70% of Employers Have Rejected Applicants Over Online Info
It is no secret that your on-line presence and personna are part of what potential employers and probably customers look at in judging a candidate or partner. So it shouldn't come as any surprise,
your digital reputation can have both positive and negative effects. So, OK, fine, this is from Microsoft, but it makes alot of sense...Think privacy: your reputation is ON the LINE
Alot depends on what you include in your LinkedIn profile, to the picture(s) that accompany your LinkedIn or Facebook or MySpace or Twitter accounts, to the statements that you make in response to questions on LinkedIn, or the "tweets" that you twerp on Twitter. The World is watching.
NOTE and PS: I was going to post this before I read and responded to Jane's earlier post about "Facts of life about self-promotion"
- NY2TX's blog
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Comments
We are getting closer to a
We are getting closer to a time when a lack of on-line personality will also be grounds for rejection. Privacy is definitely the lesser evil, compared to reckless publishing.
But the better way is building a realistic and likable image online, both personal and professional. As if we needed more work for our copious spare time ;)
Jane Prusakova
Senior Consultant at Improving Enterprises
Door64 blog
But isn't it true that even
But isn't it true that even likeable people in person can dismantle all of that with a poorly judged word or description or photograph, and therefore can be detrimental. Often "punditry" comes off as "speechifying" because in the two-dimensional world of emails or blogs or social media, true meaning or nuance is not there. I've seen frequent examples of things like this.
A likable online image is
A likable online image is one that's not dismantled by a poorly judged photo or comments ;)
And yes, one can damage the picture-perfect online image in an in-person interview. But it's better to get that interview, than never to be invited because employer did not get excited about one's online persona.
Jane Prusakova
Senior Consultant at Improving Enterprises
Door64 blog
Here's a thought. Job clubs
Here's a thought.
Job clubs often hold sessions wherein people trade resumes and critique each other's purple prose. Career coaches also critique resumes, hopefully to better effect.
Should we also be getting together, probably on-line rather than in person, to critique each other's on-line presences? Should we have a forum here on door64 to do exactly that? If so, how would we go about it to make it effective, where "effective" means "similar to what an employer or recruiter might do"?
In my case, I'm not very active on social media sites, mostly just LinkedIn and here, but I'm still all over the Web, primarily because of my dog rescue work. I have NO idea whether that's detrimental to my job search efforts. It's not embarrassing, but a potential employer might not be a pet person and might therefore think I waste a lot of time doing something he thinks is not worthwhile. It would be good to learn whether that's a problem from someone who knows, not just from another job seeker. I can't be the only one in this sort of situation.
Thoughts? Suggestions?
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Jerry Dunham
Woof!
Jerry, I think that's a
Jerry, I think that's a great idea. I wonder if Matt could suggest where on door64 we could post/copy/paste our LinkedIn profiles for example. And then, with the only real guidleine being "no mean spritedness allowed" people could comment on each profile and maybe gain collectively from what is seen.
In my case, there is far less stuff on the Internet about my company than there is about me, but that's largely because of my writing. It is a fine line that we all walk when we post things on the Internet.
that's a great idea. I would
that's a great idea. I would be very interested to learn Door64 regulars (that means you!) opinion about my online presence.
I'll be happy to provide feedback for others, as well.
Jane Prusakova
Senior Consultant at Improving Enterprises
LinkedIn Info
All good ideas. So what if
All good ideas. So what if I created a special forum for critiques of LI profiles, or online versions of resumes, or even professional blogs, etc.? Ground rules could be written that responses should be helpful critiques.
Would that work? I'm happy to do it.
I think that's a good idea,
I think that's a good idea, and perhaps it's all you should attempt as a start, but I had a bit more in mind with my original suggestion.
For one thing, a significant portion of recruiters and HR people will look beyond LinkedIn and a professional blog. Most of us are pretty careful in those venues, anyway. My questions then are:
For another thing, I think we need to make an effort to find a few HR or recruiting professionals who are willing to contribute to the discussion. If they don't have time to actually review on-line presences, then they need to at least help us answer the above questions. Otherwise, we could be kidding ourselves.
I've been to resume "workshops" where we just traded and critiqued each other resumes, and it was a case of the blind leading the blind. It wasn't entirely useless, but it didn't really accomplish what we all went there for. We need some standards to measure ourselves against, and we need to pay attention to our process.
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Jerry Dunham
With more questions than answers
I think the goal should be
I think the goal should be to become aware of and "clean up" the entire online identity, not just LI profile, professional blog and posted resume. Most damaging stuff is not on LI, anyway.
A person providing feedback would go and Google (and/or use a specialized site to research) someone's online identity based on name and/or information posted on LI or online resume. And then post comments about what s/he found, how it comes across to a potential employer and colleague, and any suggestions on how to make the online identity better.
Matt, it would be great to have a forum branch where people could request their online identity review, and provide their name and link to resume or LI profile. And invite a recruiter or HR person weight in with their professional opinion, like Jerry suggested below.
Jane Prusakova
Senior Consultant at Improving Enterprises
LinkedIn Info
One thing I believe is
One thing I believe is controlling access to door64'ers who sign up for the exercise and keep people from the outside from browsing the profiles or the comments to them. Can that be done? I'm more than willing to put my profile and background up for a critique but I'd like to know that only people who have been vetted have access to the comments and critiques. So I think some planning would be needed.
That's a REALLY good point!
That's a REALLY good point! I should have thought of that. Somehow I was just thinking of this as a closed group, and I shouldn't have assumed.
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Jerry Dunham
Appreciating
Access can be restricted to
Access can be restricted to the forum, and thus posts wouldn't be viewable by all members nor searchable via Google. However, that means someone is administrating the forum to admit persons based on certain criteria.
I don't want to be that person, but if you decide how you'd like it done, I can look into setting it up.
It's certainly not something
It's certainly not something I have time to do on an active basis. The question is, what level of restriction are we needing?
For myself, I'd be satisfied with the first one. Others may want something tighter. We need to establish the level before we know how much work it would be for a volunteer moderator. I'd think the first level would be nearly trivial, while the last two levels would be a lot of work. I can't imagine anyone volunteering to moderate without knowing.
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Jerry Dunham
Moderation in all things
Personally I'm happy with
Personally I'm happy with just door64 members in general; that's a much easier problem to solve from my perspective. No search engine will see the forum's content, but any door64 member can participate in the forum discussions.
I'm wit you,
I'm wit you, kid.
KISS.
Let's see what others say.
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Jerry Dunham
Keep it stupid, Simple.
My interest is to keep
My interest is to keep comments and critiques from becomng broadly public.
The simplest protection is
The simplest protection is that posts & comments would be viewable only from within door64 (members only). That's in contrast to most site content which is viewable outside of door64 (excluding member profiles).
We should all check our own
We should all check our own mentions online frequently. This isn't mere vanity, but self-defense. Recently I tried pipl.com for the first time, and was amazed at what appeared there, much more than a Google search.
One link in particular stood out: I had been credited by name for my photos of a costumed, outlandishly-made-up rock band, but the credit itself wasn't spelled out in the pipl link, just the photos beside my name. For fear that some might reasonably think I'm of that ilk (no offense, rockers), I'm thinking of asking the band to take down these photos. Since I gave them permission to use my photos on their site, what if they balked? Legally, there's nothing I could do.
There are outfits that promise to keep you clean online, but they're quite expensive. ReputationDefender.com charges $14.95/month as a subscription, and $29.95 to delete any specific mention. Suppose you contributed frequently as a kid to a blog called, let's say, "Sex, Drugs and Rock-n-Roll on Sixth St." You would have to make a considerable investment to get those youthful "Hell, YEAH!s" deleted, apparently.
Wayne C. Vermillion
Instructional Designer/Project Manager
This also included "mass
This also included "mass emails" you send. We are our digital selves. I guess this would seem fair, while you are supposed to separate your work life from your private one.
What sort of mass e-mails
What sort of mass e-mails did you have in mind? I don't think any of us are e-mail marketers or spammers, so you must be thinking of something else. Are you referring to e-mail sent to mailing lists or Yahoo! groups with which we participate?
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Jerry Dunham
Yahoo! group moderator
It's amazing what you can
It's amazing what you can see on pipl.com. I would like to participate in this experiment. -TH
Hi everyone, I think this is
Hi everyone,
I think this is a really cool idea. I'm an HR person but I'm not really in recruitment (I do compensation and benefits consulting) so I'm not sure how much help I'd be ... but I'd be happy to offer any help that I can. Or to try to find some executive coaches who might be able to give some advice.
My only note of caution is that I don't think HR/Recruiting people are as consistent on this concept as they might be assumed to be. There is no mass HR network that tells them what is "good", "ok", and "bad" when it comes to screening and selecting candidates (I've even seen some people who don't know the basic interview questions that shouldn't be asked because they can lead to illegal discrimination).
I think the above questions are great ones:
1. How wide (or how deep) a net do HR people typically cast?
2. What shows up when they do that?
3. Is any of it damaging, or discouraging?
4. What can be done about it?
And I'd actually love to hear from different HR people as well. I just want to point out that the answers are likely to be very dependent on the context of the position and how technologically-savvy/innovative the HR/recruiter is... so it might be good to get as wide a range of feedback as possible and to get some parameters on #3 since everyone will have different opinions on what is discouraging but not necessarily a "deal-breaker".
Also, it's important to understand that this is still a very new area for everyone in terms of privacy and what "should" be happening is not always what actually happens on both sides of the employee/employer relationship:
Check out these recent legal updates for examples on both sides:
http://www.munckcarter.com/CM/Newsletters/October-2009-Legal-Briefs-for-... (#5 is about mis-use of myspace to fire an employee)
http://www.munckcarter.com/CM/Newsletters/December2009-Legal-Briefs-for-...
(#9 is about sick leave benefits being revoked because of pictures that showed up on a public website)
To reveal my own ignorance, I had not heard of pipl.com but am off to check it out now!
Kim