Online social networking is getting increased attention by marketing guru's, the media and the general public.  Search Google using the keywords "LinkedIn" or "Twitter" and you will get an eye popping 100+ million hits for each.   Being an entrepreneur/CEO of TrainingDepartment.com and a reformed CFO, anything with millions gets my attention.  Getting my attention is one thing, but impressing me is another.  I had serious doubts if these tools were of any relevance to me as a senior executive or, for that matter, to my business.  Worse, I thought they were a waste of time. I whined like a 3-year old when I got a "LinkedIn" request to connect with someone.  Yes, I accepted all requests from friends but mostly saw it as being polite and courteous. And I was totally befuddled about Twitter.  Users of Twitter answer the question of "What are you doing today" with a response of 140 characters or less.  I mean seriously, do I care what someone had for breakfast? It took more than one whack of a sledgehammer against my head to change my opinion.  But finally I am seeing the light. 

Resistance to using LinkedIn was my first "Berlin Wall" that had to fall.  After working several years to build my personal network, I already had some 3,000 names in my desktop contact system.  Some 500 of these names were high quality and I allocated time each week to update my contact system with changes in my network.  I was pretty impressed with myself until one day I entered a few of my contact names into LinkedIn and clicked "Search".  Behold.  Even though I had just talked to the person less than 2 months ago, I found they had changed jobs.  Hmm, I thought.  So I entered more names and started realizing my contact system was not current at all.  Just as importantly, the completed profiles of my friends told me a lot about their background that I didn't know.  I expanded my search to Companies and suddenly started finding long, lost friends. I sent them LinkedIn messages and have started reconnecting with them.

Now using Twitter is another matter. I was originally in the court of one of my friends who said, "I don't think Twitter is for me". But having just been proven wrong on LinkedIn, I decided to give it a chance.  I created a Twitter account and started following a few people including friends.  Most tweets were mundane but I saw some interesting stuff.  I discovered one friend was an avid bicycler, riding some 32 miles in one morning.  But this was not enough to make me use Twitter.  Then I did a little more research and discovered ways to be alerted for "Tweets" that contain certain keywords.  So I created a few alerts.  One was related to "e-learning" which relates to my business.  I wanted to hear what others were saying about e-learning and also look for possible business partners.  Another was related to IFRS (International Financial Reporting Standards).  I wanted to know the latest on this topic because I had arranged for someone to speak in June to a financial group that I head.  Suddenly I was getting all kinds of useful information on these two topics including links to outside articles that expanded on the tweet. What about that June speaker on IFRS?  It turns out the speaker is on both LinkedIn and Twitter.  We connected on both platforms and I am now following the speaker's tweets with interest. 

For my friends in job search, LinkedIn is a great way to build your network.  Although you might be a member of trade or networking organization, LinkedIn will help you stay connected with colleagues and friends who are not members of these organizations.  Additionally, be aware that recruiters are making heavy use of LinkedIn to find qualified candidates so keep your profile accurate and up-to-date.  For those interested in Twitter for job search, see http://www.twitterjobsearch.com/.  

I still need to sort out a lot of issues using social networking and have no opinion yet on Facebook, YouTube or the like.  But at least for me, I have slowly and very reluctantly become a convert.  I understand the resistance to using social networking tools, but I think you should at least give it a shot.

Don_Ficken
dficken@trainingdepartment.com

http://www.linkedin.com/in/donficken
http://twitter.com/donstlouis