As for this “representing the industry” or whatever, it seems to me that Recruiting already suffers from the image of the smarmy, insincere recruiter, promising what she cannot deliver while luring away your best talent behind your back, barely one step up the evolutionary scale from a used car salesman. It’s hardly a “professional courtesy” to the rest of us to NOT stand up and call bullshit on that. When recruiters behave badly in public, they deserve to get called on it in public. Being authentic, telling it like it is, and laying it all out there for everyone to see seems to be to be the best thing any of us can do for “the industry,” even if it hurts some practicioners’ feelings in the process. They’re probably the ones we’re all talking about anyway.

So, I wonder, what is the draw of a blog? what is the big fascination to either pretend to be who one is, or not? Is it to just let off your steam, share your views with millions.. or for some is it for the money. With more than 1 blog created per second (as per technorati) I wonder what is the big attraction. I can understand the business perspective. The few times I have posted on mine or on others is to vent..

So do you think having a blog is the same as my wanting to respond on someone elses’s.. Indeed, it is true, more comments are brought to the surface when things don’t seem to be so polite, and are more honest.

Kyle, it is indeed a fascinating world we live in today. “Rules” are changing, ideology is also changing.. I guess I should quit focusing on the understanding the why’s and just go with the flow..

By the way, don’t think you rambled.. I really enjoyed what you said. It opened up my eyes a bit.. Guess I really didn’t understand this world of blogging as much as I thought I did..

Best to you.. and thanks for your reply.
Karen

Personally, I prefer a courteous blogger to an uncourteous one, but for some, “courtesy” may sometimes be considered another word for self-censorship.

As Ami said, part of the reason he started blogging was because…

As a longtime consumer of recruiting and related content, I found my own desperate need for authenticity, originality and substance so lacking that I decided to fill the void for myself.

While I am not an avid reader of the recruitosphere itself, it may be safe to assume that “professional courtesy” could be a symptom of the lifelessness that provoked such a strong voice as Ami’s, which is a voice that I am very happy to invite into my RSS reader everyday.

This is not to say that the blogosphere should be filled of cantakerous bastards, but it is to say that cantakerous bastards are sometimes required, and professional communities shouldn’t be so desirous to expel them beyond the walls.

Also, a word of warning, while it makes sense to think a blog would represent the “spirit of who you are,” I have a friend who blogs in exactly the opposite spirit as to who he is. He’s a well educated, left-leaning pragmatist, but he blogs as a proudly uneducated right-wing ideologue. He does it for two reasons. One, because it amuses him. And two, because he finds it challenging and rewarding to concoct arguments from the other side. Personally, I have no issues with my friend’s blog. He writes it honestly, and while he may not be representing his actual personality, he is faithful to the character he has created. He is almost like Stephen Colbert, minus the masterful command of irony.

Aside from that, however, you ask, “Is there not a difference between a professional blog atmosphere and a personal one?” To which I respond, “There can be, but there doesn’t have to be.”

I think Ami does a wonderful job of walking that line. He is participating in a professional community, but he does so as an individual. He’s not positioning himself as an “expert” or an “authority,” the type of person whose personality is based on his resume. While he may in fact deserve to be be called an expert or an authority, he only positions himself as himself, a naked blogger.

The problem that I think Ami is pointing to is the problem of “representing the industry.” The industry is made up of individuals. It is not some monolithic organization with its own governing body issuing decrees from the atop the moutain. It is made up of individuals, sitting in cubicles, eating peanut-butter and jelly sandwiches and Ritz crackers. Individuals who have their likes and dislikes. Individuals who fart and shit and vomit from too much tequila. If any of these individuals try to “represent the industry,” they do so at the expense of all the other individuals who may have very different notions of the industry itself.

What Ami is saying (I think) is that it is time for people to stop representing anything other than themselves (or, like my friend, fake versions of themselves). With more than 50 million voices on the Internet, it makes no sense for one voice to try to represent the others. They can manage just fine on their own.

Of course, Karen, this is all coming from someone who maintains “a personal blog,” not a “professional” one. But what I think Ami is telling us in this post is that there doesn’t have to be a difference anymore.

Sorry about rambling

Yes, you are correct we don’t have to do anything that others say we want to do, but be ourselves.. I guess though, maybe it is just my opinion, but don’t you think that a Blog represents the spirit of who you are? is it not your diary, your thoughts bared for the world to see. The spirit is what you write is it not?

I guess in the spirit of this conversation I feel compelled to ask, is there not a difference between a professional blog atmosphere versus a personal one..

When I hit the main host for many of these blogs at recruiting.com, I come for entertainment, but I also come to learn something about my industry… I also know that this is where many “outsiders” of the industry will be able to gain insight of our industry.. Learn about how to work with recruiters, how to do their resumes and such like. .they come for professional advice..

But, then how does it look to this industry if those who are representing this industry are not remembering Civility and professionalism. Does that bother me, as a member of this industry.. as a person who has chosen this path for my career, I do get concerned about an already fragile professional industry image.

So, again, does not lack of professionalism belong more on a personal, rather than in a professional community..

I would appreciate your feedback, because maybe I don’t understand the blog world — I don’t really have one (4 posts in the past year doesn’t make me a blogger), nah, I am more of a lurker.. coming for entertainment.. so as an outsider to the blogging world maybe I really don’t understand.. but, at least you see what an outsider may think.

1) Your comment and linked post are absolutely spot on, brlliant

2) It’s my blog and I can whatever the hell I like on it

Amitai

blogging is a today thing

I’ve written about this myself, the idea that, while bloggers can write about whatever topics they want and in whatever manner they want, the one thing a blogger should try to do is be genuine to the day. Tomorrow, all your ideas may change. You may regret your crass jokes. You may decide that a link to one site perhaps should have gone to another. Your antagonist could turn into your protagonist. Tomorrow, everything could change. And tomorrow, that’s what you write about.

But you don’t worry about that today. Today you post about today. You worry about tomorrow, tomorrow. Blogging is a today thing.

As for all the other things you’re “supposed to do,” the blogosphere is too big and too diverse, a world unto itself, and requiring a “proper” voice, tone, topic, or anything else amounts to digital fascism. You’ll hear “experts” tell you to be courtesous, to be professional. They’ll tell you to focus on one topic and to assert your opinions with authority if you want to get any respect. They’ll tell you to write short posts, informative titles, and all sorts of other crap.

But the truth, Ami, as you’ve so clearly demonstrated, is that you don’t have to do anything they tell you to do. All you have to do is a damn good job. Keep it up.

The recruiting business is indeed a small industry, and the blogging network has brought many of us together as a family. With every family there will always be turmoil, but turmoil is never solved without empathy and understanding. Sometimes we think we comprehend, or know just what a person is thinking or even what their motives are.. But do we? Do we really know anyone? do we really know anything for sure?? Each of us has our own reality which is based upon our personal experiences. This Reality allows us to interpret the same situation in several different ways. Is there really then a right or wrong.. or just a difference in opinion?

Maybe it is only when we can keep in mind that We each have walked such different paths, that we can come to realize that there is so much to discover from each other. It is from these paths that we tread that gifts are bestowed upon us.. Gifts that make us shine in different ways which allow us the ability to bring something of significance to others.

For the past year the biggest reward I have been given from this sometimes tumultuous recruiting world, and which at times has been difficult for me acknowledge as a gift, is acceptance, tolerance and Patience. There are times as though I feel tested to the max, and I have to make every effort to remember that it is important to for me to strive for empathy; It is an uphill battle sometimes, but it is truly rewarding when I catch myself and realize that Yes, Indeed Sometimes we may not all agree, and it is okay, because I realize that sometimes we will, sometimes there may be something that was said that I may carry with me for the rest of my life

Thank You Ami, for sharing those amazing rambling thoughts. Yes, they were indeed Colorful, but what makes them more interesting was the fact that you were saying what you felt, without concern of what others read into it.. I guess that is what makes it real. I look forward to your next blog.

Thank You
Karen Mattonen

It would be such a pleasure if we could all work together, in a transparent fashion without hidden agendas, without malice towards others, and above all we should reconcile futile personal divisions. It’s a long future ahead, one of innovation and new directions. Hatreds are petty. They consume us and they reflect only our worst and forbid us from growing to the betterment of those we love and protect. I look forward on the type of constructive, good spirited environment where only ideas matter, not personalities.

Let’s all work to concentrate on what we can contribute. I for only care about ideas. As an a recruiter it is easier looking from within than from without the industry.

Again Ami, great job my friend.

In the United States, we have adopted a document that says we have a right to speak freely, except for certain distinctions. How, then, can someone come along and dictate, roar at us about what or whom we may speak or whether we are allowed to even speak (or think) a name. Tiffany spoke of being spammed. I have suffered the spam treatment myself on far too many occasions. And among the spams are cries of foul perpetrated by me. Yet I am merely the recipient, not the instigator. And the offense is imagined. On the one hand is the spammed accusation, followed by a threat, followed by numerous phone calls proclaiming friendship and alliance, which is then followed by more threats and accusations of imagined sins. Isn’t free speech on the Internet interesting?

I appreciate your words, Ami. They make me think. In just a year’s time, it’s been too long that I’ve been challenged in that way. I find myself losing interest in many things that were once good and meaningful.

And I like and respect journalists as well as those who speak tactfully that which they believe and can support with reasoned and rational research and fact. Maybe I like those things because they make me think.

Keep making me think. But please, put on a loin cloth. :~)

Incidentally, I came to visit because of some content you said would appear this weekend and today. I wondered if you would really go through that much work for the sake of a few words. Truly, whether they appear one time, or twice or thrice is not that important to me.

What is important to me is to know that my efforts are appreciated, not devalued. What is important to me is that the time spent was not wasted where something meaningful that could have been done and offered for consequential benefit but instead was lost because of diversion.

Thank you for your Monday long posts.