Tuesday 29 January 2013

We're all guilty of it

Facebooking someone you've just met or are due to meet, to get a bit of an idea of who they are. Facebook is basically the Google of all humans. Well, most anyway.

It's fairly harmless, usually all we're able to find out is where they're from and if they're single or not, and largely we don't use their profiles to formulate our opinions on them.

But what if your future boss was to have a snoop at your page? Photos of you falling out of a club with your knickers on show, or a raging status update slagging off someone or something that has pissed you off. Are these things you'd openly share with prospective employers?

Obviously, that's a no. However it doesn't stop them poking around your social media presence anyway, and even worse; there's nothing to say they can't discriminate against you after seeing something YOU posted on YOUR page. But is it fair?

Just because you like to go out on a Friday and get insanely drunk, doesn't mean you're an unprofessional person who wouldn't be an ideal candidate for that dream job. In a way I think it's unfair that employers are searching through social media to get a better picture of a job candidate.

However, in the same way, if there does happen to be a seemingly endless amount of photos of your latest drunken escapades on your page - where you also clearly display the name of the company you work for - employers aren't going to want to associate themselves with you.

Fair or not, it's easy enough to stop potential bosses getting to know you before you've even met, just check your privacy settings. And hopefully if you are an ideal candidate for your dream job, you'll already have this covered!

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