Beware, your Twitter will find you out

Mar 6 2009 by Alison Lowson, Perthshire Advertiser Friday

CHECKING references used to be the final stage in the recruitment process. But in these days of Facebook, Bebo and Twitter, the smart employer would do well to check out their successful candidate’s on-line postings…particularly if said candidate is under the age of 20.

And I'll bet Ivell Marketing and Logistics Limited in Clacton, Essex, wished they had googled 16-year-old Kimberley Swan’s Facebook page before they gave her a job, rather than wait till they read how “boring” she found her first foray into the world of paid employment.

The resulting dismissal and subsequent national news coverage should act as a salutary lesson to young people daft enough to assume potential employers won’t surf their online life.

Reminds me of one young genius I interviewed who, if you believed hisflannel, was a regular church-goer, borderline teetotal and in a committed relationship with his girlfriend.

However, a sneaky glance at his Facebook site revealed his hobbies were in fact, and I'm quoting verbatim here, “chugging lager and snoggin' burdz”.

Good job too, otherwise he wouldn’t have got the job!