Slashdot Mirror
Should Job Seekers Tell Employers To Quit Snooping?
onehitwonder writes in with a CIO opinion piece arguing that potential employees need to stand up to employers who snoop the Web for insights into their after-work activities, often disqualifying them as a result. "Employers are increasingly trolling the web for information about prospective employees that they can use in their hiring decisions. Consequently, career experts advise job seekers to not post any photos, opinions or information on blogs and social networking websites (like Slashdot) that a potential employer might find remotely off-putting. Instead of cautioning job seekers to censor their activity online, we job seekers and defenders of our civil liberties should tell employers to stop snooping and to stop judging our behavior outside of work, writes CIO.com Senior Online Editor Meridith Levinson. By basing professional hiring decisions on candidates' personal lives and beliefs, employers are effectively legislating people's behavior, and they're creating an online environment where people can't express their true beliefs, state their unvarnished opinions, be themselves, and that runs contrary to the free, communal ethos of the Web. Employers that exploit the Web to snoop into and judge people's personal lives infringe on everyone's privacy, and their actions verge on discrimination."
"... and their actions verge on discrimination."
No, legal terms have legislated meanings, ad you don't get to make them up as you go along. Googling someone to see if they're a Nazi child molester on the no-fly list is perfectly legal, and as a hiring manager, you can bet I'm going to keep doing it.
Am I going to sacrifice my own career for this cause? No.
While they shouldn't snoop, It isn't going to stop. Don't you snoop out your potential employers?
Just don't let any non-friends see your Facebook.
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If you work for an employer who does these sorts of sleazy things, why are you still employed there and not looking for another job? They obviously don't deserve your services. I know, I know, "the economy sucks"...but my point still stands.
The subject line says it all - if it's public, it isn't snooping.
First, I'm an employer. Welcome to well-rounded individuals. Try writing good things around the web, and perhaps your potential employers will prefer you because of your life. Write crap, and don't be surprised.
But really, are you going to turn down a job offer because the potential employer searched for you? You can "tell" potential employers that you don't want them snooping, but that doesn't give them any negative for doing so -- you'll still accept the job offer.
But you do have boat-loads of control over your own personal freedom and civil liberties. If you don't want others to judge you, you get to be the judge. Start your own business, and run it any way you choose.
But if you're looking to benefit from someone else's proven model, someone else's money, and someone else's risk, then yeah your liberties are going to go unrespected because you're the one throwing them away.
You want liberty, take a look at what it's like to have complete freedom over a business of your own. You'll find that it ain't liberating in the ways that you were hoping.
By the way, it's excellent, and it's amazing, and I love every minute of it -- now I own and operate two and a half businesses because it's so great.
As always, take the risk, stake your life, then you can have it your way. You want to be an employee, and have your employer tell you what to do and even pay your taxes for you (well, most of them anyway), then you'd better believe that employer is going to look into you.
Besides, what's this liberty on the web crap? Public domain is the name of the game.
Employers do not care about the web ethos or whether snooping is fair or not, they only care about risk, profit, and loss. Information, regardless of how it is obtained, has bottom line dollar value to marketers, insurance companies, potential employers etc so any information they find on the web, whether favorable or unfavorable, will be used in the hiring decision. That is just reality and no amount of legislation or penalties will stop that or put the web genie back in the bottle. Really, unless you are a public figure then why do you have to put your real name out there along with whatever it is that you say? Use a pseudonym and say what you want, but be careful to never connect it or allow it to be connected to your real name ever. First rule of the web: never provide your real identity when a fake will do.
It's next to impossible to determine why a potential employee was not hired unless you have a telepath handy. So no matter how many rules and guidelines and whatnot you draft up, you can't stop people doing it. A typical example has been landlord and tenants - many people have a spare apartment and rent that out. Now in aggregate it's fairly obvious to see that there's some discrimination going on, but trying to somehow prove racism from a landlord choosing one tenant just never happens. Only if there's a repeated pattern of some clearly identifiable trait do you have a shot at it. Obviously a hiring manager is hiring a lot of people so you got quantity. You could probably pick up on him never hiring blacks or woman or people he suspects to be muslims or gays. But proving him disqualifying a very non-specific group of people on vastly different reasons he found online? Not happening.
I'm not trying to argue the morality of it, surely they should leave things alone unless it got good reason to impact your work relationship. But 99% of the time you won't even know you've been victim of it, and even if you do 99% of the time you couldn't prove it. A long shot lawsuit against a corporation for not hiring you, while you're presumably busy seeking other jobs and burning through your nest egg already? Please. The closest thing you can hope for is that these companies miss out on a lot of great talent and that the market will even it out a bit. For you personally it's still the far better option to keep your private life private.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
But how will you know if a firm passed you over because of something you said online? It'd be impossible to enforce.
Unfortunately, that's not true. It seems to make sense that there is no way that one could know why an employer did something. But certain legislators don't think that way.
For a number of classes of people ( genders, ethnic groups, etc ) the mere act of not having the right number of people of a certain class can be construed as proof that there was discrimination.
So, someday, after you have posted a picture of yourself butt-naked sharing a twelve-pack with your buddies outside the local convent, and you remain unemployed, you will be able to sue. All you will have to show is that X percent of the population does such things, and if a particular employer has significantly less than X percent of such people among their employees, they are therefore guilty of discrimination.
This is where I get to call you a pansy for not standing up for yourself and get away with it because it's on topic.
You don't even need a real tyrant to muzzle you -- you'll settle for an imaginary one.
I wonder what a prospective employer might think of the value of your input after that -- at least one worth working for.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
http://www.xkcd.com/137/
I support the Slashcott and will not be reading or commenting from 2/10/14 to 2/17/14. Beta is steaming pile of dog shit
Yeah, you know, the more I think about this, the more I feel that anyone who publishes their drunken exploits on a massively public forum deserves what they get.
Literalism isn't a form of humor, it's you being irritating.
This is my feeling exactly.
DONT POST PICTURES OF YOURSELF SNORTING COCAINE!
Or... even better... don't go around snorting cocaine off hookers in your leisure time in the first place.
And if you are snorting cocaine off of hookers it'll probably be reflected in the quality of your work. So hiding your irresponsible after hours behavior in the interview will just mean an early termination.
Just what exactly is everyone afraid their employers are going to find out about them?
"Employers find pictures of irresponsible drunken frat boy on internet. Assume an irresponsible drunken frat boy and decide not to hire him in favor of someone else. News at 11."
Well, seeing as employers are often richer than employees...
This is just a case of "The one who has the gold makes the rules", and power structures being what they are, bosses will do as they please online unless stopped by someone bigger, and quite frankly, a polite request from an employee not to be snooped is, at least from the POV of the boss:
1) A tacit admission they have something to hide
2) A challenge to their authority to check out their employee as they see fit, and be damned with ethics.
Never mind that search engines can associate you with the wrong things if you have the misfortune of having the wrong name. And never mind that some sleazeball who hates your guts could ruin your life by spamdexing your name along with some raunchy terms (like hentai).
Employers who look through web profiles are just rummaging through garbage heaps and do so at their own risk. Because while an employee may have little control over what else his online persona may be associated with (again, other people with same name), but there is also little control for the employer. However, that doesn't stop them.
So:
Surf defensively, because bosses have hooked a nice source of information, and like it or not, they ain't letting go. One may as well bow to the inevitable, submit to their place on the totem pole of power, and simply suck it up, keep their online presence clean, and cross their fingers that they won't be unlucky enough to be victimized by a search engine blunder that misassociates them.
Because, in the end, it's all about power. Are you going to resist a google search just on principle? Or are you going to be wise and realize that you ultimately have no control over what your boss is going to look for.
And if you're a boss, take your googles with a grain of salt. You're casting a pretty big fat net when you google someone, and no telling what you'll find, or even if what you dig up has any relevance. Remember that people other than your candidate have influence over what you will find.
I believe the problem arise when Joe post pictures of his drunk friend Elvis exploits on a massively public forum. Does Elvis still deserve what he gets?
Hey! That's my sig you're smoking there!
One thing you should keep in mind is that although we our government is democratic in America, our workplace is not. And frankly it's at work that we spend the majority of our hours, the majority of our days. You might even say that our workplaces are ruled by a king, or at least a junta, whose powers are very much in the medieval mold.
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Now HR people can have another reason to justify their existence AND justify wasting time on facebook! I suppose it's better than playing pretend psychologist or playing Wonder Woman with the polygraph lariat of truth. Remember kids, it's nothing personal when you get rejected, it's just the modern equivalent of chicken gizzards look wrong.
Really, if you're worried about what potential employers might think of you, you could just try not acting like a dick.
Or you could just use a made-up name. Do as I say or do as I do. Take your pick.
[Sir Garlon] is the marvellest knight that is now living, for he destroyeth many good knights, for he goeth invisible.
You bet we should tell perspective employers to STFU about what we do off-hours; however, they will also be the first to tell you that how you act away from the office reflects on them since it will become known for whom you are employed. By taking a stand in this manner, you effectively tell them "Don't hire me, I like to express myself." Also, keep in mind there are "right to work" states, that allow for hiring and firing for no reason whatsoever.
So, if you're going to post on Slashdot, Digg, or wherever, use a name that isn't who you are. Do you think my mother named me "Fudgefactor7?" Get real.
There should be a rule of etiquitte that potential employers acknowledge receipt of an application within some reasonable timeframe... I've gotten "thank you for your application" letters from the larger corporations up to 2 years after sending them in, and, of course, the smaller ones often don't answer at all.
If we can't even get acknowledgment of receipt, how could we ever get a meaningful answer as to why the application was rejected?
On the other side of the fence, the first opening I advertised in Miami after the Internet started getting "hot" (1999, I think) received over 400 applicants for a single opening. The ad explicitly stated "local candidates only", which didn't stop resumes coming from San Francisco, London and Singapore.
My opinion is that if a place won't hire me over petty personal stuff, I don't need to work for them that badly. I spent my childhood and so far most of my youth studying so I'd be worth hiring, you can be sure I'm going to enjoy the benefits now.
For my current job I rolled up to the interview in a beat up old track car (I've heard it's a common practice in North America to rent a shiny new car just to drive to an interview) with shaggy hair. I was shaved, dressed nicely and otherwise well-groomed though. I gave straight honest answers to everything. I sent my resume from my personal email address - my slashdot username at gmail. That alone is enough for some people to scoff at, one previous place that interviewed me commented on it (although the work environment there seemed far too uptight for my liking). A search for my username would have turned up my Slashdot posts, me shootin' the shit in various forums, right down to the lolcats and dirty humor, my hobbies, along with a few positive things like me giving tech advice etc. Searching for my real name would turn up little or nothing. I don't have a Facebook page or anything like that, I value my privacy more than that.
So I let them have that, and they hired me. It's been a pretty good fit so far. Let's say I got a job at the place that scoffed at my username - would I want to work at a place so uptight if I had a choice?
So on the topic, I don't think employers should disqualify a potentially good worker on personal grounds - while totally within their rights, it's just wrong.
"Well Mr. Smith looks perfect on paper, he's got a clean criminal record and good references, but I've found photos of him "cosplaying" here - my informal research indicates this is a common pasttime for sexual deviants - and you can see he enjoys violent videogames here, he shows interest in a hacker forum here, and he jokingly doctors this photo of a fat woman on the back of a motorcycle here. I don't think we want this type in our company."
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel