Quo Vadis Opinions

Just like a man, reports that the eight Bulmer employees involved in the making of this video have been sacked.
Many people still do not understand  that when you publish material on the internet, it can be found by other people, including your employer.

For example, this week, I heard about a young male teacher in all girls school who left his bebo account open, i.e. everyone can access.  So of course ,the students were following his social activities and eventually one student requested he (the teacher) be her  Bebo friend. Stupidly the teacher agreed to this.  Eventually he copped on and made his bebo account private.

Some people may see nothing wrong with this-simply a teacher being friendly with a student. But under the children first guidelines for the protection and welfare of children, if that student’s parents decided to make a complaint, the school would probably have to formally report the complaint to the HSE and/or the Gardai.
So the teacher would have a complaint  on his record. Whether there’s substance to it or not, this would have a detrimental impact on his future career. The school principal is likely to be fairly cheesed off with him, because they have to spend  time dealing with irate parents.

Another more serious allegation, where this time a young female teacher is alleged to have commented in rather coarse terms on the physical attractiveness of her male pupils on her bebo account.  Again the bebo account has now been made private.
Surely in college, these young teachers covered the issue of the power they have in relationships  with their pupil, and how they must not only use this responsibly but be seen to use it responsibly?  And yes there is a certain amount of hysteria around internet grooming of young people, but that means you have to be even more careful.

Also it’s not just teachers who have to be careful.
Two young athletes in Scotland lost their grants because they spoke about getting drunk on their bebo accounts. (unfortunately I can’t find the web reference)

Increasingly employers can and do google potential recruits and use the information to decide on job offers and questions to ask in interviews.
It may not be legal, but how do you prove you were not offered a job because an employer googled you?

The Irish Independent reports on an employee who lost his job when his employer found his  “family emergency”  was actually a trip to the States. The employee  put photos of himself on his facebook profile enjoying a beer in a fairy suit. 
Full story here

As Homer Simpson would say “doh”.

Even the Revenue Commissioners are using social networking sites to audit your taxes. Full story on  spongebopp

So don’t put anything on the internet, that you don’t want future or existing employers to see. This applies both to your own social networking sites and other peoples’s accounts.
After all if they see  saucy photo’s and you writing about being totally so hung over on Monday morning, you could n’t go into work, are they likely to want to employ you?
According to Damien Mulley, once it’s up there, it’s nearly impossible to erase.
So youthful exploits at 18  years can still be found when you’re 35 and in line for that much wanted promotion.

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This entry was posted on Saturday, May 17th, 2008 at 2:59 pm and is filed under Career Guidance, Workplace trends. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.