Today’s write up is brought to you exclusively by REJECTION ;).
Was I disheartened? Not really, because as silly as the reason was, it was my negligence, and I learned something out of this failure. And hopefully you will learn to avoid such oversights too, after you go through my candid words of wisdom ;).
We are all very aware that social media is everyone’s business these days. It has, in fact, dissolved all barriers of networking by seamlessly creating a medium where people can easily share ideas and opinions, or establish connections for personal as well as professional ends.
Now, if we youngistaanis were to prioritize different social media platforms, I believe it would be something like this:
✓ Snapchat
✓ Pinterest etc
Okay now some of you must be wondering where this write up is headed, so here it goes – Last year I lost an offer during the final round of an interview because my twitter handle wasn’t active. I was fairly confident that my CV and LinkedIn profile would suffice for the interview, having already cleared two rounds. I’d had instances in the past where employers enquired about my twitter handle but never stressed too much on it, until that epic failure.
So based on my experiences, here are the 3 social media platforms on which you stay up to date, on priority.
Everyone is familiar with this MOTHER of all social media platforms. Our lives revolve around it. Often, way too much in my opinion. But it can do miracles if you use it as tool for professional advancement as opposed to using it for engaging in pointless arguments or posting why you hate something or someone. Facebook in this day in age is a representation of your character, your skills, your interest etc. (a.k.a. posts, likes, and all our weird stickers and emojis).
So for a change try adding to/replacing the emotional and personal deluge with the following:
✓Add your professional skills to your bio, as opposed to how Clash of Clans is your life saver.
✓ Start sending requests to like minded professionals you want to interact with and learn from instead of Candy Crush requests [Seriously though, even if you don’t adhere to the former, please refrain from sending candy crush requests. Pleaseeee…].
✓ Share opinions or posts related to ideas and beliefs that resonate with yours, instead of sharing misguided or unwarranted opinions on – ‘Who Priyanka Chopra is dating?’ or ‘What Salman Khan eats for breakfast?’ [Sorry! I made that up to make a point. Hahaha].
There is no harm in little bit of silliness, makes life a tad easier, but try keeping a balance.
I have already shared my twitter fiasco so I am not going to try and pretend to be a twitter Jedi. For all those who are on the fence regarding Twitter – I’d recommend that you get yourself a profile.
Now this is serious business! LinkedIn is a good place to meet seasoned and budding professionals from diverse fields. Not creating a CV till the 11th hour, despite repeated reminders from your professors may be excusable, because you can whip one up overnight, but LinkedIn is not an overnight project since setting up connections takes time. So if you don’t have a LinkedIn profile, please register yourself. In fact, do it the minute you finish going through this article.
You can learn how to make your LinkedIn profile more presentable from Sneha Chakraborty’s excellent write up : http://happenings.lpu.in/2017/01/17/6-ways-you-can-improve-your-linkedin-profile/
There you go guys, some gyaan I felt was important to share, from my endeavors as a budding professional. One last tip, if you don’t get it [interviews] the first time, don’t beat yourself up! There are plenty of opportunities lying ahead of you. DISCLAIMER: There will be an equal number of fails too, but the one time you nail it, all the low moments will have become lessons learned.
