Are you my friend, or social friend or … ?

Or

How social networking redefines the meaning of friendships.

Has Facebook spoiled the word ‘friend’ for us once and for all?

To me the word ‘friend’ means quite a lot. I only can call a friend someone who is close to me, someone I know very well, someone I trust and have a relationship with. I don’t call all the people I know friends. Even those people that I hag out with every once in a while I can’t call friends, I’d rather call them acquaintances.

Even dictionaries define the word ‘friend’ as someone close and special.

Merriam-Webseter: one attached to another by affection or esteem.

Oxford: ‘One joined to another in mutual benevolence and intimacy.’

Cambridge: a person who you know well and who you like a lot, but who is usually not a member of your family.

But now I have some people I hardly know or communicate with, let along have a relationship with as my “friends” of Facebook. Actually, I have a problem with Facebook calling those social connections ‘friends’. I think they should be called something else, but what do I know.

I did some research online and found a very interesting website, called the Ideasproject.

Up front let me disclose that it is operated by Nokia, a world leader in mobile technology. But at it’s core, the Ideasproject is nothing more than an open platform for thinkers in the sphere of communications technology to exchange ideas and opinions. I don’t really have a problem with the project’s affiliation to Nokia. I actually find it quite smart of Nokia to use this medium to tap into the brain power of individuals, passionate about communications technology, but it is not the point of this post.

So the initiative that caught my attention on that website, very relevant to the topic of my discussion, is this – an open forum asking visitors to chip in and answer one question:

“In the era of the social data revolution, what is a ‘friend’ to you?”

Interestingly, the responses were overwhelmingly similar is differentiating real-life friendships and social networking ones.

Here are some of them:

“he era of the social data revolution ought not to change our understanding of what a friend is, or of what a relationship is. A friend give love and support, in return for same. A Facebook friend is a dramatically different use of the word friend, and a best a metaphor referring only obliquely to friends as I described above.” By Noah Burbank

“In the traditional sense, a 'friend' according to me is someone whom I can completely rely on no matter what the situation is. But now with the advent of the social era, its hard to say the same about all the 500 odd people in my list. So the term 'friend' should probably be changed to the term 'social friend' - so as to not dilute the original meaning.” By Sandeep Sripada

“In the era of the social data revolution, I think the term "friend" was hijacked by Facebook to basically mean acquaintance- anybody I've had contact with in real life that I might possibly want to see again in the future, serendipitously or on purpose. Can correlate to any number of things: similar interests, activity partners, colleagues, industry contacts, family, etc. I think "friend" has mashed up a number of meanings in the modern era and has far too broad of a scope- I'm glad twitter uses "follow/following" and linkedin uses "connected." By Jeremy Carr

So of course defining the meaning of friendships is very personal to each of us. I’ll stick to calling friends only my real friends. I’m happy to have all of my connections on the social networking sites, but not all of them are my friends.

Pick up line 2.0

Happy Independence Day and Happy July the 4^th weekend!

Just like millions of proud Americans I have celebrated the matter by going to a barbecue party to Long Island and to see the fireworks over the Hudson River.

And believe it or not, the following pickup line has helped to start a conversation and to get a perfect spot to see the fireworks.

You wonder what the line was? Ok, won’t keep you waiting any longer – “Is that an Evo?”

Yup, just like that. This short and simple line does wonders, seriously.

At first at the barbecue, I was participating in this awkward moment of several people sitting near each other and not knowing what to talk about. And then I have spotted a new and shiny Evo, one person was playing with and all it took me to sparkle a long and exciting conversation was say “Is that an Evo?”

Not sure what so magic about it, but there is something special, for sure. I think it has to do with the ego. No, not Evo, but ego.

People are very proud of their gadgets, they want to be noticed and from I’m sensing more and more, there is this group of people who don’t want to be a part of now-mainstream iPhone crowd, they want to be different, so they opt out of the Apple-mania and often switch to Android-based Evo.

The other instance when that pick-up line made wonders for me was at the Fireworks.

Imagine – Hoboken boarkwalk, packed with people and more are still coming. All of the ‘front seats’ – the space by the railing have been taken by fireworks fanatics who have been camping on their chairs and towels for hours.

I showed up a lazy half hour before the show and of course was facing the possibility of watching the fireworks through thick greenery of the trees feet away from the water edge.

I walked around and jut stopped for a moment to contemplate my options. And there it happened. One guy in a group of young-looking happy-campers who called the ownership of oh-so-wanted-by-me inches of front-row railing pulled out an Evo. And the words “Is that an Evo?” just flew out of my mouth.

Minutes later I was invited to join their party, offered a full-bar selection of drinks, a cigar and a hookah. I have politely declines all, but a diet coke and a perfect spot to view the show.

So there you have it – being on top of latest technology can be very beneficial, in many unexpected ways.

PS

Just so you could enjoy the view of the fireworks with me too, here is a pic.

Happy 4^th!

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.

Technology makes it easier for people to avoid each other

How easy is it to email or send a text message, right? You can do it anywhere, it takes a second and doesn’t require much effort. Fantastic!

But according to Vivian Bader, a clinical social work therapist with 22 years of experience, this ease of communication has two sides – a positive and a negative.

She agrees that modern technology made our communications easier and faster. We became more available. “Email and text is great in case of emergency or when there is a change in plans – it is easier for people to find each other and get instant feedback. Everything is happening faster,” says Bader.

But at the same time texting and emailing and Facebooking and twitting have shortened our conversations she said. We don’t talk to each other as much any more. And Bader doesn’t think it is good. “It creates some distance in relationships, people don’t spend enough ‘face’ time with each other,” she adds.

How ironic – technology that is making our communication so much easier, can actually create distance between people.

Vivian gave a very good example, and I, to be honest, had a flashback. I didn’t even realize that I’ve done the same myself.

“There are many situations nowadays when people can be in each other’s presence and still apart,” Explains Bader. For example people can be sitting in the same room, watching a movie or a television show and simultaneously be preoccupied with their hand-held devices. How much are they together at that moment? Are they sharing the experience with each other or with their blackberries, iPhones and such?”

Have you ever been in a situation like that? Are you guilty of being with your fried or your partner and not being with them? Maybe that is something to think about…

Social networking – personal or professional, or both? Where to draw the line?

So those of us who work, for a small business, as a free agent or for a corporation, and have a Facebook or a Twitter account. How to decide whether to use that account for professional purposes?

I see it happen left and right.

For example, someone I know who works for a large corporation told me recently that their managers unofficially encouraged them to promote their products on their social networking pages to their friends and the outside world. For failing to find a better word to describe how it makes me feel, I’ll say icky.

On the other hand, I heard that one of the employees of the national news organization, the kind that specializes in breaking news, shared a piece of breaking news on his Facebook page before it hit the wires. So that person definitely treated his Facebook page as personal but misused it from the professional stand point.

Or, take the Russian President, who during his last

visit to the Silicon Valley signed up for a Twitter account as @KremlinRussia. I’m totally fascinated with the idea that the Russian President has a Twitter account and actually uses it. But it is not the point. I actually looked through it (it’s in Russian, I do speak the language) and there are obviously two different types of messages there. One clearly is posted by his press service, it talks about all sorts of boring stuff like appointments of local authorities. But the other looks like it’s coming directly from the President.

Tweets like “San Francisco – very beautiful city. Today I’m going to the Sillicon Valley to check out Apple, Yandex, Cisco!” (my translation)

Or like “The view from my hotel room.”

Or like “The weather got worse, instead of taking the helicopters, driving to Toronto…” or “Germany and England play today, I sincerely wish them both luck. In any case the best football wins.”

So whose account is that, Mr. Medvedev’s or is it an official account of the President of Russia.

Confusing.

I’m sure that the jury is still out for defining all of these new rules of the game and boundaries. But it seems like in the end the traditional perception of spaces – personal and professional – would be reset.

Facebook, I give up

So I wonder if anybody has had a similar experience to mine.

When I first signed up to Facebook, I thought of it only as of a personal communication tool, that allowed me to share my life with my friends, whom I carefully selected. I made a conscious effort not to friend everybody and their mothers. I thought of Facebook as of this very special place where I can be open and honest with some very special people in my life.

And not that what I wanted to share was inappropriate, but still there is stuff that I can share with some people and don’t want to share with others. Stuff like my feelings, what I do, where I go.

For example, I would update my status if I had a successful shopping trip and brag to my friends about a great deal that I got for a fantastic dress.

But then, I got a friend invitation from a colleague of mine. And that made me uncomfortable. It became a dilemma. What do I do? Not friending a colleague would be awkward. But at the same time, I didn’t really want my colleague to know everything I want to share with my friends.

So I decided to stay true to my initial decision to keep my Facebook account private and available only to my true close friends.

I meticulously declined invitations from people who I thought didn’t match my criteria of a friend and explained to them that my Facebook was private and that my professional network was on LikendIn.

And then the avalanche happened.

Everybody started friending everybody. I got dozens of invitations from people I hardly knew. I even got an invitation from my boss!

How what do you do with that?

I tried, I really tried to resist. I just couldn’t. I couldn’t any longer explain to everyone that I didn’t want to friend them. It just looked weird. I tried playing with the security settings – but I just don’t have the time or any desire to set individually who I want to see a particular photo of me and who I want to exclude from reading my status update – it is just too much trouble.

So I just give up!

That’s it. I open the gate and invite everybody.

Come, be my friend.

But I won’t be so open on Facebook any more. I won’t share my thoughts and feelings. I don’t want my boss to know when I get a great deal on a pair of shoes. I will just take my personal business elsewhere and consider Facebook a part of my public life…

Looking for a job? Start networking!

I’ve talked a lot about how technology affects our personal lives. But it revolutionizes how we interact in professional setting as well – from how we look for a job, to how we communicate on the job.

Technology is definitely a blessing for corporate America. It makes so many tasks easier and faster, saves a lot of time and money. From email and intranet, to virtual conference rooms, webcasting and screencasting.

We can have meetings with clients and colleagues from different offices around the world not leaving our desks.

We can train and get trained. I’m training an intern right now, for example, via email. I give him tasks, he sends them back completed, I review them and so on. With the number of questions that he asks me about every single small detail, I think all I’d be doing is answering them, if I had to do it in person.

Looking for a job is a whole new world as well. It seems like nobody cares about paper resumes and cover letters any more. We look for job offers online, we submit for them electronically and then we check out inboxes waiting for responses from potential employers. In many professions, like design, photography, videography, writing, candidates create entire websites as their resumes with work samples and links to their actual work online.

More than 70 million people on over 200 countries have their profiles on LinkedIn.com, including executives from all Fortune 500 companies. There is Monster.com, Careerbuilder.com, and many other online job search engines. Most of the companies have their job openings posed online.

To make a sense of how to use all that cacophony of work-related technology, I talked to Allison Hemming, a founder and president of The Hired Guns talent agency, author of “Work It!” and a career management expert who has been featured in The New York Times, The Today Show, The Wall Street Journal, New York Post, Newsday, CNN, CNBC, Good Morning America, NPR, PBS, Fortune Magazine and many other media outlets.

At first she agreed that technology has changed the rules of the job hunting and hiring game: “First, it has leveled the playing field - jobs that were previously only offered through headhunters are now accessible to everyone. LinkedIn has made it perfectly okay to have your profile (a stripped down resume+bio) out there 100% of the time for all the world to see. This means you can always be looking and people can always find you. Before LinkedIn job hunters had to sneak around.” She added: “Social media and blogs have allowed individuals to elevate themselves as experts (provided that they know what they're best in the world at and understand what their personal brands). I think we'll look back at this time and see it as tremendously creative and innovative.”

But then she dropped a real bomb - despite all that growth that online job hunting has enjoyed over the last decade: “The internet only accounts for 11% of all jobs landed. 80% of all jobs are actually landed through tried-and-true networking”.

No stop for a second, go back and look at it.

Only 11% of jobs landed are found online.

Now that it is staring me in the eyes, I realize that it’s true. Let me give you an example. My friends lost her job in apparel merchandizing last December, right before Christmas. Realizing that nothing was going to happen over the Holidays, she took a break and then literally chained herself to her computer for weeks looking for a job. She has been sending dozens of resumes a week. And all it resulted in was in her frustration.

After 3 months of doing that, out of hundreds of resumes that she sent out, she landed one job interview, for a position that turned out to be below her professional level. She landed two other interviews though networking with her ex-colleagues and ended up accepting an offer from an organization that she worked for before her last job.

So now why do we spend all this time working on our online profiles, surfing online job search engines, sending out resumes? According to Hemming 80% of people spend their time working the online job boards and only 10% networking.

What it leads to on the other end? Hemming describes: “Hiring managers are overwhelmed, because more people apply online than ever before, inboxes get stuffed with a lot of "noise" that isn't appropriate for the job at hand. In essence, your competition is spamming the hiring community making it harder for your great resume to get noticed”.

So what should we do? Allison puts is nice and short:

“People need to weight their time according to what's working”.