Day Job
As some of you may know, since going to Ireland and the return I have not been working. What some of you may not understand though is that I am currently looking at changing careers. What my future may hold is unknown right now, but I have officially started looking at what my options are. There is a company in Minnesota called PLATO which I have been looking at since March/April. At West Liberty we used their software for our alternative program. It’s basically computer assisted learning and can be used in many ways. Obviously it is a little odd at this point for me looking for a “non-teaching” job, but I am very excited about what I may find out there.
One thought I had today though was this: In today’s society when applying for a job, school, etc., do prospective employers search on a candidate’s name to find out more information? There is already so much information they are not allowed to ask you for in an interview, but what stops them from getting a lot of that information from your personal page, or other’s pages? And how would you know?
It just was something I’ve never had to think about or worry about before. I’m not saying that I’m embarrassed by anything on this page, our family’s look at it after all. I’m just wondering how others feel about this topic.
Comments
Hi, Wendy sent me over to give you some info on this. I'm a Career Counselor and this is actually an issue we've been discussing with our students ALOT! The employers that we work with have told us they often will Google prospective job candidates to see what comes up. They also search MySpace and Facebook, etc. I always tell the students not to use their real name on their blogs or myspace, but being young kids, they may have more things they would want to keep hidden from potential employers.
Recruiters have said to me that they generally use it as another screening process, it allows them to see the real person. Most say they don't take it too seriously but if red flags popped up like reading about the applicant being involved in offensive groups or illegal activities or posting racy, crude pictures of themselves or talking about getting drunk every night, they will often toss that person to the "no" pile.
Posted by: Lisa | July 5, 2006 08:17 PM
Employers have been known to google applicants: http://www.nydailynews.com/front/story/401069p-339405c.html
This is both good and bad. If the 'net shows your an expert in your field, thats good. If it shows your exerpt from Teachers Gone Wild...it may be bad.
Posted by: Jerry | July 5, 2006 09:28 PM
I actually thought about this yesterday. I had emailed the super of Clear Creek-Amana inquiring about openings in the new school. In my second email to her, I forgot to erase my signature, which includes my blog address. I spent the rest of the day wondering if she took a look. But like you, there's really nothing on my site that would be problematic. Now I'm going to Google myself to see what comes up...
Posted by: Diane | July 7, 2006 06:58 AM
This last Spring semester at UT-Martin we were interviewing a number of folks for student supervisor positions. The first thing we did when we got their applications was look them up on facebook. I can tell you we did not hire a number of folks because of what was posted.
I think it comes down to common sense, if you think your parents would be less than thrilled, then you shouldn't post it.
My personal favorite was asking a student during the interview "If he would be embarrased if his parents saw his facebook page?" he turned bleach white and the interview was over.
E-
Posted by: Eric and Kim | July 9, 2006 05:48 AM