School alumni directories verify place of attendance, but so much more. They can launch your search to find where someone works, for example. And you know that’s a challenge with a common name.

The alumni sites are designed for use by alumni, not snoops, so there are usually a few obstacles. Just think as if you are that person and you’ll get through many of these. Often the sites verify past attendance, year of graduation and field of study. The field of study may provide employment cues. In this case, our student’s area of emphasis was “Internet engineering” — so he’s likely working (or in this economy, may someday be working) in the Internet technology area.

Head over to Facebook to advance your resume building. Facebook participants sometimes have more than one profile — maybe a personal one and a work one. In this case, I found the subject’s personal Facebook profile first. He listed a company in the Facebook people search but not on the public portion of his profile page. His “friends” list was private.

Then I searched by name and workplace and discovered his work Facebook profile. He kindly provided a different photo of himself here.

He listed “friends” and interests on the work site. I reviewed his “friends” list and went to their profile pages. Once there, I searched the subject’s name and found that some were friends on his personal site, too.

Maybe those people are more significant than other Facebook friends.

All of these discoveries — friends, interests, education — build the profile and help you tailor your Google searches.