“I am who I think you think I am.”
Charles Horton Cooley, American sociologist (1864-1929)
Who are you? Do you have a single authentic self, or do you have different selves – one for online, one for offline, maybe a different one for each social interaction in your life? Does it matter?
As a child, if you were brought up by parents who continually told you that you were smart and would accomplish great things, you might fulfill their expectations and become what you think they think of you. Of course, this must fall within reason. A 5 ft 2 in basketball hopeful will never make the NBA (the shortest NBA player ever was Muggsy Bogues of the Toronto Raptors at 5 ft 3 in, but he could reportedly jump 44 in vertically).
Studies confirm that both high expectations (particularly from parents) and high aspirations contribute to academic achievement. Positive expectations also influence job performance and can even be self-fulfilling. In contrast, poor expectations and/or aspirations handicap job performance and cost employers billions annually.
Online Tools
Today we have many tools to both capture what others expect of us and to remodel the image we present back to the world.
Your profiles on Facebook, LinkedIn, and other social media sites present who you think you are. Your tweets, blogs, and podcasts give others a sense of your background, expertise, personality, and goals. YouTube videos connect you with others emotionally (add a kitten for maximum impact), as do all the selfies you snap.
On the other hand, the likes, followers, and comments you receive tell you whether the image you’ve created matches up with what your public thinks about you. If you’re not getting inquiries or callbacks from HR departments or recruiters for the jobs you want, is your profile incomplete, inconsistent, or incorrect? Are you sharing your profile with the right audience?
Reactive Approach
Most people seem to use social media reactively for validation and reinforcement. This passive approach with the simple goal of boosting one’s popularity, hence one’s relevance and importance, can lead to several problems.
First, data points are limited. Self-esteem that relies on social media mentions and likes, sometimes by strangers, is superficial. In the online world, virtual validation is a shallow proxy for a real person-to-person relationship that offers a better chance of understanding where someone else is genuinely coming from. Online, we are spared the bumps and bruises of reality that are critical to personal maturation and learning to steer our own course in life.
Second, a reactive approach is unfocused. It goes wherever your tribe of choice goes. A focused profile is important if you are targeting a future career change; the more focused you are, the stronger your case. Remember, your profile is a composite of all searchable content about you from all sites.
The third problem is silos, which can close off interesting opportunities. You naturally self-select online groups to join and follow who you believe think like you and shun those who do not. “I work in design, so I’m not interested in accounting.” The result is self-reinforcing polarization or radicalization of society. Unfortunately that’s where we are today, and it makes it difficult for us to compromise, collaborate, and move forward.
In contrast, in the physical world you will inevitably encounter strangers who aren’t like you. (Enlightened people might even seek them out.) When you develop actual personal relationships with those who are dissimilar, it is much harder to stereotype, devalue, and demonize them. Intergroup contact reduces prejudice, thus innovative programs like Red/Blue Workshops base their strategy on that principle.
A More Strategic Approach
You can take a proactive path to build your image. Modify and augment your activities and online image if you want to reinforce (or change) others’ perceptions of you. The idea would be:
- You want to be seen as an expert on X, which you are not.
- Based on your research, you start engaging in activities that create or add to your image as an expert on X. This includes blogging, joining online groups, earning a certificate, giving talks, etc.
- You monitor how your friends, followers, and groups respond.
- Based on their feedback, you patch any perception gaps that exist.
- Your followers then start to have new expectations of you as a bona fide expert on X.
- Their expectations drive you further towards being an expert, perhaps in ways you hadn’t expected. You become who you think they think you are.
Isn’t it all just marketing? Yes and no. Some might call this an instrumental (or even cynical) approach to building an image, considering you weren’t an expert to begin with. Marketing often builds personas or validated profiles of potential customers. You could say you’re offering a persona to potential employers. However, in your case it’s more complicated as you may provide different personas over time depending on your career direction.
In a fast-changing world where each millennial is expected to go through 12-15 different jobs (each presumably requiring new skills) in his or her lifetime, continually managing potential employers’ perceptions of you to open doors to new opportunities will be an advantage.
Your self-image or selfie can flex, and probably will anyway as you get older and wiser (or wider in some cases). Try taking a whole-person selfie today and ask yourself: Who am I (including who do I want to be)? Who am I to others? Who do I think they think I am?
Then ask the same questions, but imagine yourself 5 years in the future.
I hope this blog bubbles up some helpful personal insights. Do you have your own ideas about how to understand and develop an effective self-image? Please subscribe to The Renewable Human and leave a comment. Thanks very much for visiting!
