Hold my stick. Damn your yellow stick. Where are we going?
A growing number of professionals are using social media to build a personal, public identity—a brand of their own—based on their work. Think of an accountant who writes a widely read blog about auditing, or a sales associate who has attracted a big following online by tweeting out his store’s latest deals.
Co-branded employees may exist largely below the radar now, but that’s changing fast, and employers need to start preparing for the ever-greater challenges they pose for managers, co-workers and companies. Their activities can either complement a company’s own brand image or clash with it. Companies that fail to make room for co-branded employees—or worse yet, embrace them without thinking through the implications—risk alienating or losing their best employees, or confusing or even burning their corporate brand.
Part of this change is generational. Younger employees show up on the job with an existing social-media presence, which they aren’t about to abandon—especially since they see their personal brands lasting longer than any single job or career.
photo { Anuschka Blommers & Niels Schumm }
