Website Lets You Rate Your Co-Workers Anonymously… Yikes.

Imagine a cross between Yelp.com and the Mean Girls Burn Book, and you’ll understand why a new site called Unvarnished has some people freaked out. Launched a few months ago by LinkedIn, (the Facebook for professionals), Unvarnished lets users create an online profile and submit anonymous reviews about anyone… meaning that co-worker with the vendetta against you now has a public online forum to air your dirty laundry for all to see. Though the site states its reviews “get the inside scoop on other business professionals, providing candid assessments of co-workers, potential hires, business partners and more”, its not unreasonable for even the clearest of consciences to be a bit paranoid — as Kanye West said, “There will always be haters.”

While Unvarnished isn’t the first site to act as a public tally of people’s karma points, it’s the only one targeted to a community of professionals. Controlling, or even managing your online reputation has becoming increasingly difficult and as social media evolves, we may find that conducting one’s self according to the old adage of “you’re only as good as your reputation” is a futile effort.

Unvarnished argues that the site offers users plenty of tools to actively manage one’s reputation, such as profile updates and the ability to request new reviews and leave comments, but when TechCrunch asked Unvarnished co-founder Peter Kazanjy if users will have the option to take down their profile, Kazanjy replied, “No, because if we did that, everyone would take their profile down.” And he’s right. Even if a negative review was a truthful and fair assessment, who would want to leave it on their profile?

There are a few (arguably minor) safeguards in place though. Negative reviews that are posted by an account linked to a dummy Facebook profile (no friends, opened recently) is automatically blocked. Trash talk and false allegations will be flagged and immediately removed. As an incentive for fairness, the quality of each review is voted on by the community and used to rank a user’s ‘trustworthiness’. Sure, these precautions are better than leaving it as a total free-for-all, but certainly not enough to put the fears to rest (or a quick nap, for that matter).

The truth can hurt so anonymity is crucial as it protects those who have a genuine issue to raise and makes the jerks accountable for their actions, but undoubtedly leaves the door wide open for downright abuse. Unfortunately, a negative review doesn’t have to be as flagrant as calling someone a “crackhead” to raise a few questions. Simply calling out a a colleague’s competence, ethics or conduct can be enough to raise doubts, regardless of whether the criticism is based on ‘proof’ or the result of clashing personalities.

My college professor boyfriend learned this the hard way when he first discovered RateMyProfessor.com a few years ago. Most of his reviews were positively glowing but his rating was significantly effected by a few negatives based on reasons he considered unfair. Disgruntled students gave him penalizations for the heavy work load despite the fact that he is actually required by law to assign a certain amount of homework each class. Others complained that he was a “hard grader” and that his tests were “impossible” to pass, but never explained their reasoning in further detail. The most alarming was when a student (falsely) accused him of inappropriate flirtation with a female student. I love my boyfriend and I trust him but I admit, I definitely raised an eyebrow after reading that… and that’s me, his girlfriend of 6 years. I’d hate to find out what his acquaintances or more importantly, his bosses would’ve have thought. Fortunately, we were able to have the comment removed (after a few days though) but for someone who genuinely takes pride in their job and the work he does, no matter how baseless the criticisms and accusations are, it’s still a bruise to the ego.

Because Unvarnished is a private beta, you’ll have to send a Facebook request if you want to join. Once you’ve received your invite, you can claim your profile and add to Unvarnished’s growing community of more than 400,000 profiles, with discretion, of course. Unvarnished is driven by the idea of karma so be sure to preserve yours – I personally suggest refraining from words like “crazy b*tch”, “mentally unstable”, “Stalin-esque”, etc. Even if your office arch nemesis is a total psycho, keep it level-headed, fair and free from personal attacks. Geeky, yes, but just remember: with great power comes great responsibility. Your karma (and hopefully, your Unvarnished profile) will thank you!

SOUND OFF: What do you think about Unvarnished? A valuable resource or a disaster of epic proportions waiting to happen?

Pictured Right: An example of the no good, bad and very ugly potential for abuse on Unvarnished . A 1-star rating from a user who admits to have never actually worked directly with this person – seriously?