What is Social Savvy?

“If a company or a person does something great but no one knows about it, does it really matter?”

That’s a question I asked in my very first blog post.

Yes, there are random acts of kindness intended to be done under the radar. Yet, hearing about them can be inspiring when others share the news, like my sister did on Facebook.

While getting coffee in her Connecticut town, she overhead another customer buying a gift card for the police officer outside who was directing traffic. That’s an instant day brightener. And maybe it will inspire others toward similar acts of kindness.

Data and information are collected about us every day, according to The Reputation Economy by Michael Fertik. The question is what we want that data to say about us as a person and as a professional.

Do we want it to open doors or close them? Do we want it to augment the hard work we do every day or detract from it? Do we want it to make our life better or make it harder?

More and more, everything we do has implications for our own personal reputations as well as the companies where we work or that we own. This is both in real life, or IRL, as well as how that becomes represented in social media.

This means we each have great power to do good in the world, to a larger extent than has ever been available to us. And it also means we have the potential make major missteps.

This means each of us needs social savvy.

What’s that?

SOCIAL SAVVY: the vital ability for people to personally brand and market themselves successfully in social media in our ever-evolving world.

This skill is important throughout our lives.

It applies to high school students who are preparing their college applications or moving into the working world.

It applies to college and grad school students who are getting ready to transition into the working world.

And it applies to people throughout their professional lives. For corporate professionals in particular, the stakes for social media are higher.

Social media can help or hurt careers. It can add to or detract from a corporate reputation and an employer brand. It can make acquiring top talent a breeze or a burden.

The risks are high, but so are the rewards. And in our ever-evolving world, no one can afford to sit on the sidelines. The pace of change is too fast for that.

Corporate professionals often ignore or short-change social media. Why? They don’t have the time, they don’t see the value and they don’t want to make a mistake.

Developing social savvy is how professionals can create and implement a social strategy to highlight and share their own thought processes and achievements, along with those of their organizations.

Social savvy is a powerful way for corporate professionals to build their personal brand, advance their career and embrace their future.

What are some examples of social savvy? What does it look like?

  • Using social media to build and amplify your personal brand, the unique value that you bring to the world
  • Positioning yourself in the most favorable light, for a number of career and life paths
  • Positioning your employer or company in the most favorable light
  • Advancing your career through a positive social strategy
  • Helping others advance their careers
  • Helping your company achieve its goals
  • Building your employer’s corporate reputation and employer brand
  • Knowing what to do and not to do in social media
  • Seeing the links between real life and social savvy
  • Knowing when and how to engage with critics

How are you demonstrating social savvy?

Look Before You Like

What do all of your “likes” in social media say about you?

More importantly, what do you want them to say about you?

Do you think before you “like” in Facebook . . . or “heart” in Instagram and Twitter?

Do you consider how that piece of data will be aggregated with thousands of other data points about you?

Do you decide if it will reflect well on you or not?

Just as you should look before you link, you should look before you “like.”

Why? Because of something called The Reputation Economy.

Say what?

In this 2015 book, Reputation.com founder Michael Fertik tells you “how to optimize your digital footprint in a world where your reputation is your most valuable asset.”

Ultimately, Fertik sets forth a compelling case that your digital reputation may shape how you experience the world – for better or for worse.

Over the last year, for example, you may think you’ve been circumspect about your political views. But your political leanings may have been identified, based on your social media activity.

Even more interesting is seeing how your digital footprint may reveal your personality.

By analyzing just a few of your Facebook likes, the University of Cambridge’s psychometric centre will predict several dimensions of your personality. (Updated: actually, DON’T do this. Instead, watch the 2019 Netflix original documentary The Great Hack. It’s about how a data company called Cambridge Analytica came to symbolize the dark side of social media.)

“You are what you like,” the site says.

You may think twice about what you “like” in the future.

Here are my non-algorithmic rules for liking content in social media:

  • Always consider how liking something will reflect on you. Will it contribute to – or detract from – what you want to be known for?
  • If you’re not sure what certain content could imply, don’t like it. And if you have “friends” who repeatedly post strange content, it might time to unfriend them.

What do you like?