Mixing Business and Pleasure

In the last few months, there has been a rise in the number of people boasting two profiles on Facebook. Concerned by the horror stories in the media about people being fired, losing jobs or being thrown out of college because of indiscrepancies caught on the social web, many are making the choice to keep their personal and business lives seperate.

While I understand the reasons behind this, I think it is a shame. For the first time ever it has been made so easy for us to educate our personal network about what we do in a non-intrusive manner. No-one is suggesting that you force your business down other people's throats, but how many opportunities are missed, both to help and to be helped, by not sharing our business lives with those who care the most about us?

Inviting your professional contacts into your personal life also has its benefits, along with some pretty obvious dangers! After all, we've always been taught that 'people buy people', here's your chance to let others know more about you, the person.

I have found that I've forged a lot of deeper relationships with others in my professional network because we have found that we share similar passions outside of work. As I mentioned, there are obvious dangers, but common sense and a degree of moderation should, in most cases, help protect you.