eevBLAB #80 - Is Staying Private Online Good For Your Career?

[EEVblog]

An extract from a live show on EEVBlog2
And interesting question was raised: Does staying private and secretive online help or hinder your engineering career prospects?
Does having a presence on social media and LinkedIn help or hinder?
Dave also tells a story of when publishing too much cost him a job at Silverbrook research.
And the value of tailoring your resume.

[hamdi.tn]

Hi,

i think this is one of those bipolar subject,
It's positive to be visible and to have some public visibility with personal projects or activity with non-profit organisation, in LinkedIn or personal website, etc ...

It's not when it come to publishing company project (without a clear consent from the company) even if those projects are not tied with an NDA. I noticed also that some engineers are publishing massively in time that are clearly working hours, i think this may be considered by a future employer as either don't have much to do or wasting company time.

Hamdi.

[DrG]

It is an interesting subject and I am weighing in openly stating up front that I never hired a degreed EE. I did, with regularity, take in young fellows/assistants/grad. students, into a laboratory. Some had enhanced (but highly specific( EE and mathematical experience. They would typically spend a couple of years in the lab (a *very* regulated environment) - in route to their PhD or MD or something like that. These were all very bright and very focused individuals. So, this is a particular situation that you may not find terribly relevant. Furthermore, for a number of reasons, candidates above that level were evaluated in a qualitatively different fashion.

Routinely, *anything* available online was looked at and I would do that myself as well as turn the candidate over to online scrutiny by other subodinate lab members. This was done *after* a successful meeting and a reasonable CV had been tendered. I never saw any value in those, so-called, professional sites - what is there of significance that is not on your CV? The answer, sadly, is too often just a bunch of self-generated and self-promoting crap.

The point that I want to stress is that at these entry level positions, the single most important factor to me was a low risk assessment. A low risk assessment, while not sufficient, was absolutely necessary. To be clear, I was the one deciding whether it was high risk long before we would get to a formal background check that was done by someone else.

I have no phobia against SJWs unless obsessive, but if I saw any evidence of irresponsible behavior, be it concerning intoxication (of any form), promiscuity, politics, racism, gambling, chauvinism and so on, it was disqualifying.

Anyone working in the lab can screw things up in a very big way - sloppy (or faking) data collection (a nightmare and I would install many covert mechanisms against that, but why worry about it?), unwillingness to report a mistake, disregard for safety, theft, sexual harassment, and so on. Any indication that the person could not get along with others and could not follow SOPs was disqualifying.

Liability avoidance is, in fact, more important than skills in this situation and I think it can generalize to many other situations. Every freaking thing that you have online, especially concerning offline behavior, is examined carefully because they were viewed, by me, as predictors. Let me put it this way, I am not just thinking about what you can contribute, I am also thinking about what you can screw-up.

I left out a ton of stuff that you addressed in the video because I wanted to make that particular point.

[coppice]

There are very few things guaranteed to have a positive or negative influence in a job application. Even a CV that includes "time in jail for serial killing" might not be a negative when applying to some of the dodgy outfits that are out there.... although in general a criminal record is not a plus. I have been in numerous interviews where the things the liked or disliked took me by surprise. A key point is that unless the job market is horrible and you would be glad for any work you can find, you really don't have anything to gain by succeeding in every job application. You want to find a place that is reasonably compatible with you.

[coppice]

Liability avoidance is, in fact, more important than skills in this situation and I think it can generalize to many other situations.

I see organisations take this to an extreme, and only hire people with a great reluctance to do anything at all.

[joseph nicholas]

I went to a job interview to solder smd components to a circuit board all day long.  The owner gave me a test to describe electronic components.  It was obvious he was trying to eliminate people so they would not complain for not getting the job.  Just a way to shut up the narcissists.

[DrG]

Liability avoidance is, in fact, more important than skills in this situation and I think it can generalize to many other situations.

I see organisations take this to an extreme, and only hire people with a great reluctance to do anything at all.

Well, I never took anyone who was reluctant to do anything at all, but your point is not missed by me. The safest lab, most secure lab and so on, is the one that doesn't produce anything. But, work in a highly regulated area where it often seemed that you have more "checkers" (as I liked to call them) than "doers", and you learn how to work in spite of some things - and that was, very much, a skill.

Still, to have a career where you get paid to think, read, write, learn, design, propose, conduct, analyze, present, publish, all of which contributes to a larger body of work, well that is what I wanted and what I was passionate about....no regrets here. 

[SilverSolder]

Pretty much all human activity exists is in the force field between "doers" and "checkers"...  we can't live without either one.  Obviously some companies lean more in one direction than the other, perhaps you could even say that companies (or even departments of companies) could themselves also be classified as "doers" and "checkers"...

The important part is to understand which direction you lean, and to work in an area that fits with your nature.

[madsbarnkob]

Over that last 10 years, I have applied for 2 jobs, been to 2 interviews and been hired 2 times.

From that you can properly conclude that I am a wanted candidate, but also I am very public using my real name on social platforms, forums and youtube.

At both interviews, we have ended up talking about my high voltage hobby, that was written about in the resumes with links to my website and youtube channel.

For me it has worked out very well and distinguished me from other candidates.

[Poe]

Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and to remove all doubt

I have not hired dozens of applicants.   Specifically due to what was on their social media. 

Either because of low competency, they don't take their job seriously, evidence of drug or alcohol problems, problem hobbies (e.g. surfers) or a personality type that wouldn't be a good fit.   

Now as a personal rule, I don't look at any social media they don't explicitly direct me to. 

Problem examples:
-A guy listed his projects with source info.  The projects looked impressive on the CV, but the source info showed they were all just open source projects to which he made a slight tweak.

-A similar guy, impressive project list with links to the design info.  He supposedly had twenty years experience in embedded systems, but all his very recent projects looked like they were done by a college grad.  Would have hired him then quickly fired him, so in this case it's better for him.

-A guy directed me to his personal website, not just his CV.  It had a four page report on why modern hygiene products are just a vehicle for government drugs.

-A girl listed all sixteen of her side businesses on her CV.

Many people put a facebook link on her CV.  This tends to have political and other personal views which your employer will be influenced by.  Not saying it's right, just understand that they WILL look and be influenced by it. 

Only list your CV and WORK RELATED content with no traces to your personal social media accounts.

[joeqsmith]

Enjoyed the video.  Can't say I have ever considered it in these terms.   Work is work and NDAs are common.