All Will Be Revealed

One of my last tasks before moving to my new job in the city was training my replacement at the hotel. I worked closely with her for about two weeks imparting my knowledge in hopes of making her transition a smooth one. During that time, we got to be friends. One day she said to me, "You must sew." I was surprised by that comment. I do sew, but I'd never mentioned that to her. I don't generally talk about it because it's not really a "guy" thing to do ... even though Tailor was once a respected male profession. I told her I did sew; then I asked her how she could possibly know. She said it was easy to tell by the way I handled scissors.

It's funny all of the ways we reveal things about ourselves unintentionally. The next time you are at a dinner party, watch what drinks people order and the way they order them. You can learn a lot about people from something as simple as that. The way people walk, what they wear, where they choose to sit on the train; all can be interpreted by the student of human nature.

I'm still struggling with this Face Book thing. I've done a little poking around, and it's kind of scary how much personal information people reveal about themselves. Talking about expensive purchases, listing travel plans; there are bad people in the world and they look for this kind of information to use against you. At the Risk Assessment course I recently attended, they gave as an example: a man in a new Mercedes with vanity plates announcing he is a plastic surgeon. It's like a law suit waiting to happen. Why make yourself an easy target?

I assume people realize that Human Resources professionals regularly search social media sites like My Space and Face Book as part of the screening and monitoring of employees. It's not even a secret; they will list the practice on applications and in employee handbooks. Why do people post things on line that may negatively affect their careers? I've even seen people post behavior that may actually be illegal. Some people just don't know when to stop.