8 rules of conduct in social networks for careerists

To get a minimal idea of ​​a person’s life, you should look at his page in one of the social networks (or better all at once). “Vkontakte investigations” are carried out not only by lovers, old friends or distant relatives - potential employers are also trying to learn more about your life.
At the same time, the ideas about the ideal worker are different for everyone: someone might like that you constantly place touching, as you think, photos of your cat, and someone may decide that you simply have no other interests. We suggest to take into account the opinions of professionals.

What not to do:
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• Show how you do not like current work. Moreover, this can not be done if you want to continue a career in the same field. Photos, where you sleep in the workplace, imperceptibly put "horns" to the head, just die from boredom in the office, hinting that you will do the same thing in any organization.
  The international job search portal, CareerBuilder, annually conducts a study, in which it polls more than 2,000 heads of HR departments - questions relate to working with social networks. According to the portal, 36% of employers ignore applicants who publish posts about how they are bored at work. For an employer or partner with whom you want to make a deal, your publications will be unpleasant in the spirit of “tired of work”, “my boss is an idiot”, “lunch is the best part of the working day”.
• Disclose confidential information from the current workplace. You should not constantly and in detail talk about current projects, the problems of the company and its customers, future plans, and so on. 24% of employers, according to a CareerBuilder study, immediately refuse a candidate if they see any hint of disclosing confidential information on the Web. Google vice president of recruitment Laszlo Bock (Laszlo Bock) in his blog notes: no company wants its employees to share private information. It seems everyone should be clear: the publication of secrets can threaten not only the fact that you will not find a new job, but the fact that you lose the old one.
• To make mistakes in their posts. Times "padonkaf" are gone - today, few people deliberately spell the words incorrectly or put commas in the wrong place. All this happens more often involuntarily, in a hurry. To avoid mistakes, Laszlo Bock advises to read your own texts from the bottom up, in order to focus on each line and each word separately.
  It is possible that your future business partners or employers will not be the most meticulous people and simply will not notice your mistakes. But the chance to run into the Grammar-Nazi or just a person who does not like illiteracy is quite large. According to the American Journal of Applied Social Psychology, half of employers who turn to social networks for information about an employee take spelling and punctuation errors into account.
• Spread too personal content. Candid photos, reports from parties with alcohol, and evidence that you are abusing illegal substances - a big minus to your image in the eyes of the employer, even if the resume seems perfect. According to CareerBuilder statistics, 46% of companies refuse candidates if they see such information on the page. Forbes columnist Kashmir Hill (Kashmir Hill) advises to stop perceiving a page on a social network as a personal space and accept the fact that in the modern world it has become an analogue of the press service for each person. You can hide information using privacy settings, but it's easier not to publish compromising information on yourself.

What do we have to do:

• Behave like a specialist. Get yourself some good habits: repost professional news, discuss the most interesting questions with friends, give an expert assessment in your own publications and comments. 43% of employers surveyed by CareerBuilder have a mental “like” resume of a person who follows what is happening in the industry and is not shy about expressing his opinion on social networks. But this opinion, of course, must be professional: do not get involved in disputes in areas in which you obviously understand little, and try not to turn into a “sofa expert”.
• Join professional groups and public groups. You can find both business partners and potential employers in them. According to the marketing director of the American software manufacturer iCIMS, Susan Vitale (Susan Vitale), participation in such groups helps to find like-minded people and make fellow friends, understand the general trends and specific nuances of their profession, always be aware of important industry events. By the way, try to join the career group of your potential employer, if he has one. Firstly, you will learn many useful things about working in a particular company, and secondly, you will show that you are really interested in starting a career in it.
• Correctly fill out your profile. You need to clearly record the professional information about yourself: the educational institutions that you graduated from, previous jobs, foreign language skills - is certain Susan Weitel. And they should strictly coincide with the information that you give in the resume. The employer will see that you are honest, open, and, moreover, proud of your experience. Laszlo Bock warns that positions and dates that do not coincide with resumes will be a reason to catch you in a lie, and no one likes liars.
• Activate more online sites. When looking for a job, do not dwell on the already traditional LinkedIn or more familiar Vkontakte for such purposes. Take a look at other resources: Susan Weitel cites as an example Twitter, where you can see the most recent list of jobs, because they are posted in real time. And this means that your tweets should undergo a small revision (to start, throw out the pain, decay and adolescent loneliness from them).

You may decide that it is better to remove your accounts from all social networks and never use them again. Perhaps for some employers or partners you will become more interesting and mysterious. But for HR departments that are used to browsing Facebook or VKontakte pages, you will simply be lost. Preference will be given to others - those who could make the best impression and be remembered before the interview. In addition, potential business partners who are accustomed to sharing through chat rooms in social networks may be inconvenient to write you letters or call you every time.
In general, our advice: play in your own PR-manager and create the image that potential employers will like.