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Facebook Etiquette: Five Dos and Don'ts

Facebook Etiquette: Five Dos and Don'ts

Facebook and other social networking sites can create an uncomfortable overlap between your personal and professional life. We show how to manage your Facebook profile so it can work for both business and pleasure.

Thoughtless: While there aren't many numbers to back this assertion (because Facebook is a private company, and data can be hard to come by), most social networking and identity experts believe a great many Facebook users never so much as glance at their privacy settings pages. The same probably holds true for other social networks. Remember that social networks plan to monetize their service by ensuring that you share as much information as possible. As such, you should believe that they'll share as much information about you as they can, and make it available to the widest audience.

The default settings for Facebook, for example, make all your profile information available for everyone on the service to see. "Assume from the get go that anything you put in there is viewable on the public internet," Dixson says. "Go in with that line of thinking. Then go in and say, if you don't want to make certain information available to certain people, go turn them off with the privacy settings."

With the information you do share, avoid being vain. Social networks do enable, if not encourage, a bit of narcissism. But don't assume people want to read a novel about your life. Also, be protective of your family. It's fine to list yourself as "married" in the info section, for instance, but don't necessarily feel that you have to put down a link to your significant other. If you have young children, for their protection and privacy, Dixson recommends you don't include their names anywhere in the bio or in pictures of them that you decide to share.

Oh, and a word about age. While you may want to include your birthday on your Facebook profile, so people can message you on the big day, you should exclude the birth year, Dixson says. Your friends and family know how old you are, and there's no reason for your professional ones to know.

3. Posting content, links, and news

Thoughtful: Post content that highlights your personal interests and your professional areas of expertise. A marketing professional might post some interesting links for a relevant trade publication he or she wanted to share, for example. Posting personal picture slideshows is fine - again, within reason. You clearly want to avoid the aforementioned pitfalls of displaying shots of wild revelry. But for all the agony about what's acceptable and what's not, remember that offering contacts a decent glimpse into what makes you you can have business benefits. "It strengthens relationships," Dixson says. "It really helps establish connections. People like to do business with people they know."

Thoughtless: Spamming people is a big no-no, as it can irrevocably ruin your social capital. It's great to be so passionate about things in both your professional life and personal life that you feel compelled to share it with people who are important to you, but remember that people can only take so much time out of their day. Also, don't assume they care about every little thing in your personal life. People know you're proud of your kids, for example, and that speaks to your commitment as a parent. Yet you need to know when to draw the line somewhere in how much they want to hear.

Definitely keep your romantic break-ups and get-togethers in private forums, like e-mails, IMs and (who still uses it anymore?) the phone.

Oh, and this one should be self-explanatory: don't go flapping your gums about your company's affairs.

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