Photo courtesy of mahalie.
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?
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