As business increasingly takes to online social networking, many of us find it creating awkward and confounding situations.

It’s natural for new technology to create new dilemmas. But where’s the line between good taste and bad? A reporter Twittering from a child’s funeral? A lawyer using a woman’s smiling photo on Facebook to argue that she wasn’t really traumatized by a rape?

Most offenses by users of professional social networking are much less egregious, but Popular Science blogger Jon Chase nevertheless argues that we suffer from a lack of a common set of etiquette principles, such as those for telephone or e-mail use. But we’re working on it.

Reihan Salam, author of the Slate article "The Facebook Commandments," compares our etiquette conundrums to traffic. We have to figure it out.

"It’s amazing that traffic ever works. We develop rules of the road, but in the meantime, some people are going to get hurt. But you don’t shut it down. You don’t penalize cars [the technology], because they obviously help you get where you want to go," said Salam, an associate editor at The Atlantic and fellow at the New America Foundation.

And just where do we want to go with social networking? Many are still trying to figure that out, too.

One of the less-often mentioned advantages of social-networking sites is that they serve as a sort of mediator between you and the other party when being too direct might be uncomfortable, according to Jo Bryant, editor for the British etiquette bible Debrett’s. The publishing house released five rules for social networking in general and discusses the issue in its just-released book "A-Z of Modern Manners."

"… it’s like you’re kind of hiding a little bit behind a façade, making you a little bit more coy in business networking or social networking in that sense. You can almost test the waters with it," Bryant said.

Salam also refers to that bit of buffer provided to both parties in the communication. In effect, it allows people to "opt in" — or not — to your communication.

"There are a lot of people who just love sending out mass e-mails to all their friends and lots of people who aren’t their friends, saying 'Here's my latest accomplishment. Don’t ya love it?' I’d like to at least think I’m not that kind of guy, Salam said. "So this is a way to let you say this without being pushy or obnoxious, and it gives me a way to keep up with you [if I choose]."

Holly Rudolph, a public relations account executive for Power Creative in Louisville, Ky., adds: "Posting on Facebook or Twitter is faster and more concise than sending an e-mail. Anyone in my network can read what I send – or not – so no one gets overlooked and I don’t unnecessarily clog co-workers’ inboxes."

Rudolph uses Facebook to promote client events and interact with reporters. She’s set up groups to share promotions for a restaurant client, posted news about an environmental group, and created a place for a nonprofit’s volunteers to connect and catch up on events. The agency has a group for employees on Facebook, as well.

So let’s go straight to gripes and helpful tips on how to be "professional" on social-networking sites.

For Large Animal Games CEO Wade Tinney, who speaks at conferences and heads an industry group in New York City, it’s getting "friend" requests from people he doesn’t know and who don’t explain how they know him. He gets gobs. Some send multiple requests. After a while, he blocks those.

"At the very least, send me an [e-mail] message explaining who you are. You can find my e-mail address in about two seconds. We can have a conversation. If it makes sense, then we can be friends on Facebook," said Tinney, who is on Facebook along with all of his 20 employees.

His company creates games for Facebook and other social-networking sites, but he says the casual game industry as a whole tends to interact on Facebook. So like Salam, he uses it for both personal and professional contacts, as well as for his company’s work of testing its new games.

And like Tinney, Salam offers cautions about making friend requests. "It’s important for you, the person making the request … to be sure you have enough of a relationship with this person so that it’s not going to be weird." Or at least explain enough so that such a relationship might develop, he adds.

Previous Page Next Page