Are you checking your employee's facebook?

Filed in archive Business Tips on February 3, 2010

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Is checking up on your employees a broach of privacy? How about checking in on potential hires? Microsoft recently released a study that says that 70% of HR departments reject applicants for something in their online history.

The upside of this is that a good social media "resume" can lead to positive hires as well. But how sensitive are these HR departments taking a personal account? Are silly things a person did in college still up for consideration when you hire them eight years later?

We all want to know our employees aren't doing anything stupid and social media is a great way to make sure someone looks as good in person as they do on paper. Its a given that most companies check your profile before they hire you. So what about current employees? Is it appropriate to check up on them on a regular basis?

Certainly, social media can help you make sure people do what they're supposed to do. Of course, you might not always do what you're supposed to do either. Is it acceptable to expect your employees to be perfect? But if they post their outside activities online, that makes it fair game, right? Where's the line? That's what you need to discover for yourself. Privacy is a personal issue but your company should decide as an organization how much they want to rely on the social media profiles of their employees.

Have you checked your employee's social media profiles? Have you ever not hired/fired someone because of what they posted?