Affairs can have terrible consequences on families and place strain on friendships, but they also have causes that many people do not foresee. Cheating is a lot of work, it takes time and resources away from the important things someone should be focusing on, one of them being their career. Just how can someone’s cheating on Facebook cause negative consequences for their job?
Finding a job
When employers decide to advertise a job, many of them will use the Internet to check out the backgrounds and personalities of those applying. In fact, 45% of employers admitted to searching for candidates on social networking sites, with Facebook the most popular place to start. One of the major reasons for rejecting an applicant was for posting “provocative or inappropriate photographs or information”. If you look at the profiles of people who use Facebook for cheating, they often use sexy photographs, crude language or engage in ‘harmless flirting’ that will look bad to any potential employers checking them out. Also, if they’ve cheated in the past, it may have caused a lot of drama and the messages on their timeline will reflect this. Hardly the kind of image you’d want to give to a hiring manager, who often just wants someone reliable who isn’t going to cause a lot of trouble.
Using Facebook at work
Although many employers allow access to the site through the company’s Internet, using Facebook at work is very unprofessional and cuts productivity at work. Someone who is cheating may be tempted to use social media more often at work because there’s less risk of their partner seeing an inappropriate message pop up or interrogating them over spending so much time on Facebook. However, this kind of social media use is massively distracting, and with many company’s monitoring their employee’s IT usage, a sexually explicit photograph or message can be enough to get someone fired. It’s not just using a work computer that’s a danger. For those who use Facebook on their smart phone, it can be tempting to be logged in all day posting messages to their lover. However, excessive personal cell phone use can also get an employee in to trouble or even fired, and in this economy employers are much less tolerant of people slacking off.
Flirting with other employees
Many people add their colleagues as friends on Facebook. After all, if they get on well and enjoy chats around the water cooler then why not? They may find that Facebook is a useful tool for communicating with others in the office, and the instant messaging feature makes getting a response quick and easy. However, communications can easily get out of hand. Even using a simple X at the end of messages can lead people to think you’re interested, and over half of office affairs begin this way. People censor themselves less when using Facebook, so a message to a work colleague could be much more forward than something they’d send from their professional work e-mail. Affairs, or even just flirting, can make a workplace environment difficult. Not only does it make the culprits look unprofessional, but it spreads office gossip, destroys reputations and can lead to accusations of people gaining unfair advantages. Some companies even have rules about relationships between colleagues, and could use it as an excuse to discipline or fire an employee.
Being distracted in general
Affairs ultimately make people unhappy. Whether it’s the victim or the cheat, they find themselves re-examining their life and priorities. Finding a new partner and getting caught up in the excitement of a fresh romance may make them dissatisfied with their lot in life, whether it’s their home, their family or their job. Spending so much time on Facebook can also cause jealousy, as posts from friends and acquaintances go on about how fabulous their lives are. It may lead to people questioning their life and career choices and longing for change, perhaps even casting off the shackles of their stable job to go for something more reckless.
Unfortunately, Facebook is an easy tool for cheating. Everything is password protected and the instant messaging feature can make it very tempting to engage in flirtatious chat. Many cheats forget that while they’re busy with their Facebook chat, life is still going on, and perhaps don’t realize how seriously their exciting new affair can ruin their career. Using Facebook at work is generally a bad idea, but using it for explicit communications can cause trouble in lots of ways.