For quite some time now, it’s seemed like you can’t turn around without finding someone tweeting, re-tweeting, or updating their Facebook status. The reality of social media has sunk into every corner of our culture.

Every corner, apparently, except one: HR. It’s hard to believe that the workplace could be so slow to deal with the social networking phenomenon, but a new study reveals that 75 percent of employers say their business has no formal policy instructing employees on the appropriate use of social networking sites on the job.

The study, “Employer Perspectives on Social Networking,” is being released along with the report “Social Networks vs. Management: Harness the Power of Social Media,” and compiles data from 34,000 businesses in 35 countries.

Beginning in October 2009, these employers were asked four key questions:

• Does your organization have a formal policy regarding employee use of external social network sites such as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn?
• In which of these areas has your policy been effective?
• In what two areas do you believe external social networks can provide the biggest boost to your organization in the future?
• Has your organization’s reputation ever been negatively affected as a result of employees’ use of social networking sites?

Three out of four employers reported their business had no policy governing social networking, and on top of that, another five percent couldn’t determine if such a policy existed or not!

The implications of these results are huge, for both businesses and workers. In a world where many people don’t think twice about regularly logging in to these sites, employers stand to lose a significant number of number of man-hours to shared Flickr streams and Ashton Kutcher’s latest posts.

In fact, 63 percent of employers who did have social networking policies in place reported that those policies improved productivity. More than a third also said their social-networking policies had helped to protect their company’s intellectual property and other proprietary information.

HR professionals should also consider that the lack of a policy can leave both managers and their employees feeling vulnerable. Many workers have already adopted a “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy when it comes to social networking at work, and may think the lack of specific guidelines protects them from disciplinary action. Managers may be frustrated by a perceived lack of support when they think social networking is leading to a loss in productivity. This is one case where any policy may be better than nothing — only 2 percent felt that their company’s guidelines were not effective.

About two-thirds of the existing policies cover only restrictions on the use of social networking. However, the study also revealed that many employers feel this type of site, when properly regulated, has potential in the workplace, and that this upside should be considered when drafting a policy. Nearly 60 percent saw a bright future for social networking in their own business, believing it could be useful in building their brand (20%), improving collaboration and communication (19%), recruiting talent (15%), and hiring (13%).

According to MarketingVOX, there are even bigger possibilities — and pitfalls — for social networking in the corporate world:

“Social networks have become a goldmine of information for companies skilled in the art of connecting the dots - a little-noticed development that is beginning to concern companies. In many cases mining such information is completely legally. For example, one can examine public statements by company staffers - especially if they are inconsistent - that can point to new initiatives under way.

Bob Fox, head of a competitive intelligence program for Canadian entrepreneurs advises firms to monitor competitors’ comments in the media, on industry blogs, at conferences and, yes, on social networks like Twitter and Facebook.”

The study concludes that, in general, employers are taking a “wait and see” attitude toward social networking. That may be true, but “wait” is a word that doesn’t mean much in the 24/7 culture of social networking,

The impact of social media cannot be denied. The 2009 word of the year was “tweet,” and the word of the decade was “google,” according to the American Dialect Society. Social media such as Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, Flickr, and YouTube—which are defined by their user-generated content—have wiggled their way into most people’s working hours, and thus onto many workplace computers.

In the field of Human Resources, most talk of social media has to do with pre-employment: talent sourcing, advertising job openings, and performing background checks. But social media is now integrated with each stage of the employee lifecycle: before, during, and after. HR practitioners should study their proper use (and possible misuse), and learn what steps to take now to maximize their benefit while heading off potential legal problems.

An excellent article on this topic was just published in The National Law Journal. In “Social media permeate the employment life cycle: Employers must address their use and misuse before, during and after an employee’s tenure,” labor and employment attorney Renee M. Jackson writes about the simultaneous opportunities and risk presented by social media. Here are some of her top thoughts, as well as those of HR pros, on points you should consider at each stage of the employee lifecycle.

PRE-EMPLOYMENT

The networking power of social media is undeniably helping people find jobs, and helping companies find talent. If you’re ready to take full advantage of it, check out an article like Fistful of HR’s “5 Must-Use Social Media Tools For HR & Recruiting Professionals In 2009.”

Know this, though: because people now publicly disclose much more information than they did in the past, organizations must take care, writes Jackson in The National Law Journal:

… Applicants may reveal more information about themselves through social media than they normally would during the hiring process. In making hiring decisions, employers can lawfully use information relating to an applicant’s illegal drug use, poor work ethic, poor writing or communications skills, feelings about previous employers and racist or other discriminatory tendencies. Employers may also lawfully consider an applicant’s general poor judgment in maintenance of his or her public online persona.

Employers, however, may face liability under federal, state and local law for using any information learned from social media about an applicant’s protected class status — race, age, disability, religion, sexual orientation, etc. — in a hiring decision. It may be hard for the employer to prove in later litigation that it only viewed, but didn’t actually use, the information obtained in a social medium when making its hiring decision.

Your organization must seriously consider whether you want to use social media in your talent searches at all. If you do, Jackson recommends that you follow these guidelines:

• Conduct uniform searches that are just and consistent
• Use a non-biased third party to perform social media research
• Do not “friend” applicants to gain access to non-public information
• And other important points

DURING EMPLOYMENT

One of the biggest issues caused by social media during an employee tenure is the simple theft of working time. There are also matters of privacy, nondisclosure, taboo topics and hostile work environment, brand protection, and many more. The good news is, this is the stage when you have the most control over the situation. Most organizations would benefit from a well-researched, clear, and fairly applied social media policy. To research the matter, I recommend  beginning with “10 Must-Haves for Your Social Media Policy” by Sharlyn Lauby, who you may know as The HR Bartender, or “How to Develop a Social Media Policy” from About.com. There are a wide range of policies, but one thing all the experts agree on is that a successful policy is not arbitrary, but is a genuine expression of the needs of an organization which has considered both the risks and rewards of this new media.

Some of Jackson’s top recommendations for points to include in a policy are:

• A prohibition on disclosure of the employer’s confidential, trade secret or proprietary information
• A request that employees keep company logos or trademarks off their blogs and profiles and not mention the company in commentary, unless for business purposes
• An instruction that employees not post or blog during business hours, unless for business purposes
• A request that employees bring work-related complaints to human resources before blogging or posting about such complaints
• And others

AFTER EMPLOYMENT

Then, there are the former employees. Some will be nice, and some will be not-so-nice.

The best defense against nightmare scenarios like this and like this is a having had a good social media policy in the first place—one that lasts beyond employment, if at all possible. But if you are dealing with a situation that falls outside of that, you might want to read an article such as “Dealing with Disgruntled Ex-employees via Social Media.”

Another huge issue is recommendations. Increasingly, people are asking former colleagues to write them recommendations on social media such as LinkedIn. Is that the same as an official post-employment recommendation? Jackson says yes—although it’s difficult to define when people are speaking for themselves, and when they are speaking on behalf of the organization. It’s a good reason to have a solid policy in place.

The warmest and fuzziest scenario is positive relations through social media in the form of corporate alumni networks. In Computer World’s article, “The new word for tech’s ex-employees is ‘alum’” large, successful sites catering to groups of ex-employees are examined. Microsoft’s alumni network, for example, has 10,000 members—what an incredible opportunity for networking and goodwill!

THE TAKEAWAY

What HR should take away from this, writes Jackson, is that the risks of social media are too great to be ignored any longer.

First, employers must understand the myriad issues surrounding social media in the workplace in order to strike the appropriate balance in the eyes of their employees and the law. Then, employers must craft appropriate policies and procedures regarding social media that are consistent with their industry and firm culture, and apply such policies in a consistent, objective and nondiscriminatory way.

Workers are tweeting, googling, and friending, and they’re doing it at all stages of employment. We need to acknowledge this, and craft good policies in response.

2009 was a long and challenging year for jobseekers. Unemployment reached record highs, and competition for jobs was fierce. If you had trouble landing your ideal job, you weren’t alone.

As we cross into 2010, it’s a natural time to take stock of your 2009 job search: what worked, and what didn’t; what time was well spent, and what time was wasted. If you were using methods that didn’t give good returns on your time and energy, now is the time to drop them.

Then, resolve to channel your fresh start and high energy into new habits designed to get you into your ideal job in the coming year. Here are six recommended resolutions to make your job search successful in 2010.

Resolution #1: I will create a list of targeted employers.
If you’re only applying to jobs that you see being advertised, you’re leaving key elements of your job search up to chance. Take control of your future by identifying the organizations in your industry where you would like to work — even if they don’t have any job openings at the moment. Do your research, and make up a list of 8-12 target employers with products or cultures you admire. Devote time to introducing yourself to them as a future candidate. Get on their radar now, before a job is even open, and sow the seeds for them to call on you later on when something opens up. This is one of the best ways to take advantage of the “hidden job market.” It requires time and planning, but the end result is a position with a company you hand-selected as a good match for your skills and desires.

Resolution #2: I will carry job-search business cards.
A person’s job is a large part of their identity, and sometimes displaced workers feel lost without the security of a title and a business card. But do you really want to be scribbling your contact information on a napkin or index card when you network in public? Increase your poise, confidence, and professional appearance by creating and carrying a personal business card just for your job search. They are easy to produce at home with a printer, or simply use a free service such as Vistaprint, which offers jobhunters 250 cards printed free (pay only shipping and handling). Job-search cards are the perfect positive marketing tool — shorter than a resume, but something physical for people to take away and remember you by. This leads to our next resolution:

Resolution #3: I will expand my network.
No matter how much you are networking, you could undoubtedly do more. Jobseekers are often shy about expanding their network, but people are typically flattered to be asked for their expertise or connections. So take the plunge: if you haven’t made the time for Facebook or LinkedIn, now is the time (keep it professional on Facebook, of course). And don’t just concentrate on online, either! Whenever you talk with a friend, peer, neighbor, or relative, aim to get at least one informational contact (not a job interview, but a person you can call and chat with for 10 minutes or so about their industry) out of the conversation. While jobseeking, you should aim to have a short informational call or coffee meeting at least a few times a month. People will be impressed with your initiative, and flattered by your attention. You may be surprised where these short, no-pressure meetings can take you.

Resolution #4: I will build my personal brand.
This is a fairly new element of the job search, and as such, many older jobseekers are not aware of it. The candidate’s role now goes far beyond their resume; it is now common for employers to do preliminary research on you on the Internet before you are contacted. Your competitors are building their personal brand online, and so should you. Start commenting on an industry with a Twitter account or on a free blog at WordPress or Blogger; establish your expertise. Benefit #1 is that you’ll make great industry connections. Benefit #2 is that you’ll shape your online image for those who are researching you. Both are necessary for your successful 2010 job search.

Resolution #5: I will revamp my resume and cover letter.
When was the last time you really gave these crucial materials more than a simple update? Adding your last position is the bare minimum, and for 2010, you owe yourself an upgrade. Research current job ads for the hot keywords are in your field, and make sure your terminology matches the current jargon. Evaluate the entire document, even older sections that have served you well for years — these are the very sections that could benefit from a re-write in the context of your later accomplishments. Aim for a clean, simple look. When you’re done, save a formatted version for printing and email attachments, and a plain text version for online forms.

Resolution #6: I will genuinely seek out feedback.
Many jobseekers get “stuck” on some issue that they don’t even know about. Maybe it’s the presentation of their resume; maybe it’s some interviewing quirk. The point is, they won’t ever know about it unless they ask their “support squad” for constructive criticism. Unfortunately, due to rejection in the job market, these same people may feel too vulnerable to ask for any feedback. If this sounds like it might apply to you, turn to trusted friends and family for resume critiques, mock interviews, and ideas about where your talents might be useful. They know you better than anyone, and you should resolve not to let any insecurity prevent you from asking for their excellent help and perspective. Ask for feedback, and you may get a surprising boost!

Do you have any job-related resolutions for the New Year? We’d love to hear about them. Share your inspiration and progress in the comments.

We’ve seen the value of microblogging sites such as Twitter for sharing short ideas, links, and personal updates, but that kind of website is wayyy too public for business collaboration. (Think about all the secret projects, private sales figures, and other sensitive matters that you’d prefer everyone keep in nice, secure, private, trackable emails.) Nonetheless, there is a need for a new way to talk to colleagues — something informal, real-time, attention-based, and inclusive…. something a lot like, well, Twitter.

In all honesty, your people may already be using services such as Twitter, Facebook, and instant messages for intraoffice messaging to boost productivity and circumvent email, which is a crushing weight on most workers. (It’s also a closed system, where someone who might benefit from the information often gets left out.) While we’re confident that email will stick around, we support finding a way for workers to securely share more information under a broadcast model, and we support top management, HR, and IT in finding a way to facilitate this in a secure and controlled manner.

In a nutshell, microblogging services are the next big thing in employee communications. Think of it as “Twitter for the workplace.” Imagine a system with all the benefits of Twitter, but designed in a secure fashion with business clients in mind. It might be free, it might be paid for, or it might be open source. Some software runs behind a firewall, and some is hosted outside, depending on your needs. Some microblogging applications have even been designed to work with Lotus and Microsoft SharePoint enterprise software!

There are many services vying to become the de facto “enterprise microblogging” application. Here are the great qualities they all have in common.

• Unlike Facebook, there is no “reciprocal friending” awkwardness… with microblogging, you lend your attention, not your friendship
• It’s broadcast-oriented communication, so you can follow someone in the organization you haven’t met
• Employees can search by keywords for projects that interest or affect them, much like Twitter’s hashtags
• It’s reply-optional, so is perfect for “FYI info”
• Microblogging clears the inbox by diverting informal communications out of email
• It allows people a way to collaborate rapidly, in real time
• It creates an archived knowledge base for new employees to read, unlike emails, which are designed to be private

Seems pretty fascinating all of a sudden, doesn’t it? If you are interested in learning a little bit more about what microblogging could add to your team’s collaboration, we have some great sites to share with you. These are some of the front-runners in the field.

Yammer — Yammer’s motto is “connect and share with your coworkers,” and users constantly answer the prompt “What are you working on?” It’s for people who share the same company domain name, and no one else. It comes in flavors for the desktop, BlackBerry, iPhone, IM, email and SMS, so it will fit seamlessly in with different employees’ favorite devices. Yammer is free when used informally, but there is a small licensing fee once the IT department gets involved.

Present.ly – Present.ly is a microblogging platform that is used by employees of CNET and The New York Times. For a small team, it is free, and web-hosted; if you wish to add more users, or use it behind a firewall, upgrade to a paid version. Present.ly has a Twitter-compatible API, so Twitter tools can be used on the system with just small modifications.

Communote – Secure microblogging for enterprise with hashtags, usernames, mobile access, and more. Communote is delivered as software-as-a-service. It has a limited free trial, and a paid business version.

SocialText’s Signal – Signal is available as part of the larger SocialText collaboration platform, but also as a stand-alone microblogging appliance. It can be hosted, or behind a firewall. Up to 50 users is free, and more will cost a small fee. Signal is interesting because it offers a server appliance that runs the software locally, meaning that you can run your own back-ups.

Are any of you RiseSmart blog readers involved in enterprise microblogging? We’re interested in hearing who is using this software: who loves it, and who hates it? Talk to us in the comments!

The scenario: You’ve been called in to interview with a company that you know virtually nothing about — and the interview’s tomorrow. While you’re excited that they want to recruit you, you’re sweating bullets at the thought of giving meaningful answers about this mysterious organization.

The answer is quick, simple, and painless. Just turn to your computer. Research nowadays is easy, and often free. There are a wealth of great sites and services that specialize in getting you up to speed on an organization.

Here’s the RiseSmart guide to making the most of the 24 hours before your interview.

1) Start with your basic homework.

• Read the company’s website, paying special attention to the annual report and press releases.
• Hoover’s has free look-ups of businesses with in-depth reports about them. Input the company name, and read away.
• Do a search for news stories about the company, written by an objective journalist. Try Reuters and this compilation of business trade articles.
• Review what you’ve learned. You’re going to want knowledge of products and services, market positioning, company leaders and organization, culture, and compensation.

2) Then get a little more advanced.

• Look up the company’s leaders, and the person interviewing you, by name on ZoomInfo. Don’t tell them that you did this, but use every morsel you find.
• I like this easy pathfinder for company research from the Los Angeles Public Library.
• If it’s a publicly held company, they must file with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
• WetFeet is a fantastic resource. Check out their list of major employers.
• Google the organization on the “wonder wheel” setting to show you related searches you might not have thought of (and the company might not WANT you to think of).

3) Check out what current and former employees say.

• GlassDoor has anonymous reviews of company culture and insider salary info.
• Look through your contacts on LinkedIn, and see if anyone in your greater circle works there, or has worked there. Ask for an informational interview, perhaps a 10-minute phone call.
• Run searches on the company name plus positive and negative terms such as “great place to work” or “sucks.” You might be surprised what you can find.
• Search on Twitter for the company’s name as a hashtag.
• Utilize Google’s Blog Search function to find out what regular people are writing about the company.

4) Don’t forget about researching the entire industry and the top competition…

• Hoover’s has more than 600 fantastic free “industry overviews”  to place your hiring company in a wider context.
• Capital IQ, Lexis-Nexis, and OneSource can all help with this, but usually require a license to use.
• WetFeet has a free directory of industry guides to check out.
• Do a search on the company’s name plus the term “poach.”

With a small amount of intelligent, targeted research, you can be ready for a surprise interview with just 2-3 hours of research conducted the night before.

Tips compiled from my own experience, and from the excellent job research articles at:

• Quint Careers’ “Guide to Researching Companies, Industries, Countries”
• Gotta Mentor’s “Researching the COMPANY”
• The Job Hunter’s Bible “Web Sites for Job Hunting Research
• Cornell University’s Johnson School of Management “Company Research FAQ”

Think twice before you use Twitter to vent or blab about work: that indiscreet tweet could cost you your job.

There have been a number of incidents this year involving people using the popular microblogging site in ways that have gotten them fired. Some classic examples (including the graphic for this blog post) are covered in ResumeBear’s “Top 30 Ways to Lose a Job on Twitter.” The list is long, but includes such bone-headed moves as tweeting about sleeping with the boss’s daughter, failing a drug test, or lying to the boss.

This reminds me of the high-profile case of @theconnor, who infamously tweeted in March: “Cisco just offered me a job! Now I have to weigh the utility of a fatty paycheck against the daily commute to San Jose and hating the work.” Sure enough, a Cisco employee soon posted: “Who is the hiring manager? I’m sure they would love to know that you will hate the work. We here at Cisco are versed in the web.” While the candidate quickly made their account private, it was already too late — it had gone viral. Not only did this individual lose the offer, but they were widely ridiculed online.

The takeaway? Your material IS indexed in searches, and people are naturally curious. Mention of a company name will likely be discovered by people working at that company.

The most recent case of Twitter-induced firing is that of a Los Angeles waiter, Jon Barrett-Ingels. According to gossip blog Defamer, he was dismissed from his job after tweeting that Hung actress Jane Adams didn’t tip on her bill. (Allegedly, Barrett-Ingels had previously tweeted indiscreetly that Heroes star Ali Larter was out and about without a bra on, and described The Office castmember B.J. Novak as looking “hungover.”)

The takeaway? This person seems to have been using his proximity to fame in a gossipy and non-professional manner. While we don’t know the legalities of his particular case, it’s good to remember that whether you are dealing with a celebrity, a corporate entity, or a regular customer, your employer has the right to expect you to behave responsibly in connection with your duties. Even if you have not signed confidentiality materials (and many do), it is certainly not part of any customer service tradition to publish embarrassing information about customers.

Numbers back up these anecdotes. A Proofpoint survey from August 10, 2009, says that the state of the economy is leading to increased risk of data loss events. Employees “oversharing” through social media is a big part of the problem, they say:

Concerning social networks, US companies are also experiencing more exposure incidents involving sites like Facebook and LinkedIn as compared to 2008 (17 percent versus 12 percent). US companies are taking a much more forceful approach with offending employees — eight percent reported terminating an employee for such a violation as compared to only four percent in 2008… Even short message services like SMS texts and Twitter pose a risk. 13 percent of US companies investigated an exposure event involving mobile or Web-based short message services in the past 12 months.

Both employees and employers have a ways to go in coming up with good strategies to deal with this new form of communication. Employees should use caution and good sense in deciding what to share on Twitter, while HR (and possibly Legal or Risk Management) needs to educate employees about the risks the organization faces on Twitter due to liability and loss of reputation.

Have you ever written up or fired someone for something they admitted to on Twitter? Would you look at their Twitter feed if you received a complaint about it? Do you have a policy in place that covers employees’ tweets?

When you read about social media and human resources, inevitably you will come across the phrase “the reputation economy.” This isn’t a new concept, exactly: in small towns of decades ago, the reputation economy could make or break the local insurance salesman or grocer. But as commerce went global, we stopped personally knowing the people who sell us things. Social media is valuable, in part, because it can give us an idea of who we’re dealing with when we don’t know them at all.

If we’re going to talk about work habits and style, who better to describe you than your current and former coworkers?

In the past, when I’ve searched for websites that claim to have a business model involving “coworker feedback,” I have mostly discovered schemes to anonymously inform cubicle-mates that they have bad breath or other irksome personal habit. (I won’t bother to link; you know the type of site I mean.)

And if I were forced to guess at who was the current leader in serious peer reviews and recommendations, I would have definitely named LinkedIn. It’s the most widely-used professional networking service around, and has a very well respected recommendation system. One important factor, for me, is that the peer reviews are not anonymous. Everyone is accountable for what they say, and their own employment history is transparent. As the LinkedIn blog says:

Most people who have applied to higher level educational institutions are familiar with the traditional methods of gathering recommendations.  Finding an advisor, mentor, or teacher willing to fill out a series of questions and write a sealed letter of recommendation. LinkedIn Recommendations bring liquidity and transparency to the reputation economy.  As a result, the way people evaluate and respond to recommendations is changing as well.

All true, valuable, and well-said. But I just read an interesting tidbit from the San Francisco Chronicle that got me thinking about peer feedback. The topic was coworker reviews, communication, and evaluation, which had obviously been on my mind. But they brought the discussion back around to confidentiality. Transparency is great… for recommendations, which are meant to seen by strangers, and need to be trustworthy and verifiable. But for improving your current work habits, without switching jobs or involving a recruiter, isn’t confidential feedback more valuable and timely?

That is where Coworkers.com comes in. They launched about a year and a half ago, and the purpose of the site is to let you accumulate frank and private evaluations from past and current colleagues. You are evaluated in terms of your core values, your interpersonal skills, your general competence, and your productivity, and given analytical tools to help you interpret and improve your skills.

One huge benefit: “You no longer have to wait for your boss to tell you how you’re doing, or what you need to do to address any issues. With Coworkers.com you can find out quickly and painlessly, straight from the people who know you best – the colleagues that you interact with every day,” says Coworkers founder Jonathan Clay. Improving before the boss asks you to is always a big plus in our book.

In the past few weeks, Coworkers.com has launched a complete career management site to complement their feedback system:

[It] gives professionals at any level, those in transition, consultants, and small businesses, the tools to instantly create a personal dashboard to manage their work, analyze their performance, gain feedback on overall performance and get reaction to specific deliverables, events, and job milestones. Companies can use the site to monitor and analyze employee performance, and recruiters can gain access to detailed candidate profiles. Businesses with virtual teams or multiple offices will find a complete suite of tools to communicate, share feedback, and monitor workgroup performance without costly enterprise software.

With this broader focus, the site is mixing private and public feedback. The site also has a paid section that is targeted at Human Resources, and aims to assist in researching candidates and managing employees.

Just to round things out, I looked around for competitors to Coworkers.com. I came across a site called RateMyCoworkers.com, but it’s clearly much smaller, has fewer features, and is more of a comment board than a private system. The Chronicle also cites Rypple.com and WorkScore.com as websites where one’s personal reputation comes into play. But I just haven’t seen anything with the scope and ambition of Coworkers, particularly with this recent drive to be used by entire teams and supplant enterprise software with a website. Very interesting, indeed.

Let’s face it. In most of life we really are interdependent. We need each other. Staunch independence is an illusion, but heavy dependence isn’t healthy, either. The only position of long-term strength is interdependence: win/win.

– Greg Anderson, the American Wellness Project

Let’s face it.  Along with the interview, the polished resume, the firm handshake and the kudos from all your Facebook friends and Twitter followers, what the HR person really wishes she knew is . . . what did Mrs. Baker write on your third-grade report card? 

Was it the prophetic “Works well with others” — or the problematic “Needs his own space”?

Yes, the pressure is on for HR to step up, embrace technology and integrate social networks into their recruiting processes.  But ultimately, the greatest pressure is to use all the tools at hand to put the right person in the right spot — and avoid forcing co-workers to welcome a square peg to fill the vacant round hole. 

The hope for a win/win falls on the HR professional.  We want a happy employee, a happy boss, and we definitely want a happy workplace.  Kumbaya is always on the success checklist.

Thomas Otter at Vendorprisey indicates it’s a tightrope on which HR professionals tiptoe.  Drowning in ever-updated databases, they still must remember that they work with people.

Writes Otter:

To be a top HR professional, you do need to have empathy for people. It is probably what attracted you to the job in the first place. But if you are going to succeed you need to be analytical, too. HR professionals that can see patterns beyond the incident, abstract the problems from the personal, and make the best move given the constraints they have been dealt with, will have a real impact on shaping the business and their careers.

Is a potential employee too dependent on others, always waiting for an assignment and needing overly specific directions?  Too independent, liable to shirk the team?  Co-dependent, only able to move at a pace equal to those around him? 

Or is she interdependent, comfortable with give-and-take and credit-sharing? 

In the absence of crystal balls and Mrs. Baker’s report card, the HR professional becomes part intuitive seer and part just-the-facts detective.  With the Internet creating personal archives of the good, the bad and the ugly for all to see, this process takes more sorting than ever.  The resume is just a starting point.

According to Mary Ellen Slater on Smartblog on Workforce, many HR professionals still place pretty high value in their intuition and training — but perhaps not enough on the candidate’s often-revealing online footprint.

She notes:

Employers’ feelings about using social media for recruiting are mixed. Nearly half of you report that you’re simply not even interested in trying it, which I find surprising. Used effectively, social media tools can be an effective way to source candidates and build your brand as an attractive employer.

Clearly this is a period of transition, with some HR professionals mainly trusting their old-school record and others tweeting to a new tune.  As Susan Strayer notes, the list of companies that recruit via Twitter is growing.

Who knows, maybe Mrs. Baker is still around . . . and tweets.

Here’s an interesting thought: the very fact that you are reading this blog indicates that you are likely to be in the top tier of tech-savvy HR professionals. At least that’s what Steve Boese seems to be saying, and he should know.

Boese teaches an HR Technology class in a HRD Master’s program at the Rochester Institute of Technology. He’s a prolific blogger with a fascinating take on the profession. We read his recent guest post on Fistful of Talent, titled “What the Future of HR is not Learning… But Should Be…” with tremendous interest.

What We’re Not Learning, But Should Be

Professor Boese has students who run the gamut from young, recent grads to HR veterans with decades on the job. Boese says he thought this variance in age and experience would make it difficult to level-set a technology class — but level-setting was actually EASY. Why? Because almost everyone is equally ignorant about the topic. Says Boese:

One characteristic I have consistently noted is a shocking lack of technology awareness and knowledge, really from students of all experience levels and backgrounds. And it is not just that students don’t understand what ERP is, or how SaaS is changing the nature of enterprise software ownership and deployment.  Heck, barely anyone understands that, and that is why we have the Tech class in the first place. But more basic, fundamental technologies that are really necessary to at least understand, if not effectively utilize, as a Human Resources professional today. Students in my classes almost never read HR blogs (I can’t even get them to read mine), understand RSS, or utilize social networking sites like Facebook for anything other than purely social interactions with their friends.

There are two factors at work here, says Boese. First, HR people often classify themselves as being in the people business — not IT. (But HR is increasingly aided by technology, and it’s becoming less and less acceptable to just shrug that off as not part of your job.) Second, Boese cites “a consistent ignorance, apathy and a serious underestimation of the impact of new technology on the businesses that HR supports” among HR pros. Faced with rapid technological changes, many HR workers stay in a comfort zone involving people, policies and paperwork.

Seize Opportunities to Become Tech-Savvy

There are solutions, of course. Boese has ideas for what curricula schools should be offering, and he offers a wealth of great HR technology links and resources so that professional who aren’t in school can educate themselves. His best advice to people already working in the field involves a certain amount of bravery, but has a big payoff:

Don’t be content to cede the technology decisions to IT. IT, by necessity, has very different motivations and criteria for technology selection (data security, interoperability with existing systems, in-house tech skills). Partner with your IT colleagues to make sure that HR goals and requirements are considered up front and not as an afterthought.

An interesting coda to this was that just five days after Boese blogged about the need for new classes to keep up with social media and new technology, he learned that the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh is creating a major in social networking. The future is unfolding quickly, indeed.

With that, we remind all our readers that the HR Technology Conference & Expo is taking place in Chicago at the end of this month — and RiseSmart will be there in full force. Why don’t you join us? This could be the year when you go from tech-uncertain to tech-savvy!

Mirrors reflect, and mirrors distort, and the Web is perhaps the greatest mirror of them all. If you’re interested at all in your professional image, you’d better start acting like a recruiter and research your own online persona. You may find that your reflection is crystal clear… but then again, you could run into some ugly distortions.

Look at these recent statistics as interpreted by one of our favorite blogs, Cheezhead, that show how regularly employers look in on your online persona:

A recent survey from CareerBuilder found that 45 percent of employers use social networking sites to research job candidates, an increase from 22 percent last year. An additional 11 percent plan to start using social networking sites for screening. Of the respondents who do conduct online searches and background checks on job seekers, 29 percent use Facebook, 26 percent use LinkedIn and 21 percent use MySpace. About 11 percent said they search blogs, while 7 percent follow candidates on Twitter.

Wow: 45%, up from last year’s 22%. That number more than doubled, so this clearly an area for jobseekers to be aware of. LinkedIn shouldn’t be a problem — it’s a businesslike place, and most people behave there — but lots of people let their hair down on MySpace and Facebook. Hint: potential employers don’t want to see you looking drunk, sexy, or silly! Check out our tips at the end of the post for doing damage control on your social networking persona.

Research Tools from the “Deep Web”

While you’re researching yourself, there are some interesting new candidates in the “online mirror” space. One notable site is pipl.com, which has been billed by TechCrunch as “so good it will scare your pants off.” Pipl uses the “deep Web” to search for results on people that you will never see using Google. The reason for this is that Google ranks pages by their importance as judged by how many pages link TO them. The deep Web uncovers Web pages that NOTHING links to. Check out what the TechCrunch reporter had to say:

It’s so good it’ll probably scare some people’s pants off when they see what information it is able to — legally — drudge up. It produces not only links to all of your profiles on social networks like Facebook, MySpace, and LinkedIn, blog mentions, and photos on Flickr. It finds mentions of your name in public records, including property records, SEC filings, and birth databases. It also finds e-mail addresses and summarizes “quick facts” about the person… Obviously, Pipl is designed for people search by name, but it also just debuted the ability to search emails, usernames and by reverse phone number lookup. The results page is designed as a “one page report” that categorizes information in an easy to read manner.

Pipl looks scary good for recruiters, and just plain scary for anyone with anything they are hoping to hide.

Our final entry of note is the most artistic and subjective of all the Web portrayals: it is an art installation called “Personas” hosted by MIT. Simply visit the site, enter your name, and let Personas go to work pulling up details from the deep Web. The information it pulls up is uncanny. It then fills out a graph showing all the components that your persona is identified with.

Here, for example, is a Personas report on RiseSmart’s own founder and CEO, Sanjay Sathe:

It’s a really interesting and beautiful way to create a portrait of oneself.

Honing Your Online Image

Tips on monitoring and controlling your online “reflection”:

• Keep good watch on your image. You can be sure prospective employers will, in this age of transparency. Be careful with social networks, but never forget about the deep Web either.
• Cultivate multiple online personas: at least one serious, professional persona associated with your legal name (JaneDoeMarketingPro, for instance), and another with a more obscure nickname known only to your personal friends. Keep rigid control over the “pro” account and keep it well separated from your fun (and disposable) nickname account.
• Figure out if there are any troublemakers with a similar name to yours, and begin the process of differentiating yourself by using a middle initial or variation on your name — even emphasizing your geographic location (Jane from California) or self-branding information (Jane the Marketing Pro) would be helpful.
• Remember that images “deleted” from social networks are often still there after you have deleted them. Search “permanently delete photos from <site>” to research the particulars. And if you need to kill off a Facebook account where you’ve embarrassed yourself, don’t merely “deactivate” the account — DELETE it. Read here for instructions on how to completely delete an account.

Have fun out there, but don’t forget that an image or comment posted on the Web can last forever. Don’t do things that you will regret when it comes time to explain it to an HR professional.