Before I begin, let me discuss my blog quickly. I've decided to use this forum to rant about whatever may be on my mind. I hope some days it will be light and happy. Other days may be more serious. However, for the foreseeable future you can always expect my blog to be on a time delay relative to the rest of the world. Sorry folks but that's just the way life is. I like doing this but it is currently number 25 on a list of things I want to do and I can usually only get the first 5 or 10 things done before the list gets re-evaluated.
I find as I get older the about of "stupid" I encounter to be always increasing. I don't know what else to call it but it is stuff that common sense would tell you is wrong without another thought. So here's today's topic: Facebook passwords and interviews.
For those of you who need the background, there has been an increase lately in potential employers asking for your Facebook credentials so they can snoop on you. Now, let me say that I work in IT. If I were allowed by my company, I'd ask this as a standard interviewing question. The only reason I'd ask it is to see what kind of reaction it got. If the potential candidate gave valid credentials, I've never hire him assuming he knew nothing of proper security. After all, if he gave me his Facebook credentials, he may give someone else his credentials to my company's systems. However, if the candidate refused that would be more interesting. Does he/she give fake credentials, do they have a dummy minimalist account setup for this already or do they outright refuse? It might tell you something about that person's attitude that you wouldn't find out normally. But really if someone asked you this what would you do? I'd say you should outright refuse and then start acting very offended that they would even ask. I've been desperate for a job before but handing over this kind of thing doesn't seem appropriate or relevant to the job I'd be applying for. If I was asked this I would seriously consider not working at that employer regardless of whether or not they accepted my refusal to hand over my password. It sets the wrong tone for the whole employment relationship. I'd be expecting them to push for unpaid overtime or worse the next time there was any discussions.
I've can't come up with a scenario where this would benefit me as a person trying to find a job. Could I see it if I was applying for a people-focused position and needed to know how the person interacted with others, maybe as some kind of living portfolio? Maybe but it seems like a real stretch. This just seems like a huge privacy invasion to me. How about as an employer? Well maybe this gets you valuable insight into a bad candidate. I don't know if that immediate sacrifice of all goodwill is a good idea if the candidate does turn out to be good. I'd assume this could be better handled by the probation period new employees are put typically put on. Something really bad comes up, they can be terminated without explanation. Was the person talking bad about a previous company in public? Well maybe but even if they were, biting the hand that feeds you rarely works out best for everyone in the long run. If they were spreading lies or leaking information I'd assume a decent lawyer could handle that with relative ease.
I don't know offhand what my own employer does about this in general. It sounds borderline illegal so I'd expect they steer well clear of it. What I don't get is if this really isn't that beneficial why are so many places starting to do this? Am I missing something obvious or is this just a case of benefit versus risk?
No comments:
Post a Comment