Side-Stepping a Professional Reference?

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A number of years ago I used to work for a large IT services firm. They were very buttoned up, very professional, and nearly everyone dressed the same.

During one of the many, many training courses that we went through (most of which were very good, by the way) there was always this one topic that pertained to HR: references.

I don't mean getting references so much as giving references.

In our training we were taught that if we ever received a call about a past employee (e.g. who no longer works for  the corporation) we were to give the stock answer. ‘Yes that person worked here” or  “no, that person didn’t work here during that timeframe.”

If the person had performance problems when they worked for us or left on ‘iffy’ terms then the simple acknowledgement that they worked here covered the company from a legal perspective. No comments made about his or her performance.

If the person was a stellar performer, we were still to give the same answer. From a legal perspective we were not going to sway or influence someone’s perception about a former employee.  It protected the corporation both ways.

And everything was pretty much fine until Social Media happened.

Enter professional sites like LinkedIn or Plaxo. Now most professionals have their resume posted at one of these online sites. And a curious feature of these sites is the ability to write a recommendation for someone.

I have them and I bet that you probably have them, too.

In a way, however, it's really grey area. You can get a professional recommendation for your work at a particular company from a reference supposedly within that company – all while side-stepping many of the rules and safeguards put into place by HR. In fact, I have seen many resumes with a link to the candidate's LinkedIn public profile (take that HR!).

It does create a lot of interesting questions that all still have to be shaken out.  Since the person offering the reference is identified as working for the company in question is it almost like speaking for the company or not? (clearly no). 

Is a person’s LinkedIn profile their own private internet presence or does it have overlap in the public mind with that of the company they currently work for? If someone defames a fellow employee or posts pictures to their Facebook page of another employee behaving badly at the last office party – legal or not  –  it creates impressions.

I think the old rules still don’t hurt in today’s social media world. Or perhaps if professional endorsements are posted, maybe it should be emphasized that it represents a particular personal opinion? (perhaps it already does)

Something to think about while I continue cleaning up these old training guides from a by-gone era. . . 

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