6 ms·

A personal observation: I'm also a hiring manager, and I struggle with this problem on both sides of the table. I Google candidates for their professional opin

A personal observation: I'm also a hiring manager, and I struggle with this problem on both sides of the table. I Google candidates for their professional opinions and activities. But what do I do if I find their profile on a public site like HN? Some of the comments are going to be useful fodder for an interview I noticed you posted a comment on HN suggesting OOP has had its fifteen minutes of fame. What do you see replacing it? ... But I might also read opinions about politics. What if the same person has posted HN comments about Obama the Magic Negro? I really don't want to know what they think and why in the context of hiring them. Worse, what if I see a comment from the same person saying one of my posts is absolute garbage and that I'm an idiot? Now I may have compromised my impartiality. I don't know the answer. I wouldn't look up a candidate in something obviously personal like Facebook or MySpace, but I have no idea how to handle stuff like HN that contains what I perceive to be a mix of relevant technical opinions and personal, wrong-side-of-the-privacy-line stuff. I don't know.

nostrademons 17y ago
"Worse, what if I see a comment from the same person saying one of my posts is absolute garbage and that I'm an idiot? Now I may have compromised my impartiality." If you're a good manager, you should be able to stomach having an employee tell you that. After all, what if your opinion is absolute garbage and you're an idiot? Do you want people working for you who won't call you out when you're wrong? The right question to ask there is why your posts is garbage and you're an idiot. See if they can defend it. And if they can, and can convince you that your own post is garbage, that's someone worth hiring. If they're just ranting, maybe it's time to look at another candidate.
- raganwald 17y ago
  If I made a practice of asking candidates to list every example they can find online of me being idiotic, my interviews would all be 6-8 hours long...
sethg 17y ago
When I started blogging I made a conscious decision to make everything public and put everything in one place. You go to my blog and you see my opinions about computer programming, Judaism, economics, sex, whatever. I wonder if my descendants will consider this kind of behavior quaint if not dangerously naïve. Of course, they might say (might will say?), you maintain multiple online identities and even if everything posted under them is publically readable, you give one URL to the guy interviewing you, and then a different one to the officemate who has become your friend, and maybe you keep your really emotionally sticky stuff on a third site that only two or three people know is connected to your true identity. And it would be an extreme social gaffe--a sort of electronic peeping-tom-ism--for anyone to reveal "the guy who posts here also writes this blog" to an unauthorized party.
- chadgeidel 17y ago
  On the contrary - you are now actively aware of and can manage your online "persona." (I do this to an extent, but I'm not very prolific). I think too many people think: "I'm going to post this on the Internet and then hide it." Sorry, folks, if it's on the Internet there's a pretty good chance you won't be able to control it.
- samlittlewood 17y ago
  Stay that way, unless you are prepared to go to extremes to maintain separate identities (physical, temporal, financial). Anything casual will crumble under pressure, so it's best not to have the false sense of security.
  - mechanical_fish 17y ago
    Anything casual will crumble under pressure... This is true, but it misses the point. Keeping your online identities separate isn't a security measure. (And when it is -- when you're a political dissident facing imprisonment or torture -- it's very very risky.) You maintain separate identities because it sends a social signal. The signal is "I recognize the distinction between professional and casual behavior; between public and private behavior; between an artistic pose and heartfelt sincerity. I understand basic social and literary conventions and I know how to use them." A classic example: Fake Steve Jobs, who I think is a pretty good model of proper literary behavior. Daniel Lyons wanted to have some fun, so he concocted a persona and started a blog under that persona's name. The persona's voice is distinct from that of Daniel Lyons, the journalist (which is why so many people say things like "man, he was so good as Fake Steve; why are his Newsweek articles so uninspiring?"), which in turn is almost certainly distinct from Mr. Lyons the person, Mr. Lyons the family member, and Mr. Lyons the party animal. But Lyons obeys the conventions. He doesn't just type everything that comes into his head into one blog. Obviously you should expect your prospective employers to Google you and read your public writing, particularly that which might pertain to your field. (I told my new employer all about my writing on HN, for example.) But just as it is your responsibility to observe proper social and literary convention, it is also your employer's responsibility: Just because it's easy to riffle through Facebook and MySpace (the online equivalent of following your prospective employee around at night, peeking into his or her windows) doesn't mean that employers are ethical when they do so. But Google makes window-peering so easy that it's sometimes hard to avoid. So: Pseudonyms, my friend, pseudonyms. Not to mention Pepys' brilliant invention: the posthumous diary. (I sometimes wonder if I should start a web service for writing posthumously-published blog posts. But it's kind of the anti-viable online business: It has negative word of mouth (your customers would prefer that their friends and family don't know about it), and the writers have pretty poor interaction with the audience, and nobody will ever have enough faith in your privacy policy or performance warranty.)
inerte 17y ago
I remember reading a story about a company who was advised by its lawyers to simply never look for stuff online, for reasons close to yours. The off chance that you could read about someone's pregnancy (something that you should not ask in a interview) was enough for them to ban the practice. I don't agree, but it's a good argument. Very protective of the lawyers.
kragen 17y ago
What if the same person has posted HN comments about Obama the Magic Negro? I really don't want to know what they think and why in the context of hiring them. Although this hasn't come up when I've been on hiring committees, I would want to avoid hiring people who are unusually racist; it's likely to make it hard for them to work with their co-workers down the line, and if they end up making hiring decisions, it might result in racist hiring decisions. (I say "unusually racist" because people who are completely non-racist are pretty rare, at least in the US. I wouldn't want to be Diogenes the Hiring Manager.)
- raganwald 17y ago
  A discussion about a Magic Negro need not be racist, however I don't even want to look at what someone has to say on the subject if I'm hiring them. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magical_negro http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magical_negro
  - kragen 17y ago
    I agree that you can discuss the archetype without being racist, but I think such a discussion is likely to reveal the degree of someone's racism. Why is that something you'd prefer to find out after hiring them rather than before?
    - raganwald 17y ago
      My guess is that I don't ever want to know your attitude about that if we work together. I want to know your attitude towards things like continuous integration :-)
      - kragen 17y ago
        I'm surprised that you are asserting that it's possible to remain ignorant of whether your coworkers are unusually racist, but I guess you probably know a lot more about that than I do.
- deleted 17y ago
  [deleted]
scscsc 17y ago
I think googling someone's name is fair game. You get to see what projects they work on, what communities (i.e. job related) they are part of etc. By yes, there is a line to draw. And definitely facebook and myspace are on the other side.
frossie 17y ago
I also hire and I have two answers to that. First, you are already supposed to ignore facts that you can see when hiring. For example, you are supposed to ignore that you are interviewing a person in a wheelchair, or that is of a different race/age/gender than you, and focus on their ability to meet your requirements. So, when I google (which as others have said, I do to check out open source activity - something I rate highly) I just try not to read personal stuff, and if I can't avoid it I do my best not to let it affect my decisions. But... Secondly: if you post content that is inappropriate under most social and professional circumstances under your own name, even if it personally does not ick me, then you show distinct lack of judgement. I quite like my people to show good judgement. There are a myriad of ways to express yourself online without it ending up in the face of someone casually googling you. Certainly for a technical job, I would be perturbed if you showed blatant ignorance on how to do it.
DanielBMarkham 17y ago
Sounds like a great accidental pre-interview question: how is this person at disagreeing with people online? If you're going to have a presence online, you're going to have to have a public presence. I know lots of people would like for it to be the other way around, but I honestly just don't see that happening. META: I'd love to upvote this article for the comments, but the article itself isn't that good. So no upvote.

nostrademons 17y ago

"Worse, what if I see a comment from the same person saying one of my posts is absolute garbage and that I'm an idiot? Now I may have compromised my impartiality." If you're a good manager, you should be able to stomach having an employee tell you that. After all, what if your opinion is absolute garbage and you're an idiot? Do you want people working for you who won't call you out when you're wrong? The right question to ask there is why your posts is garbage and you're an idiot. See if they can defend it. And if they can, and can convince you that your own post is garbage, that's someone worth hiring. If they're just ranting, maybe it's time to look at another candidate.

raganwald 17y ago
If I made a practice of asking candidates to list every example they can find online of me being idiotic, my interviews would all be 6-8 hours long...

sethg 17y ago

When I started blogging I made a conscious decision to make everything public and put everything in one place. You go to my blog and you see my opinions about computer programming, Judaism, economics, sex, whatever. I wonder if my descendants will consider this kind of behavior quaint if not dangerously naïve. Of course, they might say (might will say?), you maintain multiple online identities and even if everything posted under them is publically readable, you give one URL to the guy interviewing you, and then a different one to the officemate who has become your friend, and maybe you keep your really emotionally sticky stuff on a third site that only two or three people know is connected to your true identity. And it would be an extreme social gaffe--a sort of electronic peeping-tom-ism--for anyone to reveal "the guy who posts here also writes this blog" to an unauthorized party.

chadgeidel 17y ago
On the contrary - you are now actively aware of and can manage your online "persona." (I do this to an extent, but I'm not very prolific). I think too many people think: "I'm going to post this on the Internet and then hide it." Sorry, folks, if it's on the Internet there's a pretty good chance you won't be able to control it.
samlittlewood 17y ago
Stay that way, unless you are prepared to go to extremes to maintain separate identities (physical, temporal, financial). Anything casual will crumble under pressure, so it's best not to have the false sense of security.
- mechanical_fish 17y ago
  Anything casual will crumble under pressure... This is true, but it misses the point. Keeping your online identities separate isn't a security measure. (And when it is -- when you're a political dissident facing imprisonment or torture -- it's very very risky.) You maintain separate identities because it sends a social signal. The signal is "I recognize the distinction between professional and casual behavior; between public and private behavior; between an artistic pose and heartfelt sincerity. I understand basic social and literary conventions and I know how to use them." A classic example: Fake Steve Jobs, who I think is a pretty good model of proper literary behavior. Daniel Lyons wanted to have some fun, so he concocted a persona and started a blog under that persona's name. The persona's voice is distinct from that of Daniel Lyons, the journalist (which is why so many people say things like "man, he was so good as Fake Steve; why are his Newsweek articles so uninspiring?"), which in turn is almost certainly distinct from Mr. Lyons the person, Mr. Lyons the family member, and Mr. Lyons the party animal. But Lyons obeys the conventions. He doesn't just type everything that comes into his head into one blog. Obviously you should expect your prospective employers to Google you and read your public writing, particularly that which might pertain to your field. (I told my new employer all about my writing on HN, for example.) But just as it is your responsibility to observe proper social and literary convention, it is also your employer's responsibility: Just because it's easy to riffle through Facebook and MySpace (the online equivalent of following your prospective employee around at night, peeking into his or her windows) doesn't mean that employers are ethical when they do so. But Google makes window-peering so easy that it's sometimes hard to avoid. So: Pseudonyms, my friend, pseudonyms. Not to mention Pepys' brilliant invention: the posthumous diary. (I sometimes wonder if I should start a web service for writing posthumously-published blog posts. But it's kind of the anti-viable online business: It has negative word of mouth (your customers would prefer that their friends and family don't know about it), and the writers have pretty poor interaction with the audience, and nobody will ever have enough faith in your privacy policy or performance warranty.)

inerte 17y ago

I remember reading a story about a company who was advised by its lawyers to simply never look for stuff online, for reasons close to yours. The off chance that you could read about someone's pregnancy (something that you should not ask in a interview) was enough for them to ban the practice. I don't agree, but it's a good argument. Very protective of the lawyers.

kragen 17y ago

What if the same person has posted HN comments about Obama the Magic Negro? I really don't want to know what they think and why in the context of hiring them. Although this hasn't come up when I've been on hiring committees, I would want to avoid hiring people who are unusually racist; it's likely to make it hard for them to work with their co-workers down the line, and if they end up making hiring decisions, it might result in racist hiring decisions. (I say "unusually racist" because people who are completely non-racist are pretty rare, at least in the US. I wouldn't want to be Diogenes the Hiring Manager.)

raganwald 17y ago
A discussion about a Magic Negro need not be racist, however I don't even want to look at what someone has to say on the subject if I'm hiring them. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magical_negro http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magical_negro
- kragen 17y ago
  I agree that you can discuss the archetype without being racist, but I think such a discussion is likely to reveal the degree of someone's racism. Why is that something you'd prefer to find out after hiring them rather than before?
  - raganwald 17y ago
    My guess is that I don't ever want to know your attitude about that if we work together. I want to know your attitude towards things like continuous integration :-)
    - kragen 17y ago
      I'm surprised that you are asserting that it's possible to remain ignorant of whether your coworkers are unusually racist, but I guess you probably know a lot more about that than I do.
deleted 17y ago
[deleted]

scscsc 17y ago

I think googling someone's name is fair game. You get to see what projects they work on, what communities (i.e. job related) they are part of etc. By yes, there is a line to draw. And definitely facebook and myspace are on the other side.

frossie 17y ago

I also hire and I have two answers to that. First, you are already supposed to ignore facts that you can see when hiring. For example, you are supposed to ignore that you are interviewing a person in a wheelchair, or that is of a different race/age/gender than you, and focus on their ability to meet your requirements. So, when I google (which as others have said, I do to check out open source activity - something I rate highly) I just try not to read personal stuff, and if I can't avoid it I do my best not to let it affect my decisions. But... Secondly: if you post content that is inappropriate under most social and professional circumstances under your own name, even if it personally does not ick me, then you show distinct lack of judgement. I quite like my people to show good judgement. There are a myriad of ways to express yourself online without it ending up in the face of someone casually googling you. Certainly for a technical job, I would be perturbed if you showed blatant ignorance on how to do it.

DanielBMarkham 17y ago

Sounds like a great accidental pre-interview question: how is this person at disagreeing with people online? If you're going to have a presence online, you're going to have to have a public presence. I know lots of people would like for it to be the other way around, but I honestly just don't see that happening. META: I'd love to upvote this article for the comments, but the article itself isn't that good. So no upvote.