Summary for Topic 3 #UOSM2008 – Developing an authentic online professional profile
This topic has been highly engaging and has prompted a very high level of participation with the subject matter from all involved. I think this is partly due to the wealth of information on the topic but also because the topic is extremely pertinent and could perhaps be viewed as the cornerstone of the module.
I thought that the breadth of the topic and multiple discussions this week led to our peer learning reaching an all time high. There were a number of interesting discussions on Twitter such as this one. Through such discussions I have developed a much more thorough understanding of how to develop an authentic online professional profile than when I wrote my initial thoughts on the topic. On a personal level, this has enabled me to further develop my own online professional profile. For example, this week I have started to engage further with Twitter as I am now able to better identify relevant content to share having followed advice in this article.
Linkedin, as a specifically designed professional networking platform has garnered a lot of attention in our discussions. However, other platforms such as Twitter and Google+ and to a lesser extent Facebook and Snapchat were also discussed. In terms of successfully building a profile on the popular networks we quickly discovered that there is a lot of guidance online to help people to start using such services effectively and build up profiles. I also found a great resource to help you decide on the suitable networks to use and a brilliant general overview to managing your digital footprint.
One of the key aspects of a successfully professional online profile is authenticity. For a site link LinkedIn which features an online CV-like profile obviously ensuring that your education and job histories are accurate. However, authenticity in a profile is also about not exaggerating and, as George Chiverton pointed out, demonstrating original thought. On a platform such as Twitter this means not simply tweeting every single relevant article accompanied by a generic comment, retweeting others’ tweets without comment, or, even worse, passing off other’s thoughts as your own. A further form of authenticity is the development of a consistent profile across visible social networks and other sites and further linking them together so your entire professional profile across the web can be easily explored.
The other focal point of our discussion was engagement. Social media is all about engagement, and a someone uses a network for personal or professional purposes, they must interact and engage to have an effective presence on any such network. For a professional online profile to be seen as authentic this can be done by ‘following’ key players in your professional field, contributing to discussions relevant to your professional interests and linking to developments or articles of interest relevant to your career, among others. This can also be supplemented by creating a personal blog to write about relevant topics. The key idea of professional online identity is to create a brand for yourself to stand out from the crowd to employers so through your online presence you need to make sure that what you are putting out there is exciting and engaging, not just boring facts.
Simply put, a successful authentic professional online profile must be
- based on honesty and enthusiasm
- validated by commitment and originality of thought
- furthered by engagement with your professional interests
