So yesterday, I just posted my interview with Jason Schwartz of Chicago’s Bright Bright Great for AIGA/KC. I’m excited to announce that I will be posting an exclusive interview with Jason complete with downloadable goodies this coming week! Just to give you all a teaser, here’s a continuation of our conversation from AIGA/KC’s Blog.
How does social media affect your hiring process when you look to fill a position?
Social media is seriously the bomb.
It’s the best way to get connected to people, job prospects, fellow designers, or companies.
I am a total proponent of social media. I try to be involved with as many sites as I can, as well as keep Bright Bright Great plugged in. Staying involved is a great way to stay connected to your community, whether it is friends, family, coworkers, designers, or whoever you want to follow.
With sites like Twitter, you can really create your dream team to follow. The way I work my Twitter account is that I follow people who I admire. I follow creatives, friends, companies, local designers, and even celebrities. I recommend following people that are succeeding in whatever industry you are aspiring to be in. My follow list consists of designers/business peeps like Johnny Cupcakes (@JohnnyCupcakes), Jake (@skaw) and Jeff (@jeffrey) from Threadless, NoPattern (@nopattern), and HelloHikimori (@hellohikimori). I also follow design blogs, and companies in the design communities like Firebelly (@firebellydesign), HF&J (@H_FJ) and Hype for Type (@hypefortype) font foundries. It allows me to stay up to date with news and design related stories about people I care about.
Social media is also a great way to open dialog with people you want to talk to, but don’t have the opportunity to. Recently, I interviewed Alex Haigh from Hype For Type on the Bright Bright Great blog, which totally happened because I started talking to them on Twitter about playing Hangman. Twitter is a level playing field as well. Everyone can tweet, retweet, and direct message. No one has special Twitter powers. You never know who is listening, it’s worth a shot.
For an applicant, social media is a crazy useful tool. Before applying, spend some time searching for a company and what the profiles of it’s employees look like. This goes even further for designers. You can find links to designer’s websites and browse their work. Sneaky? Yep.
I’ve gone on an interview where before stepping in the front door I knew the favorite fonts and design inspirations of it’s entire creative staff. You think that’s valuable? You bet, when you are trying to find something common to talk about.
Similarly, It works on the reverse. I’m sure people search me and see what I’m talking about. I would put money down that a crazy picture of me from Halloween, or at a party has made it into some interview discussions. And I’m ok with that. I put pictures up on the web because I want people to learn something about me.
I had a recent applicant to Bright Bright Great first send me a traditional application via snail mail, but then he friended me as a contact on Flickr, Twitter, Facebook, and Behance. His paper samples made an impression, but seeing his work online showed me dozens of other projects that were super strong and didn’t make the cut for his sample book.
It can’t hurt to stay social and be connected to the community. Consider it a new technology tool to get your voice heard.
I’m out there, feel free to friend or follow me.
Twitter: twitter.com/jaycrimes & twitter.com/bbgchicago
Flickr: flickr.com/photos/jasons/
Facebook: facebook.com/jasonschwartz
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3 responses so far ↓
1 Anonymous // Aug 9, 2009 at 1:36 am
I’m torn on this topic. While I love twitter for its power to connect people, to level playing fields (twitter celebs vs. real celebs) and to aide in spreading one’s own message, I’m also burdened by my professional persona constantly encroaching upon my normal every day friend persona. Yes I’d like potential employers to search for me on the web, because I’m representing my professional persona well, but that’s getting boring to my friends. But, I don’t want to post about how awesome that kegger was because that might reflect badly on my professional persona. I think this blending of contexts is causing our monkey brains to evolve new ways of thinking and new processes to handle this identity management, and I’m a bit concerned about the ramifications of that.
2 Lorraine // Aug 9, 2009 at 10:01 am
I can totally see your point on this issue as it is one that I have struggled with myself. What I have finally decided is that Facebook is for friends: I’m not going to add people on there just to add them, and I use friend lists to manage what people see. Twitter, Linked In, and this blog are my professional outlets. As Jason said, I love that they give people an insight into who I am.
3 Jason Schwartz // Aug 10, 2009 at 9:43 am
Anonymous-
I totally understand where you are coming from.
When I say that I am a proponent for social media, I was speaking only about how I use it. It’s truly different for everyone.
I also understand that there needs to be a division between “professional” and “personal.” However, I am a designer that mostly embraces the web, so there is value for me to be very connected online.
Personally, I do see some benefit from connecting the two. My friends and family have a great opportunity for the first time to SEE what I do for a living. Other people post pictures of themselves at a baseball game, I post pictures of websites that I’ve created, or art gallery openings I’ve attended. I don’t go overboard, but that is what I care about so I wrap it into Facebook and Twitter.
That being said, sometimes you do get the reverse and people see lots of stuff that they shouldn’t. I guess that just comes with the territory.
For other jobs people may Facebook profiles and Tweets into consideration, but if you are interviewing to become a top lawyer, you probably don’t want to have images of you at a kegger online.
It’s personal. Everyone’s situation is different. If you feel uncomfortable having certain info online, definitely keep it offline. You can only get professionally, or personally hurt from oversharing, not undersharing.
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