From reading The New York Times a couple of days ago, it would be easy to get the impression that being on a social networking site, or having a blog would be a real problem when you're looking for a job. After all, what you post on the Web lingers forever and ever.
For example, it may be discovered years from now when I apply for a job at Microsoft that I once made fun of Bill Gates on a blog with a PageRank of 7. Or maybe the photo of me on Facebook where I'm drunk, covered in soot and making a monster face might give a potential employer pause.
But on the other side of the debate, Jeremiah Owyang is hailing the fact that MySpace and SimpleHired have joined forces to allow people to look for employment while they socially network with complete strangers.
So where's the middle ground? I'll tell you.
We're living in a world where it's increasingly easy to make your voice heard. People are posting photos, blogs, podcasts, and all kinds of other things about themselves in very public places. It used to be that you could neatly compartmentalize your personality at work and your personality elsewhere, but that's not the way things work anymore.
I expect that most of the potential employers/clients/constituent in my future will have been drunk at one time or another in their lives. Perhaps they ran around and did crazy things on their college campuses. It's possible that they've even had a little fun. So yes, my life is pretty much an open book for anyone who knows how to use Google and has a Facebook account. But isn't it possible to keep those things in context?
What I do in my free time has absolutely no bearing on how well I do my job. Sure I'm the same person, but I know how to keep things strictly business. I can dance on the bar at Cowgirls, Inc. in a miniskirt and tube top on Friday night and be completely professional on Monday morning. The two are not mutually exclusive, and they never were. Now it's just more public.
That's the truth and I'm sticking to it.
Oh yeah, and I can still hear the sound.
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