Jenny Warburton
came to lesson today to talk about how social media can affect our career path.
She was very engaging and it didn’t feel like she was saying anything that was irrelevant
to the people present in the lesson. Employers these days often look up
prospective employee’s social media accounts like Facebook and Twitter, this
seems to be so they can get an idea of a person’s character outside of the
interviewing environment. Doing this gives them a more accurate idea of what a
person is like, if someone’s Facebook constantly has pictures of them drunk
covered in puke or has inflammatory language/ideas employers may choose not to
hire you because they may view you as a person who might act unprofessional
with others or if you’re a heavy drinker they might think you will come to work
hungover or have frequent absences.
They may also be concerned about how a person’s individual behaviour reflects
on the company they work for and don’t want to be associated with that person
if they do something controversial.
An example of this is when in 2013 a girl who was hired to be a youth police
and crime commissioner was quit under public pressure because people found
language on her social media account from the past that was considered to be racist
and homophobic. Many people in the public did not think that this girl should
have been able to hold such a public position that is meant to represent and consider
the whole of society while she says such things that reflects her thoughts. Because
of public pressure she decided to quit her position but the Kent police force
came under a lot of pressure for not vetting her properly, she had CRB checks
but they did not look at her social media which people considered irresponsible
on their behalf furthermore it is likely that she would have been fired for
this if she had not of quit.
From this I took away that while we have freedom of speech and free
will having an open social media account or excepting a lot of people means
that you put yourself out their as a public figure and are judged in the same
way and people will define you by what you put on their.
Jenny then moved on to talk about how LinkedIn can help us get work
with in our respective industries, she explained that it is similar to other
social network sites but this is a purely professional one that is designed for
people to make connections with other professionals and company’s and that we
might be able to find employment through this system as it is becoming increasing
popular way for employers to find the staff they want, Steve also told us that
last year 2 graduates were offered positions based on the LinkedIn profile they
set up.
I found this very encouraging because it’s hard to know where to start
when looking for a job in the science industry and this is a very encouraging starting
point. Over all the lesson was very informative and encouraging, the first side
of lesson didn’t really apply to me because I don’t have any social media but
it was something important for others to consider.
