Given that there are 3.03 billion active social media users and that people have an average of 5.54 social media accounts, social media is now an important part of the hiring process. Employers can learn a huge amount about potential hires from social media. Here are three things employers should look for on social media when searching for the perfect candidate. Candidates are only going to include references they know will be positive, and a previous employer may not be looking for the same qualities as you are. Social media is where people share who they are, or at least, who they want others to think they are, in a fairly intimate (yet public) way. LinkedIn is business-centric, but other social media platforms are where people display their personalities, opinions, likes, dislikes and the way they navigate the world. People are writing blog posts on Medium, sharing articles on Facebook and engaging in conversations on Twitter as part of their work-life. Qualifications and references Social media can help employers flesh out things they read in candidates' job applications or validate things they've said in a cover letter. Anyone applying for a job today should go in with the expectation that his or her social media presence is fair game for employers. Social media can help employers get a sense for who candidates are, whether that matches who they say they are and whether they'd be a good fit for a job.
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Given that there are 3.03 billion active social media users and that people have an average of 5.54 social media accounts, social media is now an important part of the hiring process. Seventy percent of employers use social media to screen candidates before hiring, according to a survey conducted for CareerBuilder by Harris Poll.
Employers can learn a huge amount about potential hires from social media. From family pictures to weekend hobbies to professional blog posts, people share troves of information on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn and others that can be a goldmine for employers looking to get beyond resumes. However, sorting through all the noise and irrelevant content to identify the useful nuggets of information can be tricky. Most potential hires won’t have obvious red flags, so employers need to read between the lines.
Here are three things employers should look for on social media when searching for the perfect candidate.
1. The “authentic” self
Job candidates always put their best, most professional foot forward in formal applications and job interviews. They emphasize their strengths and minimize their weaknesses and it can be tough to get a genuine read on who a person is from a cover letter or an interview. Even references, which provide some insight, are not always helpful. Candidates are only going to include references they know will be positive, and a previous employer may not be looking for the same qualities as you are.
Social media is where people share who they are, or at least, who they want others to think they are, in a fairly intimate (yet public) way. LinkedIn is business-centric, but other social media platforms are where people display their personalities, opinions, likes, dislikes and the way they navigate the world. If a candidate seems very argumentative on Twitter or behaves childishly on Facebook, that doesn’t necessarily mean he behaves the same way offline, but it does provide a glimpse into his interior life. Properly attributing credit when using images that are not your own, such as those from stock…
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