Slashdot Mirror
One In Five Employers Scan Applicants' Web Lives
Ned Nederlander writes "CareerBuilder's new survey finds: 'Of those hiring managers who have screened job candidates via social networking profiles, one-third (34 percent) reported they found content that caused them to dismiss the candidate from consideration.' Some red flags: content about applicant using drugs or drinking, inappropriate photos and bad-mouthing former bosses."
What would you expect if you admitted you're a drunken dope user on Facebook? An award for honesty?
And the logic of posting photos of yourself in compromising situations online: There is none.
If each mistake being made is a new one, then progress is being made.
You are using the wrong word.
Your private life should be off limits.
What you do in public is public. Having people judge you by how you act in public is they way that the world works.
But guess what poor judgment will effect your life.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
Anyone who can handle being stuck in the woods with 60 kids should be able to handle irate customers pretty easily.
Any manager who scans the supposed web life of an applicant is a complete idiot if they can't verify that what they are looking at is authenticated to the applicant.
Let me put it simply. Send me your real name and address. I'll guarantee that I'll trash any job potential you have with one of these hiring managers.
Which might actually be a good thing, since any such manager has probably also populated the place with fellow idiots.
I've been a victim myself of a web smear campaign, and I can tell you that it's no fun. Plus it will stay around forever, depending on how it's done.
Except when your friends with unlocked profiles post pictures with you tagged in them.
Your resume likely gets 20 to 30 seconds of eyeball time when a manager or recruiter is scanning through a pile of resumes looking for potential interview candidates. At some point down the line, when the field is down to 5 people or so, it might make sense to screen an individual applicant's web pages.
They didn't mention which sites the hiring managers use. MySpace & Facebook are probably where you'll find lots of recent HS/college grads, but what about older professionals who aren't as likely to use those sites? I hear that a significant number of recruiters actually use linkedin.com as a recruiting tool.
I prefer rogues to imbeciles because they sometimes take a rest.
I wouldn't want to employ someone who wasn't on at least one social networking site. It's about the only real proof you can have that someone isn't the sort of person who has nothing in their life besides work.
There are two minor flaws that I can see with this application of that line of reasoning. One is that there are plenty of socially active people who don't bother with social networking sites, and plenty of avenues to be social that have no reflection in those sites. The second is that a Facebook or Myspace page isn't "proof," in that it wouldn't take much to make a fake page that passes at least cursory inspection.
That said, I can't disagree with your sentiment about wanting social people in general as part of your team.
Karma: Excellent, but still won't get you laid.
I'm constantly surprised that so many people post stupid shit about themselves using their full real name.
Also, just for fun, I googled my real name (which is not especially common) and I found three other prople who share the same name in the top 5 hits. The real me appeared once in the top 10 (I was interviewed by a newspaper as part of a charity event several years ago)
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"I can't complain, but sometimes still do..." Joe Walsh
>What you do in public is public.
Yes. And why would you bother doing anything for an employer who is petty enough to hold your web presence against you?
At my jobs, the people I've worked for have been into me for who I am.
Somebody checks my facebook page or whatever, it's what it's there for. Somebody has a *problem* with what they find there, they can kiss my ass, and I'd be man enough to say it point blanc even to a boss or prospective boss.
And speaking as a boss, I might do something like this just to test you to see if you have enough integrity to stand up for yourself. If you have a lot of counterculture / political stuff on your shirt sleeve, and you try to pretend to be someone else, I have NO respect for that.
-fb Everything not expressly forbidden is now mandatory.
And only an idiot would film themselves committing a crime, and it would take an even bigger idiot to post that video to the Internet, and...
Help fight poverty: Punch a poor person.
Use email, text, phone, snail mail, private family website for us geeks, but DO NOT ever use myspace, facebook or any other social networking site to keep in contact with people. That is unless you want anything and everything you post to potentially become public knowledge. Setting something to "private" on any of these social networking sites that we already know are full of security holes means nothing. It just means someone needs to find some of your friends who have posted information about you on their public profile or become a "friend" of a "friend" and work their way in that way.
Fortunately, myspace, twitter, facebook, et al, all have a limited shelf life and eventually you kids and you adults who didn't grow up with computers are going to grow up and realize the idiocy of spewing your private info all over the place. Then these social networking sites are going to shrivel up and die. I find it odd that some companies have actually places a value on them. I find them pretty value-less.
I don't need facebook or any other facility to get in contact with an old friend, yet I still happen to have a busy social life. In fact nothing has changed from my days in HS or college or early adult life. If I want to get in contact with a friend, I call them. No need to post my personal info for all to see in the hopes of some long lost friend to find me or to plan this weekends event.
Good, they'd be doing me a favour - I clearly wouldn't be a good personality fit. Yes, I drink - I'm 34 years old, and I can do what I damn well please in my spare time, thank you very much. As long as it doesn't impair my ability to work or bring the company into disrepute, it's none of their business what I do.
It's official. Most of you are morons.
You have it exactly right.
I would not bother mentioning my Web presence on my resume except for positive achievements I might wish to point out.
If questioned in the interview, my answer will simply be "If you look me up on the Internet you'll probably find evidence of whatever drinking and drugging goes on in my personal time. If you want to know about my ability to keep that stuff from affecting my professional life, please feel free to ask my previous employers."
I see no reason to continue the interview if they press the issue beyond that.
DRM: Terminator crops for your mind!
Seriously who uses their real name?
Oh wait I know this....yeah 20-something slacktards, stoners, jocks and sundry assholes.
Pictures of applicants drinking?
"Look, this guy is at a restaurant and there's a beer on the table. Better not hire that one, must be a lush!"
Just because you're paranoid, it doesn't mean that they're not out to get you.
Are you willing to turn that around? Face it, as an employer and a manager your company and you reflect on me professionally when I work for you. If the company's involved in shenanigans, I'm going to catch the fallout. Think about any technical type still employed at SCO, for instance. If you as a manager pull borderline-unethical stunts, future employers will be wondering if I share those same questionable ethics. So are you OK with me as an employee digging up your credit history and arrest record and everything else, digging up all the internal financial and strategic details your company'd rather not have anyone outside the company knowing about, to go through with a fine-tooth comb to decide if I want to take the risk of working for you?
"Look, this guy is at a restaurant and there's a beer on the table. Better not hire that one, must be a lush!"
I don't think that this is the problem, but, if you've put out fun pix of yourself half nekkid, with a half empty bottle of Jack in one hand, and a skull bong in the other one....you're likely to get passed over for a job, or these days...cheap insurance, a security clearance, or hell, it could affect your credit rating probably at some point.
And sadly, I hope you're never running for public office....once on the internet, this kind of stuff will haunt you for life.
On the other hand, if you keep your life private, well, this type of thing may give you an advantage, and let other people take themselves out of competition for jobs, etc...
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
I hope to hell people doing these things just keep doing them because, hopefully, non-existent deity willing, in short order none of this will matter and people will shrug. "Oh, he drinks and smokes? Well that doesn't indicate he's a bad worker and I do half of that myself so whatever."
Because really, f*#@#&ing puritans. Most people *DO* do this stuff and live well enough as it is. The fact that people have to hide the way most people live a reasonable life is just rediculous. Closeted humanity, look at yourself and accept it. Even the most pious do drugs and drink.
What *MATTERS* is billing your state for your housing costs or making money off of energy subsidies. THESE are the important things.
Calling people names because you think you're right says a lot about what kind of co-worker these applicants have to put up with once they're hired. I'm glad you're not my boss.
-- Cheers!