You may think that the five clubs you headed to last weekend is the furthest thing from your professional job interview next Wednesday, but you would be very wrong.
It is reported that a staggering 93% of hiring managers and recruiters will search your social media accounts during the interview process.
Why would they do this?
It is usually to see if a candidate would be a good fit with the company culture, your social media profiles tell a lot about you as a person and can even be more insightful than an employment screening questionnaire.
Your social media footprint will also give a potential employer an insight on how social, savvy, and skilled you are by seeing how you choose to use online networking technologies. Employers will be looking to see how inventive and original you are in what you do online. Many will also use the information to determine if your online activity supports what you have mentioned in your resume,
If you are seeking a Product Development position in the food manufacturing industry do you tweet about your love of food or post photos of your creations? Have you visited a local farmers market for fresh and new produce? Are you subscribed to food industry groups/pages?
Fair or not, employers will also be screening out candidates for what they deem as inappropriate behaviour online.
There are two parts to this. One is that while drinking too much last weekend should not exclude someone from a job. However, posting evidence of it online and boasting about how hammered you got can demonstrate that you are quite unsavvy about personal branding and how to market yourself.
It might be worth scanning your socials and looking at them from an employer’s perspective.
If you are unsure then there are privacy settings available on all social media, we suggest that you use them.
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