Personal Transparency in Perspective: The Impact of Social Networking Sites on the Recruitment Process

Abstract

to define SNS. Firstly, they "allow individuals to construct a public or semi-public profile within a bounded system" (Ellison, 2007, p.211). Secondly, they provide the possibility to share the information on this profile with other individuals, and lastly they enable users to see and share the connections of other users (ibid.). For the course of this paper, the distinction between 'private' and 'professional' SNS is highly relevant. While private sites, such as Facebook, the German StudiVZ and the Dutch Hyves are used for social interaction among friends and for exchanging private information, professional SNS, such as LinkedIn and Xing are used by both, job seekers and recruiters to establish professional contacts and exchange information relevant in the professional framework of, for example, the