Social Media background checks to play important role in 2011 hiring

background screening. What you can be sure of is that this practice will become even more instrumental in 2011. Not only because the economy is on the rise again and more jobs becoming available, but because social media is becoming such an integral part of our society. While performing a background check on someone’s social media presence is something many companies are starting to use, some believe it is a process that can be not just used, but abused. An article by Tom Field suggests that with the ability to see someone’s life in as much detail as they portray on a social profile, “you are going to learn all sorts of things as an employer you don’t want to know and legally cannot be the basis of a decision (such as race, ethnicity, national origin, marital status, sex, sexual orientation, religious preference, etc., etc., etc.)”. All of these things are obviously not available when looking at someone’s resume, or checking their references, but can lead to discrimination against a job applicant once known. Another big problem for background screening firms is what is real on these social network sites, and what is not. “There are over 300 million Americans, there are people with similar names, there are computer twins, there is the fact that anybody can go on the internet and imitate anybody else and set up a blog and pretend they are somebody else”. Which begs the questions: How would a company know for sure that they have the right persons profile? How can you be confident that a hiring manager wouldn’t discriminate against an applicant, consciously or not, due to personal information that would be found?]]>