It’s ironic that someone like me, in a former life, an online exhibitionist – whose muse used to be disastrous dating stories and whose mouthpiece was blogging – gets shy these days on subject of work-life blurring on social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook.

My day job consists of educating people on the necessity of online marketing, the importance of community-building tools in general, and how the web can make content dynamic and have a far greater reach and impact on your audience. I believe wholeheartedly in what I do. In fact, these days, businesses must adopt technology-savvy, holistic approaches when thinking about going to market with a product. It’s a prerequisite for success.

In the past year as I’ve become more of a part-time, seasonal blogger and full-time desk jockey, I’ve been finding I need to separate my work and life activities more. This wasn’t a problem in the past since most of my gigs weren’t “career-track” type jobs, but as I get older, and more serious about my 9-5ish lifestyle, I’m finding it increasingly more difficult to keep this boundary intact, which makes me crave privacy even more.

So where does this leave me? I flock to my account settings and privacy preferences on social networking sites like a maggot to rice. What this really boils down to (sorry for the butchering of a metaphor here) is that I don’t always want my work to know what it is I think and don’t think or don’t do after hours because a lot of it’s random and unfiltered. I like unfiltered. The flip side of the equation is that, for me, social networking used to be fun, which is why I started. It stops being fun when “work” enters into the equation, even when you love the work you do and value the people you work with. The same rule doesn’t apply to former work situations, however.

Recently a situation occurred where a work peer requested to “follow” me on Twitter. I have my Twitter settings set to “private” so followers must issue a request which I then can “approve” or “decline.” It’s not all that complicated and since I seem to get my fair share of spam-like twitter requests, it works out well. The truth is I didn’t readily accept the request. At first, I just left it there, then she reminded me, then before I knew it, her request had been pending for a few mos. I finally accepted it, although not without my hesitation. My reluctance stemmed from Twitter being the last piece of social networking out there that hadn’t been tainted by work. It was a relic and I cherished it.

So I could start another Twitter handle, and keep that one private, but what happens with my 65 followers that has taken me like 1.5 years to build organically and from which I had an in-grown marketing base from which to promote my work and share my failures and successes? Do I spend another 2 years building one or wait for the next best social media channel to sweep the world and pimp that ride?

A piece of advice for those facing such situations – and I have a feeling that’s a number of you out there – Be forthright and honest with your coworkers, share your hesitations and desire for privacy. You don’t owe your day job your night and weekend hours too. I have a feeling my colleague would have been cool with my candor, and even if not, eventually the tension would have subsided, and I would have respected myself more. In short, don’t always give into the peer pressure. Stick to your boundaries.

I'll cry if I want to.

Forget making friends being expensive. These days you can’t even afford the hefty price of admission at a lot of the most popular business networking events around if you’re a self-employed freelancer, unless you’re one that charges $100+ for your services.

And honestly (no offense to those who charge those steep prices), but whose services are that good?

If you’re anything like me, you’re not a high-roller and you’re not even all that convincing at playing the part by wearing the designer threads to get noticed. You’re just trying to make more business happen by expanding your community of offline contacts.

While I know there are a gazillion events like NetParty or NetMixer that are all about mingling to the beat of beer, billiards, or disco balls, my heightened sense of self-awareness won’t allow me to feel that these aren’t entirely a waste of my time.

Maybe, it’s the anti-social entrepreneur in me.

I prefer events that host some sort of themed panel showcasing a few successful businessmen/women who have sought out unique and innovative business solutions – people that I can learn from and introduce myself to. Preferably Bill Gates or Steve Jobs.

Unfortunately once you get keynote speakers involved (and I’m not talking Microsoft or Apple caliber, here), the price tag of an event jumps like tenfold. In fact, it’s an all-out class war between those who make a ton of bling and the rest of us.

As a Boston native, I scour Garysguide.org daily looking for the right event to complement my work style and brand attitude. Otherwise everything feels too forced.

Since I’m a little out of practice when it comes to these events as the last “networking” event I attended was almost 3 years ago (and that was because a buddy of mine put a figurative gun to my head), tiny, baby steps in the wading pool make the most sense. The best find I’ve come across for such an event is Steve Garfield’s Boston Media Makers. It’s informal and friendly enough to mingle comfortably, and also helps with practicing that elevator pitch since the Sunday brunch starts with people going around the table and talking for less than 3 minutes each about what is they do.

Think this is an easy task?

Think again…But it’s a low-risk environment and a great, supportive crowd to introduce yourself to. I’m sure similar events take place around the country and if they do, you should jump on the bandwagon. And did I mention it’s free, apart from the price of food?

But back to pricey events…

Since I write from time to time on issues of women in the workplace and starting their own businesses, I had a particularly strong interest in attending MIT’s Women In Technology Workshop. “What better way to band with the sisters and learn and grow from each other’s experiences?” I told myself.

Unfortunately, even at the early bird rate of $325/pp for a day’s session, I realized this was a VIP event and the likes of the average woman on a shoestring budget weren’t welcome.

Same thing for the Creative Direct Marketing Strategies Seminar day session I wanted to attend. This one involved a little more hands-on training, but at $1699/pp for “non-members,” and $1399/pp for “members” I came to conclude that even if I were a member of this club, I wouldn’t be able to afford the price to belong.

Alas, there has to be a constructive networking event/group that would want to have me as its participant, it just might take some more diggin’ before I find it.

In the meantime, I’ll continue to network online at will.

Quote of the day:

What ever happened to human contact and the kind of gut instinct first impressions that only come from true face time? Sure, there are upsides to cyber-connections. You save postage by not having to mail out hundreds of résumés. You save on gas by not having to drive to dozens of interviews, but the downside is you could spend three weeks on LinkedIn networking with the CEO of a startup, only to find out that his headquarters is a cardboard box and he just changed the name of his company to “Homeless Depot.” (Plus the stock-option, base salary, sign-on bonus package he offered you was actually a scratch-and-sniff tear-out from Mademoiselle that he triumphantly excavated from a recent dumpster dive.)

Courtesy of Tom Stern (author of the blog, “A Kick in Your Career”, Fast Company.)

And for the more visual learners, here’s a video that effectively breaks down SN into more palatable terms:

Being apart of the pack

Recently, BusinessWeek columnist Sarah Lacy wrote about using Facebook to “fire up” your career and employing social networking tools as a means to build out your professional network. She mentions Facebook, MySpace, and LinkedIn as ripe resources to unearth potentially untapped contacts and network your way to gainful employment.

Sites like Facebook and LinkedIn may make you visible and vulnerable to internet search engines, but Twitter is your face in bright lights with all its glaring blemishes.

I created a Twitter account over a year and a half ago when Twitter went beta and after a whole 24 hours was so disengaged I didn’t update it till just short of 2 weeks ago. So now I’m back on Twitter and starting to rethink its appeal – for professional purposes.

As long as active Twitterers are conscious of the fact that any of the 25 comments they update in the course of the day may show up in a search, there’s no real harm done and more to be gained from using Twitter. In fact, Twitter is all about encouraging constructive conversation, if used the right way.

• For one, I love that potential clients can “follow” me and keep abreast of all my professional endeavors. It’s the easiest way to insure that I’m in front of them at all times and that visibility could lead to potential gigs.
• It’s free advertising and effective self-promotion for the brand of you!  I can post links to my work and showcase my current work-related pursuits without resorting to an email blast which equates to more fun for everyone…
• You can choose to be a “follower” and pick the right contacts for you depending on your professional goals and who you should be mingling with. Responding to the right peoples’ comments will then allow you a more direct line to engage in a conversation with people you might otherwise have never yielded a response from.
• You can switch up the conversation on a more personal and accessible level. It’s not simply that you can reply to a comment left by someone you want to get in touch and exist solely on a professional plane with that individual. It’s the fact that you can set the tone of the conversation, its subject, and choose to much less formal in your discourse.
• Call me a voyeur, but keeping an eye on what other people in my field are up to is the most efficient way for me to research what’s out there and keep competitive with peers in my industry. Not to mention learn more about opportunities I might be interested in and what events I should be attending and most likely, am not.