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It also identifies those candidates whose online cognitive style leans towards all the traditional taboos for employers, such as bullying, harassment, racism, illegal activities and so on - all of which takes place online these days. During nearly 2 years of R&D, trials showed that there was 67% likelihood that those showing these characteristics online will also demonstrate them in their physical workplace.

But online social profiling gives much more value to an organisation than you may expect. Over time, it starts to build a profile of your business, individual teams and business areas, or the whole organisation. Utilising the data collected through SP-Index Analytics can help to identify areas of low morale, unhappy teams, unhappy management, unproductive employees, unsettled environments, sickness, absence, and more. The analytics provides invaluable data to support policy setting such as your staff handbooks, brand management policies, and policy on use of IT at work.

There can be hard £savings too. Avoiding re-recruitment costs, wasted agency fees, poor service to customers, and disciplinary and legal procedures which can cost on average £18,000 per incident.

A bully online is a bully in the real life. Most people will agree that online social profiling is a much-needed response to the growing epidemic of expensive and irreversible mistakes that employees have made online. These mistakes frequently result in sackings, tribunals and unwanted media attention for their company.

After learning more about the thought leadership in this area I now ask myself the question - "so why are so many recruiters still being seduced by the social media devil?".

If you would like to know more about Online Social Profiling contact sarah.poynton@sp-index.com  or call 0845 177 0700

Feel free to share your feedback on this article @SP_index and include the hash tag #onlinesocialprofiling.

www.sp-index.com  

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HOW CAN YOU IDENTIFY A BULLY BEFORE YOU RECRUIT ONE?

Sarah Poynton, Head of Business Development at the SP-Index considers whether Online Social Profiling can help organisations identify a bully before recruiting one.

As a former branch manager for a recruitment agency I had mixed feelings about using the online social networks for pre-screening candidates and to find out more about their true personalities, but the temptation was just too great. I often found myself surfing the web looking for signs within candidates' online social profiles that would somehow confirm their appropriateness for my client's role, or was I trying to find some negative content that would put me off presenting the candidate to my client?

Looking back, I'm really not sure what I was hoping to achieve. Occasionally I would find something really juicy in a profile and suddenly the candidate had lost, and I had won! But won what exactly? A facebook picture, a sloppy comment on a blog, a negative posting showing their 'true side', and suddenly what could have been the perfect candidate under historic measures was now off the list.

Just like 70% of the recruiters and hiring managers we spoke to last year, I was simply searching a candidate online before agreeing to interview them, a process justified only by the phrase "because I can". After all, the information was at my fingertips, publicly available on the web, and in most cases placed on there by the candidate themselves - it was fair game. More fool them if they don't manage their activities, or so I used to think.

The temptation to view someone's online social profile somehow outweighed the historic process - when companies would carry out references on new applicants; they would talk to former or current employers about that applicant's reliability, attitude, personality, work ethic, and more. These days we are lucky to be able to confirm dates of employment when taking on someone new. It is very rare to be able to find out the truth behind an applicant's experience, CV or what has been said at interview without first taking them on and then experiencing them for ourselves.

The social media devil had seduced me, and without clearer guidance from regulatory bodies, better clarity from employment legislation, and some kind of alternative approach for me to follow, the devil's path was the only path, and it has to be said (whether you would admit it or not) most of us are currently walking this path.

It's perfectly legal for you to read about a person on social media sites, but it divulges protected characteristics about them which could put you at risk of discriminating and may result in you missing out on the best talent due to subjective opinions.

Thought Leadership - Online Social Profiling

Thought leadership for this topic has been coming from a Milton Keynes based company, Social Media Consulting who trade under the brand name SP-Index (Social People Index). Utilising information from someone's digital footprint, they combine a thorough and strictly regulated web searching process together with in-house developed technology to provide personal profile reports to organisations. This may be for potential recruits, existing staff, business partners or other stakeholders.

The process is known as Online Social Profiling and the basis for evaluation is an individual's online cognitive style. The process is entirely compliant with current UK legislation.

Online social profiling is not about spying on people. Online employee screening using a third party such as the SP-Index removes the risk of discrimination and therefore protects all parties involved - the candidate will not be unfairly excluded, the agency will not miss the best talent, and the employer will be presented with a candidate who has been assessed as the best all-round. It compliments traditional recruitment methods and introduces a compliant application of information available on social media profiles.