Public Affairs Officers, let’s clean up our social media reputation. Why don’t we try to go from people who share too much, too often with too little thought to purposeful users of a communication tool. Personal and private.
Quick Story: Fort Bragg was in normal operating hours while many of the local schools were closed or delayed due to weather. Cue the useless, ignorant, ranting and terribly annoying social media comments on all of Fort Bragg’s social media.
I’m standing at my desk thinking of the poor garrison crew who have to deal with this blather when one of my buddies points out someone who works for me made one of the dumb comments!
That was several years ago and unfortunately, the trend continues intended example: #MilTwitter or the cesspool that is Facebook military forums.
Public Affairs Officers (this is serious) you can not separate your public and private life on open social media. If you expect to be taken seriously professionally then use social media professionally.
Public Affairs Officers (this is serious) you should not rant against the military or our government because you may be called to explain or defend the same policies as part of your current or future duties.
Public Affairs Officers (this is serious) use closed social media forums to vomit your hapless, poorly researched and quickly determined opinions. They make you look dumb and you’ll want to be respected by your colleagues and journalists. Hint: Twitter is not a closed forum.
Here’s a little secret – journalists, your bosses and your colleagues look at your social media. They judge you by what you share.
Freedom of speech? Sure, identify yourself as a private citizen and expect the important people in your professional life to judge you by your witless, off-the-cuff comments.
Are PAOs allowed to have an opinion? Yep, and you’ll be judged by it, better to be judged over beers with friends than the world on social media.
Are PAOs allowed to share for fun? For sure, share all the animal videos you want but make the purpose clear. “This is funny,” will suffice.
Keep it professional and smart: think about what you’re saying, think about how it sounds to an audience, ask yourself if you’ve really considered the issue all the way through, do you have a real understanding or are you a Russian bot?
Understanding social media or being social media savvy doesn’t mean you tweet a lot and therefore have a lot of followers, it means you know how to use this tool for purpose.
Purposeful action guys, purposeful.
Now go and do likewise.
Photo by Sgt. Kimberly Browne
