In today’s job-hunting world, one of the biggest fears of any person is a potential employer seeing something unprofessional on their social media account(s).
You might have heard horror stories of seemingly harmless content costing people that awesome job, and you want to do everything in your power to avoid that situation.
Even with this looming over people’s heads, many still do almost nothing about it.
In fact, in a recent survey, it was found that a mere 24% of people ever adjust their Facebook settings before applying for a job.
Another survey states that up to 93% of employers actively search out potential candidates Facebook profiles before deciding whether or not to hire them, so it’s time to get on adjusting your privacy settings.
To help you out, here are a few steps to successfully adjusting the privacy settings on your Facebook account prior to your job hunt.
- Change The Visibility of Your Profile
The first step you should take is adjusting what public Facebook browsers can see when viewing your profile.
Doing this will help you ensure that your boss only sees what you want them to see (as well as Grandma).
In order to do this step, simply go to your profile, click the “…” button on the lower left corner of your cover photo, click “view as…” and then adjust the settings to your liking.
- Time to Modify Your Search Settings
Did you know that if you have your search setting set to default that anyone with your phone number or email address can easily find your Facebook profile? If this weirds you out, it may be time to start modifying your search settings.
To change these settings, click on the gear icon in the upper right corner and click on “see more settings.”
Here you will have several choices for how people are able to find your profile.
You can determine if you want search engines to link to your profile, for example. Disabling this option, along with the ability to find you via phone/email, is the best way to ensure a boss can’t find you in the first place.
- Approving Tags Will Save You a Lot of Grief
Maybe you were at a sketchy party that you later regretted.
Maybe your former roommate decided to tag you in an obscene photo from your freshmen year.
Whatever the case, you want to have power over what content you are tagged in. It would be terrible to find out that you thought you deleted all objectionable content just to hear that your would-have-been-boss saw that puking photo that your “friend” tagged you in.
By changing your security settings to only show tags once you approve them, you will save yourself a lot of grief.
To adjust your settings, go to your privacy settings and click on “Timeline and Tagging.” From that point, click on “Who can add things to my timeline,” and adjust the settings to your liking.
- Keep Your Friends Communication to Yourself
Not everyone has to see what your friends post on your timeline.
You can change your settings so that you only see what they post on their timeline.
If you want to change this setting, just go to the “Timeline and Tagging” setting once again and adjust from the same “Who can add things to my timeline” area.
- Do a Sweep of Your Old Posts
Chances are, you have had your Facebook profile for at least a few years. With all of that potential problematic content floating around, you don’t want to leave your job prospects up to chance.
Take advantage of Facebook’s timeline feature and go through the entirety of your Facebook history.
To give you an idea of the content you should be especially cautious of, here is a shortlist of some of the stuff employers look for:
- Illegal Drugs
- Overtly Sexual Posts
- Profanity
- References to Guns or Violence of Any Kind
- Alcohol Consumption Photos
- You Could Change Your Name
Changing your name to something unsearchable can give you privacy without changing your search settings to that of a Hermit.
You don’t have to drastic with the name change either, and can simply change your first name to a nickname of sorts.
Good luck with your job search!
