Morra Aarons-Mele blogs at http://womenandwork.org. She is the author of the upcoming “Women and Leadership in the Digital Age,” part of the new Sage Encyclopedia of Women and Leadership. I talked to her about learning from the millennials, Twittering, and what it means to be technosexy at any age.
MORE: If a woman over 40 is only going to use one type of social media, what should it be?
MA: Definitely LinkedIn. It is widely considered the professional social network. A good thing about LinkedIn is that most people make their profiles public so it’s Google-able. In this day and age, it’s imperative that when someone Googles your name, something about you comes up. LinkedIn basically allows you to make a webpage advertising your skills that can be found in Google.
MORE: What should I put in my profile?
MA: I suggest you use it as a full resume. But whenever I am in doubt, I always look at people I respect and see what they do online, and I copy that. Look at someone who is in your field, a mentor, a role model—see what their what their profile looks like, see what they’re social media profile looks like. See what happens when you Google them.
MORE: Can you offer a tip that not many people know about for using social media?
MA: Never underestimate, the value of listservs and email-based communities, they’re not web based so it feels safer and more controlled.
An example of this is an online community called progressiveexchange.org which is a listserv for folks who work in non-profits. This is a wonderful example of the very best of professional social networking. People all around the country share ideas, problems, questions, promote their campaigns and send out jobs. It’s basically a professional association, but it’s an online social network. It’s tightly regulated, and not just anybody can join. No matter what line of work you’re in, do some research and see if there’s a listserv or an online community for people in your field.
I have one more tip and this is really important for women, because research shows that we doubt ourselves more, we always don’t consider ourselves experts, we are less likely to volunteer to write articles or author things in our field. You can really look as social media as an opportunity to let your expertise shine. Social media is wonderful, especially blogs, because it does index highly in Google. So if you want to write a column for a blog about something in your field, it’s a great to get your name out there in a positive way.
MORE: Specifics to avoid, in terms of Twitter?
MA: Yes, in terms of Twitter, in terms of any social network if you’re going to use your company’s name, make sure you’re aware if there’s company policy or ground rules.
There’s a really famous recent anecdote about someone who Twittered. I think they just got hired at Cisco, and they Twittered “Yeah, I just got this job at Cisco, now I just have to decide if I can live with the really long commute and rotten job.” And of course, the hiring manager at Cisco got the Tweet and said this person’s not going to work for me.
MORE: You've written about being “technosexy.” What does that entail?
MA: When I wrote the column, I was thinking about a woman I know in her 60s. Technosexy is an attitude; it's about embracing technology that can help you, not being scared of it. Being sexy is being confident, and the thing I liked about my friend, she’s not your typical Mac user. But she loves anything Mac, she has all of the latest gadgets. She’s really proficient with it, she can tell other people how to use it, and she totally defies stereotypes. It’s about making technology work for you. She’s a busy person, she’s not going to sit there all day on every social media—she's going to focus on what works for her, where are her friends, what’s going to help her get done what she wants to do.
MORE: How are women of Generation Y using social media differently than women over 40?
MA: A colleague of mine who is in her late 50s has a mentor. She is a very senior executive and she has a millennial, someone in her 20s, who is a high-potential worker. They meet, have coffee, she gets technology advice and she gives this younger woman career advice. She’s learned how to set up Facebook page. They’ve discussed should she be on Twitter? iPhone or Blackberry? Should I blog? They set up an RSS reader for her, so she could get all the relevant news.
The thing I thought was fabulous was that the woman was not afraid to ask for help. She was confident enough to admit this is new to her. And she asked for help and she has fun with it. She doesn’t take it too seriously.
MORE: What else can women over 40 learn from younger generations?
MA: The biggest difference that I see is that digital natives, Gen. y-ers are just completely comfortable in the social media world. They have a fluency with new technology. I think that’s wonderful from a gender perspective because traditionally, our stereotypes are that women are scared of technology. Women always have to get their husbands to program the DVD or the VCR, the husband has to fix everything. And what we see now, especially with younger women, is that they embrace technology. Women are more active in social media than men. So that’s a wonderful thing that older women can learn. Don’t leave it to the men. That’s my big point.
MORE: Let’s say you decided to use Twitter for business purposes. What would you do?
MM: The first thing is to make friends. Who is Tweeting in your field? Who do you absolutely have to know? Use key words, do a lot of searches, check out the blogs of people in your field because people usually have their Twitter profile on their blog. Build a list and then follow these people. It’s really important, to make friends and promote and re-Tweet other peoples’ work. A great way to get started in Twitter is to re-Tweet relevant stuff from people. As you start Tweeting, they’re like to reciprocate. Twitter is such a reciprocal environment.