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."
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.
Democracy Now! - your daily, uncensored, corporate-free
Now, if employers are breaking into your private disk space, that's different...
Maybe I'll post this anonymously, so it can't be used against me...
... in the hiring decisions. It's a good thing I checked on Slashdot before we ended up hiring Anonymous Coward.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
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.
We all benefit in many ways from the fact that our society is becomingly increasingly interconnected. However, that comes at a price. While I appreciate your opinion on the matter, I can assure you this trend is only going to accelerate.
People need to understand a simple concept: if you wouldn't feel comfortable saying something in front of a packed auditorium, you probably shouldn't say it in a public forum online. I absolutely defend an individual's right to express his views as he sees fit; similarly, I absolutely defend an employer's right to base his hiring decision on all publicly available information.
For some, increased transparency is a good thing. For others, it may prove more a hindrance. It's up to the individual to be conscious of how public actions may impact future opportunities.
512 MB RAM, 20 GB disk, 200 GB transfer, five datacenters. $19.95/month.
1. Set your facebook/irc/whatever status to reflect your positive attitude towards your corporate masters.
2. Blog and upload photos on your various social accounts showing how dedicated you are to working over time and how you're doing it for the team dispite not getting paid!
3. ??
4. Profit!
In any case, if you are going to be so stubborn about infringing on our privacy, we are just going to have to pass legislation criminalising your behaviour, aren't we?
But how will you know if a firm passed you over because of something you said online? It'd be impossible to enforce.
It's just best not to worry about it. Firms who discriminate against people who aren't ashamed of their life and like to talk openly about it will wind up full of drones leaving all the creative people to assemble elsewhere. I hope.
Nick
Lets all change our names to John Smith. Yeah, Google that biches.
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.
Just out of curiosity, is it just as legal if your google search finds the person posts on an online forum for, say, cancer patients, to use that as a pre-screen for who might be unacceptable insurance risks? I wouldn't be surprised if it was.
Unfortunately, I think it is ultimately wise to divorce your real identity from anything you do online however innocent it might be. (An exception could be made for strictly employment-related or technical stuff, but one should think really hard anytime they put real identity info online.) You never know what information could be used against you in some future situation.
Momentarily, the need for the construction of new light will no longer exist.
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
But what about the information other people have put out about me?
How so?
Well, the people posting silly stuff about themselves tend to do so while thinking of a certain context and/or being in a particular state of mind (at home, relaxed, with friends, feeling in the mood for some snarkiness). So ... more often than not, context is half the message (if not more). But all and any context is lost in transmission via the Internet, thus loosing about half the message.
Suppose on the other hand that someone *really* has something to hide. They would take exceptionally good care not to leave tracks that are easily available for a hiring manager with some time on his hands and itchy keyboard fingers. They would even change their name if necessary.
Therefore Internet presence is likely to give false positives while false negatives are all but guaranteed. Whilst there might be some justification for Googling to see if people are "a Nazi child molester on the no-fly list", it's really unlikely that you'll find any such clear-cut evidence and for anything less what you find is hearsay evidence at best. It's not illegal, but neither is Tarot reading to screen applicants. But who cares, right?
Hypocrisy, double standards, and CYA ("Cover Your Backside") tactics are as American as apple pie. And the impact on people trying to land a job is simply not the issue for the ones responsible for hiring someone.
Why not?
Well, how would you like to be the manager responsible for hiring someone who subsequently has an industrial accident (while cold sober), and whose web presence shows him/her writing something snarky about getting soused on the job? Or who is subsequently investigated for having one single marijuana plant at home and who has blogged about the virtues of said weed for relaxation? Or someone who creates racial tensions after being hired while his (somewhat racist) blog is there for the world to see? Or (if you work in catering or manufacture baby food) someone who turns out to be sloppy with hygiene when his Facebook page shows him in a messy kitchen?
Would you feel comfortable when the word "due dilligence" is used around you afterwards? Would you like to hear your ambitious rival mouthing hypocritical guff about "putting the company first", "exercising commonsense when hiring people", or "being net-savvy" afterwards?
No?
Then you'd better use *all* online information you can Google your hands on in 5 minutes, right?
I don't think that managers hiring people really believe that an unfortunate scrap of Facebook material makes someone unsuitable. It's just that they've got a choice to make (if they're hiring at all) and they can't waste all morning on it. Any reason to weed someone out that doesn't reflect poorly on them (better yet, which makes them look "savvy") in the eyes the only audience that counts (other executives) is a help.
Fear of being unreasonably second-guessed is a major justification for a whole host of useless security boondoggles, and I firmly believe that it's also why we see employers Googling for people that send in their resume.
Strangely enough, i think this can work both ways.
I have worked as a software contractor for a few years, and I have seen some disfunctional companies. I have to agree with your practices, captain HR sqeakyclean, because I do the same to you.
The boss I work for, the CIO, even you, get the same treatment you give me. So, if you are having problems with talent passing on your critical positions, well...you gave us the idea. Cat's out of the bag, good luck.
To Slashdot: Yeah, I am sort of being ironic and cute turning the parent poster's idea around. But, really, do this. I have been called in for contracts where half the company is suing the other half, I have worked with religious right wing bigots, and I almost went to an interview with Infinnium labs before I found out about their craziness. As embarrassing as some photos of a drunken kegger might be for you, your employers probably have a whole lot more to hide than you do.
HA! I just wasted some of your bandwidth with a frivolous sig!
When I go for a job I do extensive research about the company I am applying to. During the process I will get as much information on who they employ, and then try and get as much information on any who seem relevant. This isn't uncommon, in fact almost anyone would say not investigating a possible employer is a big mistake. So why is it that we are worried if the employer treats hiring in the same way?
The majority of people who are going to suffer by having people look for them online are people who don't attempt to maintain a separate internet persona and are also publicly doing things that deserve to get them in trouble. If I look up a candidate and find them on Slashdot (on the assumption it can be verified as them) and they regularly flame or troll then you can bet that would effect my hiring decision. At the same time if I found that they often gave good and tolerant answers it would also effect my decision, except this time in a positive manner.
If you post information in public then expect employers to see it. If your employer was using devious methods to get hold of something you thought was private then yes it's an issue.
I have something similar in my resume to help employers filter out the irrelevant things:
"John Doe" -drunk -idiot -fired -"bad worker" -theft -stole