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International News

3 In 4 Singapore Employers Snoop On Job Candidates Online

March 21, 2013 posted by Steve Brownstein

75 per cent of Singapore employers use online channels to perform background checks on potential candidates.

Of these, 63.9 per cent would reject job-seekers that were untruthful in their resumes or interviews and approximately 57 per cent say bad-mouthing previous employers and sharing confidential company information were frown-upon as well.

In addition, social media sites LinkedIn (38.4 per cent) and Facebook (34.3 per cent) rank as the most preferred channels among recruiters to snoop on job candidates, followed by search engines (27.5 per cent).

These were some of the results taken from JobsCentral's online survey, conducted from August to September 2012 among 396 hiring managers and HR personnel in Singapore.

"Traditional reference and background checks on job candidates have always been practiced by many employers. By looking up their candidates' social media foot-prints, employers are merely using another tool towards the same purpose of ensuring the best hiring decision possible," says Michelle Lim, Chief Operating Officer of JobsCentral Group, a CareerBuilder company.

"While job-seekers may find it unfair that their personal life is being dragged into the hiring equation, rather than bemoan the loss of privacy, it would be better to exercise good judgement in all social media engagement and make an effort to utilise available privacy settings. That is basically the reality of living in an internet age."

Most employers don't spend more than a minute screening resumes Most employers (62.1 per cent) spend less than 60 seconds looking through a resume. Only 4.8 per cent of recruiters spend more than 5 minutes to screen an application.

"A concise resume is of paramount importance as the busy hiring manager or recruiter usually has hundreds of resumes to go through. If your resume does not capture attention within the first 30 seconds, it is likely to end up in the reject pile. The purpose of a resume is to get that interview, so just give enough to get them interested to meet you," adds Lim.

Irrelevant job experience is the top resume peeve Nearly two-thirds (68.9 per cent) of employers complain that including irrelevant job experience was the top resume mistake applicants make, while half (49 per cent) of them said they were turned off by insufficient information and gaps in the resume. Others include:

Unreasonable salary demand - 39.4 per cent

Irrelevant information - 34.8 per cent

Poor language - 33.3 per cent

Resumes that are too long - 26.3 per cent

Bad and unprofessional photograph - 22.2 per cent

Majority of employers leave room for candidates to negotiate pay 90.4 per cent of employers reported that they would typically leave room for candidates to negotiate their salary.

When negotiating a better starting salary, the dominant advice to candidates was for them to employ specific accomplishments and results they have achieved for previous employers as a useful bargaining chip (79.3 per cent). Knowing the on-going market salary for the position (51.5 per cent) and having strong references (47.7 per cent) also help jobseekers in salary negotiations.

Only 16.9 per cent say that showing an offer from another employer makes a difference.

"Many job-seekers do not realise that they are leaving money at the table when they fail to negotiate for a better pay. When asking for more pay, do highlight specific skills/experiences that you bring to the organisation and your market value. This helps the recruiter justify securing a higher salary for you," says Lim.