Why you shouldn't add your boss on Facebook...

[Tazz]

http://imgur.com/6zjNO.jpg

hehehe

[thereom4]

I heard about this story today. Her former employer is so awesome. That burn will linger. Why would you add your boss as a friend on Facebook and then talk smack? Why does anyone add their boss as a friend on Facebook?

[Tazz]

I heard about this story today. Her former employer is so awesome. That burn will linger. Why would you add your boss as a friend on Facebook and then talk smack? Why does anyone add their boss as a friend on Facebook?

Hahaha.. I dunno. You have to be pretty stupid.
I can imagine that girl so vividly. Urgh!

[JackOfHearts]

Yea, putting adding a boss on facebook/myspace is a bad idea. Coworkers on the other hand... It's interesting what these people put in their photo galleries.

[thetortfeasor]

Why would you add your boss as a friend on Facebook and then talk smack? Why does anyone add their boss as a friend on Facebook?

I have no idea. And, I know they're not officially your boss, but I also don't get why people add teachers, deans, and other school administrators to their social networking profiles, while still enrolled at the school these people work at.

It makes no sense to me.

[MyrddinsPrecint]

Some of us actually have good relationships with teachers, professors, administrators, bosses. Mutual respect, appropriately clear boundaries, but real interest in each other as people. But here's the bigger thing:

I keep my facebook profile set up so that I don't care if a boss or possible employer can see it. There aren't pictures of me drunk or in slutty clothes. The information is personal in nature, but not embarassing in nature.

I have a personal brand, and I manage it as such. Not adding someone I work with (or worked with) would just be silly, since I'm hoping to use it to keep track of people who might be able to help me, or I might be able to help.

Now If I could just keep up with actually blogging about things, I'd be all set.

[thereom4]

Some of us actually have good relationships with teachers, professors, administrators, bosses. Mutual respect, appropriately clear boundaries, but real interest in each other as people. But here's the bigger thing:

I keep my facebook profile set up so that I don't care if a boss or possible employer can see it. There aren't pictures of me drunk or in slutty clothes. The information is personal in nature, but not embarassing in nature.

I have a personal brand, and I manage it as such. Not adding someone I work with (or worked with) would just be silly, since I'm hoping to use it to keep track of people who might be able to help me, or I might be able to help.

Now If I could just keep up with actually blogging about things, I'd be all set.

My view on this is a little different. Facebook started off as a college thing and then eventually it was opened up to everybody. The way I am with my friends is different than the way I am with an employer.

I think unless you have multiple facebook accounts or unless facebook comes up with some feature to separate your "friends" into different categories so that you can post what you want about yourself without censorship it's probably not a great idea to add your employer.

Why does my employer need to know my relationship status? Maybe I'm having a bad day because I just had a fight with my boyfriend and I decide to post a note about it. I don't want my employer coming up to me the next day asking how my boyfriend and I are doing. For me this just wouldn't work. But I guess it's just a matter of preference.

[MyrddinsPrecint]

My view on this is a little different. Facebook started off as a college thing and then eventually it was opened up to everybody. The way I am with my friends is different than the way I am with an employer.

I think unless you have multiple facebook accounts or unless facebook comes up with some feature to separate your "friends" into different categories so that you can post what you want about yourself without censorship it's probably not a great idea to add your employer.

Why does my employer need to know my relationship status? Maybe I'm having a bad day because I just had a fight with my boyfriend and I decide to post a note about it. I don't want my employer coming up to me the next day asking how my boyfriend and I are doing. For me this just wouldn't work. But I guess it's just a matter of preference.

The way I am with my friends is different than the way I am with an employer too, only I don't act the way I act with my friends on facebook.

Some people on facebook don't use their real name, only are friends with people they're actually fairly close to, and post personal things. But that's not really standard.

I have facebook friends I had one class with my first year of college and really never talked to again. It made a lot of sense for me to friend them then. I don't know if they're actually the daughter of a potential future boss. I don't know if another Smith grad is at a firm looking at my resume and is going to check out my fb profile.

So given that I do not keep the data on facebook restricted to people I know everything about, I have to assume that those people may spread my data to my boss or potential boss anyway. So in the circumstances in which my boss is on fb, and I'm friendly with my boss, why wouldn't I friend my boss, or accept their friend request?

[I_luv_saber]

Good rule of thumb: Don't put anything on the internet that you don't want seen by somebody/anybody, because it can (and probably will) come back to bite you in the butt.

I wouldn't mind adding my boss, but I sure as hell wouldn't post dumb stuff like that! My bosses are reasonably cool though, so...

[Mergs]

Why does my employer need to know my relationship status? Maybe I'm having a bad day because I just had a fight with my boyfriend and I decide to post a note about it. I don't want my employer coming up to me the next day asking how my boyfriend and I are doing. For me this just wouldn't work. But I guess it's just a matter of preference.

A good supervisor would already know that about you, and could sense if there were problems by your behavior, and more importantly, how it was affecting your work and by keeping their eyes and ears open. No, you don't have to put it out there for the world to see (we share WAY too much information about ourselves on-line anyway, IMHO), especially if it is something that is going to come back to haunt you later.

[thetortfeasor]

Some of us actually have good relationships with teachers, professors, administrators, bosses. Mutual respect, appropriately clear boundaries, but real interest in each other as people. But here's the bigger thing:

I keep my facebook profile set up so that I don't care if a boss or possible employer can see it. There aren't pictures of me drunk or in slutty clothes. The information is personal in nature, but not embarassing in nature.

I have a personal brand, and I manage it as such. Not adding someone I work with (or worked with) would just be silly, since I'm hoping to use it to keep track of people who might be able to help me, or I might be able to help.

Now If I could just keep up with actually blogging about things, I'd be all set.

You can have mutual respect, interest in each other as a person, and even admiration, but still not want to add that authority figure on Facebook.

I agree with theorem4, that it's just different for some people. I have teachers that I'm close with and have a ton of respect for, but I would never add them on Facebook or Myspace because to me that's crossing certain boundaries that I don't think should be crossed... A teacher or dean doesn't need to see pics of when my friends and I went to a concert or the beach, or read a status update about how I broke up with my boyfriend or whatever. And I don't really need to know all that about the teacher/dean/administrator.

But to each their own, I guess.

[Nolano]

http://myparentsjoinedfacebook.com/

[MyrddinsPrecint]

You can have mutual respect, interest in each other as a person, and even admiration, but still not want to add that authority figure on Facebook.

I agree with theorem4, that it's just different for some people. I have teachers that I'm close with and have a ton of respect for, but I would never add them on Facebook or Myspace because to me that's crossing certain boundaries that I don't think should be crossed... A teacher or dean doesn't need to see pics of when my friends and I went to a concert or the beach, or read a status update about how I broke up with my boyfriend or whatever. And I don't really need to know all that about the teacher/dean/administrator.

But to each their own, I guess.

I guess my opinion is boiled down to two things:

*I have no promise someone I don't want to see something on facebook won't see it (privacy settings or no), so I make sure that I'm comfortable with what I put up being seen by the general populace. I continue to make things difficult for those people I would prefer not see those things, but if they care enough, they'll get in eventually.

*The college I went to has a very different approach to faculty/staff/student relations than many. Almost all first years have a close relationship with the dining staff, because most first years work in dining halls. Professors eat dinner with students often, and house fellows will eat with a particular house as frequently as once a week, or attend tea regularly. Profs also invite students over to their houses at the end of the semester, particularly for small classes, high level classes, or if they just live nearby. Advisors often take their advisees out to eat/to their house as a group. And that's just normal interaction, without any particular closeness between individuals.

For the professors I knew better... I had met partners, parents, been to their house for parties, one prof came to my apartment senior year with a dairy free cake for my birthday. I received rides to go to the supermarket or linens'n'things (this was more unusual, but given circumstances, made sense).

While certain profs or departments had an increased reputation for this than others, it was widespread and considered basically normal.

[thetortfeasor]

Well, that makes sense, then. I don't think your experience is that of the average person, though.

My original comment in this thread was actually in reference to people I know who added deans, administrators, etc., but still continued to post pictures of themselves drunk and/or looking slutty. One girl even had her default pic as a pic of her in a dominatrix outfit!

But, yeah... I don't put anything on the internet that I wouldn't want anyone to see, and I think that's a good rule of thumb.