These days, there are very few people in and around Ft. Lauderdale that aren’t connected via social media somehow. You’ve got your Tweeters, YouTube users, Facebook posters, LinkedIn users, and even bloggers. On the surface, it might seem like these social networking sites are a pot of gold for employers looking to fill positions for permanent and temporary Ft. Lauderdale jobs. After all, these social networking sites allow us access to job candidates that we’ve never had before. They allow you to find out almost anything about these individuals.

Unfortunately, some Ft. Lauderdale companies take social network checks a little too far, crossing that thin line between a background check and a legal minefield. If you’re going to evaluate the lives your applicants have put on display via their social media sites, it’s important to know when enough is enough.

The benefits of checking a job applicant’s social media sites before hiring them are easy to see. These sites allow you to get to know the applicant on a deeper level; you get to understand their interests, what makes them tick, and what they like to do in their spare time. This can provide you with a deeper understanding later on of how to motivate them to be more efficient and productive. Social media checks can also prevent you from hiring someone that could be a bad fit for your company. They provide you with an unfiltered look at the person’s character through each of their tweets, posts, and blogs.

Unfortunately, the downside to social media checks is that they do provide all of this information, and it can, in some circumstances, affect whether or not offer Ft. Lauderdale jobs to these individuals. You may not even realize how much these checks affect you; however, consider the information you’re given just by reading an applicant’s Facebook page or blog.

• The age, race, and disability of the applicant. If you aren’t allowed to ask about it in a job interview, discovering this information via social media isn’t a good idea. You could, subconsciously, make the hiring decision based on this information, which would be considered discrimination.
• You could read a blog post they have written that relates to their personal ethnicity or religious beliefs. Again, if this influences your hiring decision for temporary Ft. Lauderdale jobs in the least, it could be considered discrimination.
• You could gain information by becoming friends with the individual on ‘friends only’ websites, like Facebook and Myspace. When done for this purpose, it could legally be considered an invasion of privacy.

How to Know When You’ve Taken Things Too Far

When it comes to assessing candidates for Ft. Lauderdale jobs, social media background checks should be avoided as much as possible. While they can provide you with insight into the life of a job candidate, they can be a legal minefield. If you need to evaluate a candidate via social media, keep the following in mind.

• Be prepared to ignore information you may obtain via the social media site, like the age, race, religion, or marital status of the job applicant. These should not factor into your decision of whether or not to hire the candidate for Ft. Lauderdale jobs.
• If you must violate an applicant’s privacy in order to obtain any information about them, (becoming a follower on Facebook or befriending them on Myspace,) don’t take any further action.
• Consider everything you read on an individual’s social media page with a grain of salt. While it may display their name and picture, the page may not actually be theirs. Authenticity is difficult on the internet, and nothing you see should completely alter your decision for hiring them for temporary Ft. Lauderdale jobs.

If you’re not sure you are hiring the right candidate, consider alternative choices to the social media background check. For instance, hiring a staffing service to take care of the application, interview, and hiring process can reduce your staffing burden and help you avoid legal ramifications that could result from going too far with the social media checks.

Need help recruiting new staff for your Ft. Lauderdale jobs? Contact one of our best recruiters at our Ft. Lauderdale office 954-916-2772.