A New Resume for the Information Age ~ Your "Social Media Thumbprint"

As social media continues to take center stage I believe the “traditional” resume will start to fade off into the sunset. The traditional one-two page format will simply not give us the entire picture of the candidates for tomorrow’s future.

For example, I might like to know how many people are in your LinkedIn? Have you started any groups on LinkedIn? How many followers are in your Twitter? What other social networks do you belong to? Are you on Tumblr? How many people are in your data base? Are you on StumbleUpon? What about Reddit? Or Hubspot?  And let’s not forget the all powerful Facebook and You Tube.

Do you have any published articles on EzineArticles.com? What about ArticlesBase.com? Any other sites that you have a presence on? Do you own any URL sites?

If some or most of these sites seem foreign… then I suggest you read Crush It! – by Gary Vay*ner*chuk.  *Gary Vaynerchuck’s book "Crush It" really got me started on blogging and thinking about Personal Branding and Social Media. Thank you Gary!  I have a list of other suggested books to read as well on this blog.

Personal branding I believe will have a huge weight for tomorrow’s workforce. Your personal brand can draw employers because they know by bringing you on board that you will add value to their company.

Example, “How much traffic can you drive to our company’s website if we hire you?” If I had two candidates of about the same skill level but one of them could drive traffic to my company’s products in a huge way…guess who I am going to hire? That right! The one that is bringing me customers on day one! So if you are not building up your network online…you might want to start thinking about it. 

How do you fit into the picture?

A quick warning!!!  To all of you college students, office workers, and alike! Interviewers are more and more looking you up online!!!  Personal Branding can be positive or negative…that depends on you!  And if it is public information…oh…it’s public!  Whatever you put on the internet…stays...on the internet.

We are living in a time where no one is safe from others viewing your personal information about you just by going online and typing your name.  

So be very careful of what you do in public moving forward. No matter if you like it or not if your photos become public….oh it is out there for the taking! You don’t want to have a future employer type in your name and they get…well….not such a hot photo of you passed out on the lawn in front of the frat house. Google does NOT discriminate what is good or bad. It puts whatever the most clicks are first, front and center. That simple! So I bring this warning actually for anyone out there.  

I was watching a CNBC show on Facebook and a lady was terminated from her position as a teacher because she slammed the parents and the students online. She thought her messages were private. Apparently not! The school fired her. Once the information is out there…it’s out there. So be careful! 

I wanted to bring up this topic because I do sincerely believe the Social Media will be something that most companies will eventually come to look at the most. Of course this may not be for all jobs…but you might want to start at least considering to add this to your tool box if you have not already done so. 

What will your “Social Media Thumbprint” look like? Will it be “The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly?”

My intent for this article is not to advise you on the interview per say but to get you thinking about all of the possibilities and bring this topic for discussion.

Good luck out there and stay proactive no matter what you do. It is with action that results will appear.

 

*Looking for business social networking websites? Here are a few of my favorites...

LinkedIn

OC Metro – ocmetrobusiness.com

Biznik

Ryze

Merchant Circle

Partner up

Referral Key.com

There are more to add here! So keep on the hunt and keep searching for more opportunities! We are at the beginning of this and so we need to keep adding to our tool box.

Keep Moving Forward!!!