Blog Post: Personal brand and social media landmines

Most recently was a post on Twitter that went around called "how to lose a job in one tweet." A Twitter member sent out this: "Cisco just offered me a job! Now I have to weigh the utility of a fatty paycheck against the daily commute to San Jose and hating the work."

A Cisco employee saw it and tweeted back: "Who is the hiring manager. I’m sure they would love to know that you will hate the work. We here at Cisco are versed in the web."

Oops.

Of course, there is more to the story, but, as was noted in "Office Space," people tend to jump to conclusions, which can be a very destructive instinct.

The whole thing caused quite a sensation -- coverage on MSNBC, 15 minutes of fame for the interviewee, lots of media coverage on social media and Twitter, which was on the rise as awareness in the public and media was growing about the micro-blogging service.

Say what you want about the impact of either of these messages, the wisdom of the interviewee or the motivation of the current employee. Sure, lots of people don't like their commute, or their jobs; but you have in your hands the power of something close to mass media. If you mis-step, it could definitely come back to haunt you.

Maybe someday HR departments will look beyond this type of social media faux pas, but for now, they can get you fired.

On a corporate crisis communication note, the simple website where this was posted caused problems for GoDaddy.com when it got a lot of traffic. Does not speak well of the DoDaddy hosting service.

A bit lower, in some ways, on the professional scale, Seth Godin recently had a post called "Personal Branding in the Age of Google." Seems that a friend of his posted on Craigslist looking for a housekeeper. Googled the names of the top candidates. One had a MySpace page documenting her drinking exploits, and the other noted on her blog that she was applying for jobs that were below her, and planned to quit as soon as her art career picked up. A third had been arrested for shoplifting two years earlier.

As Godin says, "Google never forgets."