Because you need proof that you exist and you are worth something.
No, seriously, that’s why in a nutshell. Ok, I’ll expand.
Two years ago I made the transition from being in IT Operations in mostly semiconductor companies for 15 years into a pre-sales role. My street cred was the fact that I was an architect for multibillion companies. Well, what’s my street cred now that I’m in pre-sales? Blank.
Am I going to capture my 15 years of experience and regurgitate it online just to prove myself? Hell no.
What do you get out of blogging? What’s in it for me?!
Today, career progression in a largely public role such as an SE(and arguably many other roles) requires that you have a public presence and you must build that presence. From zero. No matter your history or work experience.
Simply take a look at how you would go about finding another job today.
Once upon a time, you could scour the internet and your favorite companies for job postings, submit your resume, and let the calls come rolling in.
How’s that working for you today?
Crickets.
Yeah, that’s what I thought. Me too.
If you’re lucky, a friend referred you. That happened to me once.
So what is really happening?
You do some window dressing on your Linkedin profile.
You put the word out to your friends. Hopefully, you have a large circle of friends that know what you’re capable of.
The problem I came across was that I was meeting more people but it was getting harder and harder to communicate what I’m about and what I was capable of.
What about all the people that don’t know what you’re capable of?
You need to have a body of work and a voice that speaks for you. No one is going to show someone what you’re up to other than you.
HOWEVER,…
I had a lot of reservations about this.
First, am I even a good writer?
Does it matter?
Do I matter?
Does my opinion count?
I don’t want to be one of those that just retweets someone else’s posts. That’s just unoriginal.
What is reddit besides AMA?
Should I use Twitter for personal, professional, or mix it up?
Should I use Linkedin for personal, professional, or mix it up?
Should I use Facebook for personal, professional, or mix it up?
Where do I start a blog?
Is there a service I should be using?
Do I want to look like a total noob and buy a service or should I run my own freaking server like a real techie?
I should run it on AWS on EC2! Do I really want to subscribe?
What if I get negative feedback?
Could I handle it if someone attacks me online?
How am I going to handle the rejection!?
How do I preserve my privacy?
Maybe I’m overblowing it but these were many of the questions that came to my mind. I needed a lot of support and encouragement to begin. Two years worth, to be exact.
I processed the above questions one by one. Perhaps this will help you process your questions. It is absolutely overwhelming when you first start. But don’t keep it to yourself. You’ll be surprised by how supportive your friends and colleague’s are. I was.
So let’s tackle this methodically . One bit at a time.
Can you write?
Any IT professional has been forced(and I do mean forced) to write documentation. Boring SOX documentation, anyone? DR runbooks? Explicit instructions on how to install an SQL server according to company specs?
Apparently, you can write.
I doubted myself although I personally have an English degree. Go figure.
Does it matter?/Do I matter?/Does my opinion count?
Yes! I have read all the silly posts and comments online. In fact, I have a penchant for reading Yahoo comments on articles and finding value and fun in those comments alone!
More importantly, when I am researching something technical, I have found personal comments oftentimes much more enlightening then the canned technical documentation provided by the vendor. Why? Because vendor documentation is often written to favor their products. When I have seen 2 or more posts highlighting an similar opinion outside of official documentation, I know the community is on to something!
What is reddit besides AMA?
A colleague turned my head to look at reddit for more than just the Ask Me Anything section. AMA is almost as good a read as a gossip rag though. Just saying.
I’m exploring reddit, mangolassi.it, and spiceworks today as I write this.
Did you know that these are whole communities? I always thought they were random strangers posting odd things. There’s definitely some of that but did you know you could build a solid reputation for participating in those communities? I did not and I never looked at it that way. It turns out they are great places to give and take advice. These websites are great places to put your toe in the water at exposing your own concerns in small peeks! I’ll be right there doing that moving forward as a total newbie.
Should I use Twitter/Linkedin/Facebook for personal, professional, or mix it up?
This was a big question of mine. I personally already had all the accounts but they were dormant for the better part. Why? Privacy concerns and more importantly, I didn’t know how to use them.
More specifically, I didn’t see how I could use those mediums to promote myself without looking like a douchebag. By the way, I have serious concerns about projecting myself poorly online so you are not alone in that feeling!
Here’s where I started with these websites:
Facebook – all personal & I used it to post personal photos of my family. But I have the power to post professional stuff too. Should I?
Linkedin – all professional & I very occasionally posted things from my work
Twitter – confused as hell on what I should post here. I posted both personal and professional stuff and honestly, I don’t know if these people online are projecting their friendship or their professional persona’s.
Here’s where I’m going with these websites:
Facebook – I’m going to keep it personal and relatively private to just those people that I want to share information about my kids and family.
Linkedin – continue being all professional
Twitter – I’m going to project my professional voice in this space from now on. Why? Because it’s a record of everything you ever spit on online and everyone in the world can see it.
Maybe you already knew this but this is me figuring this out. I had to interview colleagues to see what they were doing and what their thoughts were in the process.
Maybe in the back of your head, you’re thinking, “Why is this so important?”
It’s important because our world is changing when it comes to how you make your voice heard. The older you are, the more you are accustomed to being a wall flower when you needed to be. You did not want to stand out. You did not want to be called on. It’s partially a product of our education system.(I have a lot more thoughts there but I’ve leave that for another day.)
However, look at the younger generation today.
There is no difference between what you see in person and what you see online. It’s like they permanently walk around with a shirt that has no coverage on the backside!
Ok, it’s not quite like that but you know what I mean. They have this innate sense of what should be put online and what doesn’t need to be online(most of them. I’m not referring to the extreme folks). And there’s no hiding. And they are comfortable with that! That’s the part that blows my mind.
Now, I’m not being hard and fast on every word being put on these mediums but that’s my personal preference and guidance.
My mantra is that your online presence is like a tattoo that will follow you around for the rest of your life.
Where do I start a blog?/ Is there a service I should be using?/Do I want to look like a total noob and buy a service or should I run my own freaking server like a real techie?/I should run it on AWS on EC2! Do I really want to subscribe?
Oh my goodness. The opinions gyrating around the world on this nearly generated a migraine on my end. Let me be the first to say that you should do what you are comfortable with. I decided on going for a prebuilt service because I got out of day to day IT so I didn’t have to manage any hardware, software, or fix anything. I wanted to write a blog, not manage a service on top of that.
Now that I’ve said that, what are the options?
First up, you could host it at your place! I have friends that used to host an Exchange server next to their fish tank. Same power supply too. I’m not making that up. I would admire the electric eel and the supermicro server in one swoop. You would be super cool. You would probably have a lot of work to do and have to spend a lot of money and time building it from chassis on up. You would make the decisions on hardware platform, hypervisor, OS, and web software stack.
Second, you could build an EC2 instance and also build the OS out and load the software stack. This would be half you and half on AWS’ infrastructure. You would manage less but have a monthly bill. This would also be true if you did this on Azure or even GCP.
3rd up: Pay for a service and manage nothing. You would be dependent on the service provider and pay a monthly fee.
Now I gloss that over intentionally since anything outside of doing it yourself, you must research and learn what is being provided commercially. Also, by the time you read this, services will have changed their offerings, changed pricing, and added features.
What if I get negative feedback?
I really had to ask my more experienced colleagues about this. Surprisingly, their experience has been largely positive. There’s less people out there being snarky than I thought. Also, it’s not like I’ve never received negative feedback before. Like a human being, I will process them and move on with my life.
Could I handle it if someone attacks me online?
The truth is I don’t know. I would think that someone that decides to be negative has more at stake than me. If you put yourself out there negatively, that’s your brand you put out and that’s what you are going to be known for. I assume that people who do that are not afraid of the repercussions. I personally like to be included, not excluded. 😉
How am I going to handle the rejection!?
I was thinking about this and my past year. I’ve had a lot of doors closed in my face. And I still get up every morning pumped to see what I’m going to do. Getting rejected is NOT the test. The test is whether you get back up and find another way or another day. I always do. Perhaps I’m optimistic but I believe that showing up is half of winning.
How do I preserve my privacy?
Let’s all face this together: Privacy is dead.
I must have spent 5 of the last years coming to this conclusion. I grew up without facebook and I didn’t play online games. I had no personality online. By the time I got on Facebook, I was a complete bumbling idiot about what content I put online. On top of that, all the people around me were expressing such deep and strong opinions about putting their information online. Stories about people posting vacation photos getting robbed scared me. And then our world really changed through the introduction of the iphone and smartphones because these devices allowed us to access to the internet anytime anywhere. The rise of facebook, twitter, and instagram started to creep into our lives. The world became aware that their online presence and preferences were of value to online companies. Our personal information became a type of currency. I read many comments reflecting the rejection of participating in such an ecosystem. However, if you needed to consume the internet in any capacity, you were giving information away. Even if you use Google just to run a search, that information is being captured. Unless you live in the grey area of Tor, an online profile about you was being created. I’ve either sold my electronic soul to Apple through the iPhones, iPad’s, parental controls of my children’s iPads, Apple Watch or I’m giving my electronic soul to Google through my Android devices, Google Home, my search history, Chrome, etc. It is naïve to think some of your information(your browser history, ID, etc.) has not leaked out. If Anthem Blue cross can accidently lose your information, if the bad guys can file for your tax refund and IRS actually gives it to them(!), what control do you really have over your personal information that you really care about? My shopping preferences really fall on the priority list when the healthcare organizations and the government can’t keep my information safe! This is not meant to scare you. It’s meant to give you a bigger view of what may be under your control and what is likely a forgone conclusion when it comes to privacy.
In the face of this mindset, blogging is a powerful way for me to shape my voice, my personality, and my presence. Especially since a picture of you is being painted online anyways, with or without your participation. It is in this context that I came to realize that having my voice in the written word is a better representation for me since I have control over it.
Whew, for a first post, this went on extensively. Hopefully, some of the viewpoints, observations, and opinions help inform your thought process around blogging and having an online presence!