[jsfg_cinti] ARTICLE: Clean Up Your Digital Dirt Before It Trashes Your Job Search

Here's an interesting article.  I wonder how the
recruiter's verify that the "digital dirt" they dig up
on a person that they do a Google (or other) websearch
on is actually related to the person they are
recruiting?  

After all, lots of people have the same name.  The
"digital dirt" that they dig up with Google or other
search engines could be dirt on the wrong person. 
Sounds like a risky way to do research for the
recruiter.

On the other hand, as job searchers this is something
you should know about.  

Regards,
Lance Feldman

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http://www.computerworld.com/careertopics/careers/story/0,10801,107810,00.html?source=NLT_PM&nid=107810

Clean Up Your Digital Dirt Before It Trashes Your Job
Search
by Jared Flesher

Less than flattering information about you online can
doom your shot at a new job. Find out how to defend
yourself. 

JANUARY 17, 2006 (CAREERJOURNAL) - Unflattering
personal information drifting around the Internet,
known by some as "digital dirt," can doom a job search
before it even gets started. Job hunters should know
that recruiters can, and often do, read much of what's
posted about them on the Web.

Christine Hirsch, president of Chicago Resources, a
professional-services recruiting firm, says she
regularly uses Google and other sites to check on
candidates. In one instance, she found details about a
candidate on a law school Web site describing
disciplinary actions related to a fraternity prank
involving public intoxication. The candidate, who had
received a verbal offer (and who had disclosed a
drunken-driving conviction in college), didn't get the
job after the new information surfaced.

According to a 2005 survey of 102 executive recruiters
by ExecuNet, an executive job-search and networking
organization, 75% of recruiters use search engines to
uncover information about candidates, and 26% of
recruiters have eliminated candidates because of
information found online.

Search engines aren't going away, so here are some
tips to help job seekers clean up their digital dirt.

Google Yourself

First, find out what's out there. Go to a popular
search engine (Google, Yahoo or MSN.com will do) and
type your name in quotation marks.

I recently Googled my name and found that the top two
results were pages I'd rather recruiters not see. One
was a link to a page from the Department of Justice's
Antitrust Division. My name is there only because
someone posted a response I made to reader mail about
an article on real-estate commissions. All the same,
I'd rather not be associated with the matter. The
other link is to a gushing article I wrote about an
online game I used to play. Nothing scandalous, but
recruiters might not know I wrote it when I was 14.

If you find something you'd rather the world didn't
see, contact the site's owner and ask that it be
removed. If you get a "no," contacting search engines
isn't likely to help. To date, I haven't looked into
getting my mentions removed.

Clean Up Your Facebook

Search engines might not find your risque profile on
social-networking sites like Facebook.com, but that
doesn't mean it's hidden from recruiters. Chris
Hughes, a spokesman for Facebook, says he's heard that
recruiters with alumni e-mail addresses log in to look
up job candidates who attended the same school.

A 21-year-old Virginia university student, a sociology
major, recently cleaned up her Facebook profile --
including removing a picture of her pole-dancing in a
cowgirl outfit at a sorority social.

"At the time, I thought it was a great idea," she
says. "I mean, who has a picture of themselves
swinging on a pole?"

She doesn't want to take any chances now that she's
job hunting. "It's just really unprofessional," she
says.

...

Bury Your Dirt

You may be able to cover up your digital dirt by
crowding it out with positive information. Search
engines typically rank their results based on the
number of sites that link to those pages. The more
links, the higher the search ranking. Make sure the
pages you want recruiters to see have more links to
them than the pages you'd rather keep hidden.

"The best way to make something [bad] go away is to
have a lot of 'online presence' of your own," says
Luis Villa, senior technology analyst at the Berkman
Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School.
He suggests starting a Web page or a blog.

Tune In to Your Blog Buzz

Just because you may be paranoid doesn't mean people
aren't talking trash about you online. You can monitor
your Web presence through sites like Pubsub.com, which
will alert you by e-mail when your name is mentioned
in Internet newsgroups, blogs and securities filings.

"It's like putting a filter on a hose and catching
information as it goes by," says Salim Ismail, chief
executive officer and co-founder of the site, which is
based in New York.

Paul Kedrosky, a venture-capital investor in Vancouver
who blogs about technology and finance, says he tracks
his online reputation on Pubsub and similar sites such
as Feedster.

"Getting regular reports on what people are saying
about things related to me is really useful because a
lot of times there are errors," he says. "You want to
make sure you set the record straight."

-Flesher is freelance writer living in Central New
Jersey.

...
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