Expand Your Brand

CIO — At first glance, social media sites such as Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter may seem like a great way for CIOs to waste a very precious commodity: your time. Maybe you've resisted because you're worried about exposing too much of your personal life—or just don't get what the big deal is.

Whatever your excuse, social media has more to offer than you realize. It's time to jump in and find out.

"If for nothing else, try it because you're a CIO and CIOs are supposed to be ahead of the curve when it comes to new technology," says Kirsten Dixon, online reputation management expert and coauthor of Career Distinction: Stand Out by Building Your Brand. "For anyone to really see the benefits [of social media] you just have to experience it."

Achieving social media's benefits—networking, collaborating, innovating, to name a few—requires active participation, says Twitter user Mike Schaffner, director of IT for the Valves and Measurement Group at Cameron, a provider of flow equipment products and systems. "Social media is just like real-life social activities. You won't get much out of being a wallflower."

Exploring several different platforms to determine which best suits your interests and goals is the best route to take, Dixon says. Be wary, however, that each platform's audience will be different, so you'll need to tailor your Internet persona accordingly. "That doesn't mean that everything you post has to be professional in nature, but everything that's personal should be tied to who you are professionally," Dixon says. "Remember that when you participate in these sites, you become searchable."

Chris Curran, CTO and partner at Diamond Management & Technology Consultants, created the "CIO Twitter Dashboard," a directory of CIOs who tweet, categorized by industry (www.ciodashboard.com/cio-twitter-dashboard). When searching for CIOs on Twitter, an old friend turned up and he added him to his list.

"I immediately got an e-mail from him saying, 'Take me off your dashboard!'" Curran recalls. "He's a poker player and only wanted to network with other poker players. So I told him to remove 'CIO' from his bio if he didn't want other CIOs searching for him." Curran recommended that he create a professional ID where he could list himself as a CIO, and use his personal account for personal connections.

Curran says that his participation in social media has opened doors for him. "I've been offered a few speaking engagements and have had people wanting to meet up," he says. "I now have five or 10 contacts who I'd never heard of before who are great thinkers in IT strategy and governance."

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