Why use social media as a selection tool in the first place?
It may be because most of us believe we are good judges of character: ’Of course I can get a sense of someone by browsing through his or her photographs and postings.’ Other organizations may be using social media to identify deviant behavior. Some organizations may just be making sure they are not hiring people engaged in criminal behaviors. We have even heard of organizations unofficially adopting a “red cup rule”, whereby if a potential employee is pictured holding a plastic red “keg cup,” they are deemed unfit and un-hire-able. This approach is fairly easy to justify: ‘If they were concerned about privacy, why would they have posted those pictures for the digital world to see in the first place??’ To everyone who has dealt with or is dealing with this, we pose the following question:
Is the content of someone’s social media profile related to their ability to perform their job?
In other words, can someone’s pictures or posts be used to predict whether or not they will perform in a professional context? It is harder to imagine jobs where this would be the case than jobs where it would not. However, for the sake of clarity, below we describe two jobs – one where social media just might be relevant and another where social media is irrelevant:
Job where social media could be related to success: The only job we could imagine where social media might be related to performance is for politicians. Politicians, for example, are the most effective when they have the support of their constituents. So in this case, social media might very well be a relevant tool to predict the performance of a politician because their public image might be reflected by their social media image.
Jobs where social media is not related to success: This category involves every other job. For the sake of example, let’s look at high school math teachers. Can we use their social media profile to evaluate their mathematical aptitude or public speaking ability (both of which are related to performance)? Unless their profile is made up of videos of them solving complex mathematical equations or giving speeches, the answer is no.
Other valid reasons to avoid using social media as a selection tool
- It is illegal to base a selection decision on certain types of protected information such as religion, political views, ethnicity, and age. Conveniently, this is exactly the kind of information that people share in their social media profiles. If a hiring manager gains access to this type of information and then decides not to hire the person, it would be almost impossible to prove that their decision was not influenced by protected information.
- Predictive validity is the ability of a hiring tool to predict future performance. The good news is that most selection procedures have been validated through empirical research. We are not aware of any evidence suggesting that people’s social media profiles can be used to predict future performance or turnover. On the other hand, decades of research have shown that certain methods (e.g., structured interviews) predict performance across every industry, type, and level of job. To learn more, click here for a blog on the Return-On-Investment for Selection Procedures.
- For applicants and organizations, face validity matters. Face validity is the extent to which a specific tool or approach is perceived as relevant and effective by the applicant. For example, potential pilots would view a flight simulator as a very relevant selection tool (high face validity). Methods with low face validity are potentially frustrating and can negatively impact applicants and employees’ perceptions of the organization.
There are many methods and combinations of methods that can be used to select the best applicants. However, there are also almost as many unvalidated tools and “best practices” that can lead even the most well informed of us astray. In the current world of information overload, the best any of us can do is to scrutinize those sources of information and base our decisions on rigorous, reliable, and valid evidence.
Other articles on employee selection:
- Outcomes of Organization Development Interventions
- Personality and Job Performance
- Employee Personality Predicts Extra-Role Performance
- ROI for Employee Selection Procedures