Category: Human Resource Materials

Hiring managers and HR departments use social media content as part of their employment screening, at least the majority seem to these days. When you think of social media monitoring for a potential new hire, it’s instinctive to first think of looking at a candidate’s LinkedIn and Facebook profiles. But what about product reviews?

A social media monitoring program for the hiring process is all inclusive – it doesn’t just focus on the “big three” social networks (LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook) but goes deeper into message boards and forums, blog post comments, etc. Essentially it can pick up all content generated by a user’s online footprint. This includes product reviews on sites such as Yelp and Amazon.

Why would a hiring manager be interested in these sites?

Product reviews have been around forever. Before social media sites became insanely popular, review sites were a go to for consumers. A lot can be revealed by a person’s product reviews that may not be captured on other social sites or during the interview process, including:

• Purchasing habits: while this may not exactly be relevant, things such as frequent posts on clubs and/or restaurants that reference a potential issue with frequent alcohol consumption may be of interest to a potential employer.

• General attitude: this is a great place to get some insight into a person’s general attitude. Some people are simply “negative Nelly’s” – no matter what happens, they are never satisfied. Typically when I see a poor review on Yelp, for example, that seems out of sorts with the other reviews, I tend to look at the person’s profile to see if they’ve left other reviews. If they have, I take a look – are they all negative, or do they seem to be fair? Someone with consistently negative reviews may signal someone that is overly negative or has the potential for a bad attitude at the workplace.

• Level of potential professionalism: while review sites are informal, what a person writes (and how they write it) could give insight into their level of professionalism. When writing negative reviews, do they refrain from using vulgar or insulting language? Do they clearly state why they had a poor experience with the service/product? Are they excessively wordy, or on the flip side, do they not fully explain what happened to warrant the less than stellar review?

Hiring the right people is paramount to a successful company – using any and all tools available will help find the right people for the job. While social media monitoring seems to be categorized at looking at the “main” social sites people visit, taking a look at the lesser viewed content can be extremely helpful in the decision making process.

 

Do you include your LinkedIn profile on your resume? If not, you probably should. If you’ve built a strong LinkedIn profile, it will be a great complement to your resume. It will also give hiring managers a clearer picture of who you are, your accomplishments, and if you’re qualified for the job for which you’re applying.

Whether or not you include it though, you may want to be aware of the fact that hiring managers will likely see it anyway; many, if not the majority, are using social media monitoring as part of the hiring process. At a minimum, they are going to check LinkedIn to see if you have a profile setup.

When job hunting, it’s important to make sure your resume is perfect, but you also need to take a close look at your LinkedIn profile. There are many telling signs a hiring manager or recruiter could see that may or may not land you your dream job.

• Does your resume tell a different story? At the very least, make sure your basic information with regard to job history, dates, etc is the same on your LinkedIn profile as it is on your resume. If you set up your profile some time ago, you may have been in a hurry and guesstimated at the dates of employment for a past job. If this is you, it’s time to update your profile to make sure it matches. The last thing you want is for a hiring manager to see the discrepancy and make decisions based on this.

• How badly do you want this job? If a hiring manager compares your resume to your LinkedIn profile and finds the two are identical, it may send a signal that, when applying for the job at hand, you did not tailor your resume to the particular job and it could have been one of 50 that you’re mass sending resumes out for.

• Are your strengths/highlights well displayed? LinkedIn is a great tool to share projects, presentations, or other media content that will nicely complement your resume. If you focus on an accomplishment in your resume of a great presentation, for example, is this included in your profile? Take a look at the additional features LinkedIn offers for users to incorporate content and media into your profile.

 

It’s a good idea to include your LinkedIn profile on your resume to make it easy for hiring managers to find if they choose to do so. They will likely do additional social research as part of the process, but why not create a great profile page and make it easy for employers to see? Resumes are simple and can be boring – supplementing with a strong LinkedIn profile can make the difference in landing the job!

 

 

High school sports are serious business, especially for those hoping to play (and get scholarship money) in college. While making sure you’re on your game at all times, it’s also important to make sure your online profile is top notch.

Athletes, and really all high school students, are educated on the importance of your social media profile – it can be very telling, and more and more colleges and athletic departments are looking at social media profiles before making decisions.

My daughter played for her high school’s softball team. They had an outstanding season, only to end the regular season with a really tough loss – honestly, they were robbed of the win by a bad call if you ask me. At any rate, I recall the coach specifically telling the girls, who post game were frustrated and upset with the outcome, to not take it online. They were reminded that they represented the school, even online, and to behave accordingly.

Needless to say, teenage girls are emotions. A lot of them. Two of my daughter’s teammates took to Twitter later that night to express their feelings about the game, the other team, and the umpire.

Imagine their surprise the next day at practice when the coach brought this up, complete with printouts of the girls’ tweets.

How can we help these students understand the reality of social media’s importance in depicting who they are as they get older and are trying to get scholarships, or into their dream college or job?

Kevin DeShazo, creator of Fieldhouse Media, founded a program to do just that – educate high school athletes about the importance of their social presence. In a recent article, high school coach Anthony Palladino shared this example of how social media can make or break a high school athlete’s college career:

“I remember one year we were recruiting two linebackers. Both were very talented, but we didn’t have room for the two of them. We checked out their social media. One was thanking people for going to the games, very polite. The other was very critical of coaches, teammates. That made the difference.”

Mr. DeShazo’s program seeks to educate athletes on how to engage on social media responsibly and in a positive way. As this becomes more prevalent, educators have also taken on this task.

As a parent and someone in the social media industry, my children are forever hearing from me about social media responsibility. While a parent’s words can fall on deaf ears sometimes, it’s important to be part of the education process. As a parent, what can you do?

• Find out what your child’s school is doing to educate students on social media responsibility and best practices. Continue the conversation at home to reinforce it.

• Take a look at your child’s social media accounts. Run a Google search for their name, or, better yet, get a social media background check. This gives you a good starting point for discussion –  show your child how to make their sites more private and “clean up” any content as needed.

• Have your child look at their social sites from an outsider’s viewpoint – if they were reading these posts from a stranger, what would they think of that person? It might give them pause if there’s anything concerning in their posts.

I’m impressed with Fieldhouse Media and their approach to educating student athletes. This is the type of mentoring and education that needs to be happening across the board. Even adults can learn a thing or two from social media education.

 

Employers want to use every tool at their disposal for vetting potential employees – social media is one area that is more “gray” and, while HR departments realize its value, they have many questions about its use, and how to go about vetting a candidate socially.

The Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) recently published a study around the topic of social media’s use for employment screenings and recruitment. Key findings show that:

• 43% state that they have used social media research or online searches during the screening/vetting process.

• 36% have disqualified a potential candidate based on something found in an online search or in a public social media site.

Rob Walker, The Workologist columnist in the New York Times responded to a question on how HR departments can manage social media for employment screening. The response explains it very simply – HR departments should make use of what’s available, and be cautious, but not overly cautious.

Some of the top concerns HR departments have when it comes to using social media as a screening tool include:

• Not being able to “unsee” information that they shouldn’t in order to be compliant (ie age, race, marital status, etc), that is easily found when looking at a person’s social media profile

• How to go about incorporating social media research – what’s the best method, at what point in the process should this be done, etc?

These concerns may be keeping HR departments from jumping into the social media arena, and they may be missing vital information to help with the decision making process. There are many ways that concerns can easily be addressed.

• Use a formal social media research program – whether it’s an outsource or an internal program, using a formal program or software geared toward HR can go a long way. For one, it will be compliant with state and federal laws with regard to employment; there is no chance to see things that you shouldn’t, as that type of information is stripped from the search results. Additionally, a third party vendor will add credibility to the research, which will be a benefit should issues ever arise.

• Only use public information – don’t try “friending” or connecting with potential candidates. Privacy settings help those who want to keep some of their social activity from the public arena, and that needs to be respected. A strong social media program only looks at public data – if information is uncovered by viewing someone’s Facebook content that you’re “friends” with, there is a chance that the person has their settings to only show content to their friend list – it is not something that a standard social media search would uncover, so it’s off limits to you.

• Use it at the right time – while that “right time” may vary and is still unclear at this point, deciding when to use it and being consistent will help with your strategy. Using social media research as a final tool, after the first round of interviews perhaps, will be helpful in learning more about the serious candidates. It’s good to have conversations within your company to determine which point in the process is best prior to rolling it out. Consistently will not only help make the process more efficient, but may help if there is ever a question of legality/discrimination brought up.

The concept of incorporating social media research into employment background checks is not new, but it is being seen more and more as a valuable tool for HR departments. I’m anticipating that this time next year we’ll be seeing it as a standard part of any employment screening. Learning now and developing a solid strategy will give your company the edge in making good hiring decisions.