Online presence means more or other than public social media accounts in my case. Through professional blogs and forums, I am an active participant in the local and North American WordPress professional development sphere such as StackOverflow, GitHub repositories, different web development and WordPress custom development oriented Slack channels as well as participate in Advanced WordPress and Advanced WooCommerce closed professional Facebook forums. I am also a WordPress Meetup and WordCamp co-organizer, where with team members we help people to belong to the WordPress online and offline community and through that, I help and give back to my open source community. My LinkedIn profile is the only social media platform where I have a maintained professional public profile.<\/p>\n
When I started my journey as a web developer I had an always updated public portfolio website showcasing my portfolio pieces. These days my private work comes through word of mouth. At the same time, I am teaching, thus at this stage of my life, I do not need public web development portfolio.<\/p>\n
My resident-visitor typology reflects a person who works and lives with technology and potentially possesses a wider spread online presence but running searches on my name clearly shows that it is really a lack of public digital presence.<\/p>\n
The term \u201cdigital brand\u201d was originally associated with corporate marketing efforts. However, the term \u201cpersonal brand,\u201d associated with individuals and developed and popularized in the late 1990s, has been digitized as a result of the ubiquity and user-friendly nature of social media environments like blogs, Facebook, and Twitter. Differentiating between corporate and digital brands has necessitated the creation of a new term: the \u201cpersonal digital brand.\u201d (Kleppinger & Cain, 2015 p.1)<\/em><\/p>\n During the MALAT program, I do plan to maintain my presence on the above mentioned professional forums, though I anticipate some drop in the intensity during the time when I am intensively teaching (such as every day) and pursuing the MALAT courses.<\/p>\n People use social media for a number of reasons: to connect with friends and family, to become part of a community, to find support, maybe fun, and to expand professional reputation. Digital communications have become a societal norm: for every professional, the choice is no longer simply to use or not use digital communication tools but to control a public image through the use of social media or lack thereof (Kleppinger & Cain, 2015). It can feel difficult to maintain a professional digital brand while simultaneously using social media platforms for personal purpose and fulfillment. In every field, professionals have to learn how to manage potentially competing and conflicting interests with regard to their own social media use.<\/p>\n I found the questions that Schryver (2013) listed very important in terms of how anyone approaches digital identity: \u201cAre you proud of your digital presence? Will you be proud of it in ten years? Are there things that are untrue or pertain someone with the same name? What can you do about that?\u201d.<\/p>\n Several years ago, I made a conscious decision not to maintain publicly active Twitter \/ Facebook \/ Instagram accounts. I do use some social media platforms privately for connecting with old friends and colleagues, but they are mainly for participating in closed professional group conversations and forums. I have no short-term plans to mindfully shift to the resident zone in my personal social media life (White & Le Cornu, 2011).<\/p>\n Through the MALAT program, especially by the end, I have the following plan to comply:<\/p>\n Goal & Purpose:<\/p>\n My goal is to create a sustainable digital identity that showcases my professional achievements and knowledge of learning technology. I will ensure to stay relevant and up-to-date as digital environments evolve. The plan is to enhance my current professional online identity including and potentially focusing on educational technology.<\/p>\n Skills & Knowledge Gaps:<\/p>\n I do have the skills to navigate many social media platforms due to my marketing and web development background. I am not used to sharing my opinions with wide audiences in a digital setting related to educational technology and related industry topics so far: it is a new direction.<\/p>\n Articulating my opinions and writing professionally will be a learning curve for me, especially due to English not being my native language.<\/p>\n Strategy & Approach to Address Gaps:<\/p>\n LinkedIn groups, Slack teams and Facebook professional forums will be the platforms I will focus on to create my digital identity in relation to education and technology in education.<\/p>\n The MALAT WordPress blog will be used strictly to keep my digital presence as a graduate student.<\/p>\n Exposure to academic writing and research methods will also be important as I begin my graduate journey.<\/p>\n Measures of Success:<\/p>\n Maintain my MALAT program WordPress site to share my thoughts with my peers and begin to follow relevant LinkedIn and Facebook groups, where I can read and potentially engage in meaningful discussions.<\/p>\n Try out new tools in my professional field in terms of integrating different tools into my daily workflows: Slack, project management tools, learning management systems, web development automation tools. Learn or dig deeper into educational technology tools such as Camtasia, Articulate Storyline etc.<\/p>\n Timeline:<\/p>\n This is a two-year plan that will be revisited time-to-time during the MALAT program as well as post-graduation.<\/p>\n I admit that I\u2019m conflicted with the cultivation of a public online presence. On one hand I am fully aware and understand that having a noticeable, strategically planned online presence is a digital currency, can lead the way to different advancements and can be done SM\/indfully (Hodgon, 2018), yet I\u2019m quite protective of my privacy and do not favour to be in the centre of attention.<\/p>\n All illustrations are created by the author.<\/em><\/p>\n References<\/p>\n Dr. Hodgon, J. (2018, April).\u00a0\u201cMindful\u201d social media engagement in an age of Cambridge<\/em>.\u00a0Presented in the Virtual Symposium of the 2018 MALAT Program at Royal Roads University, Victoria, BC, Canada.<\/p>\n Kleppinger, C. A., & Cain, J. (2015). Personal Digital Branding as a Professional Asset in the Digital Age. American Journal of Pharmaceutical Education<\/em>, 79<\/em>(6), 79. https:\/\/doi.org\/10.5688\/ajpe79679<\/p>\n Schryver, K. (2013). Who are you online? Considering issues of web identity. Retrieved from https:\/\/learning.blogs.nytimes.com\/2013\/02\/05\/guest-post-who-are-you-online-considering-issues-of-web-identity\/?_r=0<\/p>\n White, D., & Le Cornu, A. (2011). Visitors and Residents A new typology for online engagement. First Monday<\/em>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Online presence means more or other than public social media accounts in my case. 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