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During the last presidential election, I remember vividly that a certain man, a Facebook celebrity with a good number of followers came under fire by his followers and other influencers alike because he had withheld from making known his support to any candidate.
According to his followers and some of the posts regarding the issue that I read about, he is a person who is always very vocal about societal issues and trending topics so it came as a shock to people that he wasn't doing same in the situation. Some accused him of being a closet follower to a particular candidate. The draggings and insults were so bad that he made no posts for a long while, and i wondered how he was taking it.
A while later, it was revealed from someone else, apparently a close friend of his, that the man who came under fire was unable to show solidarity to any candidate and party because it was against the ethics of the company he worked with.
When I saw this topic, this story came to mind. Ordinarily, I would say that no, an employer should not ask for social media handles but sometimes, it pertubes me when I come across posts made by certain people, that I wonder if they have no one to caution them. People can be vile and inhumane and make thoughtless posts and statements. In my head, from just that one post, I already have a perception of them and would subconsciously make myself steer clear of them and their pages. It tells of them and is their true image.
So, I can understand if a company makes such requirements of their applicants. I like to consider it as part of basic research. At the end of the day, that person represents the company(i don'tknow if he stated it in his bio that he works with the company or not) but we've seen over and over that when someone does something crazy online, it will come back to the company they work for and people that have affiliation with them.
With that in mind, a company should be allowed to see how you present yourself since that public persona could affect them directly once they've hired you.
And come to think of it, how could anyone have a reasonable expectation of privacy in something they specifically choose to make public?! Are you expecting laws to protect unreasonable expectations of privacy?
These days, it's more of normal practice that employers check up on their employees' social media accounts before hiring them and when they start working with them. This is done for various reasons, including to get a better
understanding of the person, to ensure that the employee is a good fit for the job, to check for any potential red flags, and to ensure that the employee is not engaging in any activities that may be damaging to the company's reputation.
Typically, an employer also looks a few other details like the professionalism, appropriateness of the employee, they also look at the activity level, brand represntatuon and personal conduct as it relates with the company's values. I don't see why it should be difficult to submit my handles. After all, everything I post is outl there for the general public to consume, so what difference would having my employer go through my page make? It should be nothing. And for my dream job, why not?
I hope that this was interesting to read. Thanks for coming around.