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View Full Version : Using Social Networks to Research Employees



KristineS
09-16-2008, 01:29 PM
I saw this article (http://www.marketingvox.com/employers-using-social-networking-sites-to-research-job-candidates-040965/?camp=newsletter&src=mv&type=textlink) which says the percentage of employers that use social networks to research prospective employees is rising and it made me think. One in five managers is already doing this and an additional percentage will start using social network research soon.

I have two questions.

If you're an employer, would you factor information you found from this kind of search into your hiring decision?

If you're looking for a job, does knowing that some employers may research you online going to make you change anything you're doing online?

orion_joel
09-16-2008, 06:11 PM
I think that this is a great topic and something that is going to only become more prevalent over time. Also sorry if my post goes a little long...

As an employer i do think that i would take a look at the social networking sites. I do think that it could be just as valuable to get to an idea about a new hire as maybe a referee, however should not be used to replace a referee/reference. One of the primary reasons i say this is that one of the main things many people discuss with others in their comments is "Do you still work for X?" or "Where are you working now?" Often their responses are very telling about true reasons why they left previous employment or if they may go bad mouthing you if they get fired and such. While i think that it can be a good source of information i don't really know if it should be taken to much into account for the actual hiring decision.

In looking for a job knowing an employer may take a look at the myspace page or facebook page that i have is not really any issue for me. Neither of them contain anything bad that i would not be comfortable with an employer knowing. However i guess that would to some extent depend on the type of job i was going for. Although i still don't find it to concerning. The problem is that some people should be very concerned, about the information that they are putting out there on these sort of sites. It paints them in very bad way to many potential employers. This is where people do have the option to set their profiles on these sites to private, and i do not think that employers should try and circumvent when people elect to make them private.

Making use of Myspace and Facebook to find information is not just something being limited to potential employers either. Yesterday there was a knife attack at a school on the Gold Coast in Queensland Australia. When they were reporting the incident on the news they said that police were going to be watching myspace and facebook accounts of the students for any leads they may help them find who was responsible.

I think just the volume and type of information that is being put out on these sites leaves a lot open for people to not really realize just how open they become.