Companies look beyond resumes to hire future employees
Lindsey Pruitt
Issue date: 3/31/08 Section: News
Students might want to think twice next time they tag themselves in photos from last weekend's party or post messages on their friends' walls about how wasted they were. The new employers trend for hiring is looking at social networking Web sites such as Facebook and MySpace when they consider potential employees.
Many companies that recruit on college campuses have been using search engines like Google and Yahoo to conduct background checks on seniors looking for their first jobs, according to a 2006 article in The New York Times.
But now, college career counselors and other experts said, some recruiters are looking up applicants on sites like Facebook, MySpace, Xanga and Friendster, "where college students often post risqué or teasing photographs and provocative comments about drinking, recreational drug use and sexual exploits in what some mistakenly believe is relative privacy," according to the article.
UA student Amy Short is among those who believe that her Web page is private. Short uses Facebook to network with her friends.
"For the most part my Facebook is well-rounded, so it represents the good, the bad and the ugly," Short said.
"I would be uncomfortable with employers looking at it because it is intended for your college friends, and I represent myself differently in the work force than I would around my friends," she said. "I don't think employers should look to Facebook to judge work ethic - they should judge me based on my resume and personality during the interview."
Ana Homayoun, leader of Green Ivy Educational Consulting, visited Duke University this spring for an alumni weekend and planned to interview "a promising job applicant" while there, according to the Times article.
Homayoun visited the candidate's Facebook profile, where she found explicit photos and comments about the student's sex life, drinking and pot smoking, according to the article.
"I was just shocked by the amount of stuff that she was willing to publicly display," Homayoun said in the article. "When I saw that, I thought, 'OK, so much for that.'"
Many companies that recruit on college campuses have been using search engines like Google and Yahoo to conduct background checks on seniors looking for their first jobs, according to a 2006 article in The New York Times.
But now, college career counselors and other experts said, some recruiters are looking up applicants on sites like Facebook, MySpace, Xanga and Friendster, "where college students often post risqué or teasing photographs and provocative comments about drinking, recreational drug use and sexual exploits in what some mistakenly believe is relative privacy," according to the article.
UA student Amy Short is among those who believe that her Web page is private. Short uses Facebook to network with her friends.
"For the most part my Facebook is well-rounded, so it represents the good, the bad and the ugly," Short said.
"I would be uncomfortable with employers looking at it because it is intended for your college friends, and I represent myself differently in the work force than I would around my friends," she said. "I don't think employers should look to Facebook to judge work ethic - they should judge me based on my resume and personality during the interview."
Ana Homayoun, leader of Green Ivy Educational Consulting, visited Duke University this spring for an alumni weekend and planned to interview "a promising job applicant" while there, according to the Times article.
Homayoun visited the candidate's Facebook profile, where she found explicit photos and comments about the student's sex life, drinking and pot smoking, according to the article.
"I was just shocked by the amount of stuff that she was willing to publicly display," Homayoun said in the article. "When I saw that, I thought, 'OK, so much for that.'"
Viewing Comments 1 - 1 of 1
Lindsay
posted 3/31/08 @ 8:19 AM CST
What about the option to set your profile to private which only allows your friends to see you myspace or facebook page? I'm not saying I be grudge employers for looking at these things. (Continued…)
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