Should Social Media Be Used In Hiring Process?

487 Words2 Pages

Niharika Bibireddy
Professor Epstein
Organizational Behavior 300
26 May 2016

Social media and Hiring Decisions
Social media plays an important role in everyone’s life. It connects us to the world in a unique way and informs us about the current news and exciting things. A Source from (We are social) states that “Nearly 2.1 million people have social media accounts by the end of year 2015”. We have the freedom to post whatever we want on social media by constantly updating our thoughts, feelings opinions and social life on there. But should social media (other than LinkedIn) be used in hiring process? I strongly believe that Social media should not be used in hiring process because it is unfair, …show more content…

I believe this not a reliable source to consider in the hiring process. For example, a social media page can provide information about candidates religion, marital status, race, ethnicity, age, likes and dislikes, hobbies, political affiliation etc. However it’s not a good predictor of their job performance. Sometimes we unconsciously form stereotypes because it is human nature. “A stereotype is an individual’s set of beliefs about the charactistics or attributes of a group”(Epstein, 2016). Forming stereotypes can lead to poor decisions and may or may not be accurate. Stereotype is based on four categories. For example when an employee looks at a candidate’s profile, he or she will group the candidate by age, gender, race which is called categorizing. Suppose if the candidate puts up pictures of himself or herself partying, it might infer to the employee that he/she’s work ethic might be weak. Then the employee might have unrealistic expectations. Lastly we maintain stereotype by overestimating frequency of stereotypic behaviors exhibited by others. Screening candidates can unconsciously form stereotypes and since most of the things we see on social media aren’t always true, it shouldn’t be considered during a hiring