Researching a potential employer

By: Robert Palmer | Posted: 05th June 2009

If you're planning on applying for a job, or if you've already applied and been granted an interview, it might be a good idea to start finding out who this potential employer really is. Thanks to the Internet it's much easier to find out things about people - some of them true and some of them not - when it comes to both business and personal information. Google is most often used when trying to get information about a company. You can type in just the company name, and you can also try this with words like scam, fired, lawsuit, discrimination, and review. There might be some disgruntled people on there who are obviously just complaining, but if you find legitimate information (court records, etc) about the company that doesn't look good you may want to think twice about working there. Even if the problems that the potential employer might have (they've been accused of minority discrimination and you're not a minority, for example) wouldn't affect you, do you want to work for a company with that kind of reputation?

Keep in mind that Google isn't the only search engine out there, either, and that other search engines will likely come up with slightly different information. Check more than one, and read what they have to say. You don't have to spend hours, but take an honest look at the information that you find there. You can also try Wikipedia, although its accuracy isn't guaranteed. It might give you some other resources to check. Word of mouth is still the best when researching a potential employer, but talking to other employees could be risky. They might take that information back to the boss, who might not appreciate that. It would be better to talk to people who don't work for the company but who live or work near it. That's one of the best ways - other than the Internet - to get information. It can really help you decide if that potential employer is someone that you want to work with and whether the company is one that you'd be proud to be associated with.

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This article was written by Tom Sangers on behalf of Martin Ward Anderson who offer International recruitment services for international jobs
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Tags: google, other search engines, word of mouth, search engine, reputation, accuracy, boss, wikipedia, applying for a job, discrimination, court records, information check