JOB HUNTING? Be Careful What You Post on the Internet - Because Employers are Watching
New York Post
By LINDSAY EDELSTEIN
When John Ambrose, 24, interviews for jobs as a legal associate, he doesn’t cite his hobbies as “anything that doesn’t involve reading boring law books” or describe himself as a “party mongerer” - and he certainly doesn’t have Hot Chip’s “Playboy” playing in the background.
Until recently, these were among the details Ambrose, a third-year law student at Pace University, freely shared with tens of millions of MySpace users, and anyone else who landed on his personal Web profile. He figured he’d just as soon not share them with potential employers, though - which is why he wisely privatized his profile before starting his job search.
Not all job applicants are so proactive - and more are learning to regret it. While most job seekers have been schooled on how to present themselves in a cover letter or an interview, many overlook another important way employers get an impression of them: by trolling the Web for anything they can find.
Which means if you’ve got a page on a social networking site featuring photos of you mauling the stripper at your buddy’s bachelor party, or if you write a blog that details your binge-drinking and bed-hopping exploits, odds are they’re going to find it.
“The average job hunter doesn’t realize that their potential employer is going to run their name in quotes through a search engine and keep digging until they find the dirt,” says Todd Malicoat, an Internet consultant and the founder of the techie blog stuntdubl.com.
“Like it or not, your Google results are your new resume.”
Four out of five companies perform background checks on some or all employees, according to a survey by the recruiting and staffing firm Spherion. And these days that means hitting the Web, whether it’s checking networking sites such as MySpace or Friendster or just Googling your name to see what comes up.
Adam Zoia, founder of the headhunting firm Glocap Industries, says he relies extensively on the Internet.
“When companies do background checks, it’s becoming increasingly common for them to Google people. If that’s linked to YouTube or any other site on you, the prospective employer is going to see that.”
Digging up dirt
Ask recruiters and HR professionals, and you’ll get any number of stories about job applicants who’ve gotten snared in the Web (even if they’re reluctant to attach their names to the stories, for fear of opening the door to lawsuits).
Zoia relates a story of an asset-management company that was seriously considering an applicant for a job as a healthcare analyst - until they ran an Internet search on him, and turned up an investment forum where he was freely sharing information about his current company’s activities. Worried he’d dish about which stocks they were trading if he was hired, they decided to look elsewhere.
The human-resources manager for a major media conglomerate tells the story of a candidate whose page on MySpace (owned by News Corporation, which also owns The Post) got him into trouble when he applied for an entry-level sales job - not because of ill-advised Spring Break photos, but because it revealed his true ambition.
“It said his dream was to move to New York and become an actor, and that he was trying to get a full-time job to fund his trip - once he got settled here, he’d quit and pursue acting,” she says. “Needless to say, the interviewer decided the guy wasn’t right for the job.”
The former creative director at a nonprofit near Union Square recalls deciding to do an Internet check on someone who was in the final stages of being hired for a job as a Web developer, after an exhaustive check of his resume and references.
“Using MySpace and to a lesser extent Facebook, we learned that he fancied himself quite the ladies’ man. His suggestive screen name and provocative profile gave the whole office something to laugh about for hours.” (They gave him the job anyway, but he didn’t last long.)
Even after you’re hired - sometimes well after it - online activities can become a problem. One of the stories that persuaded Ambrose to privatize his profile was from a friend who was reprimanded by a boss who saw his MySpace page, which made reference both to drug use and to the company he worked for, and listed the company’s Web site.
“He felt that the guy shouldn’t be listing his job alongside his other exploits - some of them being illegal,” says Ambrose.
The head of HR for a large Manhattan firm recalls a previous job in which a site manager got far worse than a reprimand after administrators found his personal Web page on an erotic dating site, which featured photos of him in various nude poses. He was fired.
“It wasn’t illegal, but the reason given was that as a manager he showed extremely poor judgment by making such a personal matter public, undermining his credibility and losing the confidence of the staff,” says the HR exec.
In other cases it might be less clear exactly what the harm is. Almost everyone has tied one on at some point, so why should you be afraid to talk about it on your MySpace page?
The issue is less knowing that you passed out under the bar at Coyote Ugly than knowing that you’re telling the world about it, says Zoia - adding that even if employers don’t judge you the worse for it, they might be concerned about how it reflects on the company.
“Everyone, including the most successful people, did things in their youth - that’s not the issue,” he says. “An employer won’t say, ‘If I ever heard you got drunk, you won’t get hired.’ It’s more that you did those things and you’re advertising it.”
Likewise, when an internship applicant’s Facebook profile advertised his interest in “Smokin’ blunts with the homies and bustin’ caps in whitey,” Brad Karsh, the president of the job-services firm JobBound, understood he was just trying to be funny - but “it raised doubts about his judgment and professionalism,” he says.
False security
Even when job hunters think ahead and take down private information from the Internet, they forget that a lot of online content is cached and remains accessible to others for a certain period of time after it’s been deleted.
“People may think that they’ve taken something down, but it may be seen by a person that digs a little bit,” says Zoia.
Others might feel protected by the walls around a site such as Facebook, where profiles can be seen only by other members. But some employers seem to be finding ways around that. Tracy Mitrano, the director of Internet technology at Cornell University, says that when she recently spoke to a group of students about IT policy, one student told her she’d been asked by a corporate employer to look up a job applicant’s Facebook profile.
“When I asked if any other students had been in similar situations, about five people raised their hands,” she says.
As a result of the growth of cyber-sleuthing, college career counselors are increasingly warning students about the pitfalls of letting it all hang out on the Web.
“We’ve begun to talk about the MySpace and Facebook dangers,” says Bob Casper, director of career services at SUNY Oswego.
“Today’s students have grown up in a wired world,” he notes. “They may not be aware of the visibility they’ll encounter by posting blogs and personal Web sites.”
Many are wising up, though. In a recent survey, CollegeGrad.com found that 47 percent of college-grad job seekers who use social networking sites had changed or were planning to change the content of their pages.
Playing it safe
Given the potential downside, are you better off avoiding networking sites and other Web activity entirely?
It depends whom you ask.
“We tell people point-blank, do not have a MySpace page or a Facebook page. Period. The end,” says Zoia, whose high-paying clients include investment banks, venture capital funds and consultant firms. “Given that the stakes are high with these jobs, the level of scrutiny is high.”
Top Internet recruiter Shally Steckerl takes less of a hard line, arguing that if you avoid coming across as a knucklehead, such pages can actually be helpful.
“It’s OK, maybe even cool, to want to share your passion for movies, martial arts and Xbox 360 - it shows that you’re a three-dimensional person,” he says.
Malicoat hopes that, as online background checks become more prevalent, companies will lower their expectations of online purity.
“A good employer will start to understand that if a marketing executive wants to have a few pictures online where they’re out partying with friends that it might just be OK,” he says. “I think the exposure to more of employees’ personal lives will force employers to have a little bit more tolerance for extracurricular activities - or end up with bum employees with no personality.”
http://www.nypost.com/seven/03192007/atwork/caught_in_a_mouse_trap_atwork_lindsay_edelstein.htm
Lori this is a great article. The line "your Google results are your new resume" are so true. People seem to forget that anything you post is fair game. Often people forget when they post something on FaceBook or MySpace that they may have friends that shouldn't read their post. I have a friend on FaceBook who was complaining (quite explicitly) about her managers at work. I happen to be married to one of the managers and am friends with the wife of the big boss. Her comments eventually got around and she was written up for her comments. People think that if you are not on work time you can't be held accountable. Not true. Businesses expect their employees to be ambassadors for their company, and that is something that is 24/7.
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