Editing Myself
I have always maintained that any personal social networking policy should begin and end with one simple instruction.
Don’t be Stupid!
I’ve always felt like that pretty much covers it. If something is too stupid to do in person, don’t do it online. Thus, don’t have too much to drink and interact online, don’t write when you’re angry, don’t discuss confidential matters, don’t complain about your coworkers, or the organization you work for in public, etc. I’ve always felt that if you could master that simple rule, you’d be a lot better off.
In the last week, actually a bit more than a week, I’ve had to remind myself of that rule, and stay away from social networking. Thus, no blog posts, not much from me on Twitter or Facebook, heck I’ve barely even been emailing anyone. The reason for this? I’ve been dealing with a cold/flu/cough. Thus, I don’t feel all that great, I’m not sleeping well and I’m usually fairly medicated. This leads to me being grumpy, tired and not thinking clearly. Thus, my ability to not be stupid when I open my mouth, in real life or virtually, is pretty well diminished.
Since I have been unable to assure myself of my ability to abide by my #1 rule of social networking, I’ve done the next best thing. I’ve stayed away from it, and haven’t managed to say anything online that might be a problem for me either personally or professionally. I pass this career advice along, for your benefit. 😉
Hope to be back to normal, and have some more interesting things to talk about, soon!
Follow these topics: Career, SocialNetworking
I try to self-edit as much as possible, but there have been one or two tweets that I would like to take back.
+1 for the social media policy. My company’s whole policy is, “Use Common Sense.” (Also our snow policy)
I really like this post; it mostly shows that you can be cranky for external reasons and accidentally let it make you stupid if you’re not careful.
Kevin: There have been a few things I’ve said over the years that I wish I hadn’t, and almost all of them were because I was cranky about something. I need to be away from a keyboard when a comment or something makes me cranky. 😉
Jenn: That’s a great policy, actually. Trust your employees to be adults. What a novel concept!