The way in which people are employed is changing rapidly as employers are now able to use social media to not only screen potential employees but also to keep an eye on them as they work. You only have to look at this example from Facebook of an exchange between an employee and her boss to see just how wrong things can go…

The lines between what people are doing online in their spare time and what they do in the office place have become blurred in recent years and to be quite frank it is a bit of a minefield out there. As an employer myself I think you have to take things with a pinch of salt because photos and videos that are taken when people are relaxing and having a few beers are just that…people enjoying themselves.

On the flip side of this argument is the benefit that your employees can have bring to your brand through their activities online. Most people will have at least a couple of hundred friends online and if you are treating your staff well and they enjoy working for you the word will spread about your company. I would go as far as to say that it is a good thing to let your staff have access to Facebook and other social sites in the office to help spread the word about your company.

To prove the point that everybody has a little dirt in their closet I looked at my Facebook page and found the following charming picture of myself from around my 17th birthday when I may have had a couple too many beers at a house party. I didn’t even upload the photo myself and was simply tagged in it but it just goes to show how careful you have to be these days and just how much information your potential employers have available on you. Luckily most employers will realize that we have all done something like that once in our lives and had it photographed and judge you on your merits and abilities at doing your job today.

I run Internet companies and have nobody to answer to for the picture below but if I had been through 3 rounds of interviews for a job in an investment bank and was one of 2 final candidates and my opponent had a slick clean Linkedin profile with impeccable contacts and the team found this 12 year old photo of me on my Facebook page who do you think they would lean towards hiring? I would go as far as saying the photo would be the main deciding factor in a lot of people’s minds. Social media is changing the way we lead our lives and in this case the way we get employed and build job security.

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