Job Interviews and Your Online Image
I’ve been doing some job interviews in the last several days, for summer internships and the strangest thing happened during one of them - the interviewer mentioned something that I had written about on this blog! I haven’t been doing this for very long, but it is definitely true what they have been telling students - be careful about what you put on the internet, because they could come up when you’re looking for more work (not that I have anything to worry about).
While they make a good point, think about what the career advisors say, you don’t have to disappear off the internet, just so your employer won’t find the one (dozen) picture(s) of you doing a kegstand. Rather than disappearing, take control of your image online, so those kegstand pictures go to the second page when you do a Google search on your name.
- Register a domain name (davidgiesberg.com is taken, all you other David Giesbergs) and put something up there, doesn’t have to be anything fancy - HackCollege has some good ideas for what to do with it.
- Post insightful and meaningful comments on great blogs with your name on the comment (as opposed to the screen name you have been using since you got AOL in ‘96)
Bonus Link: The Corporate Hack has a great post on How To BS Your Way Through an Interview, it’s a good read (but completely inaccurate if any potential employers are reading this :D ).
Q: Talk about facing difficult situations and how you resolve them.
My answer: I procrastinate and push as much work off onto others as possible. That way when it blows up I can skip the blame.
BS answer: I feel it’s important to analyze difficult tasks carefully before making any rash business decisions. Some items are very complex and may involve insight from others to ensure my actions won’t cause conflict with other departments or individuals down the road.
March 27th, 2008 at 9:26 am
Hi David,
I couldn’t agree more. I have received job offers solely based on my blog. While I was in D.C., numerous interviewers referred to my blog and how impressed with it they were. Blogs show employers that we are engaged in our industry, passionate about writing, understand social media, and have a positive network of professionals, academics, and professors.
I’m glad you pointed it out!
Take care,
Meg
March 27th, 2008 at 9:53 am
David,
Great to see the things that we talk about and teach actually being used and tested in the real world. Employers are looking on Google and Social Networks to find out information on their prospective employees. It is up to us to put the information we want them to see online. Having a domain name for your brand is ideal but there are countless other tactics and strategies that you can use to hide that video of you taking a keg stand and jumping off a roof.
With Social Media, we are in control about what is posted about us online. No one updates my blog, or my Myspace/Facebook page but me. Hope you get the job you’re looking for and hopefully the blog post they found was a good one!!
May 27th, 2008 at 10:02 am
[...] make sure it lines up with your personal beliefs and morals. I’ve talked about how we need to manage our personal brand properly, and I still believe that a lot of that stuff [...]