Workplace Reputation & Social Media 2.0

About a year ago I posted Protect Your Reputation In The Workplace - and that post has been very popular but having re-read the post just recently, I realized that it doesn’t go far enough.  There is more to your reputation in the workplace than e-mail and voice mails, your actions speak volumes about you as does your attire and even offline activities.

We’ve seen in recent years where hiring agencies and small and large national and multi-national companies do make use of sophisticated searches of social media to find out about prospective employees.  I have no doubt that people find my site by searching for my name (in fact I know that as a fact, because my server logs tell me as much).  Some of the pages that come up are about me, written by me and some are cousins that share the same name but there are also others that are not related to me in anyway including one who is 64 years old. 

So while your online persona may appear everywhere, it may not necessarily be you – that unfortunately doesn’t work when it comes to things like Facebook and other social sites where you have the ability to post images.  There have been many stories in the media about people getting caught through simple searches in Google and having their Facebook page pop-up showing them in the act.  Most social sites time and date stamp EVERYTHING you do and now with many services automatically turning on location services, if you post an update to your Facebook page you could very well reveal where you made that update.  Claimed to be at the doctor on Friday afternoon?  But your Facebook page has you at ??? at that time.  Busted.

Here are a couple of fairly recent media reports of individuals being caught through Facebook updates, or other social media updates – these are ALL direct links (I don’t want any DMCA Takedown Notices or anyone claiming copyright or other bad stuff…):

• Mafia Boss Betrayed By Facebook
• Busted: Facebook Party Pics Violate Student’s Parole
• Mom busted in Facebook ‘high’ jinks - IMO – this person probably deserved getting busted for what they did
• Busted: Facebook fugitive who taunted police
• Zuckerbandits? Alleged ‘Facebook’ burglars busted
• Fugitive busted through Facebook pleads guilty
• Call centre worker caught out by boss after posting ‘sickie’ plan on ‘Facebook’

These are only a few that I found through a simple search – there were dozens more.  Now I would hope that the people reading the posts here are more tech savvy to:

• NOT do stupid shenanigans and post “innocently” (right) on Facebook or other social networks.
• CARE about their careers and future potential.
• HAVE much higher moral, and ethical standards than these folks did (I’m sure YOU do).

There is also a lot of discussion going on in professional circles whether it is appropriate to look at Facebook or other social media sites in determining whether a candiate is a good fit or not.  Unfortunately it all comes down to past behavior being a good predicitor of future actions.  It is very difficult for people to reform themselves and break habits.  I regularly see posts on LinkedIn about this topic in various sections including Career and HR groups.

The fact of the matter is employers can, will and probably do search you out before they decide to hire you (though most may not admit to it).  I don’t know of any cases in the courts in the US or Canada fighting employers looking for this type of information, however if you know of any please leave a comment on this post so that I can research it.

 Now I’m only making note of Facebook because they are the worlds largest social network, I’m sure others have been caught or found-out through other social networks like MySpace, or even Twitter or through images uploaded to Flickr.

As a note I don’t know if most people know this or not but by default when you take a picture with your digital camera, the camera stores the date/time the image was taken along with other technical details.  When you upload the photo to sites like Flickr this information goes with it and can be seen by others that know how to find it.  Some newer digital cameras and smartphones are also starting to add location information to the images – that’s GPS INFORMATION OF WHERE THE PICTURE WAS TAKEN!

What you do online can be just as damaging as what you do offline, especially “today” when everyone feels compelled to tell the world what they are up to – more proof of this – someone I know recently had a baby and posted pictures within hours of the birth - nothing wrong with that, but we’re ALL fixated by social networks and media. 

Not only can some information you share be potentially damaging to your career but it could give identity thieves an insight into you and your movements making it easier to steal your identity or find out where you live and steal your property.

There is quite a bit more information available about social networking and reputation now, then there was only a year ago.  I’ve provided direct links to some of this information.  But you can get started easily by checking on Google (search is ready to go, just click the link and it will open in a new window – I am in those 350,000 plus references).

• Social Networking And Reputational Risk In The Workplace
• Blog Post by Michael Specht on Social networking and reputational risk in the workplace (referencing the Deloitte 2009 study)
• Some excellent information at PitbLAWg website (Online Reputation Management – NOTE this is a Canadian law firm)

What it comes down to is to focus on what YOU can do to enjoy using social media but at the same time be aware of what you are posting online.  While you may say that your online persona is not “you” the experts will differ, and until something is challenged in court labor laws will not change and employers will continue using the internet to find out more about prospective candidate and could well look at existing employees.

Your reputation goes beyond what you do in the office, what you do outside of the office will also play some role.

Be wise.  Guard your reputation, I know that I do.

Protect Your Reputation In The Workplace

It is so easy to ruin your reputation in the workplace with one simple mistake or misjudgement. 

It could be something as simple as taking extra time for lunch thinking nobody is looking, or coming in late just a few minutes each day or something that borders on theft such as taking home notepads, pens or pencils.  While the value of these items may be minor, the thought that will cross anyones mind is “if they are taking home a notepad/pen/pencil – what else are they taking?”. 

You want your reputation to be like sterling silver, gold or platinum where you work.  The people you work with are like an extension of your family.  Consider that you’re probably spending in excess of 8-hours per day with them.

Two things that can damage your reputation easily are workplace e-mails and voice mails that are replied to, or forwarded without thought.

E-Mail in the Workplace

You’ve just been lambasted about not doing something, in a fit of anger you decide to reply and in doing so pour your guts into the e-mail message.  Oh you didn’t have any intention of sending the e-mail, but accidentally you hit SEND and the message is gone.

Problem one – you’ve said some rather nasty things in the e-mail.  This person won’t be happy, but you can deal with one person – right?

Problem two – as you take a closer look at the e-mail, it’s sent to the ENTIRE TEAM!  Now, how do you fix that?

Solution for Workplace Email

First thing – NEVER, EVER send an e-mail when you’re angry or in a strong emotional state.  It just isn’t worth it.  You will say things you don’t mean and words written down are very difficult to recant.  Microsoft Outlook has a feature that allows you to recall messages – but normally it will only work if the receiver hasn’t already read the message and if they allow it.  It doesn’t happen magically without anyone knowing.

Next – set a delay on your e-mail to something like 15 minutes, so that it checks the server every 15 minutes and  only then will it send or receive any new mail items.  This gives you some grace time.

Here is how to do this.

From Microsoft Outlook go to TOOLS, then OPTIONS and select MAIL SETUP from the tab.

Next, click on SEND/Receive… BUTTON:

Set the “Schedule an automatic send/receive every” setting to any number that you like.  I’ve set mine to 15 minutes but I can still force send by pressing the Send/Receive button on the Outlook toolbar.

Note that I am using Outlook 2007.

Third – REMOVE the names in the “TO” field.

Remember (and I tell this to my team all the time) – what you say in an e-mail is there forever.  Over the last few years, we’ve seen what happens when companies delete e-mails, so many companies will archive e-mails and keep them for an indefinate period of time.

I keep all my e-mails, with the exception of SPAM or other automated reports.  I can go back to when I first started at my present employer and pull out e-mails.

Voice Mail Problems

I hate to admit to this one, but I made this mistake – ONCE.  It will never happen again.

I get a voice mail from one of my developers, saying that they are having problems getting a hold of the Business Analyst for the project and that they have some questions.  Rather than listen to the entire message, I happily forward it to the analyst.  Bad move.  The first part of the message was nice.  The last half was very critical of the analyst.

Now while there might have been truth to the message, it wasn’t the best move on my part.

The simple solution – listen to the ENTIRE message before you decide to send it to anyone.

What happened in this case?  I met with the analyst, and the developer and we talked it out.  All ended well, but was it ever embaressing for everyone involved!

The developer learned – NEVER, EVER leave nasty voice messages.

The analyst learned – REPLY to your e-mails and voice messages in a timely manner.

I learned – Listen to the ENTIRE message before it’s forwarded to anyone.

In todays business environment, e-mail and voice mail and even instant messaging play an important part in communications and as such we need to be even more diligent in what we are sending out.  A message spoken may have more or less impact that an e-mail – however an e-mail is a permanent record of what was said, and you can’t try and explain the meaning of the message to anyone – the message is black and white (unless of course you try to be coy in your message).

Protect your reputation in the workplace - don’t send an e-mail when you are in a charged emotional state, clear the TO field or better yet – leave the e-mail and respond when you’ve had a chance to cool off.  Voice mails – listen, listen, and listen.

I’ve not even touched on the dozens of ways you can ruin your reputation through the use of social media like Facebook, MySpace or the dozens of other social networks out there — including image hosting services like Flickr. 

We’ll leave social media and Web 2.0 for another post but let me leave you with something I found while looking for an appropriate image to add as part of this post:

Everything that you post on any site can effect your online reputation for better or worse. People may become more attracted to you and be willing to listen to anything you have to say or may ignore your from there on out, regardless of the quality of the content you add to the community. It is for that reason, that in this Web 2.0 world where interaction and user input is key, that you never let your reputation come under fire. This can only be accomplished by being critical of any material you choose to add to the web. Otherwise, the reputation of 1000 days could be tarnished by a single post.

image & source of the quote - http://beyondtheonewayweb.wordpress.com/2008/04/18/a-final-note/