Social Media Academy

Nearly two weeks ago I went back to school.  I enrolled in a certification program to become a “Certified Social Media Strategist“.  Like so many things in life, I find I have

forgotten how a structured learning environment challenges thought processes.  While it wouldn’t be education without that challenge,  like parenthood and other life altering events, I’d conveniently forgotten the challenges of being flat-out in the middle of it.  #smacad

Yesterday a classmate and I discussed the big picture ideas of paradigm shifting and the small ones like our assignment as we both understood it for this week. We need to select 20 people that we want to maintain a connection with based on the person, not the “job title”.

At first glance it seems really quite simple but to operationalize the concept is quite a different thing. I started by importing all my linkedin contacts into Xeesm then began going through them one by one to see if some would pop out as being obvious members of the magic 20. The more I looked at them the more confused I became so I deleted all of them and will start over. The flaw in my initial plan of grabbing my linkedin people was that the majority of those contacts are based on job title, making the idea of starting with a group who’s common denominator is that which I’m trying to move away from… So, I’ll begin again and attempt to remain mindful that the short cut (to copy and paste) will not in my opinion net the kind of meaningful contacts I’m attempting to cultivate. My brain hurts… which if I’m not mistaken is the whole point of this exercise.. so I must be on the right track…