Managing your
online profile
Sue Beckingham | @suebecks
Invited Speaker: Chartered Association of Business Schools Leaders in Learning and Teaching Programme

Who
am I

Begins with
your online
presence

Twitter
LinkedIn
Blog
Slideshare

http://www.alexa.com/topsites/global!
will find
you!
Be mindful of how people
search for information

What is Social Media?
Social software that
supports group
communications
Shirky C, 2003
Technologies that
enable communication,
collaboration,
participation and
sharing.
Hughes A, 2009 for JISC

Social Media is
an ecology
for enabling a "system of people, practices, values and
technologies in a particular local environment"
a medium
for facilitating social connection and information interchange
a tool
for augmenting human social and collaborative abilities
Suter, Alexander and Kaplan, 2005

Social Media: An Ecology
An ecology, habitat, or studio is simply the space for
fostering connections.
Networks occur within something. They are influenced
by the environment and context of an organization,
school, or classroom.
Certain ecologies are more conducive to forming
connections. ... Connection barriers are aspects of an
ecology. ... The nature of the ecology influences the
ease, type, and health of networks created
(Siemans 2007)

Social Media gives more people
a voice and provides a
powerful tool for value creation
and competitive differentiation”
Advanced Human Technologies 2010

WEF 2016

Your personal choice of tools
Solis and Thomas http://www.theconversationprism.com

Communication Spectrum
• Collaborating
• Moderating
• Negotiating
• Debating
• Commenting
• Net meeting, Skyping,
Video Conferencing
• Reviewing
• Questioning
• Replying
• Posting and Blogging
• Networking
• Contributing
• Chatting
• E-mailing
• Tweeting/microblogging
• Instant Messaging
• Texting
Churches, A. (2009) Blooms Revised Digital Taxonomy
http://edorigami.wikispaces.com/Bloom%27s+Digital+Taxonomy

the corporate office
the water cooler
the staff canteen
the bar

How can social
media help us
become Digital
Scholars?

Established academic 'sharing' mechanisms

LinkedIn
updates
Blog
comments
Blog
posts
Tweets
Slideshare
YouTube
& Vimeo
Complementing the traditional
we are now seeing a growing
use of social channels

Your personal level of
involvement
• Creators
• Conversationalists
• Critics
• Collectors
• Joiners
• Spectators
• Inactives

Rahaf Harfoush @rahafharfoush 2016
Digital Behaviour

How are academics using social media?
Social media forums can provide a space for:
• Idea exchanges
• Q&As
• Informal learning
• Finding new scholarly activity
• Feedback
• Mentoring
• Information finding
• Networking
• Collaborating
• Promoting own work
• Sharing work of others
• Updating professional profile

Popular sites
• Academia.edu
• ResearchGate
• Mendeley
• LinkedIn
• SlideShare
• Twitter
• Google Communities
• YouTube
• Facebook
• Blogger, WordPress
• Pinterest
• Instagram

Why
Many Twitter users don't share any information.
They consume.

• To search for Tweets mentioning a user, enter the
user's username, preceded by the @ symbol, into
the search box at the top of the page.
• If you see a hashtag in someone's Tweet, clicking it
will perform a search for Tweets containing that
exact hashtag.
• Use advanced search to filter for places, dates,
keywords https://twitter.com/search-advanced

Building
your
network
takes time

@businessdocme
https://twitter.com/businessdocme/lists
https://about.me/DocPaul

"You have to be very careful in SM
as there are no filters. It's impact is
zero or huge in terms of what you
contribute. You must engage with
people that are counter to you and
your beliefs."
Dr Paul Thomas

"Keep it 'real' and be authentic. You can spot
'corporate' or sterile accounts a mile off. Tweet
regular, engage in a human way, don't cut and
paste. I've had some wonder conversations in
SM with people around the world and some of
which are A-star authors and academics most
of which show a human side that's humble."
Dr Paul Thomas

@LTHEchat https://lthechat.com/

Make good use of your bio

https://press.linkedin.com/about-linkedin
build
connections
group
discussions
collaboration
opportunities
share your
expertise
Why

Shining the spotlight
on LinkedIn
MAKING
CONNECTIONS
SKILLS AND
ENDORSEMENTS
RECOMMENDATIONS
SEARCH GROUPS
DIGITAL
SCHOLARSHIP

Complete your profile

• Complete your profile
• Include keywords people will use to search for
you/your skills
• Add your publications, projects and presentations
• Claim your public url
• Give and ask for recommendations
• The interface keeps changing so do refer to the up
to date resources provided by LinkedIn
https://help.linkedin.com/app/home

• 70+ million users visit each month
• Over 18 million uploads in 40 content
categories
• One of the top 100 most-visited websites
in the world.
• over 80% of SlideShare’s visitors come
through targeted search.
http://www.slideshare.net/about
Why

• Social sharing - viewers are encouraged to share
via LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook so include your
contact details within the presentation
• Findability - include keywords within your
presentations to increase chances of it being found
• Stand out from the crowd - add your SlideShare
presentations to LinkedIn

Why Blogging
• Helps you to establish writing as a routine
• A space to summarise and share
conference presentations and publications
• Utilise multimedia such as video, audio
and images
• Reflective space

Blogging:
private, invite only or public

https://socialmediaforlearning.com/

Using social media to remain in
good standing
Middleton and Beckingham 2015

Your Profile
• Bio - this is your elevator pitch so share your
professional expertise
• Profile photo - help SEO and accessibility by adding alt
text
• Interconnectedness - links to other profiles
• Customise backgrounds - use to share additional
information (text and/or images)
• Promote - add links to your email signature, website and
business card

Consider
your audience
• colleagues within your discipline
• other academics
• students
• prospective students (and parents)
• professional bodies
• policy makers
• practioners
• the general public

Understand your audience
The way you tell your story will depend on whose attention
you’re trying to attract. Whether it’s peers in your
professional network, potential research or business
partners, or other useful business contacts, understanding
your audience will help you tailor your profile to speak
directly to them.

1. WHO could you connect with?
2. WHAT would you gain from making new connections?
3. WHERE could you make new connections?
4. WHEN could you make new connections?
5. WHY would you make new connections?
6. HOW could new connections benefit your career?

Three important networks
OPERATIONAL
NETWORK
DEVLOPMENTAL
NETWORK
STRATEGIC
NETWORK
Purpose Getting work done efficiently;
maintaining the capacities
and functions required of the
group.
Enhancing personal and
professional development;
providing referrals to useful
information and contacts,
Figuring out future priorities
and challenges; getting
stakeholder support fro them,
Location and temporal
orientation
Connections are mostly
internal and orientated
towards current demands
Connections are mostly
external and orientated
toward current interests and
potential future interests.
Connections are internal and
external and orientated
towards the future.
Players and recruitment Key connections are
relatively nondiscretionary;
they are prescribed mostly by
the task and organisation
structure, so it is very clear
who is relevant
Key connections are mostly
discretionary; it is not always
clear who is relevant.
Key connections follow from
the strategic context and the
organisational environment ,
but specific membership is
discretionary; it is not always
clear who is relevant
Network attributes and key
behaviours
Depth: building strong
working relationships
Breadth: reaching out to
contacts who can make
referrals and introductions.
Leverage: creating inside-
outside links.
Harvard Business Review 2011

Image source: Noah Sussman
3
1
2
Building a valuable network

Identify second degree connections

Weak Ties
Strong Ties
YOU
Strong Ties
Friends or peers are
less likely to be able
to provide new
information or
connections
Weak Ties
May be able to
introduce you to new
people with
potential company
information and
potential job
offerings

Onalytica 2016
Lead by example

The #SocMedHE15 community NodeXL map

CREATE
CURATE
COLLABORATE
COMMUNICATE
CONNECT
SHARE
FEEDBACK
The 5C Framework Nerantzi and Beckingham 2014

QUESTIONS TO EXPLORE
• CONNECTING
As a digital scholar how can I develop a professional online network?
• COMMUNICATING
As a digital scholar how can I disseminate my scholarly outputs?
• CURATING
As a digital scholar how can I build and share collections of resources
relating to learning and teaching pedagogy and innovative practice?
• COLLABORATING
As a digital scholar how can I develop collaborative working partnerships
with my peers (and students)?
• CREATING
As a digital scholar how can I showcase innovative practice and openly
share this with other educators?

Don't do social; be S.O.C.I.A.L.
Sincere
Open
Collaborative
Interested
Authentic
Likeable
Afshar and Martin 2012: 31
"Being social consists of
this set of attributes.
These help people connect and
build relationships."

Shareology
• Knowing what to share
• Knowing when to share
TMI factor = too much information
Kramer 2016:79

A sharing learning community
provides signposts to
conversations
examples
resources
images
video
Q&As

commenting
liking
replying

http://jarche.com/2016/01/the-core-competency/

Benefits of Working Out Loud
Internal: enterprise social
network
• peer-to-peer recognition
• improved internal
communications
• better working
relationships
• humanised work
• higher productivity
• increased innovation and
collaboration
External: professional social
networks
• build and extend
professional networks
• opens virtual doors
• crowd source information
• breaks down
geographical barriers

To benefit from learning
and working out loud we
also need to progress
from selective hearing
to active listening

The Lurker
to be in a hidden place : to wait in a secret or hidden
place especially in order to do something wrong or
harmful
computers : to read messages written by other people on
the Internet in a newsgroup, chat room, etc., without
writing any messages yourself
Vicariousness
experiences or felt by watching, hearing about, or
reading about someone else rather than by doing
something yourself
Is 'listening in' vicarious lurking???

Positive Silent Engagement (PSE)
I would argue that positive silent
engagement (PSE) is not only valuable,
but an essential component of digital
connectedness.
We learn by listening. It is no different
online

'getting' social media is a bit like learning to ride a bike
initial uncertainty and discomfort...
...but with persistence and determination,
along with some support and encouragement,
it can be very rewarding

Sue Beckingham | @suebecks
Educational Developer and Senior Lecturer at Sheffield Hallam University
with a research interest in the use of social media in education.
Blog: http://socialmediaforlearning.com/
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/suebeckingham
Image sources: where uncited all images used are either public domain via Pixabay or author's own