Patti Lamberti is a professional in residence who teaches courses in journalism and new media at Loyola University Chicago’s School of Communication. In her post Tech Savants, she gives us the rundown on what twenty-something’s think about a mainstream workplace communication tool:

“Email is for old people.”

Ouch.

Anybody who’s had a conversation (or more likely, a text exchange) with a college undergraduate will not be completely surprised by this sentiment, but I suspect that many college graduates would be surprised to find out that their preferred communication choices don’t always translate well when they join the workforce.

In the interest of helping ease the college-to-workplace transition, I’m going to set aside my orthopedic shoes and walker for a moment and give a bit of advice to undergraduates hoping to land a decent job after college. Here goes:

We “old people” (think: older than Facebook’s 28 year-old Mark Zuckerberg) are still running the show at most companies. So, beside the prehistoric company email system you’re going to need to master, here are some changes you’ll need to make in your communication to make a successful transition from college life to the workplace.

You will have to actually speak to people. While a college student’s communication lifeblood is texting, that’s not the case in most office settings. If your new job requires you to be in a space with other human beings you will have to actually converse with them. This means looking them in the eye and carrying on a thoughtful conversation. Yes, some people will be snarky or whiny, but that’s part of learning how to get along with people at work.

When you’re at work, you may not be able to check Facebook. Shocking, I know! Company policies vary on the use of Facebook, but even the most progressive places will want you to limit your personal updates to your break times. Oh, and when you do update? Keep the nasty commentary about your dragon-lady boss or smelly co-workers out of your Facebook feed. It will come back to haunt you.

It’s rude to use a cell phone when someone is talking to you. This one is tricky— company cultures vary and you may see some people checking their phones constantly during meetings. So, it may be considered acceptable. I still go old-school on this and say it’s rude to do so during meetings. The one time it’s always considered rude— when you’re having an important conversation with someone. Again, it goes back to that eye-contact thing— co-workers expect it, especially we middle-aged types.

You will need to cut down on multi-tasking. In college you may have simultaneously watched TV, studied for your poli-sci exam, updated your Flikr account and texted your friends across campus. But the reality is that you suck at multitasking. We all do. And, even if you were a multi-tasking genius in school, you won’t be granted complete control over your work surroundings. You may be in a cubicle that’s so tiny that your nearest co-worker will still be able to hear your music coming through your ear buds. And that co-worker may not like your taste in music.

Feeling frustrated by all these “rules”? Don’t let it get to you. It does take some time to adjust to the structure of a workplace setting. And the upside is that if you’ve chosen your first job wisely, people in your office will (mostly) be energized by your youthful enthusiasm and your up-to-date technical skills. Who knows, you may even be able teach your co-workers a few things about technology.

Even if we’re old.

Reputation Management.  Personal Branding. Credibility-Based Relationship Building.  No matter what the name, it all comes down to the fact that your interpersonal behaviors create an impression of “who” you are as a person. Are you reliable? Trustworthy?  Do you get things done?  The people with whom you interact are making these judgments about you based on your behaviors.  This is especially true when meeting people (either in person or via social networking) for the first time.

Stephen Covey is well-known for his use of the term “emotional bank account”, meaning that people’s behaviors either “make deposits” to or “withdrawals” from others’ emotional bank accounts.  Too many withdrawals and you become “overdrawn” with that person.  An overdrawn emotional bank account is every bit as distasteful and energy-draining as a physical savings account with insufficient funds.

Here are the sure-fire ways to quickly deplete my emotional bank account when connecting with me:

• Grab my business card from the table at a networking event and then send me a LinkedIn invitation, without ever having personally introduced yourself.
• Attend a networking event. During the keynote presentation fall asleep and snore loudly.
• When you shake my hand, don’t look me in the eye.  In fact, don’t even pretend to do so.  Look conspicuously over my shoulder, as if scanning to see if someone “better” has just entered the room.
• Send me continual unsolicited invitations via Twitter or Facebook for things I might not be interested in: “join my (fill-in-the-blank) game”.
• Ignore the subtle hint that I don’t want to be your Facebook friend or LinkedIn contact.  One reminder is fine.  Three seems a bit like stalking.
• Live in my neighborhood for 10 years. Rarely speak to me, except when our paths cross directly and there would be no graceful way to avoid saying “hello”.  Then, when you’re out of a job, contact me at my place of employment and ask for “inside scoop” on whether my company is hiring or not.

It always amazes me that when building a personal brand, some people seem to think that they have a large existing account balance with a new acquaintance.  Wrong.  Beyond general social niceties, that account balance is paltry.  You need to make frequent deposits before you can start removing funds from that account.

To add to someone’s emotional bank account, consider doing the following:

• Ask permission to add someone to your mailing list. They rarely say “no”.  If they do say no, then you’ve avoided annoying them.
• When someone presents their business card, take the time to really examine it and make a positive comment on something their card says.
• Respect people’s personal/business boundaries.  Only send Tweets or Facebook updates that are aligned to your contact’s interests.
• Offer to help with no expectation of anything in return.
• Constantly be on the lookout for ways to connect people who may benefit from knowing each other.  Become known as a “connector”.
• Above all, keep your word.  The old adage of “under-promise and over-deliver” never goes out of style.

Do a quick interpersonal banking audit— how does your ledger look?  Overall, are you in the black or the red with your key business relationships?

Professionalism in the Web 2.0 Era

It all started with a t-shirt.  When I posted the results of my 30 Days of Tweeting Experiment last month, I sent an email to my colleagues announcing the blog.  The email contained a photo of me wearing a navy t-shirt (courtesy of the Ellen Shop) that boasted “My Tweets are Real” in white lettering.

The reaction to the t-shirt was far stronger (and varied) than the reaction to my blog post.  Male colleagues sent playful replies about my “tweets”.  No female colleagues replied, but I did wonder if they were raising their eyebrows.  The one female who did comment?  My mother.  She laughed out loud when she heard about the t-shirt saying, but still managed to sound both reproving and scandalized when she found out I sent a photo of me wearing it to business colleagues. I confess to second-guessing my choice. And yet, it just felt “right”— this completely unglamorous amateur photo of me wearing a t-shirt with a witty saying.  It felt….well, authentic.

Many fellow bloggers have ruminated on topic of authenticity. My social media mentor Barbara Giamanco has traveled this path in her blog posts. So have  Joan Koerber-Walker  and Seth Godin.

So, the question on my mind is, “How far should one go to show authenticity in the business world?”  When I published the photo, I was certainly aware that it was a bit “out there” in terms of what is accepted business practice in my sphere of influence.  But to me it was simply a playful and  clever way to introduce my Twitter experiences. 

And I pushed the boundaries a bit because of this observation:  things are more casual these days than they used to be.  Frankly, that’s not comforting to me, but it’s the truth.  Professionals are podcasting via self-produced YouTube videos, Twitter photos are amateur head shots at weird angles and many blogs posts have misspellings.  I came of age in an era where a “professional” had a professionally produced head shot, complete with the requisite suit.  Some of these things are not, in my opinion, acceptable—misspellings, for example.  But I’m ambivalent about the others—does it really matter anymore that things look “professional”?  Is that even somehow a liability?  I notice that many of the most popular YouTube instructional videos are decidedly low-tech: hand drawings on a white board that get tossed away by a human hand in the foreground.

Please share with me your observations…how does your authenticity show up when at work?  And does the “new business casual” work for you, or do you share my hesitations?

I was sitting in a meeting with a VP of Technology the other day, preparing to meet with her company’s president. She watched me pull out my paper calendar and exclaimed, “Dude! You have got to get a BlackBerry!” Now, this person is in her 40’s so she’s a Gen X-er. So this wasn’t a comment uttered by someone fresh out of college. This isn’t the first time I’ve heard women being referred to as “dude”. To wit:

When picking up my son from daycare one day, his college-aged teacher exclaimed “Dude, that’s a really cute purse!” I looked around and didn’t see any other adults in the vicinity, and I don’t usually hear men complimenting each others’ handbags, so I could only conclude she was addressing me. My reaction was part pride (“hey, she thinks I’m a ‘dude’…that means I’m somewhat with it) and part old fart matron (“Geez, young people today—no respect!”)

Overhead wafting from a cubicle in a corporate workplace… “Liz” addressing “Katherine”– “Dude, you have got to read this email. It’s hysterical!”

So is the use of the word dude to address women commonplace in your workplace? And if it is commonplace, what are the boundaries for its use? Should only peers address each other this way? What about supervisors and direct reports? Is this a generational issue and if so, in what way?
I’d love to hear your thoughts.