By answering a series of 12 questions, you can develop a rather robust Social Media Policy for your organization.  Every question in the series allows you to limit or expand the use of social media and also allows for the insertion of the name of the individual or department who is accountable or who can provide assistance when necessary.

Here is a sample Social Media Policy for Yankeeincanada.com after selecting the answers that would allow for fairly open use of social media.

YIC Social Media Policy

This policy governs the publication of and commentary on social media by employees of Yankeeincanada.com and its related companies (“YIC”). For the purposes of this policy, social media means any facility for online publication and commentary, including without limitation blogs, wiki’s, social networking sites such as Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Flickr, and YouTube. This policy is in addition to and complements any existing or future policies regarding the use of technology, computers, e-mail and the internet.

YIC employees are free to publish or comment via social media in accordance with this policy. YIC employees are subject to this policy to the extent they identify themselves as a YIC employee (other than as an incidental mention of place of employment in a personal blog on topics unrelated to YIC).

Publication and commentary on social media carries similar obligations to any other kind of publication or commentary.

All uses of social media must follow the same ethical standards that YIC employees must otherwise follow.

Don’t Tell Secrets

It’s perfectly acceptable to talk about your work and have a dialog with the community, but it’s not okay to publish confidential information. Confidential information includes things such as unpublished details about our software, details of current projects, future product ship dates, financial information, research, and trade secrets. We must respect the wishes of our corporate customers regarding the confidentiality of current projects. We must also be mindful of the competitiveness of our industry.

Protect your own privacy

Privacy settings on social media platforms should be set to allow anyone to see profile information similar to what would be on the YIC website. Other privacy settings that might allow others to post information or see information that is personal should be set to limit access. Be mindful of posting information that you would not want the public to see.

Be Honest

Do not blog anonymously, using pseudonyms or false screen names. We believe in transparency and honesty. Use your real name, be clear who you are, and identify that you work for YIC. Nothing gains you notice in social media more than honesty – or dishonesty. Do not say anything that is dishonest, untrue, or misleading. If you have a vested interest in something you are discussing, point it out. But also be smart about protecting yourself and your privacy. What you publish will be around for a long time, so consider the content carefully and also be cautious about disclosing personal details.

Respect copyright laws

It is critical that you show proper respect for the laws governing copyright and fair use or fair dealing of copyrighted material owned by others, including YIC own copyrights and brands. You should never quote more than short excerpts of someone else’s work, and always attribute such work to the original author/source. It is good general practice to link to others’ work rather than reproduce it.

Respect your audience, YIC, and your coworkers

The public in general, and YIC’s employees and customers, reflect a diverse set of customs, values and points of view. Don’t say anything contradictory or in conflict with the YIC website. Don’t be afraid to be yourself, but do so respectfully. This includes not only the obvious (no ethnic slurs, offensive comments, defamatory comments, personal insults, obscenity, etc.) but also proper consideration of privacy and of topics that may be considered objectionable or inflammatory – such as politics and religion. Use your best judgment and be sure to make it clear that the views and opinions expressed are yours alone and do not represent the official views of YIC.

Protect YIC customers, business partners and suppliers

Customers, partners or suppliers should not be cited or obviously referenced without their approval. Never identify a customer, partner or supplier by name without permission and never discuss confidential details of a customer engagement. It is acceptable to discuss general details about kinds of projects and to use non-identifying pseudonyms for a customer (e.g., Customer 123) so long as the information provided does not violate any non-disclosure agreements that may be in place with the customer or make it easy for someone to identify the customer. Your blog is not the place to “conduct business” with a customer.

Controversial Issues

If you see misrepresentations made about YIC in the media, you may point that out. Always do so with respect and with the facts. If you speak about others, make sure what you say is factual and that it does not disparage that party. Avoid arguments. Brawls may earn traffic, but nobody wins in the end. Don’t try to settle scores or goad competitors or others into inflammatory debates. Make sure what you are saying is factually correct.

Be the first to respond to your own mistakes

If you make an error, be up front about your mistake and correct it quickly. If you choose to modify an earlier post, make it clear that you have done so. If someone accuses you of posting something improper (such as their copyrighted material or a defamatory comment about them), deal with it quickly – better to remove it immediately to lessen the possibility of a legal action.

Think About Consequences

For example, consider what might happen if a YIC employee is in a meeting with a customer or prospect, and someone on the customer’s side pulls out a print-out of your blog and says “This person at YIC says that product sucks.”

Saying “Product X needs to have an easier learning curve for the first-time user” is fine; saying “Product X sucks” is risky, unsubtle and amateurish.

Once again, it’s all about judgment: using your blog to trash or embarrass YIC, our customers, or your co-workers, is dangerous and ill-advised.

Disclaimers

Many social media users include a prominant disclaimer saying who they work for, but that they’re not speaking officially. This is good practice and is encouraged, but don’t count on it to avoid trouble – it may not have much legal effect.

Don’t forget your day job.

Make sure that blogging does not interfere with your job or commitments to customers.

Enforcement

Policy violations will be subject to disciplinary action, up to and including termination for cause.

via Gigaom

via Flowtown.

via cmo.com

There were a few resources I mentioned that I wanted to make available here.

• Positioning Information Professionals for the Future (SLA Alignment Project)
• Competencies for Information Professionals of the 21st Century: Revised edition, June 2003 (SLA)
• What Color Is Your Parachute? 2009: A Practical Manual for Job-Hunters and Career-Changers by Richard Nelson Bolles
• Never Eat Alone: And Other Secrets to Success, One Relationship at a Time by Keith Ferrazzi and Tahl Raz
• First Have Something to Say: Writing for the Library Profession, By Walt Crawford
• Now, Discover Your Strengths by Marcus Buckingham and Donald O. Clifton

According to The intelligent enterprise: Creating a culture of speedy and efficient decision-making:

• Decision-making is accelerating, and becoming centralised in the C-suite, rather than being pushed
  out to regions or business units.
• Despite the wide recognition that accurate and timely decision-making is crucial, most firms’ ability to
  make good decisions needs improvement.
• Customer service is a significant trouble spot. Information from customer service and support is ranked
  among the most critical to a company’s business strategy, yet it ranks poorly as a source of good
  business insight.
• Although data-driven decision-making is espoused by the C-suite, formal governance policies
  or procedures to ensure the consistency, integrity and accuracy of the data are rare. Even fewer
  companies dedicate resources to information governance, which is key to ensuring that information is
  properly analysed and transformed into actionable intelligence.

Fascinating that only 3% of executives would describe their own companies as being the best at using timely, relevant and accurate information for descision-making.

There’s one graph, in particular, that should grab the attention of any savvy knowledge and information professional out there.  It speaks to many potential opportunities out there for you.

About the survey
This survey included 208 respondents, 21% of whom were CEOs, presidents or managing directors, 45% held other C-level titles, and 23% were senior vicepresidents, vice-presidents or directors. Thirty-eight percent of respondents were located in North America, 27% in Western Europe and 23% in Asia-Pacifi c, while 29% worked at companies with annual revenue of US$10bn or more and 31% of respondents worked at companies with annual revenue of US$500m or less.

The more lines you have, the more @replies to different people you sent. If you don’t appear on the graph, but know that you sent out @replies, it’s because the person you sent your @reply to never sent out an @reply and so that person won’t appear on the graph and unfortunately, you can’t either!

For a more detailed explanation of how this was done, see #sla2009 Social Network Graph.

Based on the code of eskimoblood.

Created using Processing with data from the #slaname Twapper Keeper archive setup by iBraryGuy.

For larger sizes, see the original on flickr.

This is my first year as a Director on the Board of Directors and I voted in favor of the motion to put the proposed name to a vote because:

• as a member you have the right to cast your vote to make this momentous decision;
• “change the name” has been a constant refrain for many years;
• the proposed name is based on solid research, conducted in good faith; and
• the proposed name reflects a direction many members have told me they want to go in.

Personally, I believe in this association’s diversity and see it as a strength.  I also believe it’s what sets us apart from other associations.  That is why I have spent my own money to be a member for eight years.  Diversity of opinion begets perspective and I need multiple perspectives reflected in the association I choose to belong to so I can grow and prosper as a professional in this increasingly complex world we operate in.

The name Special Libraries Association narrows that potential for perspective and Association for Strategic Knowledge Professionals broadens it.

Vote YES to Association for Strategic Knowledge Professionals – vote yes, vote early and vote often!

Using Processing and sample code from www.eskimoblood.de I have created a basic social network graph of replies sent during #sla2009.

The thicker the line the more times you sent an @reply to that
person. The more lines you have, the more @replies to different people
you sent. If you don’t appear on the graph, but know that you sent out
@replies, it’s because the person you sent your @reply to never sent
out an @reply and so that person won’t appear on the graph and
unfortunately, you can’t either! Interestingly, a few people only sent
replies to themselves, so they do appear on the graph as a line that
goes back to themselves.

The sample code from eskimoblood required that my data be in the following format:

• One array of all the usernames in alphabetical order
• A second multi-dimensional array that links the users with each other (in this case based on @replies) using an ID number.  Like this:

@amalthea67
{70, 74}

In other words @amalthea67 sent @replies to the 69th and 73rd person in the list of usernames on the wheel.  The first person in the list is at number 0.

Here is an outline of what I did:

• Queried the #sla2009 re-tweeter database for all tweets with @replies as of June 19, 2009
• Using php, created an html table of this query that lists the ID of the tweet, the username of the person who sent the reply and the username(s) of the person(s) it was sent to.  Here is a screen shot of part of the HTML table that resulted.

• Imported the html table into an Inmagic database, which allows for multiple entries in the “Replies” field (separated by a space)
• Created a secondary Inmagic database for every username, plus a unique ID for each.
• Exported the data to a report that lists the username and the ID number of the person the reply was sent to.  Here is a screen shot:

• Using Excel again, this table was copied, pasted and transposed so the usernames ran along the the first row and the numeric ID of the target of the @reply ran along in the second row.  A little bit of find/replace to get the data in the exact format (as above) and voila!  My data is in the format that I need it in.
• I made a few changes to eskimoblood’s code and ran the sketch in Processing, which resulted in the social network graph above.

Update: this graph is now available with color.