10 months, 32 articles, 1070 tweets and 385 followers later, I can only be pleased with how the project has developed to date. My humble placement blog was quickly embraced by the careers blogging community, and I soon received a guest blog opportunity from Career Geek. I have been extremely grateful to the likes of Rate My Placement and PlaceNet for publicising my articles to their Twitter followers, which has been a great help in expanding my network and reaching a wider audience.
I have engaged in a variety of conversations, some serious, others less so, with bloggers, careers & placement professionals, recruiters and students, that simply would not have happened had this blog not existed. While to that extent my time as 'The Placement Officer' has been successful and I have undoubtedly advanced my social media skills, it has been difficult to map personal development as throughout the project I have been hiding behind my online alias.
Anonymity was very important to me when I started out. Initially I wasn't sure how well received the blog would be or if there would be any interest in my musings. 'The Placement Officer' provided a safety blanket which offered protection from failure. I was also very clear that I wanted my blog to retain neutrality, fearing that if it was too closely identified with one person from a particular university it would not appeal to a wider community.
Now that those fears have been allayed, I feel the time is right for a proper introduction. In recent days I have unmasked to a few people and the sky did not fall in. Hopefully that won't happen now either. If curiosity gets the better of you, my LinkedIn profile can be found by clicking here - I know this won't be a complete bombshell for some of you who had already joined together the dots!
With disclosure comes both apologies and confession. At the PlaceNet conference in May I was offered numerous opportunities to unveil but chose not to. Several delegates questioned me directly and to my shame I denied all involvement. I would like to take this opportunity to publicly apologise to all those concerned and I will be contacting them privately to do likewise.
The eagle-eyed amongst you may notice from LinkedIn there is a discrepancy between my job title and my chosen alias. I am not in the literal sense a placement officer, so if any of my readers or followers feel mislead then I unreservedly apologise to you. When picking my name, I went for something that was easily understood and to put it bluntly, 'The Placement Assistant' would not have been half as effective in establishing an online identity. While there may have been a slight embellishment in this area, I stand completely behind the content of my articles. I am passionate about my industry, a huge advocate of placements and if 'The Placement Officer' has motivated even one student to pursue an internship, re-start an application or give due consideration to their graduate prospects, I believe that this will have been a worthwhile project.
Having built a strong online presence, I will continue to blog and tweet under the same alias. However, for this one article I will make a long overdue formal introduction. My name is Graham, I am 'The Placement Officer' and it is great to make your acquaintance.
Anonymity was very important to me when I started out. Initially I wasn't sure how well received the blog would be or if there would be any interest in my musings. 'The Placement Officer' provided a safety blanket which offered protection from failure. I was also very clear that I wanted my blog to retain neutrality, fearing that if it was too closely identified with one person from a particular university it would not appeal to a wider community.
Now that those fears have been allayed, I feel the time is right for a proper introduction. In recent days I have unmasked to a few people and the sky did not fall in. Hopefully that won't happen now either. If curiosity gets the better of you, my LinkedIn profile can be found by clicking here - I know this won't be a complete bombshell for some of you who had already joined together the dots!
With disclosure comes both apologies and confession. At the PlaceNet conference in May I was offered numerous opportunities to unveil but chose not to. Several delegates questioned me directly and to my shame I denied all involvement. I would like to take this opportunity to publicly apologise to all those concerned and I will be contacting them privately to do likewise.
The eagle-eyed amongst you may notice from LinkedIn there is a discrepancy between my job title and my chosen alias. I am not in the literal sense a placement officer, so if any of my readers or followers feel mislead then I unreservedly apologise to you. When picking my name, I went for something that was easily understood and to put it bluntly, 'The Placement Assistant' would not have been half as effective in establishing an online identity. While there may have been a slight embellishment in this area, I stand completely behind the content of my articles. I am passionate about my industry, a huge advocate of placements and if 'The Placement Officer' has motivated even one student to pursue an internship, re-start an application or give due consideration to their graduate prospects, I believe that this will have been a worthwhile project.
Having built a strong online presence, I will continue to blog and tweet under the same alias. However, for this one article I will make a long overdue formal introduction. My name is Graham, I am 'The Placement Officer' and it is great to make your acquaintance.
No comments:
Post a Comment