Last Friday, I attended the TCU Neely School of Business' conference on business uses of social media. It was a great event that included a speaker from LinkedIn, Hubspot, SABRE Holding's Cubeless team, and Handango, as well as authors of recent books on Twitter and Facebook.

Using LinkedIn and Facebook for recruiting candidates was a hot topic, especially given the fat-free diets many recruiting departments are on these days. A couple mentions were also made with regard to using social media sites to background check applicants (executive summary: a bad idea... read on).

Worforce Management published an article last week on the same topic. In that article, my friend Pam Devata, an partner in Seyfarth Shaw's Chicago office, points out:

"Sourcing from professional network sites such as LinkedIn carries a risk that the method could be challenged on discrimination grounds,” Devata says. “It represents a hiring pool that is not open to the general population. Using a limited network may have a disparate impact. If hiring through these networks can be challenged, it will be."

Notice that Pam doesn't say "don't use LinkedIn to recruit." She simply points out that there is a disparate impact risk in limiting your recruiting tools. Lawyers from other firms make similar observations and advise against using the social media websites as background checking tools. All great advice.

So, I was surprised when one of my favorite HR bloggers, Kris Dunn at Fistful of Talent, responded with an article called 'Hey Employment Law "Experts", You're Killing My Profession.'  Kris isn't having any of it and argues risk-averse HR departments may take such advice as gospel to their own detriment. Jessica Lee had a similar but more gentle response. I agree that there is a risk there but at the same time I believe that there is a bigger risk of using social media as a recruiting or background screening tool without first evaluating it's place in the larger legal and talent management framework.

My response to Kris's article at the FOT website follows:

Anyone who has been through an OFCCP audit or defended an employment discrimination claim recognizes that the advice in the Workforce Management article is on target. On the flip side, though, I agree that too many HR departments are too-risk averse and take legal cautions as gospel.

The government and juries will look at the composition of your applicant pool and your outreach efforts to traditionally disenfranchised populations. You'd better be ready to defend your practices, whatever they are. Identifying and sourcing candidates through social media is great IF your pool of candidates is sufficiently diverse. If not, you better be reaching out to other recruitment sources (ethnic chambers of commerce, traditionally-minority institutions, groups assisting older workers or veterans transition to new jobs, etc.) to at least try to identify qualified candidates. Otherwise, you are painting a target on your back - not to mention potentially excluding some extremely qualified candidates to whom you may not have been exposed otherwise. But by all means, use social media (particularly professionally-orient social media like LinkedIn) to identify potential candidates.

Once an individual has formally expressed interest in a position (ugh, the old quandry about when in your organization an interested party becomes an applicant) the use of social media should be extremely cautious. Using a candidate's personal blog or facebook page to evaluate their freak-factor is lazy and would be hard to defend against discrimination claims. The EEOC's E-RACE initiative is targeting these sorts of unvalidated selection procedures.

I'm told that LinkedIn's Recruiter platform has a means of eliminating photos and other potentially discriminatory information from information received by recruiters. That's smart. It protects the recruiter from claims of bias (intentional or unintentional).

And while the FOT authors are very professional and deliberative recruiters who will do whatever is necessary to land the best talent for their firms, I've known some recruiters and many hiring managers for whom the first impression is as far as they ever get. If that first impression is a five-year-old picture of the candidate doing something stupid in college posted on flickr.com or tweetpic by someone else, that otherwise qualified candidate is out of the game and everyone loses.

The best advice I have for employers who believe that their employees’ online presence is job-relevant, need-to-know information is to create a firewall between the individual conducting the “social-media background check” and all hiring authorities. The person conducting the research should have clear guidelines about what information would be relevant to the position for which the candidate is being considered. Any potentially relevant information should be shared with a neutral member of management who can assess the information fairly without risking prejudicing the hiring manager prematurely. This reviewing authority might be a senior member of HR, Security, Risk Management, Legal, or perhaps even someone in the chain of command above the hiring manager. In some cases, your background screening firm might provide this service with a strict understanding of what will and will not be reported.

I know that seems a lot more complex than just googling candidates because your CEO “doesn’t like freaks,” but I’ll bet he doesn’t like all the lost productivity that comes from employee relations headaches and lawsuits, either.

Intelius, the online data broker notorius for selling information most people would consider personal to anyone who wants it, has released an iPhone application that is a must-have for the on-the-go stalker.

Their Date Check app is touted as a way for users to check out potential hook ups while they are still sitting next next to you at the bar. For a few bucks, you can use Date Check to check out your prospective paramour's background - criminal history, address... even an asset check - by providing as little initial information as their cell phone number.

This is an insanely dangerous idea for at least two reasons. First, all criminal records databases miss a lot of records. A LOT. This means that anyone relying on Intelius to determine whether the Prince or Princess Charming they just met at the monster truck after-party has a criminal record are potentially missing important information. The danger in this, as in relying on any criminal records database, is that users may rely on the information to make critical decisions... with potentially devastating consequences.

Of even more concern to me about this app, however, is the giant potential for abuse. This app obviously doesn't have any way of measuring the intent or goodwill of the user. Want that cute blonde's address so you can show up at her front door to convince her that you are soul mates? This is the app for you! Have a more nefarious intent? No problem!

This is such a bad and dangerous idea that I won't even post a link to their site. Google it and you'll see what a bad idea this really is.

Last Wednesday, I attended the DFW SMA’s Diversity Strategies panel discussion at the Gaylord Texan Resort in Grapevine. The group of five panelists not only represented a variety of perspectives, but brought a lot of value and insight to the table. Here’s a run down of the panel:

• Melissa Wallace, Manager of Diversity Strategies for American Airlines
• Elizabeth Otenaike, Diversity and Inclusion/Change Strategist for Lockheed Martin
• Gracie Vega, Vice President HR for Gaylord Texan Resort 
• Sherri Elliott, President of Gen InsYght and Author of Ties to Tattoos
• Nancy Ruth, Program Manager for Cultural Awareness International

Generally, diversity and inclusion are topics that can begin to sound redundant to employers and employees alike, but I found the contributions from these five professionals refreshing. During the discussion, they covered several topics including the scope of diversity, recruiting, and understanding diversity as a competitive advantage within an organization. As far as diversity goes, many of us have mastered "talking the talk", but how many companies actually "walk the walk"?

Recruiting strategies can have both a positive and negative impact on an organization, and implementing methods that take diversity into account doesn’t necessarily translate into race and gender considerations, according to Sherri Elliott. When asked how an organization can recruit and attract a diverse set of employees, she emphasized that although there are many factors to consider in the process, age and generational differences must be thoroughly understood.

Understanding the nature and impact of these generational differences may be to an organization’s advantage, particularly in times of economic distress when keeping valuable employees involved is crucial. Today, for example, more “Gen Yers” place more value on contributing worth to a company as opposed to reaping monetary benefits. 

Another, perhaps more prevalent, diversity issue was touched on frequently throughout the discussion--differences in values, nationalities and backgrounds. From an HR standpoint, it is not enough anymore to ensure your workforce is diverse. In fact, this reality often creates unintended and completely avoidable problems that affect productivity and profitability within a company. 

For example, Nancy Ruth, the program manager for Cultural Awareness International, cited a particular cross cultural conference call she encountered that underlined the consequences that can arise from not familiarizing oneself with cultural differences. This particular discussion, like so many others, faltered because of a lack of awareness--something organizations can help prevent by implementing the right programs and asking the right questions.

Perhaps the main send home in this entire panel discussion was that organizations and all individuals involved in running them must understand the intrinsic value and competitive advantage diversity provides. Greater success lies not only in the recognition of a problem, but also in the assessment of solutions. 

As Nancy Ruth put it:

“We tend to give platitudes for being diverse, but leave that value of it on the table... find the value that the diverse workforce brings.”

In summary, simply ensuring you have a diverse workforce is not enough. Effective articulation of goals, self benchmarking and assessing and initiatives by all levels of management to ensure understanding among employees and employers is the cornerstone of today’s more productive and profitable organization. It’s not only an opportunity to strengthen and establish commitment and security. It’s a business case for diversity.

For a  more in depth look at this subject, check out Mike's podcast interview about workplace diversity with Scott Airitam of Leadership Systems.

As an applicant, providing information to potential employers is routine when you’re looking for a job, but using discretion about who exactly you disclose it to is imperative. In this CraigsList Scammer article from the News-Sentinel, Aaron Organ cites just one of many unfortunate incidents that occur on a daily basis. 

A man in Michigan posing as an individual who needed a babysitter required applicants for the position to provide personal information in addition to a twenty five dollar background investigation fee, something employers typically do not require applicants to pay. Luckily, police were notified of the strange activity and arrested the scammer in a sting operation, but individuals answering classified ads must educate themselves and remain careful about internet scamming and phony employers in order to prevent something much worse than losing a few bucks—identity theft. 

The CraigsList website actually provides a link to a list of personal safety tips that should be followed when making a transaction with an individual you don’t know. You can find the list of helpful pointers here.

How many people in your organization are "happily employed, using their skills, with a sufficient feeling of security to plan the future, and a minimum of stressful overload?"

In an article on the Harvard Business blog, Rosabeth Moss Kanter calls hitting this "sweet spot" the goal of progressive companies employing value-based management techniques to encourage innovation and profitability. This, says Kanter, involves a shift in corporate mindset from managing employees to giving them the tools and opportunities to be successful. It's an interesting read that highlights what Kanter calls "vanguard companies" in this area, including Procter and Gamble and IBM efforts.

On a related note, during the upcoming HR Southwest Conference, Al Lucia will be presenting presentation title highlighting the importance of maximizing employee engagement and commitment. Register today!