Talent Emporium’s low cost, flat fee recruitment offering is heavily influenced by the use of web 2.0 and social networking sites such as Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook. Our previous blog postings have highlighted the importance of social media and social networking for positive brand promotion to help finding employment and improving your future career prospects.
However, whether you tweet a few lines or scribble on the Facebook wall, your social media use could decide your job prospects and even whether you have a job to return to after your latest social media posting. Research from the US has shown employers are ramping up their use of social media and social networking sites to carry out candidate research before putting pen to paper and sending out an offer of employment.
45% of employers surveyed by CareerBuilder said that they use social networking sites to research job seekers and candidates attending interview, a massive increase from 22% when surveyed last year. About 11% of the companies surveyed highlighted they are planning to implement a candidate screening process using social networking mediums.
Also, the last 12 months have seen the emergence of social networking sites playing a pivotal role in the dismissal of staff from both small and high profile companies including:
A 16 year old girl from Essex for describing her job as boring on Facebook http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/essex/7914415.stm
A Swiss woman has lost her job after her employers spotted she was using the Facebook website when she had claimed to be too ill to use a computer
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/8018329.stm
And a Waitrose employee has been sacked for insulting the supermarket chain on Facebook
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/3357689/Waitrose-worker-fired-for-Facebook-slur.html
Therefore when embarking on creating your own unique brand on the multitude of social networking mediums available keep the following in mind:
1. Everything is public. Act as though it is going to be on the front page tomorrows news papers
2. Welcome pages are easily searchable and can be viewed without being a signed up member. The information is highly public and hard to erase from search engines memory
3. Don’t do it during work time unless you have permission to do so. Better yet, don’t use it at work unless you think it will get you a raise.
4. Don’t post anything that you wouldn’t feel comfortable posting or discussing in the lunchroom at work
5. Remove comments posted by others that can get you into trouble
6. Raise your privacy settings.
7. Do not ever admit to anything even remotely resembling a crime.
8. Don’t disclose personal information that you are not comfortable having out there.
9. Be considerate of others when you are posting things.
10. Don’t discuss confidential stuff online
11. Be careful if you mix your personal and business online
Social media and networking is an essential part of our success in being able to provide a low cost, flat fee recruitment solution ensuring we are successful in bringing together progressive employers and talented individuals. If you have any questions on how your company can employ successful social media practices to attract talented individuals or if you are a job seeker looking to empower you job search using social media either leave us a post on our blog our email info@talentemporium.com with any questions.
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