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SOCIAL MEDIA IS TRANSFORMING OUR CAREERS

Online social media represents a new social space where professional reputations can be built and destroyed. Survey after survey demonstrates that social media is transforming the way we assess people’s employability and career potential. In a recent CareerBuilder survey of 2300 hiring managers, nearly 40 percent of respondents said they used social media to screen potential hires and examine cultural fit with their organization. On the one hand, nearly 30 percent found reasons to hire candidates who appeared well-rounded or showed a wide range of interests and creativity. Moreover, more than half of employers noticed that those candidates conveyed a professional image — in other words, they used a consistent and relevant strategy on social media. On the other hand, nearly half of hiring managers rejected candidates after viewing provocative or inappropriate photos and comments, or because of candidates’ drinking or drug use, bad-mouthing a previous employer, making discriminatory comments or lying about their qualifications. Another survey by the Society of Human Resource Management reported an even higher proportion (56 percent) of employers who used social media to screen candidates. While most of them used LinkedIn, which is entirely professional, 58 percent and 42 percent used Facebook and Twitter, both of which are networks that mix the professional and the personal.

CONCLUSION

The ability to manage boundaries has become an important social skill for employees and managers as the workplace continues to move online. For global work teams, social media can help to build stronger bonds with long-distance colleagues because it allows them to share both professional and personal information. The fact that team members can interact with each other as whole people can help build trust as well as mutual knowledge of a colleague’s modus operandi, best times to work together, best ways to communicate, and so forth. However, in an increasingly diverse set of industries and organizations, employers and institutions are taking steps to establish policies on social media ground rules and etiquette. Physicians are advised not to break the physician-patient boundary on social media. Employees of the Justice department are warned against connecting with judges, defense counsels, jurors, or witnesses and against discussing a case on social media. In addition, British citizens are now warned that contempt of court has now been expanded to any and all social media actions, since information shared on social media can interfere with fair trials taking place. To this end, the UK government’s chief legal advisor, Attorney General Dominic Grieve, has just decided the time has come to provide free legal advice to Twitterers and Facebookers to help educate them on the responsibilities of using a ‘‘tool of mass communication.’’ As managers and executives, you can take action to craft online boundary management behaviors that will help you take advantage of the opportunities social media provides at work instead of having it backfire on you and the organization. As a Talent Acquisition officer commented: ‘‘For large enterprises that experience unwanted exposure or with limited impact-control due to scale, education on personality types — Integrators, Segmentors, Impressers and Expressers — could be a different educational tact to try.’’ Here as well, taking a thoughful approach where you consider your organization’s goals, your industry and occupational context, and your employees’ skills, can improve your organization’s online experience.