Several years ago, when I joined Facebook, I friended old friends and colleagues. One of those was a friend who was also the chair at a college I knew well.
As I was looking for a position in my city, I would post on fb whenever I had an interview. I would ask for prayers, encouragement, good vibes, blessings, whatever positive things could be sent my way.
I was very encouraged by my job search because I was getting interviews and second interviews in positions which had hundreds of candidates.
When a job came up at the college of my fb friend, I applied. I was not even considered for the position. The reason? My friend/chair said, “If she can’t get a job when she’s been a finalist twelve times in Big City, there must be something wrong with her.”
Why did she think that? Her college had 5 applicants for the position they advertised. She assumed, very wrongly, that all colleges and universities were receiving about the same number of applicants for positions. Imagine if I was one of a pot of 48 people for 12 different jobs and never got one. That would not say great things about me, or it would say REALLY great things about at least 12 of the other people.
Thankfully she was speaking with another friend and that friend had job searched in Big City for five years, before she went to work at the college with my friend/chair. She explained to friend/chair that the jobs I was applying for had 250+ and that my having made it to the finalists 12x was a BIG deal.
I did finally get a ft position in Big City. But it was very painful to know that my friend had used my fb posts against me.
Be careful what you post on facebook. The context is not always as clear as you think it is.
Here is a model of discourse analysis on Facebook that was presented by Kate Retzinger:
