Interesting to see that most new young job seekers are hiding their online status, wether it is on facebook, myspace, or even on linkedin (their non professional network).

I found this article to be right on the money, people are used to ‘Googeling’ someone prior to an interview, and trying to get as much detail as possible.  Luckily for me, my name is the name of a couple other guys who have PhDs in various disciplines, so it always goes over well as a joke in an interview by going “So did you google me? And did you see I hold 4 different PhDs? Good”.  But seriously, I think as a first impression this online search is informative, but employers should not be basing their judgement on what they find online.  Especially if they cannot identify the individual visually (photo from resume?).

But this type of reaction by job seekers makes you think.  How open do you want to be with your information online?  Facebook leaks people’s info all the time.  Just do a search for your name, I guarantee a facebook reference is on the 1st or 2nd Google result.

Scary huh?

http://www.cnn.com/2010/TECH/03/29/facebook.job-seekers/