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Your social media profile affects your employment prospects.

In this month's blog, Westwood Lodge details the power of social media. We identify common features of what employer's look at and how it impacts the employment prospects of an applicant.

Social media is a medium commonly used by people to interact with friends and the world at large. The more popular social mediums cross geographies, boarders and language barriers to link people with the broader international community.

Employers have been known to use these mediums to scrutinise prospective and existing employees. This is done by checking the personal accounts of the employee candidates and/ or employees to see what they have posted. Social media accounts are a reflection of the person's thoughts and reveal their behaviour.

In this blog edition, we use a study conducted by HarrisPoll on behalf of CareerBuild in the United States that collected data from 2380 hiring and resource managers. The findings are relevant to employers, employees and job seekers alike as it provides informative pointers on how social media activity affects employment prospects.

What employers are looking at:
Referred to as "Social recruiting", Human Resources (HR) departments have made this a core component of their employee screening process. According to the research conducted, 70% of employers use social media to screen candidates. Employers use social networking sites to look for information that:

• Supports their qualification/s for the job (61%)
• Reveals a professional online persona (50%)
• Reveals what other people are posting about their candidates (37%)
• Gives reason not to hire a candidate (24%)

69% of employers are also using search engines such as Google, Yahoo and Bing to research candidates.

Employers reasons not to hire candidates:
Social media content is cited as a reason why employers do not hire a candidate for an open role. 54% of employers have mentioned social media as a cause for not hiring a candidate. Reasons not to employ a candidate based on their social media profile included:

• Candidate posted provocative or inappropriate photographs, videos or information (39%)
• Candidate posted information about them drinking or using drugs (38%)
• Candidate had discriminatory comments related to race, gender, religion (32%)
• Candidate bad mouthed their previous company or fellow employee (30%)
• Candidate lied about their qualifications (27%)
• Candidate had poor communication skills (27%)
• Candidate had been linked to criminal behaviour (26%)
• Candidate shared confidential information from previous employers (23%)
• Candidate's screen name was unprofessional (22%)
• Candidate lied about an absence (17%)
• Candidate posted too frequently (17%)

Social media also assists in cultivating your online presence and can lead to gaining employment. According to the research, 57% of employers are less likely to call a candidate for an interview if they can't find them online. By the same token, 36% like to gather more information on candidates before calling them for an interview. 44% of employers found content on social media that caused them to hire the candidate. The primary reasons that employers hired candidates based on their social media profiles were:

• Information on social media profile supported candidate’s professional qualification (38%)
• Great communication skills (37%)
• A professional image (36%)
• Creativity (35%)

Once in the employ, an employee is a representative of the company. Thus, 51% of employers use social media to research current employees. This has resulted in 34% of employers finding content that has led to disciplinary measures.