Reflection #2. Heejin Hong.

This article, “You Might Find Your Next Employee (or Job) on Facebook” written by Lesya Liu is reporting about the new feature that Facebook is planning on to do. Facebook already have many different features available for users such as “to broadcast live videos, to share disappearing messages, to catch on the trending news, and even to send money to your friends” (Liu). But, Facebook is adding another one which is to allow business pages to list their job openings and to contact employees. Facebook is benefiting from the high popularity of users to attract business customers to use their platform. Lesya in her article asked two important questions: “how much information will potential employers be able to see? Does using a personal profile for professional aspirations opens the door to subtle discrimination?” These two are very important questions. Facebook is the platform that people use for their personal purposes. “With respect to the social dimension of Social Media, the concept of self-presentation states that in any type of social interaction people have the desire to control the impressions other people form of them (Goffman, 1959)” (Kaplan 62). Therefore, it is questionable if the new feature will really help the businesses to hire potential employees, or all the applicants will get a chance to get a job.

6 strategies Facebook have to consider: 

1.    No fake information or users: there should be a proof of any information that users add to their Facebook account, or business account. 
2.  Sharing information: only share applicants’ personal information when necessary with the businesses if they accept the applicant 
3.  Make it private: everything have to be private. There should not be any public announcement, posts, comments, and sharing about the applicant. It should be only between the business and the applicant. 
4.  Keep it separate: there should be a clear line between personal and professional. Businesses should not explore the applicant’s personal account. They should only receive and see the application. 
5.   Blocking/ eliminate: if any businesses use the applicants’ personal information wrongly, Facebook should immediately eliminate or block the business account from Facebook. 
6. To Facebook: Facebook should always keep private both the businesses information and applicants’ personal information.

Kaplan, Andreas M., “Users of the World, Unite! The Challenges and Opportunities of Social Media,” Business Horizons (2010) 53, 59-68 (PDF)

Kietzmann J.H. et al., “Social media? Get Serious! Understanding the Functional Building Blocks of Social Media,” Business Horizons (2011) 54, 241-251, http://busandadmin.uwinnipeg.ca/silvestrepdfs/PDF06.pdf

Liu, Lesya. “You Might Find Your Next Employee (of Job) on Facebook.” Entrepreneur, February 24, 2017. https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/289667. Accessed February 26, 2017.