Breaking up is hard to do: career changes and social media – a sticky situation
If you're reading this blog, you're probably drinking the social media kool-aid. You recognize the value of social media not only from a personal perspective but as a critical tool for your organization to reach new audiences, communicate more seamlessly with its constituents, raise money, and market products or services. You may have spent months growing comfortable with the tools, building your online presence and that of your organization. You've explained what 2.0 means to the organization's leadership. You've helped move them to it...and then past it. You're one of the primary social networkers on the staff. It's great for your organization. It's great for your career. There's only one problem. A recent study showed that the average 26-year-old has changed jobs seven times in the last eight years. Especially if you're a Millennial, odds are that you're eyeing a jump to a different job, issue area or sector, or you will be soon. Have you thought about how you will approach the challenge of transitioning your social media identities?
I was recently chatting with a friend - let's call her Sarah - who had no idea what to do with her Twitter account. As a communications professional at a nonprofit organization fighting human trafficking, she's spent more than a year connecting with hundreds of people who also work on human trafficking. She's used social media to build the brand of her organization, foster discussion and distribute resources. Now she's transitioning to a new job that explores another of her interests - cooking. While she still cares about human trafficking, she won't have the time and energy to immerse herself in reading, writing and, yes, tweeting about the issue. Instead she will probably want to leverage her social media skills, and her account, for her new job.
But this could be a significant loss for her organization, which, at least in part, helped her to build her presence online. After all, they paid for the hours she invested in social media as a part of their overall strategy, and the organization's brand recognition offline probably lent her immediate credibility with new contacts online. On the other hand, without Sarah's initiative, skills and personality, her social media accounts, and those of the organization, might never have gotten off the ground. Now that their donors and partners are accustomed to engaging not only with the organization's official Twitter stream, but also Sarah's individual account, it might be difficult to transfer that relationship and interest to a new staff member.
This also creates a personal and relational dilemma for Sarah. She wouldn't go on attending human trafficking conferences or accepting speaking engagements on human trafficking issues, but her Twitter feed isn't so simple. Should she unfollow most of her human trafficking friends to make room for her new cooking friends? Should she start an entirely new account focusing on her new endeavor and build from scratch? Or should she make some Twitter announcements about her plans to switch to a new primary topic and let the chips fall where they may? Should the human trafficking organization have any say in how she talks about their break up?
With people of all generations increasingly and necessarily blending their personal and professional lives on social media platforms like Twitter and Facebook, we may be faced with many more tricky questions about how to move on. Have you made a major transition with your social media account? How can we make it smoother for ourselves, our followers and our organizations?
Comments
Maybe it's a good practice to separate your personal Twitter account with your professional? For example, you could use a professional Twitter name @yourcause or @yourorgname, but in the profile include your own name to keep it social and personable. That way when you transition, someone else from your organization can more easily take over your Twitter account, and use their own name in the profile.
Sarah, in your example, could decide to turn over her entire Twitter account to her organization, if it's really so devoted to human trafficking that it's easier to do that. They could rename it — again @thecause or @theorg or something like that. And she could start over, fresh, with another personal account, and this time build a specific Twitter account for her new cause and/or new organization, using her own name in the profile.
Importantly, though, Sarah should keep her stats and perhaps a few screenshots of her own Tweets from her original Twitter account before she transitions it, so that she can use those in a future career transition portfolio.
What do you think of that?
Hi Amy, thanks for your response. Keeping your work and personal accounts separate is certainly one way to do it, especially if you are responsible for the official account of your organization. And when starting a new account that is tied to an organization, having an exit strategy in mind might not be a bad idea. I think, so far, many of us have been doing a lot of experimenting with some of these new platforms and weren't totally sure what how our voice, following and interactions would end up. Whether we plan to or not, we end up mixing professional and personal, just like we do offline, and that's where the situation can get a little sticky.
Thanks also for your suggestion to keep Sarah's screenshots and stats for her portfolio. That's a good tip that could help demonstate her social media experience for future positions.
Sarah's situation will create a dilemma for professionals who don't plan long term. Few people will keep one job for a lifetime, so employees and organizations should have a long-term plan for their social media presence. I'm a big believer in personal accounts, because you can express yourself freely without always being aware that you are representing your employer. With my personal account at @mmiller20910, I can comment on music, sports, and other personal interests, but I also sometimes share news from my work at @childrenshealth. But when I write for work, I do not express my personal opinions.
I think Sarah has two options -- 1) turn over the account to her employer, but first send a tweet asking people to follow her at a new personal account or 2) keep the account and tell her followers she is no longer with the organization, so understand when her tweets change. She can also stop following anyone who she doesn't want to keep up with, but there's no need to block people -- they may enjoy hearing about her new culinary adventures.
It would be a shame for the organization to lose her online persona, but if they haven't made plans for this transition, it's their loss. If they understand the value of online networking for their organization, they'll make it part of someone's job and not rely on savvy people like Sarah to do it on their own.
Mark, thanks for adding to the discussion. Since using social media as part of our work has become more mainstream since Sarah started her job a couple years ago, I think individuals and organizations will both start planning more long term when they are building their social media accounts. Unfortunately some organizations may experience some unforeseen setbacks during this learning period as they begin to see their first users and policy setters transition.
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