Make It All Shine Online
1 year, 5 months agoSonja Carberry
Fri May 9, 6:15 PM ET
Thanks to the Internet, your life can be an open book. Make sure it's a good one. Some facts about how the Web affects your career.
Equal opportunity threat. Corporations and colleges routinely scour the Internet for inside peeks at applicants.
A lascivious party photo or a post raging against a previous employer can kill your chances.
Those examples just scratch the surface, says Michael Fertik, CEO of ReputationDefender.com. His company finds and removes unflattering digital content for clients.
"It's definitely not limited to college kids, but they are the vanguard of the problem," Fertik told IBD. "Our business has grown in our adult market. It's the new credit report -- it's a reputation report."
Think long term. Once something is posted on the Internet, it can stick around indefinitely.
"Think of the Web as a tattoo parlor," Fertik said.
If you don't want to live with it forever -- or go through the trouble of removing it -- don't post it.
It's not you. It's your friends. A fishing buddy who posts a photo of you enjoying an inebriated weekend means no harm, but the human resources manager reviewing your resume won't be amused.
"Half of the stuff on the Internet that we have to clean up is stuff that other people put up," Fertik said. "Its stuff that is not super-dangerous and not super-consequential until it gets out of Facebook or My-Space."
Question safeguards. Don't be lulled into thinking you can keep your social networking content under password lock and key. "The privacy controls that people think they have on MySpace and Facebook do not work," Fertik said.
Heed the dark side. A snapshot of two young women laughing is innocent enough, until it's snatched up by an unseemly site. A photo of one of Fertik's clients turned up on a Web page of drunken college girls.
Remove bad reviews. Maybe you got into a heated discussion on a blog and someone called you some choice words. It doesn't matter if the other person's assessment of you is wrong; an impression has been made.
"You have to get on top of what's being said about you," Fertik said.
Police yourself. When 20-somethings complain about being passed over for promotions, "No More Ramen" author Nicholas Aretakis tells them to cut back on Internet distractions -- instant messages, entertaining Web sites, blogs -- while on the job.
Employers track your online habits. On top of that, surfing at work eats up precious time.
Pre-Internet, "when you got bored at work, you asked for more work," Aretakis said, and that's what got you ahead.
Turn the tables. A positive spin on Internet transparency is the site Careertours.com, where employers post videos of employees in actual work situations to show potential applicants what it's like to work there.
"You get a much better feeling for if this is the job you want," Aretakis said. You can dig deeper by scouring Internet blogs for blemishes on a company's online reputation.
