Social Media and Job Searches

Introduction

Background references checks of jobs candidates are essential screening tools for all employers. These not only allow companies to get relevant information about the potential candidates but it also protects the companies from going in wrong hands. It protects the organizations and its employees from workplace violence and hence it protects the organization's reputation from being destroyed. Implementing credit checks helps the companies to keep away from enormous lawful expenditures in the future. The wrong decision can endanger the organizations assets, status and safety.

Backgrounds checks are conducted by employers in many different ways. These include previous employment reference checks, cross checks from educational institutions and also from the peers. Now days a new trend has emerged and the employers are now using social media as a background checking tool.

Many credit check organizations and agencies also recommend that credit checks are essential safety measures for the organizations. Many criticisms have been emerged on this tools as well as there are many supporters of this online credit check method.

Social media and employers

Before the confirmation of employment, employers must need to know about the characteristics of the potential candidates and its activities and interests.

Social media websites on internet gives considerable opportunities to employers to know and reach the potential candidates and finally it helps them to recruit those potential candidates. However, these social media sites put them into great challenge if they use such sites for background checks and screenings in pre employment processes. It is even very critical to check employee's references through online social resources.

A psychology professor at Eastern Kentucky University, Jerry K. Palmer, has said that in his studies he has not found any major correlation among the recognition report quality of the employees and the probability of job performance of that employee. He has also said that no studies have clearly showed that there is direct relationship among poor recognition of credit and fraud or violence conducted by the employee. 

A survey was conducted by Reppler, a social media screening service provider, who took responses from above 300 professional recruiters about their screening practices of job candidates through various social networks. They found the following responses:

The survey responses clearly exhibited that many recruiters are using social networks for employee cross checking but the question arises that how do the recruiter get know about the candidate that it would definitely work best at the job by looking at the candidate's profile. It is not definitely necessary that the person who is hired because of attractive and impressive profile will perform in the same manner as it looks in the profile.

Besides these, the negative comments that people makes about their previous employers cannot reflect the valid judicial point because people usually leave their jobs because they are not given enough benefits or they are fad up of their employers, so it is accepted that they would not give positive comments about their previous employers.

Recruiters' problems and expected solutions from social media

Recruiters are now widely using social media not ...