Self Searching
I highly reccomend checking yourself on Google.
Why? Because your next employer may be Googling you, that’s why. At least, according to this article on the New York Times, that’s what’s been happening. I certainly know that I’ve been found on Google on more than one occasion. Not only by employers, but also by potential dates and, well, obviously, dates. This blog did, after all, start as a marketing scheme, a way to get the search engines to find me and catalog me. It worked. Very well, in fact, as this page has a Googlerank of Five out of Ten. And, if you Google Linux Resume, I’m the second hit. If you Google CNE Resume, I’m the first two hits. If you Google Jim Hoffman, I’m the sixth hit. So, I think about what I say here, and how I say it, because I know people might actually read it. People I might care about and people who’s opinion matters to me or can effect my life. And, I’m told that in the dating world, it’s more and more common to Google potential dates to see what mischief they’ve been up to on the web. Obviously, one never knows what might turn up.
This is a special concern for bloggers, of course, who put themselves “out there” on a regular basis. Do you want a potential employer reading that last rant? Or about your after-hours antics? Or about the slacking you do at work to post to your blog instead? All things to think about. So, what do you find when you Google yourself? If you don’t know yet, maybe you should try it and see what turns up.
Advice from your Uncle Jim:
"It is better to be approximately right than precisely wrong."
--Warren Buffet
