Five Lifestyle Activities that Can Get You Fired

Yahoo lists five lifestyle activities that can get you fired as follows:

• Smoking, drinking, and overeating
• Risky behavior
• Speech
• Romantic relationships
• Political activity

I don't have any issues in any of these areas, though I did once date a woman that worked on the same business I did (I know, stupid idea, but I was young and you couldn't tell me otherwise.) I found out later that the higher-ups didn't like her and I think it reflected poorly on my career. Thankfully, I soon left that company (and her) and never repeated that mistake again.

The piece also ends with a bit of good advice that I just have to share:

"My general advice is, don't do anything on your own time that, if reported in the local paper, would reflect poorly on you or your employer," Bales told Yahoo! HotJobs.

How about you? Any of these ever been (or could be) an issue for you and your job security?

Comments

[Richard]

Why I work for myself.

As a former town officer, but hardly a politician, how is government to work if citizens are afraid their involvement will hurt their career?

[rdub98]

1. I am a smoker, but have been almost two weeks without a cigarette. I have never heard of someone being fired for smoking, though. But, in general, it is a bad idea. I don't drink and don't overeat.
2. I don't do anything that will risk my life. I have a family that I love dearly and want to be around for for a long time.
3. I try not to speak. Oh wait, that's not what they are talking about. It is a known fact that HR Managers everywhere search the social networking sites for personal blogs. Some of the content of those blogs have gotten people fired. I don't do that either.
4. I'm married and very happily so, so no problem there.
5. I never never never talk about religion or politics outside of my immediate family. Poor choice if you do.

[Tanya]

I was let go because I did not want to date within the office (it was a custom for managers and higher ups to date young newcomers)I was never part of "the family"

[David]

I can understand watching yourself in the workplace but I don't think I would waste my time working for a company where I can't be myself on my own time. For example, I work for a Christian college but I play in a non-Christian band that gigs primiarily at bars. Those two things certainly conflict, but they are separate parts of my life and one does not affect the other. I am also involved in fighting for equal rights for the GLBT community, which is in conflict with most Christian doctrine. However, I do not bring my outside-of-work activities to the workplace and therefore would not expect job security to be a concern. Myself, I work to live, not the other way around. So having a job that would prevent me from living the life I choose is just not a consideration.

[Tracy]

I mean - I get the obvious things like don't have ridiculous or obscene facebook pictures posted before you go to an interview, but I'm sorry, I do not and would not kowtow to a job so much that I'd deny who I am.

If someone wants to fire me because I'm a Democrat or because I volunteer for the HRC, then that company sucks and that job certainly isnt a good fit for me.

[Ryan S]

Don't blog or read others blogs while at work. Especially financial blogs.

[Chase Roper]

I just want to say that I really appreciate Richards comment. I don't think Political Action should be on that list. Its too bad that its true though.

[Jetgirl]

My husband and I are definitely unique. We are both engineers, and since he graduated from college (I graduated and started working full time 2 years earlier), we have worked for the same companies. Time and again, our particular skill sets have landed us working on the same projects. We have a track record of this at 3 different companies now and on multiple projects, and I suppose we must strike the right work balance for it to continue. It is something that we have to spend a lot of time talking about and perhaps because we are concerned about it we tend to do a very good job of keeping things professional in the work place. I don't know how long this will last, but currently I see us working on our current program together for at least another year or more. However, concerns aside, I do have to say that working with my best friend is a huge plus to me! We give and receive good feedback to one another that you just are not going to be able to get otherwise.

[Richard]

"Don't blog or read others blogs while at work. Especially financial blogs."

haha! What if that is my job?

Ok, it's not really my job, but my employer is OK with me using the internet during down times. Like right now I'm waiting for a program to finish running so I can analyze the results.

Social Media sites are a two edged sword.

I posted just this morning about how my personal web pages helped me get an interview (and as of an hour ago a job offer with a $9000 salary increase!). My websites have stuff that I've done that doesn't belong on a resume but portrays me as well rounded and creative.

On the other hand, just this week we didn't hire a girl to nanny for us because of things she had on her LiveJournal, Facebook and mMySpace pages.