Archive for November 5th, 2009

Ok, sorry for the Shakespearian play on words to grab your attention.  But now that I have it, I have a question for the experienced bloggers.  How important is blogging for HR Professionals?  Is it the new SHRM mini-magazine?   I’ll defer to China Gorman who can far better answer that question.

This humble, blog post is dedicated to generous people like you who like to help new bloggers succeed. I’ve been reading a lot of HR blogs. Some HR blogs are informative, and helpful.  Not all blogs make it to the “A” team.  What differentiates the good from the bad?

Being new to the media-blog-o-sphere (really, is there such a word?) I am interested in learning best demonstrated practices by experienced bloggers who’ve been doing it far longer than I have. 

 Cincinnati colleague, Jennifer McClure @cincyrecruiter, has quite a following.  She is an Executive Coach with Centennial.  My friend, @Karla_Porter and I have become fast friends thanks to twitter. Karla works for The Chamber of Commerce in PA.  She is a wonderful writer, and gets a kick out of helping folks like me.  Then there’s @Tlcolson, Tammy and I are going to be roommates at the up coming #HRevolution.  She’s fun and I like her. An entire blog post can be devoted to the HRevolution conference in Louisville.  Of course, I’ll be live tweeting from that event over the weekend.  Back to blogging, My point is this, Twitter and blogging has introduced me to HR professionals I would have never met other wise. 

For instance, @TrishMcFarlane and I became twitter friends.  She sent me a press release for HRevolution, I sent it to a few media contacts, and Stephan Johnson from the Fox affiliate in Louisville is doing a story this Saturday, November 7th.

Networking on twitter can make a huge difference.  I’ll give you another example.  Before I left HR to open a one stop shop for people like me who enjoy spending way to much money on their pets, my twitter name was @pawspagal.  @Cincyrecruiter had a really funny post about this fuzzy @animal guy.  Silly me, I thought he was a recruiter who also liked animals.  Not the case, but as it turns out, he is one of the preeminent authorities in the recruiting world.  @Animal devotes much of his helping people by making comments on their twitter profile.  Well, he made a funny quip about mine. “@pawspagal: wrong name-HR person?  HR/Training professional who used to own a pet boutique and spa, well yes. 

From that point on, @animal has continued to help me (G-d I’m sure he’s going to hate this) and countless others.   @Animal hates flattery and enthusiasm.  Which explains why I enjoy doting on him.  Then there’s @paris22.  He was one of the first people to reach out to me.  He started by telling me my profile link to my LinkedIn site wasn’t working.  Oy.  He’s continued to help me with sage business advice, and has even invited me to be a guest blogger on his site recruiterreqs.com  Paul’s an altruistic guy who isn’t in it for the money,  He hates the term head hunter, and he is my favorite “unrecruiter.”  With that said, he devotes countless hours to helping people in transition connect with employers and recruiters.  He’s all about making good things happen, not just making a quick buck.  It’s a karma thing.  It’s why I like him. Here’s the thing about being a new blogger that is so heartwarming: there are so many people willing to offer a helping hand and really want to see you succeed.  That often is NOT the spirit in the dog-eat-dog business world. Now, I have to mention a recruiter and cyclist (who’s in much better condition than I am).

@jlipschultz, Jeff Lipschultz is a masterful recruiter in the U.S.  He is another one of the good-guy recruiters who doesn’t mind helping out a candidate.  He once spent 30 minutes on the phone with me  helping me prepare for an interview.  No, it wasn’t his job order, he was just being a nice guy.  How many recruiters do you know that would spend billable time helping a gal like me? NOT MANY.

Last but not least, there’s Bill Boorman and Mervyn Dinnen.  These two are my jolly ole chaps from the UK.  If I lived in London, I’d add them to my coffee klatsch. Wait, they drink tea don’t they?  I jest, but Bill and Mervyn take a certain amount of time out of their day to help people.  Bill has a huge, and I do mean huge, following in the UK.   I’ve been on his show several times in the past two weeks, and I was amazed how my twitter follower count went up after each appearance.

I found my new Executive Job Coach through Paul Paris’s radio show.  We were both guests.  We hit it off right away.  Her name is Janice Worthington.  I look forward to meeting with her next week.  If it hadn’t been through microblogging and blogging, I would not have found any of these wonderful, kind and generous people.   The twitterverse and blog-o-sphere is filled with kind and generous souls that are willing to help new bloggers like us.  I was joking with Jeff Lipschultz today.  I said, “Mark my words, one day the newbies will take over the world.”  WORD!

When people ask me, whether to blog or not to blog, my answer is a resounding and emphatic yes.  Get on twitter, find the people who inspire you.  Read their blogs.  Find your voice and blog away.  It just might lead to your next job.

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