Mental Meals!™

Blue Collar Management and Social Networking

Posted October 17th, 2008 by Bart Gragg

The big buzz around the business world is social networking.  Most of the events that focus on the use of LinkedIn, Facebook, blogging, and many other facets of networking are attended by professionals, entrepreneurs and people looking for jobs or more work.  As in all marketing strategies the key to all of this is exposure, whether it is corporate or personal.  Social networking is a place to become known, a place to be found, and a place to become a subject matter expert.

Whether you use social networks for corporate or personal exposure, they do boil down to personal exposure and relationship building.  That personal exposure does reflect on the company.  In social networks your personal profile is every bit as important as how you present yourself when in public, only it is compounded by a factor of ten at least, and probably a lot more than that.  If we agree that first impressions are the most important, your presence on the web is your first impression to the entire world.

To the question of blue collar management and their use of these tools - is there a professional and corporate value in it for them?  I believe so.  We know that people in any given industry grow a reputation inside that industry that is spread by word of mouth.   It takes years to build a reputation as being good in your area, but It spreads like wildfire if you screw up.  If we teach blue collar managers the importance of social networking and that it is the face they put on the company and their personal reputation, is it possible that this could cause them to feel more professional?  Is it possible that this could cause them to look more professional?  Is it possible that this could cause them to become more professional?

Is this something we should incorporate into their unit’s business plan?

Tags: Blue Collar Management, social networking