July 2, 2010

Facebook and work “friends”

After posting this and this I decided to go out and do an unscientific ‘field’ research. And of course what else could I have used but Facebook.


I asked all my friends (all 60 of them) what they thought about sharing facebook between their personal and professional lives.


To my surprise, I discovered that I was not the only one who was uncomfortable with mixing my personal and professional connections and confused about what information was appropriate to share with all of them.


Here is a quote from one of my Facebook friend’s, a colleague in real life, response:


“I don't actively seek new friends because I am very private and reserved with my information.I find it weird that I know more about my work collegues from reading facebook, than I do from talking to them and I find myself feeling a little guilty, as if I am spying on them.”


And here is another interesting response: “I watch what I post especially since i have work collegues as friends. I am concerned that my posts would be misinterpreted. I try to keep it light and positive and fun, But I haven't been posting anything lately, because I sometimes feel like- "what's the point?"


Well, we live and we learn… So we are yet to discover how to balance those two dimensions of our lives that historically have been so separate. Maybe they will blend more together. Maybe the way we use social networking will change. I guess we’ll just have to take it one step at a time.


1 comment:

  1. An interesting topic, but I don't think it's quite accurate to say that work and personal life have been separate. It has only been when the industrial age got into full swing that the personal and work lives became separate as we know them today. Prior to that, most people tended to live and work in the same place and were identified with their profession (thus last names like Baker, Taylor, Carpenter, Smith, etc.). It would be interesting to read some historical accounts of the changes people went through in the industrial revolution as crafts and workshops closed and people went to work in factories.

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