Many young workers don't want employers using their online data for HR or hiring purposes, write Scott A. Hurrell, Dora Scholarios and James Richard

Hurrell, Scott A.

Richardson, James

Scholarios, Dora

LSE Research Online

4/25/2017Employers beware: Generation Y loves social media, but toa pointblogs.lse.ac.uk /businessreview/2017/04/25/employers-beware-generation-y-loves-social-media-but-to-a-point/Social media is a ubiquitous feature of modern life inside and outside the workplace. Employers now recognise thebenefit of using social networking sites for attracting, retaining and engaging employees (e.g. through encouragingcommunication and collaboration), especially members of generation Y, born from approximately 1980 to 2000.Although there has been debate about the distinctiveness of this generation’s work values, they have a particularrelationship with technology, and social media is often integral to their lives.Employer use of social networking sites remains legally and ethically controversial. There have been well publicisedcases of firms dismissing employees for material posted on these sites. Debate rages over whetherorganisations are protecting themselves in such cases or invading employee privacy. As a recruitment tool, to attractjob applicants, there is also concern over whether the use of social networking sites may lead to discrimination (e.g.against older workers).Practically, there are concerns regarding organisations’ use of social networking sites, for example whetherinformation gathered over these forums is sufficiently job-related for hiring decisions. The use of social networkingsites by firms thus constitutes, to use Richard Edwards’ term, a ‘contested terrain’ with ample opportunity forconflict between employers and workers, with the associated potential for worker resistance.Our study had three key objectives:firstly to examine young workers’ experiences of employer use of social networking sites;secondly, to ascertain how fair they believed this practice was – their justice perceptions – and whetherthese perceptions differed depending on the specific employer practice; andthirdly, to see whether young workers actively managed their social media activities with employers in mind,and whether this affected their justice perceptions.1/4The study consisted of an online survey of 385 undergraduate business and management students studying inScotland, who were currently or previously employed.Respondents revealed various employer uses of social networking sites. These included encouraging social eventsoutside work (37%), recruitment (32%), communication and collaboration (22/27%) and screening job candidatesprior to hiring (21%). However, less than a third who were aware of employers screening applicant’s profiles prior tohiring reported that candidates had been made aware of this.Twenty seven per cent reported that they had experienced employer disapproval of their social media activities, witha third of these formally disciplined. Few respondents reported that non-work related activities were subject toemployer sanction. Formal discipline was most likely when employers disapproved of social media activitiesoccurring during working hours, or when posts specifically mentioned the employer (for example someone had beendisciplined for referring to herself as an ‘underpaid slave’ on Facebook).Justice perception variables were grouped into four factors (see Table 1). Simplified here, these factors representedthat employer use of social networking sites either: a. violated justice perceptions (e.g. were invalid or invadedprivacy) or b. satisfied justice perceptions (e.g. were valid and effective) for two sets of practices – recruitment andselection, and internal HR decisions.Table 1. Justice perceptions for employer use of social networking sites (SNS)Note: Scores were measured on a scale from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree)The items shown in Table 1 were rated on a 1-5 agreement scale, and show higher perceived justice violation than2/4satisfaction for each category of employer practice. Respondents thus tended towards a view that employer use oftheir social media data was unjust. Table 1 shows that respondents were especially concerned about the efficacy ofusing this data for workplace decisions, although they also had privacy and ethical concerns.The single practice with the highest degree of satisfaction was the use of social networking sites to allow two-waycommunication during recruitment. Indeed, when examining recruitment and selection, the items with highersatisfaction were more related to the attraction stage of recruitment, whilst the items with higher violation were morerelevant to the hiring stage — the process of selecting who from the shortlist was to be offered the jobYoung workers appeared to respond to these perceptions of injustice. Over half reported managing their socialmedia profiles with current (52%) or prospective (56%) employers in mind. Specific examples included groupingwork and non-work friends separately on Facebook (e.g. so different privacy settings could be applied to differentgroups) and not ‘friending’ managers.Regression models revealed that those who actively managed their profiles had significantly higher perceived justicesatisfaction and reduced perceived justice violation for the use of social networking sites for internal HR decisions.People with active profile management also had significantly higher perceived justice satisfaction for the use ofsocial networking sites during recruitment and selection. The magnitude of these changes were, however, small.Those using LinkedIn reported higher satisfaction with employer use of social networking sites for recruitment andselection, independently of active profile management.The results indicate that employers need to be careful about how they use job applicants’ and workers’ socialnetworking site data, even with the technologically literate generation Y. The young workers here displayed ageneral cynicism towards employer practice in this sphere, despite popular conception of them as ‘digital natives’.Whilst there was little evidence of employers attempting to control current workers’ non-work online activities, theydid, however, engage in activities that could elicit resistance such as covertly screening job applicants’ profiles.The alertness shown by many of our sample in managing their online activities indicates an awareness of thepotential for conflict, with active management of social media profiles somewhat reducing perceptions of injustice.The findings point to the need for employers to reflect on the ethicality of their social media practices (especially aslegal guidance remains vague in many countries) and to engage in transparent behaviours which are perceived asfair by workers and job applicants.If practices are perceived as unjust then employers may face reputational damage, as well as potentially basingdecisions on erroneous information. One way for employers to do this, our data suggest, is to concentrate efforts on‘work-purposed’ sites such as LinkedIn, especially for recruitment. Indeed attracting applicants during recruitmentappears to be the most fruitful avenue for engaging young workers via social networking sites and should perhapsbe employers’ focus, rather than using such data for internal HR purposes or to make hiring decisions.♣♣♣Notes:This blog post is based on the authors’ paper ‘The kids are alert’: Generation Y responses to employer useand monitoring of social networking sites, in New Technology, Work and Employment 32:1The post gives the views of its authors, not the position of LSE Business Review or the London School ofEconomics.Featured image credit: Link Humans Christmas 2016, by Link Humans, under CC-BY-2.0 licenceBefore commenting, please read our Comment Policy.3/4Scott. A. Hurrell  is Senior Lecturer in Human Resource Management and OrganisationalBehaviour in the Adam Smith Business School, University of Glasgow. Scott has a particularinterest in labour market and skills issues, work organisation and the use of social media in theworkplace. Scott has published in world leading academic journals, a number of edited bookcollections and has conducted research with a number of policy bodies.Dora Scholarios is Professor of Work Psychology at University of Strathclyde Business School inGlasgow. Her recent research activity has focused on examining the implications of employerrecruitment and selection practices for social mobility and graduates’ career transitions into qualityemployment. She is currently Co Editor-in-Chief of the Human Resource Management Journal. James Richards is Associate Professor in Human Resource Management in the School of SocialSciences, Heriot-Watt University. James is generally interested in social injustices of theworkplace, leading to research on a range of topics that include: employee misbehaviour andresistance through social media, managing hidden disabilities in the workplace, and, in-workpoverty and marginal societal groups. James has published in a range of high quality academicjournals and edited book collections, and produced a range of consultancy reports. Copyright © 2015 London School of Economics4/4

Employers beware: Generation Y loves social media, but to a point

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