It’s long been considered that it’s better to be apolitical in the working world. Whether you lean right or left, the conventional wisdom is that the least said is better. Politics falls into the same category as religion and money.
As workplaces become more informal, and associates get to know each other over time political allegiances become visible and differences come to the surface. HR departments create policy around such issues and individuals have to play it safe, for fear of potential political misalignment with the boss. Long story short, it’s a delicate area.
If individuals are cautious at work, surely it makes sense they would be online too? especially given its visibility to colleagues, clients and potential business partners?
This doesn’t seem to always be the case. We can’t be alone in noticing the dissolution of the formality found on Linked In from two to three years ago, people are now sharing memes, fundraisers and all kinds of content more traditionally shared on Facebook. This transition isn’t necessarily a bad thing but it does leave individuals open to posting content that says much more about them than they might think.
In the post Cambridge Analytica, “Post Truth” era we are all aware of the pollution of Facebook and the damage caused by the sharing of content into a social environment. Linked In equally has the ability to become an echo chamber for misinformation and lies and with a UK election, the forthcoming BREXIT process and US elections on the horizon we owe it to ourselves and those around us to scrutinize the content we share, the bias it represents and the message behind the content.
Fact-checking, integrity and scrutiny of data is something we do every day in our business roles, it makes perfect sense that we should do that on Linked In too.
If you tell the truth, you don’t have to remember anything
Mark Twain