Party Hard? Your Potential Boss Will Know

You Won't Have A Job In The Morning

"New research has found that employers who quickly dismiss applicants based on unpleasant status updates and incriminating photos from a trip to Vegas may actually be missing out on great talent."

What Social Media Can (Really) Tell You About Job Applicants

 

"Have you ever been afraid your employer was looking at what you post? Reality check, they are. Why do employers look at job applicant's social media status in the first place? Wouldn't that be an invasion of privacy? What about my "First Amendment" rights?," are all valid arguments made by hot-tempered job searchers who were just denied a job based on their social media presence.

Is this really unfair? Tons of research has been created to defend and justify employers' actions. A study done by J. William Stoughton, Lori Foster Thompson, and Adam W. Meade, "Big Five Personality Traits Reflected in Job Applicants' Social Media Postings", identifies link's between an employees work performance and their online behaviors and characteristics.  According to North Carolina State University's department of psychology's published journal Cyberpsychology, Behavior and Social Networking, unfiltered personal interactions, including photos and comments, consisting of profanity and references to drug an alcohol use, are what employers watch out for the most. 

Dr. Lori Foster Thompson, co-author of the study, stated, "Companies often scan a job applicant's Facebook profile to see whether there is evidence of drug or alcohol use, believing that such behavior means the applicant is not 'conscientious,' or responsible and self-disciplined." 

Will Stoughton, lead author of the study and a Ph.D. student at NCSU, commented, "This means companies are eliminating some conscientious job applicants based on erroneous assumptions regarding what social media behavior tells us about the applicants."

Let's take this into perspective. If you were an employer, wouldn't you want to know that job applicant's true personality? An employer has the right to defend their company by preventing those who tend to voice their opinion and engage in arguments in the virtual world to be hired. With that statement, you could get into the discussion of whether or not social media postings and online presence is an accurate representation of someone's personality. Some may argue that the web is a place for anyone to post without putting a face to the text. As if what persons are saying on the web are disregarded because they are not necessarily voicing the text. Another argument could be that the same text could be perceived in 10 different ways; an argument to one person could be sarcastic conversation with a good friend. The employer will never know that. Also, should employers base hiring of an employee strictly on their online behavior or their credentials? If a job applicant made one controversial tweet, does that single happening reflect himself or herself as a professional? It depends on the company. If the company has a large image online all potential threats will be cut off. 

Watch what you post on personal, unblocked, social media accounts because employers are starting to inaccurately evaluate a users online persona.

It only takes one tweet to lose a dream job.

                                                                                   Chloe Smith

 

For more information:
How Social Media Can Help (Or Hurt) You In Your Job Search
1 in 10 Young Job Hunters Rejected Because Of Their Social Media
Job seekers getting asked for Facebook passwords