I looked up a future colleague on LinkedIn before I started a job. I told him about it and he seemed surprised. Should I apologize?

Question

I was thinking about this and was wondering if my behavior is unethical - the information was public, and I didn't think much of doing so at the time.

Comments are not for extended discussion; this conversation has been moved to chat. — , Apr 10 '19 at 09:23
Surprised is different than offended. I'm not even sure if it is clear whether you're apologizing to an offense or to him being surprised. — Nelson, Apr 10 '19 at 09:29
I'm generally confused as to whether he looked up a colleague and then told another colleague that he looked them up, or that he told the colleague he looked up that he will be starting there... Second seems more plausible, but not clear from the question. — Lukali, Apr 10 '19 at 10:26
Why does ethics immediately spring to mind? Maybe you'd be better off framing it in terms of basic politeness first? — Lamar Latrell, Apr 10 '19 at 11:36
As you can tell from all the answers and commentary, opinion is totally mixed on whether reaching out to a future colleague via LinkedIn is appropriate. It's safe to assume that this future colleague is on the other side of the opinion that you (though you didn't detail his actual reaction). The best thing you can do is introduce yourself to him when you see him and explain that you were just enthusiastic about joining the team. — teego1967, Apr 10 '19 at 12:09
I feel like this is a general question. If I didn't do anything wrong to someone but they feel offended, should I apologize? — isaace, Apr 10 '19 at 15:32
This should've had a transcript of what was said to avoid confusion. If you look at people's comments, they seem divided between people thinking the guy was surprised/offended somebody looked up his public profile and others thinking he was surprised (perplexed) because the OP went to him and said, out of the blue, "I looked you up on LinkedIn before starting the job", as in wondering why someone would tell him something so trivial. — user, Apr 10 '19 at 16:00
By "surprised" do you mean surprised in a bad way or neutral way? (I assume you wouldn't be asking if they were pleasantly surprised). — Captain Man, Apr 10 '19 at 16:07
Voting to close because OP won't elaborate. Now I understand why people think the HNQ is hogwash... — MonkeyZeus, Apr 10 '19 at 16:22
I added my boss and my director (my boss's boss) two months prior to my interview. Talk about coincidence. I don't think they minded when I told them about it. If anything, it's probably why they interviewed me in the first place because my name probably looked familiar when they reviewed my resume. — , Apr 10 '19 at 18:49

score 219 · Answer 1 · edited Apr 10 '19 at 13:44

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No. Don't apologize.

Had it happen to me, and I've done it myself. If a person doesn't want their profile accessed, they shouldn't make it publicly available. There is nothing wrong with that.

edited Apr 10 '19 at 13:44

Giacomo1968

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answered Apr 09 '19 at 17:21

Keith

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Not only is there nothing wrong with it, but LinkedIn essentially exists purely to allow and support professional networking. Checking out the people who work for a potential or future employer is a very common use case of "professional networking" and I would be quite surprised if someone found it unusual. – dwizum Apr 09 '19 at 17:38
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I imagine you'd think it would be REALLY creepy if he had asked to connect? I don't see a problem with someone accessing my public social media profile that I create. They can then feel free to discuss it with me if they want. – Keith Apr 09 '19 at 19:34
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@Abigail how do you feel when LinkedIn tells you things like "8 people looked at your profile this week"? – mkennedy Apr 09 '19 at 20:30
@mkennedy There's a big difference between anonymous people looking at your public profile than one of those anonymous persons confronting you in person telling you that they have been looking at your profile. Do you think that is a normal behavior? – sf02 Apr 09 '19 at 20:31
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@sf02 Uh, "colleague", not anonymous person. I get people contacting me via LinkedIn to ask questions. Sometimes I know them. It gives them a way to break the ice too by knowing how long you've been at the company, where you previously worked, went to school, etc. What's creepier? Someone states where they learned something about you or when they don't tell you where they learned it? – mkennedy Apr 09 '19 at 20:41
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@sf02 yes of course it is. – edc65 Apr 09 '19 at 20:51
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@sf02 you wouldn't believe the number of "friends" who regularly try to start discussions with me over something posted to my public social media. Creepy! – iheanyi Apr 09 '19 at 20:58
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@Abigail I imagine "making a point of saying he'd checked me out on LinkedIn" went something like "Hey, I saw on LinkedIn that you are the Dev Lead here" or similar. That's not creepy and shouldn't be unexpected. If he had said to a new colleague "Hey, I found you on Facebook and saw that picture from your family vacation last summer" that's very different, but learning relevant information about your new coworkers from things they posted about themselves on LinkedIn is 100% normal – Kevin Apr 09 '19 at 22:54
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@sf02 "Confronting" is applying ridiculously stronger language to the situation than the OP used, and the OP is not an "anonymous person" but a coworker. You're completely misconstruing this situation. – Chris Hayes Apr 10 '19 at 00:40
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Stronger: this is not just okay; it is expected. It is, indeed, the entire point of the website. OP's colleague is insane. – Lightness Races in Orbit Apr 10 '19 at 00:44

chasly - supports Monica · Answer 2 · 2019-04-10T15:32:51.400

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I told my colleague about it and he seemed surprised. Should I apologize?

I suggest you ask him, e.g.

"I noticed you seemed surprised when I said I'd looked you up on LinkedIn. I've been feeling bad about it in case it upset you in any way. *Are you okay about it?"

Note

I have edited the last part of my answer in response to valid comments. I feel that a final question is needed in order to encourage the other person to have their say. I'm open to other suggestions.

As Ister suggests, "I hope you weren't offended" is another good possibility to finish with.

edited Apr 10 '19 at 15:32

answered Apr 10 '19 at 11:37

chasly - supports Monica

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I would keep the first phrase but replace the rest with something along lines: "I hope you didn't feel offended". Asking someone outright if you should apologise them sounds a bit awkward to me. With my version if someone confirms being offended it automatically opens a space to apologise. – Ister Apr 10 '19 at 13:28
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I'll second @Ister Remove the last three words and this is a great answer. – aslum Apr 10 '19 at 13:35
@Ister - Yes. I added that because I felt it needed some kind of question at the end. Otherwise it is merely a blank statement and there is nothing to be said in return. I'll edit. – chasly - supports Monica Apr 10 '19 at 15:26

Giacomo1968 · Answer 3 · 2019-04-10T15:07:13.290

Other answers are fairly blunt in the “No…” category, but I believe there is subtlety here:

If you feel you need to apologize, then you should apologize…

But don’t feel bad about it.

Yes, if a LinkedIn profile is made public then people can view that profile and then (based on their level of access in LinkedIn) they can see they viewed your profile. All fair.

And yes, you can lock down your LinkedIn profile so you can only allow people you are connected to to view that profile. That is fair.

But at the end of the day there is human etiquette. And if you feel that you might have offended someone by simply looking at their profile, you should apologize.

You should not recommend that they lock down their profile because why should they? Because ultimately if the profile is public, they might have a good reason to do so and not really want to alter their online presence for the needs of one random person they just met.

In general think about public online profiles like mail: You know, I can see my neighbors ordered items from Amazon. And many packages have tracking numbers right on them. There is technically nothing stopping me from making note of that tracking number and then—the next time I saw my neighbor—say something like, “Boy! That Amazon package you just got took a long time to get to you!” I mean, that’s prying and kinda crazy, right?

Ditto with online public profiles.

In the case of your co-worker, if they were stunned by what you did just say something like:

“Well, sorry about that. But since I was starting this job and just wanted to get to know my co-workers. My apologizes if that was an indirect way of going about it.”

The reality is that technical boundaries—such as blocking access to a profile—and human etiquette are two different things.

score 1 · Answer 4 · edited Apr 10 '19 at 13:45

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There's no need for an apology.

If someone creates a profile on LinkedIn, then they should expect that people will be looking at it, whether it be potential employers, peers or anyone using the site. I wouldn't even bring it up again, unless it seems like there's some unspoken tension over it.

edited Apr 10 '19 at 13:45

Giacomo1968

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answered Apr 10 '19 at 12:56

score 0 · Answer 5 · answered Apr 10 '19 at 16:19

I told him about it and he seemed surprised.

^^ So what??

When I see acquaintances shopping at the same store as me I get surprised too. It doesn't mean that they should apologize.

Stop overthinking and don't make things weird by apologizing. Move on with your life.