Before writing my inaugural blog, I had to understand what a blog actually was and the purpose of blogging. What I have garnered so far is that blogging is a communication tool intended to reach a wide audience in relatively rapid manner. One of the great
things about blogging is it does not have
to involve a cost, therefore, making it
relatively fast and easy to promote and/or support one’s thoughts and
knowledge. It is a great platform to
share ideas and generate conversation related to what the blogger wishes to relay.
While researching information regarding digital identity, I came across a short but informative article. In this article, the authors state “Professional identity is the professional self‑concept of an individual grounded in attributes, beliefs, motives, values, and experiences.” (Jawed et al., 2019) Not really that different from our personal identity, right? So where does personal end and professional begin? Difficult to answer as they really are intrinsically linked.
What I have learned about my own social media presence and identity is that I really did not have one. Until this course, I possessed a twitter account, Facebook, Instagram and YouTube. Other than liking other people’s tweets and Instagram posts I only communicated personally through Facebook Messenger. I generally keep away from professional, political or controversial posts as I am very aware of the impact and effect that these can have on other people both personally and professionally. I most recently changed and limited my privacy details on Facebook and Instagram when I found out that some of my staff were lurking me! Naïve perhaps, but it had never occurred to me that this would happen. My profile was relatively limited to those that I know, however, I found that if someone really wanted to find my personal information, it would not have been that difficult. Honestly, this gave me a bit of a fright! I went through my details and posts to see if there was any information that could be used or manipulated. Luckily, I had not posted anything that could potentially harm my professional image, but it did make me question what others perceptions of me were and how it could be potentially taken out of context.
I recently saw a commercial on TV about a young physician who was applying for his first position. It flashed to a night out that he had with a friend that was a video of them getting drunk. Purely innocent in the sense that he was young, single, and celebrating, but it potentially lost him the position. Social media is a wonderful tool to collect information, impart knowledge, and network. As health professionals the ease of access and the ability to thoroughly research information almost immediately has advanced our profession and health care dramatically, but like many things which are used for good it can also have a negative impact as well.
The need for digital etiquette is important and it is not always instinctive. Our governing bodies, in my case the College of Nurses of Ontario (CNO) https://www.cno.org/, as well as our organizations all have social media policies that are intended for our use as a guide to help protect us, our colleagues and ultimately our patients in this digital world.
Public posts and responses can be a virtual mind field if one is not experienced or socially aware.
I feel that as individuals and as professionals we need to be more cognizant of our digital presence and the potential impact that this can have on us socially and professionally. This we can do once we have a clear understanding of who we are and the impact that we wish to make.
Registered Nurses Association of Ontario. (n.d.) Social Media Guidelines for Nurses. Retrieved January 28, 2021, from https://rnao.ca/news/socialmediaguideline
Jawed, S., Mahboob, U., & Yasmeen, R. (2019). Digital professional identity: Dear Internet! Who am I? Education for health (Abingdon, England), 32(1), 33–35. Retrieved January 29, 2021, from https://doi.org/10.4103/efh.EfH_232_17
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