new thread
About 3 weeks I ago, through an agency, I went to interview at a company.
The next day, the agency called me to tell me I was hired and I was to start in 2 weeks.
Then 3 days before I'm set to start, I get a call from the agency.
They notified me that the company has decided to reorganize and decided they no longer need the agency's services, therefore, making me SOL.
Well, to my shock and surprise, as I was googling my website the other day, I found a russian blog that linked to my site, and it was about my job interview!
Fortunately, or unfortunately for me, I am Russian, and know how to read it.
In a nutshell, the blogger (who apparently works in the company), wrote:
Our company needed to hire testers immediately, and yesterday we interviewed a bunch and hired them. But there was 1 guy with a ponytail that irked us. We told HR about it.
From there, we decided to google his name and found his site. Now we don't know what to do.
I guess now, I know exactly what they did, and had the agency feed me that excuse, or so I assume.
So now that makes me wonder, had I not had longhair, would they be as intrigued to google me?
If they were so bothered by my hair, then why did they hire me to begin with?
Was my hair the dealbreaker, or was it my website?
For those of you that don't know, I write poems of an adult nature, mostly humorous ones about porn, sex, etc.
I have since taken drastic steps to tone down my 'pervertedness'.
Turns out a few years ago, a newspaper did a story on my act which featured my real name, and I suppose that's what came up in search results.
As of now, only 2-3 things come up but I am doing my best to eliminate them.
Regardless of the outcome, I just think it's a shame that
1. My longhair bothered them.
2. You can't have a life outside of work.
Well I suppose with the internet being as open as it is some people will check up on things and of course you will never really know just have to put it down to experience. But is does sound strange that have to do that and not do it on face value.
Cheers,
John.B
It's a real shame if this was the case. I often worry as in the US, organizations can find something out about you, and if that rubs them wrong, they can not hire you, or even fire you. I believe in the UK, this is illegal. To bad it's not illegal here as it seems privacy is a dwindling thing. I've terminated my MySpace account, and feel I should not post as frequently on boards on the Internet. I fear Identity theft and if I "screw up" on the Internet, I could be up that certain creak, loose my job, house, identity. Scary stuff isn't it? Maybe the ALCU or privacy organizations should consider this.
Taking network security classes in the past has really changed my outlook on things. I was shocked when I Googled my internet name "ESDI-80" and that all the first hits referenced me. The references were to this board and the audio board I read, but still. Ouch!
Not sure if I should even post my first name on boards anymore?!?!
It's such a shame that the world has become what it is.. But it is what it is and here we are.. Just remember that there is a fine line between caution and paranoia ;-)
I grew up in a small town. Everyone knew your business whether you wanted them to or not. We had this communications system called "little old ladies", and anything that happened by sundown on Monday was known by everyone in town by noon on Tuesday. When you grow up in such a place, you grow up not expecting privacy. Instead, if you are ashamed of doing something you just don't do it. This is called "protecting your reputation." For me, the world has not "become what it is"; it has always been that way.
The Internet has made the world a small town, and it is getting more so all the time. When I first put my pages up on my inability to recognize faces, I felt that was sort of private, so I put the copyright (which mentioned my name) on a separate page. Did that matter? Not for long it didn't. Before long, people who liked the material referenced it and said it was authored by me. Now if you google my name, over 800 pages come up, many of them mentioning that work. Many of those pages are at universities, and one of them is the clip that Bruce put on line of me appearing on a national TV talk show about the topic. The bottom line is that people will find out who you are if they have an interest. The Fox network did not e-mail me to ask if I'd appear on the program. They phoned me here at the house.
Someone liked ATP's work and mentioned him as the author. Yep, I've been there.
Face recognition software is rapidly being developed, which will be a boon to people like me. No technology ever deployed has ever escaped Google, and you can bet your bottom dollar that they will roll out face recognition software before long on Google Images. Then at last, I can look at all of the photos tourists have taken of me when they wanted "San Francisco hippie" shots. This will also be one more way people on line can find a page with you on it, whether you put your name on it or not.
The good news is that everyone else's life will be an open book too. We all did dumb stuff in school, when we were younger, or whatever. Hey, it's just like a small town! People remember all that stuff about you. And they laugh it off because they did dumb stuff too. Small towns have survived as a social entity for centuries, so we will live through this transition just fine.
If you grew up in a big city, though, remember that every man has a thing called a "reputation". Kids who grew up in big cities may not be so aware of that.
Bill
Great response, Bill. I feel the same way. If one is worried that they will be held in lower esteem for their chosen actions, they have a few options, as I see it:
Ultimately, though, I think that it is the requirement of any self-respecting person to live in a manner consistent with their own guiding principles; the opinions of others matter little in the long, run (even though it doesn't feel great to disappoint those one holds in high esteem).
Thanks for sharing your thoughts, Bill. I approve ;).
Shawn
PS Did you yet receive the CBC 'The Nature of Things' documentary on which you were featured? I thought it was quite good.
Another thing that people forget is that, if you do good works, most of the stuff found on Google about you will be positive. People will discount a few negative comments should they appear, in the face of a flood of good works.
Thanks.
Yes, they sent me a DVD of the program, and I think they did a great job on it! I'm glad you got to see it.
Bill
I agree with you Bill. I also understand the "small town" bit as I live in one.. I guess I'm not overly concerned about anyone finding me or my contact info online as I pretty much advertise it being in the business I'm in..People around the world have my phone number and everyone around here knows me or knows of me.. Anyone in small business typically must "sell" themselves to the customer first so if they want "look me up" I WANT them to find something about me.. So, for me, being visable is to my advantage...
Tom
Hi Alexander,
Have you considered confronting them about it? I'm not very knowledgeable about finding employment (not to say I haven't had jobs before), so I don't know if this is a bad move or if it is considered unprofessional. If not, you may want to give it a try.
Cheers,
Peter
If they did do this they are just WRONG. You probably wouldn't like working for them anyway. Their loss IMO. Hope you find gainful work soon.
ATP, they can find a fault in anything upon anyone. Be yourself, be as neat as you want to be, and live your life knowing you've been true to yourself.
--
Splat
It is most unfortunate that this happened to you. It could very well be that they except everybody and then snoop about on them and the person gets an excuse why he is not hired right before ready to start. (Only a shot in the dark but I think the whole thing was wrong!) At least you didn't cut your hair because of them ahead of time. Whew.
Best of luck in finding another job which will be much more on the up and up and not snoop around in business that has nothing at all to do with your abilities in the job force.
Alyosha,
I love your poetry and think it's brilliant. I just re-checked it out and heard your originality in it. I heard Catullus too just a little and some of the other greats in the long conversation. But I think it's what sealed the deal. While long hair is often spurned by our society's quasi-traditionalism and ignorance of historical fact, anything to do with explicit sexuality is as well, but moreso. There are so many Victorian holdovers in our sense of morality, especially in America, and still such a narrow band of "acceptable" sexuality in the realm of conversational acceptance that anything too extreme is literally scary to some. It's a real paradox. Everybody's doing it, but no one, or almost no one, talks about it.
I'm sorry you didn't get the job, but you had it until they checked your web site. No?
It would seem I did have the job, even while they were having issues with my hair. I suppose their desperation to get people in, overcame their reluctance with my hair.
So I suppose yeah, ultimately my website is too blame :( And I've since taken measures to 'pro' it up.
Funny you should mention Catullus. I believe him and Ovid are 2 guys I've found who were precursors to my style :)
That's really sad. I work for a non for profit and I know if I didn't keep myself anonymous on the internet I'd be fired in a heartbeat. At least you're living the way you want!
Hi ATP,
Sorry you did not get the job you interviewed for.
My guess is that they just said "guy with a ponytail" to identify you, much as they might have said "guy with a New York accent". Something about you might have creeped one of the people interviewing you out a bit, so he googled you.
Certain things are not talked about in public places by respectable people, and blatant sexual stuff is one of those things. Like it or not, the Internet is a public place. If you would not talk about it on the bus or in a restaurant where strangers would overhear it, it doesn't belong on the Internet. If you are retired or independently wealthy, you can throw conventionality out the window and do what you want, but few are in that position.
It is legal in most places to discriminate against people on the basis of hair length, but my take on what you said is that it was because you posted stuff a bit too racy on the Internet.
My two cents,
Bill
Hi
There are certain reasons why the company decided not to hire you. But after what I read about, I agree with Quester. You would probably not want to work at that job anyway. If they choose not to hire you because of your hair being long, then that job is not the best. Don't worry, you will find something better.
Interesting story, thanks for sharing it with us. That raises another question. I've wondered about how public a person should be on the internet. The internet, (www.archive.org) is forever. I think you can go two ways. You can be totally open and have a high profile and just go with it. Or you can choose to be anonymous. I think there is a lot to be gained by participating fully and being open. But you never know.......
Public figures and politicians are now coming clean before the campaign process, cause something can always be dug up later. Cheaper to pay now than later.
One thing that seems obvious, we all have something we may not like in the public domain. People are people.
Hi ATP,
You've already gotten such excellent replies already (I especially enjoyed reading Bill's comments), that I doubt I have all that much I can add to them... But, let's just say that I think it's all about balancing your personal desire for total "openess" about who you are, with enough discreetness and subtlety to separate your private life from your co-workers' and superiors' knowledge about EVERYthing, --- in other words, if there's anything you can do at all to make it more difficult for the general public to NOT know much about your private life (and to not be able to FIND OUT SO EASILY - lol), you will then be viewed by whomever your future employer will be, as, "professional" (lol)!!
Hypocritical as it may sound that we all know that all human beings have a private sexual life, the vast majority of human beings don't want to hear about ANOTHER'S, --- probably for fear of jealousy that you're having too good a time (lol)!!
- Ken
"probably for fear of jealousy that you're having too good a time (lol)!!"
Ha! I love it.
Shawn
The place I work at does google hiring prospects for department
head or management. They did me I found out much later and nothing
came up. I must really be boring, ha! They also wanted me to cut
my hair and shave the goutee but I refused and they still hired me.
Good luck
Kevin
Thanks for sharing an important experience.
While I doubt if your longhair really swayed the employment decision, perhaps the overall tone of your website raised an eyebrow. But that is not really the point.
Our world is changing so rapidly that it is sometimes difficult to grasp the significance of what we post while in the now illusive "privacy" of our home. Despite the implied ethics of a potential employer searching outside the presented credentials of an applicant, we must realize that if we post parts of our private lives on-line it is easily available to all.
While each of us has a right to share whatever we choose to with our friends or folks of similar tastes, we should take care that we do not inadvertently show the public things that we really mean to keep to limited privacy.
For those in the job market, perhaps a squeaky clean, slightly self inflating website should be created and the link included on resumes.....((hmmmmm don't we see a couple of Democrats doing
this!!?? HA!)
Again, thanks for sharing your experience and stimulating an interesting discussion...
Walter
If the underlying reason was the hair or the poems, then it's a real shame, so sorry to hear this happened. As some others have said, you probably wouldn't enjoy working there anyway.
Btw, I would have never guessed you're russian! (I'm russian) Were your poems in english or russian?
Hope you have better luck finding a job next time,
derf26
My poems are in english. Not that good at writing russian, hehe.
It does sound like it was your web site, rather than your hair.
This incident reminds me of something that happened to me once. Some idiot wrote an e-mail to his boss saying they shouldn't hire me because I was a "loser". Nice, huh! This wasn't hair related, just based on my resume, sight unseen. You guessed it, he sent it to me as well as his boss, apparently by mistake. Of course, I then forwarded it to his boss with a few choice comments of my own, just to stir things up. I don't know if I made any trouble for him, but I'd like to think so!