Well to be sure, folks who you find in social media are coming from all sorts of backgrounds. While “traditionally” you’ll find folks from marketing as the most prevalent practitioners. However, I’ve found that folks from any profession are surfacing as real social media professionals. Many never thought about a career transition from what they were doing into marketing, PR, or communications. Many never thought of themselves as writers, broadcasters, teachers, or leaders.

This is what happens in the early phases of any new field. Where did the early “computer geeks” that built out the early I.T. departments made up of micro-computers? They came from accounting, shipping, or it may have even been the boss’s secretary.

The reality is that as many disciplines developed, they were started by folks who really were professionals in another field, but had an interest or passion in something new. Perhaps it was the “new” factor, to be challenged in a new and unexpected direction, learning things that they never thought they’d need to know. To be out on the leading edge and be looked up to because of solving a problem, that could be it too. Sometimes it’s the least expected things that attract people to a job.

Another interesting thing about social media pros is that they have an extensive background. That is, they have multiple skills, developed over time from this job or that opportunity that they’ve followed up on. Whether these skills were intentionally pursued, or unintentionally picked up in some maintenance job, all these skills are what you’re going to look for in a social media professional.

These folks will come with communications skills, writing skills, technical skills, project management skills, and more. They work well under stress, they understand the concerns of the c-suite and legal, yet are able to demonstrate the opportunities for an organization as well as the challenges. They can walk from a technical project status meeting in IT to a creative marketing meeting, and be able to understand and participate with both on equal footing.

Finding these people is a challenge in itself, and you may have to look long and hard to find the right mix of skills for your business. The important part is to not be afraid to look inside, as many hidden gems are laying, waiting to be discovered in your backyard. For social media practitioners are in all corners of every business. Sometimes it’s just being able to recognize raw talent, providing time and experimentation, and letting them lead the way.

Photo Credit: photoholic1

Amy, Brianna and I are enjoying the stars in the sky, and the crickets in the yard.  Watching the fire flickering away and playing “20 questions” to pass some time.  Its been awhile since we’ve had some quite time like this, and its nice to have it right in the backyard instead of several hours drive away.

There’s a lot of writing I do that never makes it anywhere.  Sometimes I think make a mistake in not publishing more posts when the muse strikes.  Like tonight.  There’s a lot of things that come to mind and, for once, I’m not going to talk business, or strategy or ideas around any of it.

Instead, it’s really about the simple things in life.  Family, quite time, a flickering fire, and getting a chance to listen to it all.

Oh, and an the occasional shooting star doesn’t hurt too much either.

So, for all of us rushing through our days and weeks.  Please don’t forget to take a day, an afternoon, or an evening, and sit down with family or friends.  Or simply take time for yourself and relax.  A few hours can make all the difference and is the recharge we all can make use of in our busy lives.

The reality in social media, as with any burgeoning industry or trade, there are none.  Or at least, there are only a handful who truly have the skills, but will never call themselves experts.  I’ve really enjoyed Christopher S. Penn’s explanation of experts in social media.  Relating the rise or growth of individuals who have explored the space before many others got there.

In two of his posts from June 2008, Who is a social media expert? and  How to Become a Social Media Expert, he recaps the analogy of Japanese martial arts to social media and (ironically expertly describes why it’s difficult in the world of social media to identify a true expert.

There simply isn’t a better description of what it takes to start down the right path to be a viable social media professional than those two posts.  There’s a lot of great content on the Internet to help folks figure it out, and experimentation is a great leaning tool.  But as a professional practice, there are many pitfalls to claiming expert status.

As with project management methodologies, there are just too many ways to do the same thing.  What works for one client, for one project, for one product, isn’t necessarily what will work for the next.  Even if it’s an update to the previously successful product that enjoyed a thrilling viral marketing campaign.

There are talented folks out there though, and these are the one’s that you want to seek out.  Whether it be for a contract job, hiring for training purposes, helping change the culture in your company, or running that stunning viral campaign.

They’re not hard to find, but they are hard to get scheduled as they’re often in high demand.  So don’t hesitate to ask consultants who inspires them, who they learn from, or what resources they use to learn new things.  Their answers are indicative of professionals who know their stuff.  For true experts realize that they don’t have all the answers, they are aware that surprises await in every endeavor, and they have the resources to deal with everything that is thrown at them.

So while you should be cautious of those who claim (scream?) expert status from their online profiles, you’ll also find a growing group of real professionals in social media that come from all backgrounds… and that’s for another post.

• What if I call my boss a jerk on Twitter? It depends…
• What if we find bloggers defacing our product images?  It depends…
• What if my company finds me posting on Facebook when I’m home sick? It depends…
• How do we monitor the blogosphere for our multiple brands? It depends…

The complexities of the requirements for big business and their employees is not as clear cut as it is for small, aggressive start-ups. In the end, the reality is that discretion is required on both sides; by the people who post or create media, and the people who read or consume media.

I’d like to posit the idea that consensus is not required to explore the opportunities that social media present. Sure, you may (or should) gain approval from the group you’re working with, getting the every executive, or department, or business unit’s buy in just won’t happen. At least not in the timeframe you’ll need to reap some of the rewards of joining your community.

Consensus is one of the problems that social media may be able to solve as well. As large companies continue to consolidate resources internally, they also create more silos for information, and push the decision making to a select few at the top.

Sure, these fine folks have years (decades in many cases) of business experience that allows them to plot the course for large companies. However, these same folks are now spreading themselves quite thin and it requires more time to make decisions for each business. This translates into slow moving companies that can’t adapt fast enough to changing market conditions.

In this, social media allows faster interaction across the organization. By leveraging both the business experience of executive staff along with the day-to-day mid-level management that is tracking the trends of each business, large companies have the potential to move almost as fast as a much smaller organization.

The need for an open, transparent culture still exists though. Without it, the company won’t have the ability to try new things and learn from them quickly.

Social media is more about cultural and conceptual changes than technological. And you don’t need consensus to understand that either. Good luck.

That’s what lies before today’s C-Suite executives if they choose to explore it. What I’m talking about here, of course, is really about relationships. With the advent of social computing in the second half of this decade, the power has shifted from producers and marketers to people.

The challenge, of course, is for today’s executives to leap into the deep end of the pool and embrace these new relationships. To build new loyalty into their customer base, by demonstrating the ability to listen, learn, share and improve.

This is a great opportunity that current executives and VPs have that their predecessors didn’t have.  The ability to change the relationship and make it one built on the trust and respect of quality products and honest interactivity.  This goes equally for internal communications.  The opportunity to use these same open and trust building methods within an organization is huge.  Especially with organizations that are struggling with employee engagement and moral in these trouble economic times.

It goes beyond displaying good will, however.  Any effort in using social computing for building new relationships requires a commitment to open dialog, acceptance of public feedback (both good and bad), and the willingness to discuss this in a public venue.

The point here, is that our current executives have this powerful new option that their ancestors did not.  The question is, how many are of strong enough to take that bold step?

Image credit: Envios