Why I’m opening up the Space and not censoring the Face

Finally Finally Finally someone gets it!

Garys’ video reminded me of a conversation I had a couple of months ago with a perspective employer in Beijing. The conversation (which was flowing along quite nicely) came to a halt when the gentleman I was speaking to commented “I saw your profile on Facebook…you look like quite the party girl”. The rest of the conversation consisted of me giving vague ummm and ahhhh answers while I raked my brain trying to imagine what incriminating photos/comments/posts he could have seen on my profile.

Within roughly 30 seconds of putting the phone down, both my Facebook and MySpace pages had been privatised.

Luckily for me my pages are relatively tame. Although at the time the display pic didn’t scream professional it certainly wasn’t anything I would be upset if my mum saw. Even more luckily for me, this guy was cool. As a senior PR practitioner he was interested in social media and appreciated my amateur adoption of it. Their company has a Facebook group which I am now proud to be a part of.

While I agree with most of what Gary is saying in his clip, one point I take contention with is his argument that you cannot have multiple personalities. I would argue that we all have multiple personalities, or perhaps more accurately one mulifaceited personality. Different social situations act as forums to express different elements of our personalities. I am a different person around my friends to what I am when I visit my grandparents or when I am at work. I use different language, discuss different topics and wear different clothes.

I think what social media is doing is making it possible for these different personalities to cross over. What Gary is saying is that for the first time our friends/family/colleagues are able to get a fully rounded picture of our lives – not just one piece of our personality puzzle. We can now be judged (to a higher degree) as entire entities. The separation or distinction that divides our personalities is getting narrower. If an employer visits my MySpace profile they can see the type of person I am around my friends. At first the thought of an employer seeing this side of me was unsettling. However, the more I think about it the more comfortable I am with it.

If Jane happens to be tagged in a bikini on the beach that doesn’t mean that she views that as appropriate work attire. Any employer who comes to such a conclusion is not someone I would want to work for. If I was photographed at a club with my friends. So What! I am a grown woman and presumably it’s the weekend. If it’s 9-5 on Monday through Friday then yes…I see where an employer may take issue!

I found a quote by the wonderful Mitch Joel recently that sums up exactly how I have always approached my professional undertakings…”I treated every position I had as if I owned the company and it’s success (or failure) rested on my shoulders”. Maybe this sentiment isn’t apparent on my Facebook or MySpace page (however, there is certainly nothing to contradict it). Different online communities serve different purposes. If you want to see how I will conduct myself on a Saturday night out with my friends check out MySpace. If you want to see how I will behave in the office go to LinkedIn. If you want to see a complete picture of who I am – have a look at both.

There is no more security in obscurity. Facebook is mainstream. MySpace is mainstream. You are mainstream. Employers and perspective employers are going to look at your profile. Hopefully when they do see you in a less professional context they interpret it as having the work/life balance.

I like Gary’s point about good triumphing over evil. If you have posts up and down your page talking about how horrible your workplace is, how you should really get off Facebook and do some work, or how much you dislike your boss or colleagues then yes a perspective employer will probably (justifiably so) read into this as you being lazy, unproductive, and socially disruptive. They will hire someone else.

Seeing another side of a perspective employees personality is (in most cases) not a bad thing. Employment ads preach about the quest for diversity, ‘people persons’, and energetic people. People say they are these things…now an employer can check it out for themselves. Humans are social creatures, we like to express ourselves – obviously keep some things private- however I can’t imagine an employer who wants to hire an army of 100% all work/no play clones. I’m sorry, but if I am a recruiter and I go on to a potential candidates MySpace page and see nothing but a slide show of them slaving away in the office i am going to come to the conclusion that this person is a one-dimentional robot. If I go to their LinkedIn page and see some photos of them in a professional setting – then fine. DIFFERENT ONLINE COMMUNITIES SERVE DIFFERENT PURPOSES AND CATER TO DIFFERENT ELEMENTS OF OUR PERSONALITIES.

Employers have to understand that these social networking devices need to be viewed in context. Facebook and MySpace – I see as more social networks. I use Facebook strictly for friends. MySpace i’m slightly more liberal with. I’ll accept a ‘friend’ request if you are my friend, you are a family member that I like, you play music that I like, your profile is interesting, or you write me a nice note telling me why we should be connected. LinkedIn and Golden Key (honour society network) are different. They are professional. I wouldn’t dream of putting photos that were anything less then professional up on one of these networks.

People who are good are going to win…I’ll go one further and say people who are balanced –  in the personal and professional -  are going to win.

Today I opened my myspace page and made it public…so in an act of balanced shameless self-promotion:

Check out -  LinkedIn AND MySpace