We live in a hyper-connected world. Communications technology has changed the face of many industries and one of the areas significantly influenced the jobs market. Most of us enjoy the benefits of online recruitment sites through which we have access to almost all possible and impossible jobs available today in the world. There are also websites where you can find employees feedback on the companies they work for. Obviously, these are exaggerations, especially negative ones, but if you can read between the lines you can create a pretty good picture about the company you want to work for.
From the employer perspective, I would say, it is more difficult to discover what kind of people apply for your positions. There are classical techniques that companies use when recruiting: interviews, referrals, psychological tests, technical tests, etc.. But there is always an error margin in selecting an employee and its not uncommon to get unpleasant surprises. However, we are experiencing an major shift in the recruitment process. Employers began to receive unexpected help from the Internet and, in particular from social networks.
The results of the survey in 2010 published by Jobvite showed that recruiting using online social networks has become a primary channel for companies looking to hire. 83% of respondents say they already use social networks for this purpose or will do it soon. Among the most commonly used social networks the top three are: LinkedIn, used by 78% of companies, Facebook with 55% and Twitter with 45%. For more details, check the free report on Jobvite website.
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Only Facebook already has over 500 million active users, with 50% of them accessing their account daily. As much as our existence is increasingly going online, it will get easier to create the personal and professional profile of someone based on the information about that person available on the Internet. Web 2.0, based mostly on user-generated content, can be your friend or your enemy in seeking or keeping a job.
Obviously ,there are information about you on the web which you can control and information that can’t control. Here’s what you can do:
1. Be careful of what comments and what statuses are you posting online.
2. Avoid as much as possible to post online critics about your bosses or colleagues.
3. Avoid uploading inappropriate pictures and if your friends do that in your place, ask them kindly to delete them.
4. Configure your social networking profiles so that your approval is required for any comment or tag on the photos before being made public.
5. Builds a consistent online image. Do not try to appear eager for adventure on Facebook and highly reliable on LinkedIn. It will not work.
6. Ask for recommendations where this is possible. It is good to have different recommendations: bosses, colleagues and subordinates. Don’t forget that you should also prepare recommendations. Be honest and creative.
7. Make sure that the information you put in the resume will not be contradicted by the information available online. You will lose credibility.
The Internet has made the world becoming one large community. Basically, everyone “knows” everybody. It is difficult to hide and that, after all, is not a bad thing.
