Since the advent of social media, diligent hiring managers and recruiters have scoured the internet to see the real you prior to hiring you. What’s changing is the level of sophistication and ease with which it’s happening now. Imagine a college party posting from twelve years ago determining whether you get a job or a promotion today? It’s happening. And what’s more, is it’s happening often without a human ever specifically seeing the pictures or reading posts you made.
The latest trend is social media software that includes presets determined to be red flags by hiring managers, programmed into the software that then allows artificial intelligence (AI) to scan the internet for anything attributed to you. If it finds something, that might be the end of your prospects or at a minimum could create a severe disadvantage for you in a competitive situation. According to Fama the AI is 99.98% accurate in making a determination that often isn’t flattering. To you give an idea of how pervasive negative content is found, 36.5% of all people who use social media accounts have content that’s potentially disqualifying.
That's more than a third! And here’s the breakout of negative content found by the AI.
- #1 Misogyny and sexist content
- #2 Violence, illegal drugs or crime
- #3 Bigotry and/or racism
That’s not even including drinking/drunken behavior content. The point is this, more than a third of social media users have stuff posted that could be disqualifying and if it’s ever existed new technology can find it. Rather than being frustrated with AI being programmed to find dirt on us online, it's a good reminder that being the worst versions of ourselves is never a good idea and it could cost you more than you would ever been aware of.
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