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Social Media Policies – Linking/Friending Etiquette during a Hiring Process

Posted by Dunrie Greiling at 07:49 am | Wednesday, October 26th, 2011 | Filed in LinkedIn, Privacy

Pure Visibility has been fortunate to be hiring! We’ve met some wonderful people through our job postings and through attending local job fairs and workshops. However, the social nature of today’s businesses and today’s hiring process has caused us to re-examine our internal policies. Essentially, we discovered we needed to be more deliberate about how we as a company, and how I as a member of this company, interact with applicants and candidates through social media.

What to Do When a Candidate asks to “Link In”

I Heart Job Offers Resume T-shirt by BlackBirdTees

LinkedIn is a great place to find candidates, network for business, and learn more about people’s work history and connections. Until recently, I was pretty loose, accepting people as the invitations arrived.

A few events led me to decide we needed to be more formal about it, during the hiring process. In one case, someone who applied for one position and was redirected to a different position was able to see the candidate we were favoring for the first position in my LinkedIn connection history.

I got a note saying “Hey, saw who I think my competition was, I totally understand why you went with her.” Which was a great response, except the details were not final and so we’d inadvertently made an “announcement” about our hiring process midstream.

Then, after a job fair, I received a number of LinkedIn requests. As the hiring manager, it makes sense that individuals I spoke with at the fair wanted to stay top of my mind. But, I worried about what message I was sending by accepting. Was I leading them on? Would they still want to connect at the end of the process, regardless of outcome? What is polite and what is proper in this case?

I decided that I should hold all Link requests until after the process is complete, and then accept them or decline them at that time. This seemed the most fair to candidates and our process.

What to Do When You’re a Facebook Friend of a Candidate?

In a separate hiring situation, we had an applicant I already knew from a non-work situation in Ann Arbor. We were Facebook friends, and during the process of considering the candidate, making an offer, waiting for the details to be ironed out, and in the period between the acceptance of the offer and the new hire’s start date, I think we both felt pretty weird about what we posted on Facebook.

I can only imagine her stress during the process. I have to admit I go to Facebook intermittently. Maybe once a week, sometimes more, often less. I wasn’t watching her stream. But I can imagine she might have felt a little trapped or at least aware of the potential for scrutiny…

An Age-Old Problem, with Heightened Visibility

Social Media platforms don’t present anything new. This kind of “in between” social stress can also happen in real time interactions. For example, I saw the “Facebook friend” candidate on the street in the last week of her hiring process. The candidate was with someone else, it turned out to be a family member, but it could have been a colleague from her then-employer.

So, I was friendly but distant, I did not want to invade the candidate’s space, yet there was this weighty thing between us…and I know the candidate was trying to read my interaction for information on her status.

So, none of the pain I’m describing of interacting with candidates during the hiring process is isolated to social media. It’s part of the awkwardness of being human, being social. However, the fact that interactions between individuals is shared with a social network broadcasts and amplifies the interaction.

Our Decision

One of our core values is simplicity. So, we’re looking to create a simple policy to avoid this kind of awkwardness, and to avoid having to think it through in individual instances. I am going to wait until the hiring processes are complete before accepting link requests.

Looking for More Guidance?

The Charlene Li of the Altimeter Group has compiled a great directory of corporate social media policies that you can review. Looking at examples from this list is sure to inspire and inform.

How to develop a Social Media Strategy across the big four networks

Posted by Eric Wortman at 09:30 am | Thursday, July 28th, 2011 | Filed in Branding, Facebook, Google, LinkedIn, Marketing, Social Media, Twitter

Now that Google+ has reached 20 million users, in order to stay in the social media game you’ll have four services to keep track of. Facebook and Twitter are the obvious big dogs. LinkedIn, the business social network, has been increasing in popularity and importance. With a huge number of initial sign-ups and very positive press, Google+ doesn’t seem to be going away. Most speculate that once more people start using big G’s new network and business pages are integrated, even more growth can be expected.

So how do you manage having a presence on four different social networks? There is no universally correct way. Everyone should develop their own strategy. To help find how others created theirs, I surveyed a group of marketers in the Ann Arbor, Michigan area. All of them have a strong presence on multiple social networks. The survey asked which of the big four networks they use, what their strategy was, and what impact, if any, Google+ has had.

With these tips you can develop a social media strategy that works for you and effecively targets your audience of followers.

Facebook

Facebook Usage

With over a quarter-billion users, Facebook is the largest social network. One main difference from Twitter and Google+ is that, for both these networks people have to agree to follow each other in order to “become friends.” This fosters a more personal experience. Users tend to know each other before becoming friends.

The usage chart indicates how people surveyed use Facebook. Personal usage is on the far left in darker colors while Networking and Work is lighter and to the right. This same format is used to show usage for the other social networks. As you can see, most use Facebook for personal, family, and entertainment.

“…when I share things that are more personal or family oriented I sometimes go straight to Facebook.”

“Facebook is more oriented toward keeping up with friends and family relationships.”

“I use Facebook to post more about what I am doing and who I am doing it with.”

Twitter

Twitter Usage

Twitter is a mixed bag of sorts. Usage is spread fairly evenly except for family use. Twitter is the service that tends to “stay out of the way.” They provide a method for you to share 140 characters of thoughts or links with others. The rest is up to you. Even though it is a very simple, limited interface, people often find it the most confusing. Regular users often have found specific ways Twitter can deliver custom news or information to them.

“…I use it as an aggregator of news or stories from reporters/networks I enjoy, bloggers I read, music news I care about…”

“Twitter is just for fun – mostly just follow/tweet my hobbies.”

“(Twitter) has really allowed me to build my personal brand…”

“I often cross post from Twitter.”

People tend to find their own personal use for Twitter. Often times other services feed into Twitter so they may have personal and work topics in the same stream.

LinkedIn

LinkedIn Usage

LinkedIn promotes itself as the professional social network. Its more about creating a network of business associates. People you’ve done work for, companies you’ve worked at. Content can be shared but tends to be more focused to business news or the users related industry. You can see from the usage chart that there is a heavy lean towards networking and work.

“LinkedIn is only about professional networking…”

“I’m not posting entertainment stuff on LinkedIn…”

“I use (LinkedIn) for the forums and to keep a professional network. I rarely find the feed interesting but will regularly use it to see who is reading my profile and to have professional contacts…”

Besides being marketed towards professionals, LinkedIn does not allow you to share photos. One major reason it will always lean towards the work and not personal side of the usage chart.

Google+

Google+ Usage

Do a a Google Search and you will find dozens of reviews for Google+. It combines many features from each of the other big three. So how are people using it? How should you use it?

“Try not to post the same things on each network. Google+ is the only one that may cross that line…”

“Basically it is a good middle ground between Facebook and Twitter for me.”

“…with Circles I can be more precise in who I share with and really tailor content to that group.”

“I think I’ll enjoy it more when I start following the Twitter audience, bloggers, news, companies.”

“Google+ appears to be a composite of the major social media approaches.”

Finding Your Strategy

Your strategy needs to be your personal strategy. Many of those surveyed spoke on tailoring content to your audience. Keep track of who is following you and determine what would interest them.

“Create and build a personal brand through sharing content that is relevant to the audience, while still keeping one main thing in mind: BEING SOCIAL.”

This quote brings up another important point. Be yourself. You can turn off your followers if all you are posting “seven ways to…” or “top five reasons to…” links. Engage your audience. Respond to them. Let them see who you really are while still staying with in the boundaries of the specific social network.

“Be myself and always be transparent. Also, have fun with it!”

“I definitely think transparency is important, but that doesn’t mean post everything all the time. It just means to be aware of conflicting view points and to not get trapped in an echo chamber of similar content and people. This also allows for more interaction, and much more interesting discussion and connections.

So get out there, post, share, and have fun developing your personal social media strategy.

Facebook and LinkedIn – What’s the Difference?

Posted by Catherine Juon at 05:39 pm | Tuesday, April 14th, 2009 | Filed in Entrepreneurship, Facebook, LinkedIn, Social Media

I would like to point you to a favorite article on the topic of Facebook vs. LinkedIn, but after browsing a couple pages of Google results I’m here writing because there was a disappointing amount of industry-centric commentary. We’ve got A-List bloggers scorning one or both systems (hardly a “use case” or fair comparison for the average business person); pundits debating which network will succeed, and scenarios describing the use of these systems in getting (and unintentionally losing) jobs, etc.

While all of that analysis has its place, what do Facebook and LinkedIn offer to the average business person? Here’s my “elevator pitch” answer…

LinkedIn
If you’ve got a business card or a resume, you need to be on LinkedIn. It’s a tool for sharing professional recommendations, which means you belong here if you’re working on growing your business or your professional network. Period.

Facebook
If you want to get back in touch with your buddies from college and high school, join FaceBook. That’s what it was designed for, and what it still does best.

For a little more detail on both LinkedIn and Facebook, read on: Read More

It’s Time – Get LinkedIn!

Posted by Catherine Juon at 11:43 pm | Monday, March 31st, 2008 | Filed in Facebook, Job Hunting, LinkedIn, Social Media, Twitter

I’m not an early adopter – I just hang around a bunch of them.

By November 17, 2003, enough of these early adopter types (aka friends) had bugged me about LinkedIn that I finally felt compelled to sign up and give it a whirl. For a long, long time it was mostly my techie friends there. And not much happening.

Years later, when facebook took off and I became a Twitter addict, I figured LinkedIn was dead. Unlike these other social media tools, LinkedIn wasn’t “giving back”. You could collect data (ie make connections and add resume items) but beyond that, what was the use? It seemed limited to being a virtual file cabinet for resumes – and I’ve already got enough places to file things, thanks. Read More