As you continue to work hard toward computer certifications and the job of your choice, it’s time to start paying attention to how employers perceive you.
When Facebook recently announced that it had successfully passed the 500 million member milestone, internet gurus and users alike applauded the achievement with much fanfare online. There’s a south side to the scenario, though: Your potential employers and recruiters can now learn just as much about you as your friends and fans, and they can’t all be exactly flattering. Bottom line? Your online reputation is just as important as the professional image you project on your resume. As a job seeker in the workforce, this is even more true for you because companies in a variety of industries, but specifically the IT and IT-enabled services industries, routinely screen potential employees not only through from vetting firms, but also directly at Almighty. Google searching Google for your name in quotes for an identical match within organic search results. Here are some powerful reasons why you should not just consider but also implement the strategies outlined below immediately once you are ready for the job market by completing your certifications.
Prioritize your commitment to online reputation management
Your online reputation is no longer just relevant to banks, mortgage companies, and credit card issuers. Your employer is also very interested in meeting you on the Internet and seeing what others are saying about you. On whatever platform you want to participate in, such as blog comments, forum posts, and contributions to discussion groups and lists, your “two cents” really should be worth a quarter. Your comments and observations should be intelligent, insightful, and thought-provoking. Never criticize, insult or slander a fellow poster because negative data always tends to stick out like a sore thumb in the minds of those looking for you for work purposes. If there are a hundred comments from you or about you that are positive in nature and only one negative comment, your prospective employer will remember the latter. Let psychologists figure this out.
Examine your Facebook profile with a critical eye
Facebook is the number one social media forum that employers are consulting these days, and given recent controversies regarding the privacy issues that continue to surround the website, no information about you is protected on Facebook. Therefore, it is time to be proactive. Replace both covert and overt personal photos with neutral snapshots. Photos of you hanging around bars and pubs in the company of like-minded creatures will have to go, especially if they happen to be “action oriented”. A little Tom Sawyer-style whitewashing might be in the offing, as you’ll also need to clean your wall of all the harmful graffiti.
Connecting with LinkedIn the right way
If you have a professional job profile on LinkedIn or any of the professional networking social media websites like ZoomInfo, Tribe.Net, Spoke, Ryze, JigSaw, ecademy, and others, take it for granted that your future employers will pay you a visit. Courtesy. Like Facebook, these websites can also be accessed in two ways: either through a search performed on the major search engines or through the search function offered by each of the websites. Your profiles should be sharp, crisp and truly professional, with no spelling or grammatical errors. List all of your computer certifications clearly in reverse chronological order, listing the most recent computer certification first. More importantly, the data you post on these websites must be fully consistent with your resume at all times. If you are a regular participant in LinkedIn Answers and LinkedIn Forums, your contributions should be meaningful and constructive. Many employers pay LinkedIn as part of their premium service offerings to gain unqualified access to the website through vertical search. So it’s a good idea to examine your LinkedIn Connections and Connections just to make sure you’re actually in the right company and not perceived to be hanging out with the wrong kind of audience online. Your online album and LinkedIn image gallery should contain only snapshots that project you professionally, presenting in front of a large audience, attending a meeting, dining with formally dressed colleagues, waiting at the airport reading the Wall Street Journal. . image. You are your own brand and you need to manage it wisely.
Mission-critical tasks like preparing your resume, organizing your online portfolio, and managing your online reputation are just as important as completing your computer certifications. Once you dedicate a few hours a week to this acceleration exercise, you’ll be ready to storm the work scene and make a mark on the preferred companies of your choice much sooner than you think.