As many of you know I am finishing up my last semester at school and at the same time on the lookout for jobs (For those interested, you can look at my résumé).

As a part of the last few classes I have to finish, I am taking a CPSC Seminar course which so far has consisted of talks from the Texas A&M Career Center. A lot of talk has been on managing your personal on line reputation. Besides the obvious “don’t post pictures of you on Facebook doing keg stands” or “don’t post embarrassing, topless photos of yourself”.

A lot of these tips are based on the idea that you don’t want potential employers that read your blog (Hi prospective employers!) and research your internet famousness to screen you based on what they gather from their research. From not hiring you because all of your Facebook pictures involve you being trashed at a party to an extreme scenario of a Baptist corporate recruiter seeing that post you did on how much you hate Baptists. The theme is the same: don’t let the company screen you unnecessarily. Usually the safe bet is to TIGHTLY titrate the amount of information you post on the internet.

However if one does a cursory Google search of my name, one will find that I have not shied away from associating my content with myself. Granted the first page of Google results is mayhaps even sexy to recruiters (hey look, a couple of my technical blog posts linked on PHPDeveloper.org, my LinkedIn account), if one can see or gets access to my Facebook profile or read the rest of my blog, one will notice that I do not hesitate in expressing myself.

Why would I put myself out there like that? Because while companies are out shopping for employees, I am out shopping for companies. And such shopping extends beyond basic research on a company and visiting their work environment.

How many of you found the above photo offensive? uncouth? unprofessional? ridiculous? How many people would put that person lower on a hiring list because of the information you’ve gathered so far in seeing that photo? If you were, I would bid you adieu (yes, that picture is of me) because a company that would penalize me without investigating as to why a picture is ridiculous. Would the backstory that this picture was taken of me performing a skit as a Fish Camp counselor in front of 150 freshmen, trying to provide a little humor as we spent a little over 3 days preparing them for their time at Texas A&M, change your opinions?

The way I see it is the company that would weigh so heavily on the superficial and not on the content (leeway given to the fact that not every company will have the time to do full background research on me) is not a company I wish to work for. If they do this while they’re in the process of hiring me, what do I have to look forward to in my future with that company? Apparently not much.

Maybe this is just an excuse to myself for having a lot of information about me out in the wild, however I feel like I have carefully filtered information about me onto the internet to aid in my job search, and to help potential recruiters understand my personality a bit better. Because as cantankerous as I sound above, the “not being hired by X firm” works both ways. I don’t want to work at a firm where I will not be a good fit. I’ll cause friction, drop morale, and generally be ineffective.

Plus this post has been a great chance to explain that picture.