3 Reasons You Must Look at Your Social Media Before a Job Interview

If your Facebook profile picture shows you drinking with a bunch of friends at a party, a future employer might think that’s how you act all of the time. For this reason, it is important to make sure your profile picture is a professional-looking photo of just you. Take a look at any of your publicly viewable social media photos to make sure these pictures convey the type of person you’d want to meet at a job interview.

Everyone gets frustrated sometimes. It’s easy to use social media as a place to vent about your political beliefs or the jerk driving the delivery truck that cut you off at the light. However, employers may not find these rants as amusing as your friends do. They might see this behavior as defiant or needlessly outspoken. They may even fear what you’ll write about their company if you have a bad day at work.

Right or wrong, people judge your character based on what you post online. Some employers don’t want to hire moms because they are nervous that moms will need to miss more work days for childhood illnesses. This isn’t right and could be illegal.

If a potential employer sees that you have children on social media, they may just ask a different candidate to come in for an interview to avoid their perceived hassle. This isn’t to say that they wouldn’t hire a mom to do the job. Once they meet you and you are no longer a faceless resume, they’ll most likely make the decision on your qualifications and if they feel you’re a good fit.

Look through your social media profiles to see what these accounts say about you as a potential hire. Would you hire yourself based on what you see? If not, make whatever necessary changes are needed to your public profiles while you’re in the interview process. Once you’re back in the workforce and feel comfortable with your employer’s social media policies, you can relax your standards for social media sharing a little.