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Should I befriend my boss on Facebook?

Living online is tricky. How you the internet can get you a job or show your manager those photos that prove you weren't sick at all last week... JV Chamary solves your work web worries with our guide to living in the Information Age.

Should I befriend my boss on Facebook?

Should I befriend my boss on Facebook?

Originally designed as a social networking site for students, Facebook now boasts over 400 million active users – just under six per cent of the world’s population. The site aims to help you connect with the people in your life. But should that also include your boss?

“The second you ‘friend’ your boss, you have to change the way you use Facebook,” says personal branding expert Dan Schawbel. “If you forget and say something bad about the company, it can be very dangerous.”

This is because snooping on employees is becoming more common. Last year, 16-year-old Kimberley Swann was sacked after the teenager described her new job as “boring” – a comment that co-workers relayed to her manager. One way to avoid this would be to alter your privacy settings and add your boss and colleagues to a list of ‘workplace friends’ who can only see limited information.

If you decide to accept the friend request from your boss, always watch what you say because they’ll be able to see what you write.

Remember that Facebook also puts a time stamp next to your online activity. If your boss notices that you’re spending too much time online, they may think they haven’t given you enough work to do, and you don’t want that.

 

How to get a job online

  • Become a brand - Employers need be able to find you through an internet search, so get a unique user ID based on your full name, and reserve it on the top three social networks – Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn – as these appear high in Google results. If you can, register a website using your full name for its address.
  • Social network - Build professional relationships with people before you need their help. That way, it won’t seem like begging when you need a new job. To do this, join LinkedIn, a business-orientated site that helps build a network of trusted contacts who will be familiar with your skills.
  • Spread the word - Announce to the world what work you’re after; contacts will then relay your request through their networks. And the fact they’re broadcasting on your behalf acts as an invaluable third-party endorsement.

 

Can social networking harm my career?

According to a recent survey of 2667 human resources managers, 45 per cent of US employers use social networks like Twitter and Facebook to screen job applicants. Of these socially savvy companies, 35 per cent had rejected a potential recruit after finding questionable content – such as provocative photos or inappropriate information – on their social profiles.

Job seekers should therefore be aware that a prospective employer may judge them based on the first things they discover through Google.

“Most first impressions now are being conducted online before you can even establish the relationship offline,” warns Dan Schawbel, author of Me 2.0: Build a Powerful Brand to Achieve Career Success. “The online world is a public environment. How you live online is a representation of how people perceive you both online and offline. Everything that’s posted online can hurt you both professionally and personally.”

Schawbel says the solution is to create a personal brand and have a strong online presence (see ‘Get a Job’, right). You should also adjust your social network’s privacy settings to restrict the content that appears in search engine results. But this won’t necessarily stop online acquaintances talking about you or tagging you in their photos. And because the web is built on links between sites, what they say can be broadcast right across the internet.

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Issue: 
Extreme worlds
Comments: 1

Kimberly didn't get fired for

Mon, 2010-06-21 15:18
Esther

Kimberly didn't get fired for calling her job boring, she got fired for saying that she hated her job and for calling her boss a total pervy wanker who was always making her do shit stuff just to piss her off. Let's face it, who's going to carry on employing anyone when somthing like that turns up on your news feed? I think her boss let her off lightly by not dumping her in it and allowing her to claim that she just said that her job was boring.