason that you can't keep your eye's on them at all times. It only takes a second and ... If you are keeping your eye's on them the entire time you are not getting the required amount of work done or quality of work requested by your employer. One the other hand, what about your fellow employees that are trying to work, is it fair to them?

HOWEVER there are times that I to have to bring mine in and I don't like it. They mind and don't touch but I am dreading that one day...

My overall thought on the matter - if you are going to allow children in the work environment give them a place that they can play and keep busy and that you the parent don't have to worry about them or any machines.

Set up a computer with the kid programs and use a program like "Deep Freeze" so when the kid is done with it a simple reboot restores it back to the original configuration. No worrying about crashing or deleting anything?

What ya think?

Robert0z

Wasn't that a movie or something???

I used to get on the computers at my ma's various jobs when she, say, couldn't get a babysitter or whatever, and I messed those things up. I crashed them, I infected them with viruses, made them unusable, and the like. Granted, this was way, WAY back in the days when 300 baud was warp speed, but the same concept applies. And that goes squared for networked environments. Imagine some young hacker-in-training doing his/her thing on your network and not covering their tracks, and I believe you have your (admittedly paranoid) answer. Heck, anyone doing any C/C++ can wreck your machine lickity-shickity. Beware.

Yes the children can play on the computers as long as they are the older ones and not on the network so they cannot get into company files and mess up the company network. It would be a network admins nightmare to keep it going and working to keep the business up and running.

1. You must protect company data. If it is all on the network, then you simply need to prevent access to the network. This can be done using "guest" or locked down accounts, non-networked computers, or keeping kids off any company computers.
2. You must protect the computers. If all important data is on the network, this means returning the computer to a clean condition after use. If you have a policy that computers are subject to re-imaging without notice, then the worst you have to do is reimage the computer. Other options are to set aside a computer that auto-reimages on reboot.
3. You must protect the children from inappropriate sites. You know how to do that.
4. You must protect the company from liability for the children, and enforce accountability of the parents. That can be done with signed agreements. If a parent's child downloads malware, that child is not allowed access to company equipment again.
5. Obviously, no child, non-employee, or even most employees come near the actual server(s). They ARE in a locked room, or even offsite, right?

Within these guidelines and your own set-up, you decide what you have the time and resources to do. The more secure your system already is, the less problem you'll have with kids, whether you let them on the company computers or not. And by the way, the less problem you'll have with any inadvertent OR malicious actions.

I don't believe that children should play on company computers. If their family cannot afford a computer, they could go to the public library and use those computers.

Company computers are company property. They may contain sensitive information that could be copied or changed. Computer configurations, Windows registry, and the like could be altered to change the way the computer functions or make it disfunctional.

If children are injured while on company property, the company could be sued.

Is this permitted by company policy? Who provides them the vapability to logon? Are they provided the password?

It is great you bring the kids. They can play on my network computers all they want. I haven't read your other replys, but have pretty good idea what they say. Your kids can play on my computer anyday and hack if they think they can. I can handle it and I would tease my network admin that they couldn't if they were intimidated by idea of my kids at large on their network. Me, I designs stuff for kids. My grown up kids, my users.
I think it is great you bring kids to work and sorry if you are getting a hassle over it.
Any decently setup system should be able to handle whatever is dished out and if it can't, should be able to recover pretty painlessly from a problem. Me, I welcome such problems to help me learn to improve my network.
I would be very flattered, however, if you asked me first. and I would try to learn what your kids are doing (with YOUR permission) so i can get hip to what is cool...

No,children should not be alllowed to play on company computers,anything could happen in a instant,that may cause computer to crash which results in lost data
Security is a major issue here

Ask yourself,Would I allow co-workers kids play on my computer if setup for business use

I solved this problem by bringing in my laptop and allowing her to use it at the office. Since my laptop is running WinXPHome and is configured for my workgroup at home, I can plug her into the Internet connection and there is no way she could access the LAN or company data.

As a network engineer and network security administrator, I do not see a problem with the kids using CERTAIN computers that have been put in for that purpose. This is also a good way to recycle your old equipment. If you take a couple of old PII or PIII computers and as someone else said here, put EDUCATIONAL programs on them, Such as typeing tutors, math, reading games etc. Then I feel this will benefit all persons involved.

On the other hand should they be allowed to use Networked Office computers that connect to the company LAN or WAN, ABSOLUTELY NOT. This would have the potential to bring in Viruses, Worms, Spyware, or just even open up a hole in security that would create a vunerability in your infrastructure.

Michael Black

That's a big NO!

For those reasons:
1) It initiates them into the real world of what is the purpose of this technology
2) Help parents to supervise the kid in it learning curve (Web surveillance - parental ...)
3) Expose the kid to what is a daily agenda, day of work, things to be done and not to be done ...)
4) Help the manager to see the issues an employee have with its children and how it address it
5) Help the kid to recognise its parent's contribution to the enterprise and value its own to the community
6) It is easy to manage trough special profile
7) Help the communication between the Techies and the client because of this situation to establish a framework
8).....

Benefits are in for both sides, employee and employer and also help to build more responsible citizens by teaching by example.

Of course the framework must be defined by including every level of the enterprise but also will alleviate the 'ownership' of responsibility to everyone.

Well we do it sometime (special day) and it work very well. But again prior to that we sat down and discuss how we will make it.
One of the main things is no email on a personal account server allowed (Hotmail, MSN, Netscape, Yahoo ...)

Because English is only my second language, forgive me for some mistake I might have done. Good luck

..I sleep all night and I work all day!!!

This sub-thread reminded me of the Monty Python skit.

http://bau2.uibk.ac.at/sg/python/Scripts/TheLumberjackSong

My view is that kids at work can be very beneficial but I would suggest that 12 years + is the correct target for this. I cant believe the comments here about kids seeming to run wild and do anything... in some establishments. You need very firm guidleines & most importantly to take responsibility for the kids & their actions. It can work and is an excellant opportunity to give kids a taste of the real world and employees the feeling that they are working for a company thats caring. 'Work Experience' is great provided its handled correctly.

No child or anybody else for that matter who isn't directly affiliated with the firm or is not somehow invoved in the computing end of th firm,should be allowed to go anywhere near "any" of the Firm's computers.Period.
These are for Company use, they are not, Repeat not toys and shoudn't be used as such.No matter who's kids thet are,they SHOULD NOT be allowed to touch any Compnay Computer.If it is that important to yourself and your staff that kids have computers to play with while they are visiting the firm Fine.In that case,may I suggest that a special area of Computers be set aside strictly for kids.That way there is no Company Info to be destroyed, on them and there is no chance that some child will inadvertantly cause a meltdown. I would strongly suggest that you set up up a few Computers with games on them and set them completely apart from those of the Firm, that way everybody is happy, the kids have thier fun and the Company remains secure and the information undamaged or worse yet, unchanged.
Regards
Aaron A Baker

It's great when the work environment is kid friendly. To make it so requires that every parent instill in their children respect of other people and their space. Part of that is respect of ownership. The company's computers are there for a purpose. Unless that purpose specifically includes personal use the kids should not be using them. Personal use of company property has been held in the past by the courts as theft.

I live in Michigan, Detroit Metro area. There was a recent news article about seven or eight people being canned because they smoked at home. One of the employees was not even on the companies health and medical insurer. The state tells them, "sorry nothing we can do because this state is an "AT WILL" state." In other words once you are hired you are the "WILL" of the employer. There have been cases nationwide were it did not have anything to do smoking or obesity (evidently it is okay to be a drug addict or alcoholic), but hobbies after work (like sky diving, what companies called "DANGEROUS" hobbies, including scuba diving). Some states have clamped down on companies regulating what an employee can do after work, after they punch out. These states now have an employee bill rights, which state that after work, after an employee punches out the is the employees basically free to do with their life as they want, not the companies.

http://www.detnews.com/

or

http://www.freep.com/

Do a search to find the article.

I saw that ad and was wondering to myselfy why the virus got as far as the firewall in the first place? In the context of the workplace, it is just as likely that "Marge down in accounting" (a print ad) will download a malicios program inadvertantly as my 7-year old.
The onus is on company administrators to provide a safe computing environment, and protect sensitive information regardless of the users. Whether its my daughter in with me on weekends, or a malicious employee trying to steal or destroy sensitive information, if you don't have end-to-end protection, then something isn't quite right.
To accomodate kids who do come into our office with their parents, we have a limited-rights account set up with a roaming profile and strict ECL policy, and have a variety of games and activities the company purchased and made available on the server for them. All of the employees know that if they bring their child into the office, they can give them their own account to log in with and use. It makes the child feel special, we know they can't harm or access anything sensitive, and we have complete control and visibilty of their activities.

-=Phil

I'll agree with that. The adults still have to maintain order and if parents make a habit of using the office as day care they need a good talking to by their supervisor. Maybe once or twice a year, at a small company. And my daughter would also be hard pressed to handle my long days, but I do often bring her during weekend maint. work of up to 6 hours. But I've had enough of my software developers bring in a virus from home or stupidly open an obviously dangerous email that I can't make the broad statement that a kid involved is always bad.

Never. I can't begin to list all the
problems and headaches I've seen arise
from this over the years from computers
corrupted to serious injuries from
being unsupervised and running and falling.

Stan Middlebrooks/MMCC

In answer to the question, "Should children be allowed to play on company computers?", that depends on whether you want them downloading malware, deliberately or otherwise, not to mention visiting sites which could compromise your career.

Gervas

Before the 20th century most kids worked alongside their parents in shops, farms, whatever. When I went to college I was very often the ONLY kid among my peers who knew exactly what my Dad did when he went to work because as a farm kid I very often pitched in and helped. Everyone else watched their fathers leave the house and come home and hide behind the newspaper. Most young people I knew were really disaffected by the corporate workplace because they had no knowledge of it.

Being able to work at home and at times having my kid come to work has been really helpful at breaking down this wall between work and home for my family and I've always appreciated it. As an IT professional, I too have come across situations where staff children have caused problems. Glad to hear IT folks have come up with supportive solutions for family integration with work. It's a positive move!

You didn't miss much....Elaine did a better accent.

I think the best way to accomodate all parties is to provide a special room in which the children can play.

I disagree to allow kids playing with ANY company computer. If your environment is really kids friendly, then there is no reason your company can not provide a special room for kids.

That is the safest way, both for the kids and for the parents. (and also for the companies assets)

Children in a work place allow a parent to do that "extra" work the companies often require, however, a company should not be expected to leave its back door open by allowing kids to play on the network. There are enough hand held games, music devices etc to keep kids happy while you work away...

Allowing children to work place may affect their safety as well as safety of company assets plus affect the concentration of employees due to distractions.

If any company wants to have a kid friendly policy where they are allowed to come to office with their parents, they should have a separate kids area which is supervised by professional child care people, and should include amenities for children's entertainment and care.

I am a parent of two older children and never brought them into the workplace other than for very brief visits. Some workplaces may permit a liberal approach to the ongoing presence of children but most don't and won't for reasons of security, liability, professionalism, etc. A parent who expects co-workers to deal cheerfully with their children should not only keep them away from corporate pc's, but should also not insinuate them into others' work-space. If an on-site daycare is provided, that's fine, otherwise, they should get a babysitter like other grownups. Hang on to that grouchy face, advancedgeek. It might come in handy if YOUR workplace is ever "invaded".

The computer system belongs to the employer, and there is a lot of damage that can be done by un-knowing persons, children or adults. Only staff members should be allowed on work computers!

The concept behind children in the workplace is a fine idea, and after reading a couple opinions, it seems pretty clear to me; so long as they are designated certain rights that they may not break, such as malicious websites and such, so long as they abide by them then they're entirely permitted to use the machines. Institute a leave it how you got it policy.

Just wanted to be different :-)

Really, the way to do it, if you are going to do it, is pretty simple. Give 'em Firefox and a restricted or least-privilege account. The kids will pretty quick abandon the computer anyway in such a mode; no games! But it is good for kids doing homework, they can still "Google" and print.

I agree with many of the posts stating set up an old PC. Don't put it on the network and I don't believe it should have internet access. You are too busy working to monitor their web activity.

NO children should not be allowed on company computers UNLESS....

Presumably your company benefits from having people that come into work on the weekends. After all your giving up some of your very important family time to come into the office and do some extra work. Getting caugt up on stuff you didnt have time for in the week or getting a jump on the week ahead. Either way the company is getting huge benefits at your expense. So why dont they just set aside an old PC, an ex-leaser or something thats not on the network or the internet and let the young'uns have at 'er.

Your company computers are as safe as if the kids werent even there and little Johnny gets to rot his brain in front of a pc a little longer... "well it keeps him quiet and lets me get on with what i have to do"... when he should out in the park with his dad tossing a ball around and having some real time together with his dad rather than just being an inconvenience when daddy's trying to work.